July 2017 Newsletter

Here's what our gracious Lord is doing in Lungala Bible Ministries. 

We pray for you that are not fine and are going through hard trials, may His peace and comforting hand be upon you and lead you through.

The Word of the Month, “I am the LORD your God, who brought you up out of the land of Egypt. Open your mouth wide, and I will fill it” Psalm 81:10. 

‘Psalms 81:10, is the passage the famous George Muller the Lord put upon his heart when he was faced with challenges of finances in his plans to expand the ministry, to be able to give gospel trucks and begin an institution for missionaries’.

Its again our great privilege and opportunity to share with you what the Lord has done here. The Lord has continuously exhibited His mighty hand over this Community Church 

(Lungala Community Bible Church) beyond what we can understand. As you already know, 

12^th August will be our official day of opening this church communally.   We have invited and are still inviting our village neighbors both born again and those that aren’t. It will be evangelistic service, we expect 200 people. We will also have a light lunch with them since we will be finished by lunch time.

 They can’t wait to see this day reach. As a church, we are working hard at different times to make sure the bushes on our foot path are cleared and the weed around the church as you see on the right is photo. The service will start at 10:00 am to 2:00 pm, at our home compound where the church is. If your reading this and would want to join us, you are more than welcome.

We get surprised when we have church work, some  ladies and men come to help and do church work. May God bless them more especially their souls J

This was one  of the days that we normally slash off the bushes

We need to level the ground, put up the flaps of the tent, to get more space and also be fetching water from the well. It is such a tedious moment both spiritually and physically. A couple of days the witchdoctors spent days calling on their evil spirits. But we the Lord’s church will prevail over Satan’s darkness. If you have been following our newsletters, continue to pray about this, we live in a community where witchcraft is practiced a lot. We thank God that we have churches that are teaming up with us to see that people get to the gospel.  

Lungala-Community Bible Church is steadily growing, reaching out to the hearts of people both in equipping church leaders and evangelism. Recently a former  lady ‘ Mrs. Loyi’, whom we met in our evangelism days, had got born again but she had back slid. She now joins this community church  but she has no bible yet. 

As we shared with in our last newsletter, we have no bibles at the moment. All Luganda Bibles are finished. People call us on a weekly basis to see if we have bibles yet and others come to our home to find out if we have them. But we are out of stock. We trust that the Lord will provide at His timing.   The biggest challenge we have as a ministry are the bibles. Bibles are expensive to majority of the brethren. And since that most of us depend on farming, you find it’s hard for village believers to buy them as the income from farming is too small.

We normally get preaching and Bible teaching opportunities in near-by churches. And sometimes in High schools. As you see in the caption bellow, Alex was preaching at St. Jannani Luwumu this last Sunday, a Kampala city suburb church. He preached in three services, he came back too tired but thankful for God’s work and His hand that touched congregations. Many believers were so happy to hear about the Lord’s ministry here and what we do in Lungala.

The photo below was the first service for students.

  

This one below was the second service:

This last one mainly were parents

In one of our discipleship class, (Christianity Explored) class, Helen who has been a Roman Catholic, has given her life to Jesus finally. Praise the Lord! In our discipleship programs, we recruit both born again and none born again. And as time goes on exploring the bible wisely but also straight to the Christ Centered message, a lot of students have come to Jesus. Helen is in high school. She is the one in white T-shirt on my left side, in the photo. She has been carrying a huge cross of ‘Jesus’ in her neck. Pray for her spiritual growth.

Our prime reason while were starting this high school ministry, was to reach out to the lost souls. And we thank God that many have come to Jesus and more are still to submit to His Lordship.

In this month we had a pastor’s conference that took place in the Capital City of Uganda. It was led by brethren from Zambia. It was such a blessing time to be with them, with such a good expositions on Bible. We were blessed to be part of it. Simon took the photo and Alex is right in the middle.

Our prayer requests:

  12^th August 2017 Inaugural service and people to fulfill their pledges.

  Provision as a ministry and other activities

  The growth of this church plant spiritually

  Bible funding.

In the Lamb

Alex and Simon (Uganda- Africa)

June 2017 Ministry Update

Dear brethren - we glorify our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ as we share with you what He has done in Lungala Bible Ministries-Uganda.

