Church Development
Bible Training Strengthens Mozambican Communities
Pastors learn to trust, unite and reach out to transform lives.
Mozambique has struggled beneath a long history of violence, mistrust, poverty, natural disasters and spiritual oppression. Especially in the rural areas, Mozambicans hold strong beliefs that the spirits of dead ancestors influence daily life. They also believe sacred natural resources such as mountains, land and rivers have spiritual influence over them. They consult “spiritual” healers for medical problems.
Against this backdrop, a small group of local pastors have caught God’s vision of transformation that Food for the Hungry has taught them. They passionately bring God’s message of hope to their communities.
Pastor Tomas Zephaniah, a Mozambican who trained in a Bible school in Portugal, pioneered Food for the Hungry’s Mozambique church strengthening program in 2001. When the program started, Pastor Tomas says pastors bickered because of their denominational differences. He adds that many also did not have sufficient understanding of various doctrinal issues and they lacked the biblical knowledge necessary to lead their members to spiritual maturity.
“In their church they would often mix biblical truths with indigenous beliefs,” Pastor Tomas says. “People would come to church on Sunday, but they would consult the witchdoctors when they got sick.” And the pastors, he adds, struggled to differentiate between the old ways and the way of truth.
For three years, Pastor Tomas worked hard to educate the pastors through periodic seminars and by providing them with good teaching materials. Over the course of time, many of the pastors became mentors to others, passing on what they have learned to potential ministry leaders.
“He [Pastor Tomas] came here and brought all the churches together. So now you see that represented here are folks from many different denominations,” says a pastor through an interpreter.
“Our churches have definitely been strengthened,” adds another pastor.
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