The Christian Chronicle (Oklahoma City, Okla.), Vol. 68, No. 1, Ed. 1 Saturday, January 1, 2011 Page: 18 of 35
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CURRENTS
18 JANUARY 2011
THE CHRISTIAN CHRONICLE 19
The miracle of MALAWI
J.
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Global
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The changing face of the church
Chiphaliwali
Children play near Dedza, Malawi, where church members plan to build a Christian school, hospital and orphanage.
Republic of Malawi
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Edward Mbeta teaches Fixon Mnanga and
Robert Paul at a ministry school in Salima.
Stone pews line the walls of the D-Malikebu
Church of Christ in the village of J a I i, Malawi.
LOCATION: Southern Africa, bordering Mozambique, Tanzania and Zambia
CAPITAL: Lilongwe (pronounced "lil-ONG-way")
POPULATION: 15.4 million, one of the most densely populated nations in Africa.
RELIGION: Christian: 79.9 percent; Muslim: 12.8 percent; other/none: 7.3 percent
HISTORY: In 1859, explorer and missionary David Livingstone
encountered Lake Malawi. Livingstone adopted the motto "Christi-
anity, Commerce and Civilization." Missionaries brought education
and medicine, and Malawians began to associate Christianity with
a better life, said Bisani Mphongolo, assistant director of Namikan-
go Mission. Formerly the Nyasaland Protectorate, Malawi became
independent of Britain in 1964 and adopted its current flag July 29,2010.
CHURCHES OF CHRIST: Malawian Elaton Kundago planted the first congregation in
1906. U.S. missionaries arrived in the 1950s. Today the country, about the size of Pennsylva-
nia, has 4,000-plus congregations. Churches of Christ that have supported work in Malawi
include the Pleasant Valley church in Mobile, Ala.; the Thomaston Road church in Macon,
Ga.; the St. Augustine Road church in Valdosta, Ga.; the Mill Street church in Cassville, Mo.;
the Elm and Hudson church in Altus, Okla.; and the College Hill church in Fort Worth, Texas.
FOR MORE INFORMATION: missionmalawi.org, ccbcmzuzu.org, malawiproject.org
SOURCES: interviews, "Churches of Christ Around the World"by Mac Lynn, cia.gov, news.bbc.co.uk
A sign points to a Church of Christ in the
Malawian city of Salima.
•■■■ ,,
Kaliso
Church of Christ in Limbe, Malawi,
who attended the meeting.
This behavior has contributed to a
decline in church growth, he said.
“Little by little, leaders are going
here and there, saying, ‘Let’s work
together,”’ Kaliso said. “We are contrib-
uting equally. ... This meeting was
very, very successful.”
XJHHIA 7
A NEED TO REACH GROWING CITIES
Christians in suits and ties worship
at the Red Cross church — one of the
oldest and largest congregations in
Malawi. About 400 people attend the
English-language service, and another
400 attend the Chichewa service that
follows. A new auditorium, complete with
balcony, is under construction next door.
Many of the church’s seven elders are
second- and third-generation members.
Among them are business owners,
lawyers and government officials.
After the English service, Dorothy
Chiwaya and Rita Chiphaliwali watch
their grandchildren scamper across the
church’s courtyard, playing tag. Both
ladies came into the church through
their husbands, and have worshipped
here for 20 and 30 years, respectively.
Their children grew up in the church,
but not all of them stayed. Two of
Chiphaliwali’s sons live in Lilongwe
and worship with fast-growing charis-
matic churches.
“What they want (is that) the church
should be more alive,” Chiphaliwali
said. Young people want to know more
about what they read about in the Bible
— including the Holy Spirit, she added.
In Malawi's big cities, they find religious
groups that promise them answers.
Malawi is increasingly urban. In the
past decade, the population of Lilongwe
has nearly doubled, according to census
figures. Though Churches of Christ
have excelled at rural evangelism, they
Malawian church leaders listen during a unity meeting of elders, deacons, ministers and
their wives in the southern Malawian city of Blantyre. About 250 people attended.
when it comes to Christian education,
said Evance Mwapasa, an elder of the
Area 47 church. Today, many longtime
church members send their children to
Catholic schools, he said.
Randy Judd, a second-generation
missionary in Malawi’s north, hopes to
use the country’s increasing access to
the Internet to help Christians train for
urban ministry. In addition to a Bible
college in Mzuzu, Judd and Malawian
Christians have established ministry
training centers in Blantyre, Salima
and Zobque, Mozambique, using the
church-supported Internet training
ministry Nations University.
Though he sees the need for urban
church growth, Judd hopes that
Christians in Malawi — and U.S.
supporters — will resist the urge to build
American-style urban congregations.
“When we try to make the church
anything instead of letting the
Malawians make a Malawian church,
we’re going to have problems,” Judd
said. “Besides, it’s Jesus’ church. And
Jesus was not an American.”
