Prophetic words and a massive Pencil…

The last 8 days of outreach have been spent in Zimbabwe, just on the other side of the border with Zambia and the Victoria Falls. Even though over the last 20 years(!) we’ve visited the falls many, many times on the Zambian side this is the first time we’ve seen them from the Zim side👆🏻and of thankfully done some great ministry too. 

One of the most significant moments was when the team went to work with a group of young people (some of whom had lived on the streets) and after playing a variety of fun games and leading them in a Discovery Bible Study (see previous blog post) Gemma had a series of prophetic words for the group as a whole and specific individuals within it. The team came back so encouraged at how God had been at work amongst them. In fact, over this whole DTS and outreach it’s been so good to see how God has been using Gemma in similar ways - often bringing prophetic words to whole congregations in church services, bringing life and people’s faith to really rise up.

Even though in the last few weeks Tim’s been both on the Zambian news channel and on a Christian Radio station talking about Fatherhood👇🏻...

...the thing people seemed most impressed by in Zimbabwe was simply his giant pencil. We used it for a church service back in England on New Year’s Day and stuck it in one of our bags when we left for Zambia rather than leaving it behind like so much other stuff. Then we brought it to Zimbabwe and as we started going into schools it just proved a massive hit. Despite the object lesson being pretty simple, pupils and students of all ages were mesmerised and backed up by powerful testimonies from the team about times of sharpening, mistakes being rubbed out by Jesus and knowing God holding them in His hands etc, the door was opened for lots of kids to share their struggles, come forward for prayer and ask Jesus into their lives.

Despite us not knowing exactly what to expect on outreach, all our ministry has gone amazingly well, even when totally on the spur of the moment. In between visiting schools a couple of days ago, for example, when we suddenly found we’d got a couple of hours to wait around, we ended up preaching to men gathered at an outdoor pool hall. Someone jokingly introduced Tim as the ‘English Pool Champion’ and after he then (quite surprisingly and convincingly) beat 2 of the main guys at the table we had ourselves an audience!

We’ve just known God’s grace in so many ways, including with Abigail and Hannah. Being in Livingstone and Zimbabwe for this last part of outreach has meant the girls have been able to go to different tourist attractions, museums and lodges for outings / ‘school trips’ here and there alongside the busyness of team ministry. It would have been so different if we’d been in most other parts of the country!

So with just the journey back to Mkushi (tomorrow), a week of debrief activity and then our DTS graduation on Friday, we’ll be done! Then just to move house, finally unpack all our boxes from England, rest a little and start to work out exactly what’s next!! Whatever it is, this first 6 months has been a great start!