As I mentioned in my previous report, our evangelistic team continues to put an internal check on it members and strengthening souls. We thought it is both necessary to add new souls to the Lord each day and also teach our members the importance of discipleship because this is all about the Big picture in Mathew 28:19.
A number of topics were taught in a series by many invited local teachers in order to edify the congregation. And this coming April, our friend and lover of the gospel brother Daniel Gaines will start teaching another 13 lesson series on Giving (worshiping God through our finances). We hope and believe that these lessons will bring much blessing to both of our visitors, old and new church members.
I found it necessary to share with you the good progress our congregation. Over the past few months I encouraged my adult class to continue praying and thinking about the need for elders. As the scriptures teaches the importance of having a strong leadership, we also need be moving into that direction. At this time we pray a lot and teach in the area of leadership. As a preacher I spend much time with the men of the congregation who have shown the desire to serve as our church leaders in the future. The work of equipping faithful men to take a lead has never been easy, but we believe, with the Lord’s help, things will take its shape very soon.
During March two brothers were restored to the church and that brings glory to our Lord God. Brother Yohana Laizer and Alfred Massawe decided to withdraw their membership from the church and went to join the Pentecostal faith, and that was two years ago. But through our earnest prayer, we kept on talking to them, and they decided to come to the church and ask for forgiveness. I still believe that when the gospel has been preached to a person correctly, there is one day before it is too late, after wondering into the world, a person will come back home. We are glad that they decided to repent and change their way before it is too late for them.
Brother Daniel Edaga (age 22) in 2014 received a TEAM booklet from one of our evangelists in Arusha. He was still worshiping in a denominational church since 2010 when he arrived in Arusha from Morogoro for the purpose of finding a job. As a young boy in a new town, he had many life challenges. After a while he finally got a job of selling shoes and a place to stay. During this time he never stopped reading the TEAM magazine which was then produced by our brother Cy Stafford and other staff at ACSOP. As he was reading the subject of baptism and the one true church of the Bible, many question came it his mind. Lucky enough there were many contacts for further questions. He finally called one of the numbers of brother Gasper of the Mto wa Mbu church of Christ and later got connected to me because I am the preacher at Arusha. For many months now we have studied with him through messages and this is because of the nature of his job of traveling to different markets on each market day. He finally gave me a call early in the morning this Friday and asked me to be baptized. And this is part of his message “… I have studied enough to know the true baptism and the true church Jesus built and there is no need for me to wait to be baptized so that I can put on Christ in baptism and added to His church…” To be honest I called him right away and took him to the church building making the water ready for him to be baptized into Christ. As I was making preparation of the baptistery and water ready for brother Daniel, my coworker, Isack Kusupa, encouraged him with many words from the scriptures for what he is about to do. You can tell from the pictures this man was very happy for this new spiritual birth. Please continue to pray for the the Arusha congregation as we seek to do God’s will.
Godfrey Mngoma