17 Jul Mozambique Update 3
Hi family! Sorry this has taken so long. This has been a crazy few weeks but here are just a few things that have happened lately…
24/7 Prayer: For the past 2 weeks we have been doing a base-wide 24 hour prayer. Most of our shifts were from 12-2am and a few from 6-8am, with 8 shifts total. We prayed for anything and everything, whatever the Holy Spirit lead. Most of our prayers were for the nations, persecuted Christians as well as persecutors, our families and hometowns, and Iris Global as a whole. We have been praying for everyone back home a lot lately. We pray that the things we are learning and experiencing here, is happening at home as well so we would love to hear any testimonies from home of how God is moving in your lives!
Food Weighing: Iris has a ministry here in Pemba that distributes and provides food for over 500 families in the surrounding villages every week. A few weeks ago we helped the mamas sort and weigh rice and beans. They just dumped hundreds of bags of beans on the porch of a building and measured a small bucket full, poured that in a bag, tied it up and it was ready to distribute. We did the same thing with the rice. It was piled so high it was probably knee deep! It was really hard work carrying heavy bags all day but we had a lot of fun just singing with them and enjoying their presence. They were so appreciative to have some help.
House Building: The house we have been building on Fridays is almost finished. It’s a beautiful brick house which is going to be amazing for the family especially during the flooding season here. We started building the latrine this week by digging a hole 2.5 meters deep and lining it with brick and cement. We plan to have everything finished next week which is just amazing!
Classes: last week we had the honor of learning from Mel Tari, an amazing missionary of 50 years from Indonesia who wrote the book “Like a Mighty Wind”…Here are some excerpts from his teaching:
“Passion to the Lord and passion to the lost are 2 sides of the coin of the currency of the kingdom.” -Mel Tari
“When you pursue the lost, God will confirm the word and miracles will pursue you. Don’t pursue the miracles!” -Mel Tari
We also heard from Todd McDowell from Caleb Company…Here are some things we heard from Todd:
“Gods love language is obedience. To obey Him is better than anything you can give Him.” -Todd McDowell
“Sometimes when we are in dry seasons it’s because we haven’t been obedient to the last thing God told us to follow.” -Todd
“The most important talk you will ever hear is what you tell yourself.” -Todd
Weekend Bush Outreach: For our weekend outreach we went to a village called Meluco, which was in the middle of a nature reserve right by the mountains. We were warned to look out for elephants and lions, as well as being aware that there are still land mines in one of the mountains, diamond mines nearby, as well as a lot of witchcraft in the area. When we heard this we were SO EXCITED to go!
It ended up being about a 5.5 hour drive for us. Heidi and her team preached the first night in a nearby village and we saw 3 deaf people completely healed. One of the children was deaf and mute and spoke for the first time ever. He had to learn how to even say hello, which was incredible to see. All of this happened infront of the entire village so the people were very intrigued. After this we showed the Jesus film and then we all went up front to minister and pray for anyone who wanted to accept Jesus or needed healing. We ended up seeing close to 500 people come forward to receive Jesus! Heidi also purchased land and supplies to build a church there in that village.
The next day so much happened! We had a children’s program in the morning for the children of the village and Heidi and her team did the Good Samaritan skit. They taught them songs, scripture, etc. Heidi asked us to pray for the children and people there to receive the Holy Spirit, so our team began to pray for everyone. Mitch noticed that some of the older boys in the back of the building were really hesitant and almost mocking what we were doing, so we walked back there and began to pray for them. The first boy we prayed for ended up accepting Jesus and him and all his friends asked for Bibles. We also got a word of knowledge for another man that his foot was in pain. He said he stepped on something and it was now infected. He was limping so bad he could hardly walk. We prayed for him a few minutes and by the time we finished he was completely 100% healed. Jesus is so good! Then an older man ran over to us because he had been watching us and asked us to pray for his back, and Jesus healed it immediately! His faith was so inspiring, and people truly recognize Jesus. We ended up giving out about 100 Bibles and tons of solar audio Bibles In their local language.
Later we split up into small groups and did some house to house ministry, as well as inviting people to the Jesus Film that night. We prayed for too many people to tell you about them all, but we will tell you the ones that impacted us the most. There was one mama named Rosa that was a really old widow. She said she was a Christian, but she still had a lot of fear because of the witchcraft in the mountains. She also had terminal heart problems so we prayed for that as well. It was really bothering me (Jill) though because everyone was standing up, hovering over her, doing their loud yelling prayers and it just seems like we were all trying to be the white powerful people and I got really convicted. So, I asked everyone to step back and asked Rosa to please sit in a chair. I sat in the dirt at her feet, took my drinking water, washed her feet and dried them with my skirt. God told me to serve her and make myself lower before her and in that moment she felt something changing within her and she received the Holy Spirit . She knows the power that she carried overcomes any fear that tries to come against her now! 👏 Then we went to a mans house whose legs were hurting. I felt like the men and children were to pray over him so all the men in our group prayed over him and I took the children’s hands and taught them how to pray for the sick. I placed their hands on the mans legs and told them to say “Ma nchina na Yesu” (in the name of Jesus). It was so powerful! Shortly after the man got up and was jumping and dancing and praising Jesus!!
For lunch that day we ate rice and bean as well as elephant meat! 😳 That was not our favorite meal we have had. Later we ministered in a different village and showed the Jesus film. We saw Jesus heal 2 deaf people and about 50 more people accept Jesus. When we did our introducions I didn’t need a translator because I just love learning their local language and God has given me so much grace for that so I introduced myself in Makua and the entire village just loved it, and thought it was hilarious all at the same time. Haha!
Overall this was an amazing, life changing experience for us and by far the highlight of our summer so far. Yes, we saw God do some amazing miracle during our time there but the greatest miracle of all is SALVATION and we are honored to get to see so many lives be welcomed into the kingdom!
Testimony: When going to the village market one afternoon to look for some fabric, I was telling Mitch how I felt God say to me that He was going to start putting women in my path to minister to everywhere I go, because that is my heart and part of the ministry God has given me. Well, just minutes later a momma sitting on the side of the road stopped us and asked us to please pray for her foot. We didn’t approach her which made it even more clear that this was a divine appointment. There was nothing visibly wrong with her foot except a little bit of swelling. I heard God say that she had no blood flow and the circulation was cut off on her foot, so it was basically dying. She took us into the dirt yard of her home to pray, so we prayed and she said she could feel a little bit of a difference so we prayed again. This time she began to jump and run because it got so much better, but she was still limping a bit. The 3rd time we prayed we literally watched veins begin to form in her foot and she was clapping and saying “Hallelujah!” 😄 Thank you Jesus!
This past weekend we went into town and sitting outside one of the shops was a crippled man. We prayed for his leg and although we didn’t see a physical healing, he just began to cry and yell out the name of Jesus and point up to heaven. He was touched in a way that none of us will ever know what happened, but God knows! Thank you Jesus!
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