Update - March 9 - at World Hope Offices

Another VERY cool thing from our meeting with the national superintendent here-he is VERY passionate about the Wesleyan church. His conversion story is extremely powerful. He said he is going to meet with some of his team in the coming days and hopes to plant a church in Rogbere! He said they need to have more of a presence in that part of the country and he was very supportive and passionate about wanting to make that happen. His name is Reverend Usman Fornah. He has an incredible faith story and was personally influenced by Carrie Jo's dad, Don Kinney-a very powerful picture of disciples making disciples.

We made it back to the Cains' compound for the night. We got to see the welcoming ceremony at the village for our teammates from Michigan. We toured their village, saw their pineapple farm and their completed, working well. We also visited a well drilling that is currently in progress.

The most sobering part for me personally was the Ebola Survivors clinic. World Hope has several peopl e on staff there who help with all different aspects of the Ebola recovery process. 

This is a photo of one of WHI's partnership with GE-a clinic in a can. They have four shipping containers that were sent here at the height of the crisis. Inside is a fully functioning, sophisticated exam room, typical to what a dr office looks like in the US. It is run on solar power. During the crisis it was used as an exam room for patients, now it is used for survivor clinical testing and, most importantly, recovery counseling.

Along with professional counsellors, they have two male survivors who serve as advocates/encourages for other survivors. One of them lost his wife, two children and 11 other family members to Ebola. The other lost his brother, other family members, along with 38 people from his village. There is so many unknowns with Ebola, even now in the recovery stage. Many Ebola survivors are discriminated against and turned away from traditional medical centers because of their survivor status. This place is CRUCIAL, not only for their health, but also for their mental recovery and spiritual healing.

Team Rogbere: March 7-14

We are sending a short-term missions team to Rogbere, Sierra Leone from March 7-14. We will be traveling to Sierra Leone with Phil Smart, from World Hope International, who will act as our guide. While we are in Rogbere, our goal is to build relationships with the people of the village, assess the progress of the development projects so far, and find out what the partnership will look like in the future. Please pray for our team as we work through the logistics of going on this trip and as we ask God to prepare our hearts for the trip!

Team Rogbere: March 2016

In a few short months, we will be sending our first small team to the village of Rogbere. We almost have the team members finalized, and we are keeping the team small because it will be our first contact with the people of Rogbere, and so we aren’t sure what exactly we are going to encounter. This trip will also be different than many short-term mission trips. We won’t be doing construction or medical missions or street evangelism. We aren’t going to an established church or mission work, because as far as we know, there is no church in Rogbere.

So what will we be doing?

           

We will meet the people.

We will introduce ourselves.

            We will listen to their stories.

            We will try to learn from them about their culture.

            We will see the pineapple farms that we have helped them plant.

            We will assess the resources of the village.

            We will assess the needs of the village.

            We will take pictures.

            We will share about Jesus at every opportunity.

We want to make the most of this opportunity to share Jesus. Colossians 4:5-6 says:

⁵ Be wise in the way you act toward outsiders; make the most of every opportunity. ⁶ Let your conversation be always full of grace, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how to answer everyone. (NIV)

Please pray that during our time in Rogbere this March, our words will be “full of grace” and “seasoned with salt”.

Pineapple Update

Rogbere is one of 10 villages that is receiving outside assistance to establish its pineapple crop. See in this video how villagers from these communities are working to plant these pineapples. They are optimistic that this new cash crop will help them to be able to pay school fees for their children and to better their living conditions. 

Ebola-Free!

For the last year, the Ebola crisis has plagued Sierra Leone, which has claimed over 11,000 lives in West Africa. This crisis has had very negative economic effects on Sierra Leone and our village of Rogbere has been affected by this crisis as well. Due to strict quarantine regulations necessitated by the Ebola virus, villages like Rogbere have not been able to attend vital agriculture trainings and to farm as they desire.

We also haven’t been able to have very much contact with the village because of the Ebola crisis. From the beginning of this partnership, we have hoped to send short-term mission teams to Rogbere to build relationships with the villagers, assess additional needs that they might have, and to share with them why we are doing what we are doing (Jesus!).

I am now pleased to report that Rogbere’s district in Sierra Leone has gone long enough without a new Ebola case that they are considered Ebola-free. 40 days is considered to be the time when a district is safe, and they are now beyond that. We can praise God for this while continuing to pray for a complete resolution to this crisis.

The current map of Ebola cases in West Africa

Because of the improvement in the Ebola crisis, George Beals, who oversees Village Partnerships at World Hope International, has informed us that they are ready to start sending short term mission teams into Sierra Leone. We are looking forward to being able to go and visit Rogbere sometime early in 2016!

Faith and Rogbere

Breakdown

In the nation as a whole, 63 percent of the population is Muslim and 16 percent are Christian, which puts Christianity significantly in the minority. The same is true of the region that includes Rogbere. Islam is the primary religion in this area, and there are few Christians. Most of the villages in the area do not have any Christians.

Attitude towards Christianity

Although Christians are in the minority, they do not experience hostile treatment from local Muslims; they have coexisted peacefully. Christian activities have not been hampered by any Islamic group or sect in these villages. It has even been expressed that if a woman or child decided to leave Islam for Christianity, then they would be given the opportunity to do so.

Church

There is only one church in the midst of the eleven villages associated with the Community Based Organization. 

A Wesleyan Church in Sierra Leone

The local people have made a strong commitment to cooperate with this church in any evangelistic activities. However, it was suggested that establishing a church at Rogbere would not be helpful at this time as it would be difficult to attain membership in such a rural community. Working to establish other social facilities, such as a school and health center, would likely be more helpful at this time. Rogbere is centrally located, so members of surrounding community would be able to access these facilities as well. 

Prayer

God, as this Village Partnership continues to develop, would you help the efforts to reach residents of Rogbere to be fruitful? We also pray that you would raise up laborers from the Wesleyan Church in Sierra Leone, and from our own church as well as we look to send a short-term team.

How does life in Rogbere compare to life in America?

A village school in Sierra Leone.

Schools
For Rogbere, only two of the eleven villages nearby have schools. Of these two, only one educates students up to 6th grade. For some children in this area, it means walking over 5 miles to and from school every day. The nearest Junior High and High School is located in Newton, which is about 20 miles away from Rogbere. Many students grow weary of walking long distances to school and drop out.

For us, there is access to K-12 public education right in our immediate communities. And for children who don’t want to walk to school, we have school buses that pick children up within a couple blocks of their home. Walking miles and miles to school is not an problem for us.

Healthcare

Access to health care is a serious problem as none of the villages near Rogbere have a health center. The nearest one is located in Newton, which, again is 20 miles away. This is representative of Sierra Leone as a whole, which has the worst infant mortality rate in the world andhas a life expectancy of 45.3.

We have very broad access to healthcare here. Yes, we complain that it is expensive, but we take for granted that at least we have the ability to see a doctor or to get medicine or to go to an Emergency Room.

Water

Access to safe drinking water is a serious problem. Rogbere does not have a well that can provide clean water. This upcoming year of our partnership will help provide clean water for Rogbere, along with building sanitary toilets.

Our access to safe water is unlimited. In fact, Cedar Falls was recently awarded for having some of the best tasting water in the state. Not only is our water safe, but it tastes great! Let’s be truly thankful for what we have as we pray for Rogbere.