MOZAMBIQUE 2010 - A Time To Build

Lichinga, Mozambique
Saturday, March 27, 2010
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Building a Home
About a month ago, the Lord released us to build a small home next to the Bible School at the IRIS Ministries base here in Lichinga. We have just started breaking ground on it. It will be in the shape of an oval and is very inexpensive to build because we are using burnt mud bricks in the construction. I just got all of the piping done for our plumbing in the bathroom and kitchen. We are currently working on the septic tank and the foundation of our oval house, as well as a small storage shed for us and a larger garage to lock up our evangelism motorbikes, bicycles and Jesus film equipment. The house will cost under $10,000 to build, and we are doing it in phases. Thankfully, we had saved some money while still in the U.S. over a year ago, so we haven’t needed to use our normal monthly support, which we have been using approximately 90% of for ministry; i.e. the construction of the church in Assumane, evangelism materials, Bibles in Portuguese, etc. We will keep you updated in its’ progress.

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Our plot of land near the Bible School........Pile of burnt mud bricks for construction
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Victo digging the foundation..................Salomao laying bricks for the foundation
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Christian cutting pipes for plumbing.............Plumbing buried and ready for use
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Corner foundation of evangelism garage..............Luciano digging the septic tank
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Church of Assumane Construction Update
We have been making real strides in the construction of our new church building and children’s ministry center in Assumane. We are close to being halfway done with the foundation of the children’s ministry center, which is a much more complicated building. The foundation of the church building has been completed for a few weeks and we are waiting for the large burnt bricks to build in between all of the posts. We are also about halfway finished with a caretaker’s home adjacent to the church property, where Lucia will stay to be close to the church family and watch over the church property. We also have a huge praise report: We needed to purchase a construction license as we are using rebar for the new buildings. We found out later that they couldn’t give us the license unless we also paid for legalizing the land which we were given, which in the end would cost us around $1,300.00, including the construction license. Last week we they issued us the construction license after we paid approximately 1/4 of the legalization cost. So praise the Lord! Things are going forward!
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Christian Young

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New church foundation near grass church.....Children's ministry center foundation

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Children's ministry center foundation...........Caretaker's house adjacent to church

MOZAMBIQUE 2010 - Evangelism Through Dreams

Assumane, Mozambique
Friday, March 26, 2010
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Evangelism Through Dreams
Something incredible is happening across the planet these days, especially in Islamic countries where Christians aren’t permitted to go. Jesus is visiting people in their dreams; many times they are people who don’t have the opportunity for a missionary to come and visit them to tell them about the good news of Jesus.
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This is happening where we are here in the Niassa province of Mozambique among the Yao people as well. We have some amazing stories of how God spoke to people who are now believers before they ever came to Christ. For example, Phineus, who is now a church leader at the church in Assumane, a few years ago had a dream that two white people, one tall, the other short, would come to tell him important news about eternal life. Not long after, Jesse and Tanya, a tall white man and short white woman, strolled into Assumane to evangelize after they first arrived in Lichinga, stopped at Phineus’ house, and shared the gospel of Christ with him. He gladly accepted the good news of Jesus, perhaps because the Lord had already prepared the way through the dream he had. Dreams are very important in the Yao culture.
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Tonight we showed a short film about a Muslim man from Africa who had given his life to Christ because Jesus came to him in his dreams. After his conversion, he was completely cut off from his family; his father even tried to kill him because of his “infidelity” to the Muslim faith. It’s a great film. Please feel free to watch it below as it is in the Yao language, yet with English subtitles.
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The truth is, there are people in our church of Assumane who have literally been cut off from their family because of their faith in Christ. Yet they remain faithful to Jesus in the midst of this persecution from within their own families. Please pray for them. There is a great cost in them following Jesus, rather than following Islam. We are living in the last days. God is "not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance." This is the heart of Jesus. He is reaching people who are unreachable through missionary efforts. Literally thousands of Muslims are being visited by Jesus in their dreams and giving their lives to Him. Praise the Lord!
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Christian Young

MOZAMBIQUE 2010 - Pics of our Missionary Kids

Lichinga, Mozambique
Wednesday, March 17, 2010
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Pics of our Missionary Kids

Just wanted to post some cool pictures of our children here on the foreign mission field in Mozambique, Africa. So to all of the grandparents, great-grandparents, family and friends, feel free to right click on the pictures and click "save as" to keep them on file and look at them. Enjoy!