We always want to share with you what the Lord taught us in the course of the month. Acts 16:1-5. “... As they went on their way through the cities, they delivered to them for observance the decisions that had been reached by the apostles and elders who were in Jerusalem. So the churches were strengthened in the faith, and they increased in numbers daily”.  

As we were studying this text above in our church prayer meetings, we discovered that church planting can’t happen unless there is deep adherence to sound preaching/teaching of the Word and putting it in practice. There will be more converts as a result of those who have heard His word and seek to obey it through evangelizing to others. This will lead to a strong ministry as Timothy Keller puts “A full confidence and rich grasp of the authority and inspiration of the bible is absolutely crucial for a sustained, life changing of the Bible teaching and preaching

  

MINISTRY OPPORTUNITIES IN KAMPIRINGISA VILLAGE

Recently Alex was invited to a church leaders' prayer meeting in Kampiringisa village. It was a good ministry opportunity. He also had to give out ESV Study Bibles to these church leaders. They were so happy. Alex is on the extreme left on the first photo. Alex gave an exposition on Ecclesiasts 12:9-11. He challenged them to be consistent Bible readers as church leaders and to use these study Bibles as an extra study source.

The lady with a baby (in the photo) in her testimony said she has done a bible group and called it ‘Bible Operation Wembley’. She says this to encourage believers who have no bibles to get one.

Although as I talk now, we don’t have any left. Please donate towards this project so that we buy more bibles as we are overwhelmed by the demand. Bibles continue to be a challenge to get. We normally get 1-2 boxes of Luganda bibles and 3-5 boxes of English bibles. We still trust the Lord for more support in bible ministry. Just to let you know that a local language version of bible would cost $12-$15 approximately. This is a lot of money for a village person to get and as a result many Christians may never own a bible.

LUNGALA COMMUNITY BIBLE CHURCH EVANGELISM

As few days ago we visited two  families during their fasting period. They were at first resistant but later they accepted us to share with them the gospel. Through this evangelism, there are people who have given their lives to Jesus this month.    We only need bibles to give to these new converts. Left is a photo of a prayer night meeting in our community.

Thank you for praying Proscovia (left). She is now well and her daughter is too. Proscovia had malaria and serious health complications. We took her for medication and the Lord has restored her health.

CHRISTIANITY EXPLORED CLASSES RE-OPEN AGAIN

This is Alex with high school students. The students went on a break so we had a few weeks to rest. However we have started again and the classes are going well. We focus on finishing the lessons this

term. We praise the Lord for the way these students have been impacted. Some of these students are Roman Catholic, Anglicans and born again students. We use this as evangelistic tool to reach out to them.  When we finish the lessons, we normally do a small thanks giving meeting where we reward each student a gift to encourage them (graduate). Please pray for provision for this youth ministry.

LUNGALA COMMUNITY BIBLE CHURCH HAS SIGN POSTS

Our dear friend Paul Kavuma and his wife Jordan with the other believers putting up one of the 2 sign posts.    It was great hosting them for three nights, they greatily encouraged us spiritually. Last Sunday a new believer joined our church after having got directions from the sign posts on a Sunday morning.

FUNDAMENTALS FAITH PROGRAM ALSO RE-STARTED 

It’s a joy to see all the 13 students in this class growing in knowing God’s word and understanding some of the fundamental about our Christian faith. Each

one of them is involved in a ministry in their local churches. We are also memorizing scriptures as a way of drawing them to the Bible daily reading.

12TH AUGUST 2017 INAUGURAL SERVICE AT

LUGANDA COMMUNITY CHURCH   

This service is meant to thank God for how far He has brought us and where He is taking this ministry. If you’re in Uganda, don’t miss it please come & let’s give God the glory He deserves. There will be preaching of the word and commissioning of the community church.

OUR FARMING GOD’S WAY

                  Our project is doing well. Our four Month chickens have 

grown Although they haven’t laid eggs yet

PRAYER REQUESTS

Ø  Pray for 12^th August event to go well.

Ø  Pray for ministry minded leaders.

Ø  Pray for financial provision.

Ø  Bibles

Alex and Simon (Uganda, Africa).

INVITATION - 12th August 2017

BIBLES ARE NEEDED

BIBLES ARE NEEDED

If you are able to help - please contact us as there is always a great need for more bibles for the people of Lungala and Mpigi, which we are able to sell at a reasonable price.

