| Mission Trips |
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FIRST MISSION TRIP Abuesi is a fishing town in the Western Region of Ghana. The main occupation of the men is fishing and the women are fishmongers. Everything in the town revolves around fishing. It is in this town that Jesus - chief of fisher of men purposed to do business this past summer of 2001. The town was steeped in idol worship and every imaginable sin. Cursing was one unmistakable characteristic of the town. The adults cursed as well and as frequent as to make their children imitators. The weak preyed on the weakest. The poorest was treated as the scum of the earth. Sexual promiscuity and drunkenness was rampant. To this fartherest of places God sent us to bring the Gospel of Light. The people living in darkness saw a great light. It was the preaching of the message of the cross that brought gladness and joy to a people living in the shadows of death. I had gone to Ghana with a young Baptist preacher, Brandon Bond, who had been directed by the Lord to go Africa with me. And so, June 9th we left Springfield, Missouri and arrived in Accra, Ghana on the 10th. We spent the first few days in prayer and fasting, seeking the Lord's direction and favor in our impending ministry : For the Lord to lead us to the right places to do ministry. Prior to coming to Ghana, our plan of ministry was for us to go to an unreached village or town, conduct a gospel crusade for a week , disciple those who would give their hearts to Christ for one week and then move on to the next town or village and repeat the same thing. But as we fasted and prayed, the Lord directed us to go to Abuesi, an obscure town, far removed our minds. And so we left for Abuesi to lay the groundwork for the crusade the next week. We met the chief of the town, Nana Konduah IV, and told him our mission to preach the gospel of Christ in the town. He received us warmly and promised to cause an announcement to be made to invite the whole townsfolk to come and hear the gospel. It was unheard of that a chief would go to the extent of using his position to invite his subjects to come to a Christian crusade. On June 20th we came to Abuesi and set up our simple crusade gear: a blow horn, a borrowed amplifier, two microphones and a tape player. We set up shop in the towns public square, a cramped space of about 40 by 40 feet where humans and livestock vied for space and attention amidst a cacophony of haggling traders, playing or crying children and bleating goats. Pastor Brandon Bond started the evening with the kids crusade. A star attraction as probably the first white man to come to town and mingle so freely with the towns folk, he drew more than a hundred children, who listened attentively and patiently to him as he told the simple message of Jesus lover of little children. At the end of sharing the gospel, he led them to receive the Lord. The children taking a que for his beginning prayer " Our father in Heaven', broke out in spontaneous unison and said the Lord's prayer in their native Fanti language. Later in the evening, the adult crusade began in earnest with praises and worship in both English and African languages. When the altar call was made 17 people gave their life to Christ. The next two night of crusade followed a similar pattern. The final night was marked by exuberance worship and praise, as the village square was filled with a teeming and attentive listeners. When the altar call was made 20 people gave their hearts to Christ. Those who gave their life to Christ were counseled on Saturday and told to come to Church on Sunday. A local video screening center ( call it a movie theater, if you will) became our meeting place. The first church service was attended by almost all who had given their hearts the previous four days and close to a hundred children. Over the next six weeks or so that we spent with the people we witnessed a transformation that we had never anticipated. Lives were changed and many made total commitments to the Lord. A man in his thirties who was training to become a fetish priest came to Church and gave his heart to the Lord. A few with various degrees of mental incapacitation and physical disabilities received restorations. We baptized about 30 adults. Today men who used to only fish for living have been transformed to become fishers of men. SECOND MISSION TRIP It was a trip of a lifetime. It was the realization of a year long dream. It was also a trip that began with uncertainty but ended with the greatest joy for us all. This was the trip I made with five friends from Willard to Abuesi in Ghana, West Africa. When Rev. Joel Childers, Senior Pastor of Robberson Prairie Baptist Church, Willard and four members of his church - Bruce and Beverly Pearson, Brad Dalton and Kathy Taylor- left the Springfield Airport for Africa on June 9 with me, he was thrilled because it was the realization of a long-held dream. " Since I was fourteen years old, I have been dreaming and praying to go to Africa to do ministry," said Rev. Childers. " I'm elated and filled with great anticipation for this trip" The team from Robberson Prairie church was going to Ghana with me on a missions trip to be with their sister church, Robberson Prairie Chapel at Abuesi in the western region of Ghana. We left Springfield airport at 11.45 am on a 30 hour journey that took us through Memphis, Detroit, Amsterdam and finally Kotoka International Airport in Accra, Ghana. The Accra airport isn't any bigger than the Springfield Airport. We went through immigration and customs, and in no time we were headed for the El-Elyon hotel, where we spent the night. Accra is a metropolis of about 3 million people. As the business and administrative capital, it has some of the amenities of any American city as well as the signs of a urban slum. We drove past private mansions, modest houses and downright shanty building made from brick. Modern European luxury cars competed with jalopy Japanese cars on & some good and some not-so -good, pot-holed roads. The modern was just a posed against the old and decaying. Sunday morning we were on way to Abuesi. We left Accra, the capital of Ghana, on a 20-seat Mercedes Benz bus on the three-hour trip to Abuesi that was as interesting as it was hard on the bodies of my American friends. As we left the capital city, my American friends came to grips with the other face of Africa : stark poverty and small villages with ramshackle mud huts dotted on bone-jarring pot-holed roads. We passed some of such small villages with strange-sounding names as Ohiamadwen ( poverty begets wisdom) or Ansteamboa ( don't pass judgments without all the facts). My Ozarks friends couldn't contain their excitement about the sight, the sounds and the smells. " The scenery reminds of Vietnam," said Bruce Pearson. We arrived at Abuse to a raucous welcome by the congregation at Robberson Prairie Chapel, who broke out in spontaneous, exulting praise, thanking God for bringing their American friends to them. And we felt welcome indeed. For the next five days, as we talked with people, as we did ministry at the Church, we fell more and more in love with the people of Abuesi. Most of the people lived in 12 by 10 one-room mud and cement houses with their families. Beverly Pearson couldn't hold her emotions as she ministered to little children. " I have fallen in love with these children. I don't think I can go back", Beverly sobbed. Bruce concurred, " These people are happy with nothing." Nothing is an apt description of the living conditions in Abuesi. A fishing village that subsists on a seasonal fishing cycle, there's great lack in the town. There are no adequate toilets, little education or no alternative economic skills. You couldn't walk in the midst of such poverty and not be touched. Tuesday morning we had audience with the chief of Abuesi, Nana Konduah IV. At his palace, amidst the cacophony of bleating goats and giggling and inquisitive children, he spoke through a linguist who served as a go between him and us. Tradition dictates that the chief only speaks through his linguist. Rev Childers couldn't contain his bewilderment. We told the chief our intention to carry through a promise to help the town to complete a six block elementary school building. Through their own initiative and the help of the United States International Agency for Development (USAID), the chief and his people had completed three rooms and needed help to complete the remaining three. We promised the chief with the help of God and the help of well-meaning Ozarkers we shall raise the required fund to help complete the school building project and help with the provision of public toilets. All told the trip to Africa was life-changing for my American friends. Between ministering to adults, youth and children during discipleship sessions and gospel crusades, between visiting them at theirsparse homes and praying with them, my American friends built a bond that would be hard to be broken. |
| The Cross Ministries@2006 |
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