Malawians fish on the shores of Lake Malawi. Often called "the calendar lake," Lake Malaw
is about 365 miles long, 52 miles wide and is fed by 12 Avers.
them believe what we tell them about
Gospel,” he said. “It’s love in action.”
r—
dismay. “I think the main problem is
pride and leadership issues.”
Recently, about 250 elders, deacons,
ministers and their wives — repre-
senting Churches of Christ across
southern Malawi — gathered at a
police barracks in the city of Blantyre
for in-depth discussions of the chal-
lenges they face in the 21st century.
The meeting was part of an ongoing
dialogue among the churches, said
Arthur Msowoya, an elder of the Red
Cross Church of Christ in Blantyre.
“There was a time when we were
leading at bringing people to the Lord,”
Msowoya said. “Over time, it has sort of
gone down.”
“We have the right message,” he said,
“but... we are not good
at shepherding. We have
overemphasized things
that we shouldn’t have
been emphasizing.”
In the past, evangelists
have been divisive and
territorial, said Rabson
Kaliso, minister for
the 70-member Soche
n
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DIVISION AND UNITY
Despite acts of benevolence, “One
sad note is that many of the Malawian
congregations do not fellowship with
each other,” missionaries Wiinon
Walker and Robert Reese wrote in the
book “100 Years of African Missions.”
Some African leaders have broken
away from the church and formed
their own religious groups, the authors
wrote. Missionaries from Churches
of Christ that believe using one cup in
communion is the only
X scriptural model have
' ■ planted numerous
congregations, as
I 7 have churches that
oppose support of
church institutions.
In recent years
churches have split
over the issue of
singing during commu-
nion. Malawian Christians note that
many of the divisions have roots in
missionaries from the West.
The lack of unity frustrates young
preachers, including Nyasulu, who
came to Namikango Mission from the
northern city of Rumphi, where he
works with a Bible institute.
“There is lots of division here — one
cup, choir or no choir. Ay-yi-yi-yi!” he
said, using a Malawian expression of
.... _ ..
7 i
X
CONTINUED
people of Malawi, church members say.
Researchers estimate that the country
has more than 4,000 congregations
— accounting for more than a quarter
of known Churches of Christ on the
African continent.
When the first missionaries from
Churches of Christ arrived, they
concentrated their efforts where most of
Malawi’s people lived — rural villages.
It was an effective strategy, said
Roderick Maluwa, an administrator for
Namikango Mission.
“I just want to thank our fathers
who came here years back,” he said,
because they “chose to prioritize
those who were then
in the majority — out
in the village. They
went again and
again and again, and
the Gospel spread.
“The poverty of
the Malawians
helped them to
cling to Jesus, who enriched them with
the Gospel,” he added.
Churches of Christ also offered a
faith of simplicity, said Wilson Tembo,
Namikango’s warehouse and distri-
bution officer. No buildings were
required. Congregations could meet
under a tree.
“Most of the churches in Malawi don’t
allow members to join without a monthly
or annual contribution fee of some sort
— and long-term lessons before one is
actually baptized,” Tembo said. “This is
not the case with the Church of Christ,”
which offered free membership to
anyone “heeding to the Word.”
Though training is available for
preachers, it is not a strict require-
ment, Tembo added. Anyone who
wants to preach may do so.
“There is no compromise with the
Gospel,” said Moses K Banda, a
Malawian minister studying at African
Christian College in Swaziland. ‘We tell
people plainly, ‘No Christ, no salvation.’”
Churches of Christ also are known
for their generosity and kindness, espe-
cially during times of need, Banda said.
“The help we give people during
funerals and sickness outbreaks makes
are not well equipped to reach educated
people in big cities, Maluwa said.
“I have seen some evangelists who,
when sent to go work in towns, they
shiver,” he said. “Something has got to
be done.”
Church leaders believe education is
the key to reaching souls in big cities.
-------------1 Outside the town of
Dedza, workers are
setting the foundations
| for a new Christian
school, hospital and
orphanage. The project
is a partnership between
the Red Cross church,
the Area 47 Church of
Christ in Lilongwe and
the Green Valley Church of Christ in
Noblesville, Ind. The Malawi Project,
an Indiana-based nonprofit overseen by
church members, is partnering in the
work, along with Sunset International
Bible Institute in Lubbock, Texas.
Though Malawi has many ministry
training programs, “we realize that
we’ve lost a lot of time in this country”
4
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McMillon, Lynn. The Christian Chronicle (Oklahoma City, Okla.), Vol. 68, No. 1, Ed. 1 Saturday, January 1, 2011, newspaper, January 1, 2011; Oklahoma City, Oklahoma. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth1509300/m1/18/?rotate=90: accessed July 16, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu; crediting Abilene Christian University Library.