Training people where they are

Cephas leads a discipleship-training program in Zambia, affiliated with Global Disciples. For five years, he’s been equipping Zambian believers to make disciples and plant churches there, and in neighboring countries too.

At a recent gathering, Cephas shared the uniqueness of the training program as his cluster of churches operates it. “We have a mobile school,” Cephas said. “We move and go out to train people where they are. And then send them out as church planters. They don’t graduate until they have planted a church!” What would happen if a Bible school or seminary here in Canada required students to plant a church in order to graduate?

Like so many places where Global Disciples training programs continue, Cephas and the disciple-makers he trains face many challenges. He told me about a recent outreach in northern Zambia. It’s a place that is a stronghold for witchcraft. “We went to this isolated place,” he said, “on an ungraded gravel road, we traveled for three hundred kilometers, and it took us all day and all night. You take extra tires along—and we blew out three of them on the way! ”

He and his team put in hours of preaching and sharing the Gospel with the community. They were also able to use the local radio. And every day, many people came to ask about salvation, and for prayer for healing and deliverance. “Many people are coming to know Jesus,” Cephas reported. And they’re seeing spiritual fruit from their ministry.

Cephas said, “Last year, we started no less than 15 churches. And each of them has more than 50 people in the fellowship. We are also in Congo, in two towns with two churches. And now we are going to move into Mozambique.”