AP

Wednesday

I spent a good part of today with CCAP Zambia Synod General Secretary, Rev Sevatt Kabaghe at the church’s headquarters in Chunga. As I was driving toward that part of Lusaka I kept muttering to myself: turn left just before the huge sports stadium (Heroes Stadium), then turn right, turn right and then turn right again. Easy! Yet there are many hazards along the way, especially the street where CCAP is located – cavernous pot holes that could nearly swallow the car whole.

Sevatt is a very decent fellow – and he’s absolutely focussed on serving Christ. A more honest and humble church leader would be hard to find. He enters into his final year of a four-year term as GS, with Synod elections in August 2024. You could trust your life with him as you could with most of these pastors.

Let me show you a little of Chunga farm, and explain the purpose for it and discuss future plans. I probably haven’t got the story quite right, but it goes something like this: in the carve-up of buildings and other properties during the big Kaunda-inspired church union era and the formation of the United Church of Zambia (UCZ), this continuing group (the evangelical wing of the Presbyterians) was awarded what they thought was an almost useless farm in a difficult to access part of Lusaka. It’s in a run-down part of the city, not far from the Council’s rubbish tip. It had a manse and a few sheds on it.

With foresight and trust in God to provide, the Synod has developed this five-acre plot and gradually made the land to be useful for the church. Some highlights of the CCAP vision, much of it with PresAID funding:

• there’s a solid brick fence around the entire property – which immediately prevented encroachment onto church property;
• a large and very fruitful ministry-centre building;
• shops at each corner to provide the church an income stream via the rentals;
• crops such as maize, sweet potatoes and other vegetables;
• lemon and orange trees, together with bananas.

It’s been 34 degrees most of the day, most days. And not an operating a/c in sight! I might regret saying this: but you ‘sort of’ get used to it … and you stop discussing it and just get on with your duties.

Thursday

The day promised much and gave me back even more. The entire day was spent serving a small group of CCAP pastors at Mtendere CCAP. Mtendere: don’t get me started … it’s a community not far from where I stay (Mika Lodge) but one of the poorest, most chaotic, crowded, dust-filled places imaginable. Such is the chaos of market stalls that you can’t even drive down the laneway to enter the church premises.

But I love the church, and its people where I first preached the Word of God in 2005. I enjoyed inspecting the school premises, meeting the Principal again, speaking to the students and checking up on this: one of our latest PresAID causes: Mtendere CCAP Community school. The school is making progress thanks to help from PCA. They’ve even built a very secure strong room at the heart of the buildings. This means they are permitted by the government to store national examination papers and to conduct their exams on site – this is a real boost to the prestige of the school.

The remaining part of the day was another pinnacle in the life of this pastor. 

• Can you imagine preaching God’s Word to a hungry group of pastors who absorb every message like sponges and who take in every word without distraction? An absolute delight to experience. You could feel the presence of God.
• Can you imagine preaching with every comfort or normal provision absent? The heat, then humidity, is draining – clammy clothes are sticking to your back. There is no pulpit or microphone. In the morning, you are battling the noise of the market stalls that have encroached onto church land, and for the afternoon, dark clouds came over to blot out the light and make it almost impossible to read the text of my Bible.

Yet, to my surprise, I was able to preach energetically four times from the book of 2 Timothy. I felt empowered of the Lord, and capable of delivering the message with clarity and conviction until I grew tired about 3.30pm.

After each session, there would be feedback and questions, and I listened intently to the pastoral situations they face. Some familiar, others not. For example, one pastoral scenario repeats: pastors are at their wits end with the curse of prosperity gospel preachers who entrap their youth with empty promises of health, success and wealth. The lies of so-called ‘miracle–working’ prophets are the curse of Zambia.

I’m so grateful that what I prepared at home (wondering what would be helpful in a strange culture to mine) was the EXACT fit for the occasion and each pastor thanked me profusely. I was able to preach and yet at the same time explain how the sermon was constructed from the passage. We went on our way rejoicing.

Curious things happen that you don’t expect: by chance, I discovered a group of women sitting outside on a concrete step just below an open window – within ear-shot – taking notes so that they can use the material themselves when called on in their church. 

Tomorrow, we have a ten-hour drive to Lundazi.

Hmmm! Which way would you turn for relief? 

– John Wilson