Africans Reaching Africa

Wow. What a week. Most of you are aware that Junior and I recently returned from an inquiry trip to Africa to check out a ministry that our church supports: Africans Reaching Africa.

Billy and Jenn were an upper middle-class couple with successful jobs, working in accounting (analyst) and medicine (nurse practitioner), here in the northwest suburbs. They were very comfortable in most ways. But they took a couple of months off work to volunteer for a small medical mission compound in Africa. That’s when they became uncomfortable.

They learned that the vast majority of overseas mission work on the continent was taking place in Christianized countries, where the Gospel was already abundantly available. All the while, the northern part of the state, the Muslim countries, where less than 1% of the population are Christians, has virtually no Christian witness.

Also while in Africa, Billy learned that there is an abundance of African Christians in the Christianized states who are eager to go to the persecuted countries and risk everything to bring the Gospel to communities where Jesus has never been proclaimed. They just needed training, structure, and funding to do so. Billy was blown away by the cost of sending one of these native missionaries into unreached and unengaged villages…just $200/month. That’s what they are used to living on and all that it would cost to support one of these church-planting missionary families. And yet, he could not find a mission organization that was doing this.

So Billy and Jenn quit their jobs and started Africans Reaching Africa, a new missions organization to provide structure, training, and funding to send native African missionaries into Muslim countries to live in unreached and unengaged communities, begin Gospel-oriented Bible studies, home fellowships, and then home churches. In just five years, ARA has expanded into multiple closed countries, supports hundreds of native missionaries, and sees thousands of converts, annually.

Junior and I taught at one of ARA’s training conferences last week, one conference of pastors in just one of the many countries they are now ministering. And we were blown away by what we saw.

It was a hard week in that we are spoiled Americans and not used to living the way most Africans live. Few have indoor plumbing. The food is very different from what we are used to. Transportation is difficult and uncomfortable. It is very hot year-round, and few homes or cars have a/c.

But the people…oh, the people. In some ways, I left my heart in Africa. Sweet, joyful followers of Jesus who are intentionally sacrificing everything for the Gospel. I felt like I was back in the first century in the Book of Acts. These people put everything on the line to bring Jesus to people who, up until now, have not been interested. But God is on the move, and the cause of Christ is sweeping like a wave over unreached communities.

We’ll follow up more on ARA down the road. But in the meantime, join me in prayer for God's Kingdom work in Africa.