We Have a Better Story

Here is a story I hope you will enjoy: These men are all pastors in our sister church in Uganda, Obadiah Lutheran Synod.

At the request of OLS, I led them in learning from September 2–13. We met in the Bugiri District of southeastern Uganda, just north of the Equator.

The brothers came from various tribes, including Acholi, Bagwere, Banyora, Basoga, Luo, and Nuer. Isn’t that a good story, all on its own?

They are from various Ugandan regions. One of the youngest men came from a refugee camp. Some of the pastors are inexperienced. Some have had lots of formal training. But they are united in faith and purpose. They love God’s Word.

They all speak English too. That helped me a lot.

For eleven mornings and afternoons, we met in this tent. We also broke into various groups near the tent for discussions and projects.

These visitors to our learning tent do not speak English, but they were also welcome.

One great part of the course story: This was the first taught by an American missionary like me. The July course OLS leaders taught. The same will happen in December, God willing.

Here is Pastor Nick, the dean of students. The acronym behind him is a sermon outline. ISLAGOR, he told us, stands for “Introduction, story, law, gospel, response.”

We began each day with worship. Here is an example. Philip, an Acholi pastor with his back to the camera, is leading.

The pastors especially learned about Jesus as true God and as true man. They practiced witnessing God’s grace in Christ to non-Christian neighbors and family members, especially Muslims. As the group kept saying, “We have a better story.”

That was the theme of our course, as we discussed the whole Gospel according to John. “We have a better story.”

Here is Pastor Joseph telling the rest of the group his story. He and his wife have eight children. He loves to laugh.

That is not the best part of the story. He used to be a Muslim. Now he is not only a Christian, he is a Lutheran pastor.

All of the pastors made plans to preach and teach from John in the future.

On the last day of the course, all recited a section of John in his heart language. Some told the story of Jesus raising Lazarus from the dead in John 11:17–45. (We have a better story!)

Some of us shared from memory the story of Jesus rising from the dead in John 20.

To check out the same Gospel according to John videos from the Lumo Project which we watched over the two weeks we were together, go to this YouTube playlist (It’s the New International Version. Lumo has Luganda too.)

It was emotional for me on the last day to recite to all the other pastors John 20. “Jesus did many other miraculous signs which are not recorded in this book,” John concludes.

“But these are written that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God and that by believing you may have life in his name” (John 20:30–31).

We have the best story to share.

Missionary Dan Witte and his wife Debbie live in Lusaka, Zambia.

Please pray for those working in fields that are ripe for harvest. Share their story, engage with future news, and receive updates. Learn more about our mission fields in Africa and how the Holy Spirit is working faith in people’s hearts at https://wels.net/serving-others/missions/africa

You Can’t Quit

She is hurrying. Who wouldn’t? Her daughter’s struggle is awful.

Her daughter’s struggle with what? School? Medical issues?

Demonic torment.

“Have mercy on me, Lord,” the mother cries. “Oh, Son of David!” (What a name for a Canaanite woman to give a Jewish man.)

“My daughter … the demon is hurting her so badly.”

Jesus does not answer her.

That story is for us, dear reader. In it Jesus and his disciples are far from home. They are abroad, up north by Tyre and Sidon—modern Syria.

In February Pastor Howie Mohlke and I left our Zambian homes. We too went to a country north of us.

I was in Sondu, Kenya for two weeks. Three pastors in the Lutheran Churches in Mission for Christ (LCMC) and I learned and practiced adult education.

*Sondu is located in Southwestern Kenya*

Pastor Mohlke flew up for the second week. Near Sondu in Chabera he led a workshop for LCMC lay preachers—over 50 of them.

At the end of our time with our brothers, one of them, LCMC Bishop Richard Ogosi Amayo, led us all in a service of holy communion.

In that closing service Howie preached from Matthew 15:21–28, the story of Jesus and the Canaanite woman with the demonized daughter.

Does demonic torment seem as distant to you as East Africa? Something far away, something mostly just in Jesus’ day?

Millions of Americans figure that Satan is not just far away, he is fake. Your African brothers and sisters in Christ know better. Many have fears you may not.

Demonic Pentecostal preaching is spreading in Sub-Saharan Africa. Witch doctors advertise even in upscale urban neighborhoods.

Why would Christians be tempted to run, not to Jesus, like the Canaanite woman? Why try charms or traditional healers?

What a liar, our old evil foe. He means deadly woe. God seems distant. Other help seems closer.

God seems slow. Other options seem faster.

The Swahili proverb I learned from my Kenyan brothers in our course on dialogue education was Haraka, haraka, haina baraka. (“Ha-RA-ka, ha-RA-ka, high-EE-na ba-RA-ka.”)

That is, “haste, haste, there is no blessing.”