Ministry Update - May 2017

Hello friends J 

Once again we want to thank God for the month of May which is nearly to an end for the great things He has done. May His awesome name be praised!

At Community Bible Church-Lungala, this month the Lord has been teaching us ‘The working of the Holy Spirit in missions'. Acts 11:21-26). We spent a four days fasting and praying.

(And the hand of the Lord was with them, and  a large number who believed turned to the Lord… Then when he arrived and witnessed the grace of God, he rejoiced and began to encourage them all with resolute heart o remain true to the Lord…).

We learnt that spiritual multiplication can only happen if we are dependent on His grace and hence teaching and preaching sound sermons which will draw lost people to Him. This is what we are currently focusing on.

As one of the aims of us here, is to reach out to this community, evangelize to them and pray for them.    Recently we reached out to Hajjat ( a lady who has been to Mecca). We shared with her the gospel and also delivered a Christian book that can help her read the bible on a daily basis. This happened after she sent someone to inquire about the availability of bibles. Now she has a Bible and she has special interests to know about Jesus. We pray that this will turn out to be a good harvest to our King Jesus.

Community Bible Church steadily grows, as you see in the photos. Simon was preaching. The taller lady (Ms. Nakaye, second photo below), we met her in one of our school discipleship programs. She is a very enthusiastic Christian.    She has willfully committed herself to train youths fellowship on Sunday. So now we have a Sunday choir. She works as a matron in one of the near -by schools. 

We thank God for the twins Solomon and Samuel comes very early in the morning to put church chairs in order. These boys have been in our of classes for kids, Simon is teaching them to serve God. They enjoy the worship session and seemingly don’t understand much once preaching session Starts. They have been of great help.

As we shared with you last month about 

the sign posts, the Lord has so far provided 

two. We still need more two. That was Simon 

with a tape measure to ensure that measurements

 were right. We will paint the and laminate them too.

In August we have a Grand inaugural opening for this ministry in general. The date has been verified as 12^th/8/2017 and confirmed.  We will be so glad to have you on that day, please mark your calendars. By July feel free to email us if you want the program for information for all the activities that will take place on that day.

This ministry in its small capacity has touched the lives of many people both near and far. The ministry of bible distribution has been bountiful to the hearts of many. 

In this month Alex was invited to speak to the a crowd, explaining about the missing verses in ESV (which we give out). This happened as one of the city pastor burnt KJV and Good News bibles from his church. His action left many hearts hopeless and void. Having spoken and defensively used the Bible to defend itself, most people were encouraged. He had gone with a few bibles, these were all taken, people had such a love for bibles again. The Bible continues to be the most needing thing here.

As we have also discovered, as more people continue to need the bibles, we have put more emphasis to teach them how-to read it. We discovered that most people may read it but forget what they read or how to interpret it in some ways. So, this will help to avoid wrong interpretation and wrong application. On right  is a photos Simon and Bazaale as he was receiving an ESV Bible study from Simon. He leads an organization ministry in the Midwestern region of Uganda.

On a weekly basis we do meet children especially on Sunday’s. We find thus valuable. Our meetings involve children from Roman Catholics, Muslim homes and born again. We think there are covenant children in these none believing homes. We had take a break without meeting.

The high school ministry resumes next week; Simon, he started already this week. We will be glad to catch up with them again. We hope to finish our discipleship syllabus this coming term.

Our gardening has continually done well due to the good rains that we have. A few people were able to plant because of the drought we had. It was such a prolonged drought that Ugandans we have not had for the last many  years. So now that we have the rain, we praise he Lord. Last month on our garden you saw pigs and crops, this time you will see  NZ tomatoes and passion fruits. These passion fruits are Ugandan original. However we have discovered that most of people did not like the size of the tomatoes, they are too small. So, we may have to eat them by ourselves and don’t sell any. The ones of the other season were liked by many because they were very big in size and juicy. 

As we shared with you the previous text from Acts, we saw that its God's Spirit that draws wholeheartedly workers to Him and saving sinners for His glory. Our daily prayer request, pray that as this ministry grows, people of God's heart will willfully join this ministry and that people’s lives will be touched. Our passion is to love this community and all those that God allows us meet and deliver transforming gospel to them. We call you to join us to this chapter of ministry.

v  Pray for August inaugural Grand opening,

v  ministry computer and more two sign posts.

