Ethiopia Is 2011 YWEA Project
The Church of God International Youth and Discipleship ministry, in coordination with World Missions, has adopted Ethiopia as the project for the 2011 Youth World Evangelism Appeal. Young people throughout the U.S. and Canada will invest their efforts next year to raise funds to provide much-needed ministries and facilities for the Harvest Church of God in Ethiopia. The following is a progress report as presented by Heinrich and Lisa Scherz. missionaries in Ethiopia.
Bible School Guest House Completed
In March and April, I had the privilege to be in Ethiopia for about a month, working with two teams in completing the physical work on the guest facility of the Martin Kielwein Memorial Project on the Bible school campus in southern Ethiopia. Jeff and Davin Hall from North Augusta, South Carolina, were joined from Germany by Marc Brenner, missions coordinator, and Karl Kettenacker, a retired minister. Together they did a marvelous job in tiling the floors and showers of the five guest rooms. They had to “home-cook” the grouting cement with local sand, sifted through a coffee strainer. God gave the creative solutions and the grace to complete the work in the allotted time.
After the four men returned home, Ron Barker and Harry Dale came from the Westmore Church in Cleveland, Tennessee, and did the concreting of the large porch area in front of the rooms and dining hall. For this project we had the unexpected assistance of a Youth With a Mission team from Norway, and several Ethiopian pastors who had just completed an intensive training course in the area. They helped National Overseer Hiruy Tsige and Regional Overseer Samuel Hirpo to erect a privacy fence along the highway frontage of the campus. All in all, it was a busy and productive four weeks.
Utterly Poor, Yet Rich in Christ
On the weekends, it was a joy to experience the Ethiopians in their worship of the Lord Jesus. At Kokosa, a remote town high up in the Bale mountains, people came forward to place their offerings and tithes on a purple cloth spread on the floor next to the pulpit. Mixed between the coins and bills were small packets of butter, wrapped in dried leaves of the false banana. Others brought a couple of young chickens, some cabbage, a jug of sour milk, and a pack of banana rootlets.
After a Sunday morning service near the Bible school, Bishop Samuel Hirpo took us on a walk and introduced us to several church families, who invited us into their humble, thatch-roofed homes. We could see how life must be a hard – a daily struggle for them. Adequate food supply and clean water are scarce for most. Yet, they consider themselves rich because they know Jesus. Their faces radiate the joy of the Lord.
Land in Exchange For Clean Water
After completing our task at the Bible School, Ron Baker, Harry Dale, and I had the opportunity to participate in the dedication of a new well near Wolkite, a predominantly Muslim city some 100 miles southwest of Addis Ababa. For years, Brother Hiruy wanted to establish there a church among the Gurage people, one of the unreached people groups within Ethiopia. But the city refused to give the needed land. However, a lady responsible for water resources of one of the woredas (counties), and a committed Christian, “happened” to meet Brother Hiruy. She offered to help secure free land for a kindergarten school and a church in exchange for a new water well on the campus of an elementary school in a rural area nearby. So, we witnessed the dedication ceremony of the well that was financed by congregations in New York and Texas. It was moving to hear the Muslim elders celebrate the first clean, fresh water source for their community. They recited poems, had prayer, provided a meal for everybody, and even had a TV reporter present. Before the well was dug, all their water had to be carried from a muddy creek an hour away—a most burdensome daily task for the women and girls of the village.
Martin Kielwein Memorial Bible School
Project Number 1657005
© 2011 Church of God World Missions