The Bible says similarly: “Enthusiasm without knowledge is no good; haste makes mistakes” (Proverbs 19:2 NLT).

It’s not just true in education. All those sayings remind me of another African proverb: “If you want to go fast, go alone. If you want to go far, go together.”

That sums up a key aspect of what Howie Mohlke and I were doing in Sondu and Chabera, Kenya. Our LCMC partners asked your One Africa Team for help. “Let’s work together,” they said, “in training for practical action in Christ.”

The result may mean this time, classes for veteran pastors on a master’s degree level. Those brothers teach future pastors in online evening classes.

Or the request may lead to a workshop for men learning for the first time how to study a short section of the Bible and preach specific good news about Jesus from it.

No matter what, we go together.

Jesus’ disciples didn’t want to go together with the Canaanite woman, did they? “Send her away,” they tell Jesus. “She keeps bothering us.”

How that must sting. Can you imagine how afraid and ashamed she must already feel, with all the battering her daughter is getting from the demon?

(Did the mother feel responsible somehow? And where is the father? What about any other relative or friend? Why does she come to Jesus all alone?)

You can’t know fully the demon’s agenda in abusing her daughter.

Nor can you know the depth of why Jesus at first answers her pleas with nothing. He tells her he is only sent to the lost sheep of Israel.

But that’s not the whole story. Jesus wants so much to help her and her daughter.

Today too prayers for help to Jesus can seem so futile. Nothing is happening, we conclude. After we pray, all we hear is heaven’s door being slammed. Bolts click. Lock after lock closes, almost audibly.

But do you know how it went with the Canaanite woman? A door opens.

How? The woman doesn’t quit. She kneels before Jesus.

Jesus tells her, “It isn’t right. You don’t take the children’s bread and throw it to dogs.”

Nevertheless, she doesn’t quit.

“Yes, Lord,” she admits. “Yet even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from the master’s table.”

“Woman,” Jesus beams, “your faith is great. Let it be done for you as you want.”

Just as when God said, “Let there be light,” as soon as he says it … You can’t imagine her joy. Her daughter is whole again.

Ever notice that the only times Jesus in the Gospels heals someone from a distance—the centurion’s servant in Matthew 8, the Canaanite woman’s daughter here, and possibly the royal official’s son in John 4—it involves a foreigner?

So two biggies, friend. I’m on my knees before you, almost like the Canaanite woman before Jesus. Please.

1. The man who writes down the story that Howie Mohlke was preaching in Kenya—Matthew? He is Jewish, right? So are all the apostles.

But Jesus keeps hinting to his fellow Jews that his church will be multinational. Worldwide. Gentiles will fill it.

Matthew, we think, writes mainly to Jewish believers. They struggle so with God’s paradigm shift.

Demonic terrors, crazy situations, cross-cultural barriers. Such will not be the exception. They are all part of God’s plan.

2. Delays too. I mean, Jesus prayed the most desperate prayer, didn’t he? And it didn’t look like God was answering at all, did it?

Jesus died all alone in place of us all. Jews. Gentiles. Kenyans. Americans. Everybody.

So don’t quit praying. For Everybody.

Pray for missionaries far away. Pray for gospel victories close to home.

Whatever Jesus says happens. What does he tell the desperate woman? “Let it be done for you as you want.” Boom. Whatever Jesus says happens.

Then why pray for others? Why pray much for others? Maybe with people who look different from us, people with lives that seem in shambles, it feels easiest to shoo them away. We are like the Twelve.

We are like the woman too. God may seem slow. Prayer to God seems slow. Other options seem faster.

What if in Christ you don’t quit? What if right now you pray for someone who is lost? (Your daughter? A friend’s child?)

You can’t quit! What if you keep praying for the Spirit of God to lead many more people to trust in the Son of God for the glory of God?

You can’t quit! What if you pray every day, even when so much bad stuff doesn’t go away, or God seems to impose yet another delay? “Have mercy, Lord.”

What if Jesus really is David’s direct descendant, a man just like us, and King over everything? “Oh, Son of David.”

Darkest powers, you can’t be too close to their web. Jesus is stronger.

You can’t have done anything too bad. It’s already paid for.

You can’t have failed to do enough good. He was perfect in your place.

You can’t be too distant. The Canaanite woman’s daughter proves it.

You. Can’t. Quit. Keep praying. Pray to Jesus for that other person. Today.

Missionary Dan Witte and his wife Debbie live in Lusaka, Zambia.

We Arrived

To say, “We arrived,” in Bemba, you say, “Natufika.” In Chewa, “Tafika.” In Dholuo, “Wasetimo.” In Swahili, “Tumefika.”

Saying such words—that was the plan. Twenty-two pastors would leave home in Cameroon, Kenya, Malawi, Nigeria, the United States, and Zambia. They would gather in Lilongwe, Malawi.