Simon and Alex (Uganda, Africa)

Ministry Update - April 2017

Greetings from Lungala Bible Ministries. We hope our Saviour Jesus Christ kept you well. As it has always been, we want to share with you our devotion verse for the month.

 “Until I come, give attention to the public reading of scripture, to exhortation and teaching… Take pains with these things; be absorbed in them, so that your progress will be evident to all”( 1 Timothy 4:13-16)

In our Thursday prayer meeting as a church, we were contemplating on that text and we learnt a lot in the way we are to commit ourselves to His Word.   Again we want to thank you so much for your donations for buying a tent, we have now established Community Bible Church – Lungala - may God alone bless you and remember your work with this ministry and we have not ceased to pray for you. We focus on teaching/preaching the Bible to this community faithfully.  Here is a picture of our first time to pray from it. The other photo is Simon preaching.

As we have said above, God’s  Word is our centrality.  A few days ago we heard of a pastor from Kampala had been burning Bibles. This pastor preaches to thousands of people with no theological studies. He has no deeper understanding of doctrinal issues and how to explain the bible. He burnt them claiming that they lack certain verses eg. Good News version. He says  that KJV has the Word ‘Holy Ghost’ and claims ‘Holy Ghost’ means an evil spirit. Meaning that if believers carry this version, evil spirits will claim their lives too.

 As a ministry, we had taken an initiative to teach church leaders about this; especially those that attend our monthly Pastoral meetings. So, when this sad news broke, we met them to find out how they dealt with it, amazingly they were very strong and had a firm foundation.

Right now, as a church, we do door-to- door evangelism every Monday. We are also designing sign posts that direct people to the Community Bible Church.

Discipleship Opportunities

We continue to focus on our discipleship programs to make sure Christians grow in the Word.  Left is a photo is an organization leader ( Methuselah Sebagala) in central region of Uganda receiving an ESV bible study from Simon. As u remember, we give ESV bibles to pastors as a way of making trust worthy bibles study with good research materials to help them in preaching.

Last week Alex (photo on Right) was invited to preach at a school’s night prayer meeting for students.    It was a joy seeing students listening to the word without sleeping. As Proverbs puts it “Train up a child in the way he should go; even when he is old he will not depart from it”.    


We think by training these youths in schools and having the gospel preached, there is hope for a god fearing generation tomorrow.

Christianity Explored Class (SOUL) students (right) on the last day of class for the term. In this class as Christianity Explored materials require, we focus on the gospel of Mark.   Most students can now explain the totality of Mark's gospel and the purpose of life. Rachel gave testimonies, she has been born again for a long time but she has never read the bible keenly as she does now. ‘To us, this is wonderful’.

We have discovered that there are so many believers but with no bibles, not even any christian material at all. To us, we think this is very dangerous to the spiritual depth of the church.    Please stand with us to make sure bibles are available to people.

Our home is always visited by people from far and near villages looking for God’s Word.   Most Christians take Luganda bibles being that most people speak Luganda. Recently three ladies from Roman Catholic background said they have never owned a bible - these ladies now read God's Word.   As our work, we follow them up and explain to them the purpose of salvation. They haven’t given their lives to Jesus but it’s great to see them studying their bibles. There is a great need for bibles since they are too expensive for low income earners to buy.

Children’s Ministry

The children’s ministry is going well - one of the kids (Solomon) comes very early Sunday mornings to prepare the church. He organizes the seats- is very thrilling to teach children to serve God when they are young. 

Farming God’s Way

The Lord has given us rain, unlike the other season when many crops died due to a lot of sunshine. We planted New Zealand sweet corns (very sweet), NZ cucumbers & NZ beans. It has been a test of new crops, our community people always wondered about NZ beans and sweet corns. We like the sweet corns, they are yummy. We like farming because its what supports us to do ministry.   We have been able to add 3 pigs to our numbers.

Prayer

Ø  Continue to pray for Community Church – Lungala

Ø  Pray for Alex as he plans to start a new life with Carolyn

Ø  Pray for the our ministry opening in August 2017.

Ø  We still face challenges with our 5 year old computers.

Ø  Pray for  signposts that are needed that can direct new believers to church.