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Christian Young

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Jonas hamming it up on guitar...............Jonas and Abibi on the boat in Chiluweya

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Jonas and Abibi at church in Assumane..............Jonas with cat in Meponda

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Jonas preaching in Lussenhando........Jonas and the boys at church in Assumane

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Jor and Justine at baptisms in Assumane......Jor and Justine on rocks in Meponda

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Jor and Justine learning Yao language.................Jor drawing at her desk

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Some of Jordan's artwork drawing through the book of Revelation

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Justine holding a baby chick..................Justine holding an African child

MOZAMBIQUE 2010 - Making Indigenous Yao Instruments

Assumane, Mozambique
Thursday, March 11, 2010
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Making Indigenous Yao Instruments
Coke bottles. Old used guitar strings. Scraps of wood. Bottle caps. Nails. From a Western mentality, these would be things found in the green recycled bins that are in front of homes every week to be taken away. But here in Africa, these are the elements that make up indigenous instruments that are used to worship our Lord Jesus Christ. They replace things such as electric guitars, bass guitars and keyboards which are found in churches and used by worship teams across the United States and Europe.
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Since we have been here in Mozambique, working among the Yao people of the Niassa province, we have been asking the Lord to release the indigenous sounds that lie dormant within the Yao believers. Since the Muslims came over 100 years ago, and the Yao people embraced Islam, it has been difficult for the Yao people, even believers, to be musical people. Often, we have seen the Yao people borrow sounds from the Chichewa, Nyanja or Makhua people after conversion, yet it seems as though their own indigenous expression of worship has somehow become lost. This is what we are praying will be drawn out of the Yao believers we are discipling.
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Last Sunday during the church service, I was observing a young man, Kaisi, who is a new believer and who has just been baptized along with his wife. He was really engaged in the worship of YHWH, and was clapping in time with the songs with beautiful rhythm. It was then that the Lord spoke to me about Kaisi becoming a worship leader in the Church of Assumane. I felt as though the Lord was showing me that he would lead a group of young people from the church in making indigenous Yao instruments, and teaching them how to play them, practicing weekly for the worship time in church on Sunday mornings.
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Today, we saw some history in the making. Kaisi brought a group of youth who have been involved in the church to begin making these indigenous Yao instruments. We all met in our temporary grass church building. I have seen some things that other African tribes have used across Mozambique, Malawi, Kenya and Tanzania for their worship instruments, and brought a big box full of those things, which can be found along dirt roads in any given Yao village, along with a hammer and saw, and let them at it. We talked together. I read Psalm 150 about the different instruments used to praise the Lord. Kaisi prayed. Then the fun began. These guys began to make some of the coolest indigenous instruments I have seen yet here in Africa. Then the cool thing is how they made them sound along with Yao worship songs after they had finished making them. They will now continue to look for other materials found locally to make more instruments, and will practice every week under Kaisi’s leadership. The Yao people of Niassa are finding their sound! Praise the Lord!!!
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Christian Young

MOZAMBIQUE 2010 - Outreach in Chiluweya

Chiluweya, Mozambique
Sunday, March 7, 2010
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Outreach in Chiluweya
This past weekend, our evangelism team hit the road once again for a Jesus film outreach. This time, we traveled 1 1/2 hours by car to Meponda, then loaded all of our Jesus film equipment and our other things onto a boat that would take us another 3 to 4 hours north up Lake Niassa to the Yao village of Chiluweya. The outreach was a success, and rather than write out any more details about the outreach, I would rather have you watch the really cool video below that we made of our outreach to Chiluweya. Enjoy the film!
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Christian Young

MOZAMBIQUE 2010 - Ciyawo Language Classes

Lichinga, Mozambique
Thursday, March 4, 2010
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Ciyawo Language Classes
This week, from Monday to Thursday, we attended a four day seminar on Ciyawo grammar at the Anglican Diocese of Lichinga. It was really great to be in that class.
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The class basically taught you how to put together the Ciyawo (or Yao) language. It was run by two guys who wrote a grammar book together. The class was made up of people from IRIS Ministries, SIM, the Anglican mission and YWAM. It was a great asset to be able to understand the Ciyawo language.
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This is one unique thing about the Niassa missionaries: there are no organizational barriers. There is such unity here among the missionaries. They just get together and love Jesus, no matter what background you’re from!
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Jonas Young