Arrived with Difficulty

Some would arrive Monday, October 16 after a full-day cross-border bus ride that began at 3:45 a.m. That was the plan.

Others would start a cross-country bus trip early Saturday. They would get to their capital city at midnight. They would begin flying Sunday morning, and arrive by plane Monday afternoon. That was the plan.

We would all hug and shake hands with joy. That was the plan. In at least six languages we would all thank God and say, “We arrived.”

For eight days we would study God the Spirit since Pentecostalism surrounds us in Africa. We would start Tuesday, October 17, the day after saying, “We arrived.”

But one brother had an old passport. In his land, a law had just changed. Airport officials said, “You cannot fly to Lilongwe without a new passport.” That would take weeks.

Three other brothers had surprise visa delays. They waited near airports. They prayed.

What else to do? The three were trying to fly out on a Sunday. How do you get help from Malawi Immigration when their offices are closed? When you don’t live in Malawi, how do you even reach an immigration official?

Feeling sick, I asked myself, “Why didn’t I apply for visas for the trio sooner?”

On a Sunday how do you get someone in Malawi to approve a visa already applied for and paid for online? Wait for Monday? No. Monday, October 16 was Mother’s Day in Malawi. For a third straight day, no government offices were open.

Enter Godwin, my new best friend in Malawi Immigration. I met him at the airport in Lilongwe that Monday. I had just flown in from Lusaka, Zambia.

Godwin scanned the trio’s paperwork I had brought along and looked at my clerical collar. He offered, “I will try to help.”

Within minutes two pastors got visa approval. Amazing.

For the third pastor, it took two more long days. Not surprisingly: Travel in Africa means “Expect the unexpected.”

A better reason not to be shocked: God is so gracious. We offered him so many prayers.

On Wednesday afternoon, October 18, the first two brothers made it to our meeting place in Lilongwe. Two days late? No problem. They said in Efik, “Ima isim ufak!” Big smiles. Hugs. “We arrived!”

Another brother arrived six days after he left home, three days late, on Thursday afternoon. In his native Akoose, he could have said “Mpidé bwam!” “I arrived well!” You should have seen the joy. We sang.

That last brother’s bag— had it arrived with him? No. Arrgh.

His luggage came the next day. But the office holding it closed at 3:30 p.m. He could not call. When we learned that his bag had arrived, it was too late to fetch it.

He waited one more day, until Saturday, to say, “Ntid mpidé meh bwam.” “It arrived well.”

Still on the Journey

Why tell you an extended “we arrived” story? Three reasons.

1) This is how international travel works in Africa. You don’t know where the bumps in the road will be. You know, “There will be bumps.”

You pray for safe journeys. You thank God for journey mercies.

2) The pastors from six countries who gathered in Lilongwe, Malawi were on a learning journey.

We meet face-to-face twice a year. We were in the sixth of nine courses toward a bachelor’s degree in theology.

I direct the program. Usually, guest professors teach. Dr. Kenneth Cherney, Jr., of Wisconsin Lutheran Seminary, led the learning journey this time. The African brothers, Ken, and I discussed the power, work, and promises of God the Holy Spirit.

Professor Cherney and I prefer “learning journey” to “class.” Ken could have been the sage on the stage, as some say. He aimed more at being the guide on the side.

He is an expert in the Bible. He knows Pentecostalism. He has taught this class before in Africa and India.

Ken would still say, “We were on a journey together. We all learned from each other.”

*Photo by Denise Krebs https://www.flickr.com/photos/mrsdkrebs/16407898563*

3) As you read this, the twenty-one pastors from six countries are back in their homes—most plan to meet together again at the end of April.

But when will we say “We have arrived”? When we finish the bachelor’s degree program at the end of 2025, God willing?

Or when Jesus reappears?

“He has arrived,” we will cry. The songs. The tears. The joy.

Even then, will learning about Jesus end?

Jesus told the Eleven the night before he died for us, “I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Counselor.”

Didn’t that happen at Pentecost? (“He has arrived!”)

And didn’t that happen for each of us at our baptisms? Shouldn’t each of us have said then, “We have arrived”?

Not exactly. Jesus said, “The Father … will give you another Counselor to be with you forever” (John 14:16).

Forever? Oh, we have so much to learn from the Spirit.

Our learning of the depth of the riches of the wisdom and knowledge of God will never end. With God, on the new earth, never will we say, “We have arrived.”

That is one reason His Spirit will be with us forever.

Our growing in knowing the beauty of Jesus our Lord and Brother and the glory of God our Father—by the Spirit of God, the learning never will end.

Missionary Dan Witte, based in Lusaka, Zambia, serves as a theological educator on the One Africa Team.