Thanks

Simon and Alex (Uganda, Africa)

Community Church - Lungala

Great News – Our Church Tent Has Arrived

As a ministry, we write to you with such a great joy; God has heard all of our prayers for the community church tent - it has been such a tedious work.  You remember we have always asked you to pray for the provision of a tent outside our house: our congregation has steadily grown. God heard our prayers, the tent is now here!!     What a joy and a great amazing God we serve!     Indeed if God calls any one for His work, He will orchestrate all the events &circumstances to provide for His work to go forward.

One day David was going through many difficulties against King Soul David said, “I will cry to God Most High, To God who accomplishes all things for me” (Psalm 57:2). For us as believers, it’s God who accomplishes all things for us. Below is a photo of the tent; the first photo is the ground where the tent would sit, the second is the tent set up. Some of our church members have been of great help as they have volunteered in leveling the ground, cooking & fetching water and also helping the technical team while they were setting it up.

Our Lord and Savior has continually given us grace, it’s this ministry in the whole of this district that provides bibles for low income earners. We get people either born again or not  wanting  the Bible. We have persuasively encouraged Roman Catholics to get bibles after discussing with them the joy of having God's Word in their houses. When these people take them, we follow them up as way of evangelizing to them & to make sure that they reading them and also to pray with them.   We have had many people from Roman Catholic background who have eventually received Jesus from here. 

Since we now have this blessing of a larger tent that can seat 100 people, we will be having massive evangelism around our community. If you feel God calling you to help in this please come !!!!  -  you are more than welcome. J

Ministry Update - March 2017

We greet you our friends and ministry partners in Christ Jesus! With all surety, we know that the Lord has been gracious to you and your families.

Great News – Our Church Tent Has Arrived

  

As a ministry, we write to you with such a great joy; God has heard all of our prayers for the community church tent - it has been such a tedious work.  You remember we have always asked you to pray for the provision of a tent outside our house: our congregation has steadily grown. God heard our prayers, the tent is now here!!     What a joy and a great amazing God we serve!     Indeed if God calls any one for His work, He will orchestrate all the events &circumstances to provide for His work to go forward.

One day David was going through many difficulties against King Soul David said, “I will cry to God Most High, To God who accomplishes all things for me” (Psalm 57:2). For us as believers, it’s God who accomplishes all things for us. Below is a photo of the tent; the first photo is the ground where the tent would sit, the second is the tent set up. Some of our church members have been of great help as they have volunteered in leveling the ground, cooking & fetching water and also helping the technical team while they were setting it up.

Our Lord and Savior has continually given us grace, it’s this ministry in the whole of this district that provides bibles for low income earners. We get people either born again or not  wanting  the Bible. We have persuasively encouraged Roman Catholics to get bibles after discussing with them the joy of having God's Word in their houses. When these people take them, we follow them up as way of evangelizing to them & to make sure that they reading them and also to pray with them.   We have had many people from Roman Catholic background who have eventually received Jesus from here. 

Since we now have this blessing of a larger tent that can seat 100 people, we will be having massive evangelism around our community. If you feel God calling you to help in this please come !!!!  -  you are more than welcome. J

  

2017 Fundamental of the Faith Classes Started

Recently we started the Fundamentals of Faith class at Kisugu S.S. and there was a good turn out. We also had Robert & his wife join us – they were visiting Uganda for the first time. This youth group is basically led by Simon. Below is a photo of students as they were ready with their pens, bibles and books to study the bible.

We can say there is much improvement in understanding of ‘principles of reading the bible and growing in it' from the testimonies these students give.

Alex & Carolyn

As some of you already know -  God has blessed Alex with a young woman - Carolyn Kembabazi Carolyn - they are engaged and God  Willing, they will get married this year. Keep them in your prayers.

Christianity Explored Classes

We also had Christianity Explored Classes, at St. John's S.S.   Judith an ‘A' level students says “I like this program because it has shaped me desire for God from a right perspective. I have a right understanding of bible which has led me to be prayerful “.Left is a photo when students are studying

This has given us desire and zeal to continue youth Christian Programs of this kind.

Farming God’s Way

Again thanks for the prayers for rain. God gave us good rains and our gardens that had died now have regrown and our passion fruits are fine. We practice mixed farming in case there is a lot of sunshine.

This year we started also started rearing pigs below is a photo of some of them

 Thank you so much for your donation to the community church tent, and all your support for bibles. We always pray for you!

In the Lamb  

Alex and Simon (Uganda, Africa).