As this season here in Tanzania has taken shape, certain things have gotten clearer and easier for me to see. We have reached eight different villages so far this year - several of them multiple times - and in three of them the ministry has taken a step past the first stage of reconnaissance and evangelism. In our lead village, Kama, discipleship is firmly rooted, and the church there is not simply growing, its foundation is hardening like the setting of a concrete slab. With our first annual Pastor's Retreat, we hosted four pastor's families, that's four pastors now established in villages across a 175 mile route, either on their way, or just beginning to cultivate a reproducing indigenous church. The growth is there. Maybe not as fast as a technologically enhanced and multimedia fed American church plant can grow, but the growth is true and organic. The infrastructure is developing. Two of our pastors now have dirt bikes, and with the roads consistently improving throughout the region, so is their access to each other and more people. And in Kama, an actual church building will be completed in the next year, at the current pace.
But even with all of this beginning to take on a shape that's more than just a strategic plan for the ministry, what is coming into focus more than anything else is both encouraging me and challenging me. For me, this will never be about how many churches we plant. It will never simply be about how many salvation prayers are born from the Jesus Film village crusades. For me, this will always be about the Ibrahims.
On the heels of our Pastor's Retreat, I am amazed at what God did. Four pastors and their wives, all of which have a basic Biblical foundation at best, and all of which have an extremely limited understanding of discipleship as a process, came together and really received what was taught. As we painted a picture of discipleship in light of God's master plan for creation, we went deep after cultural bondage like the oppression of women and the lack of servant leaders. With open minds they engaged as we taught Jesus as not only the key to interpret every aspect of life, but also as the preeminent example of how humility - and not dominance or success - is the true expression of the power of God. We taught that freedom, and not religion, is the function of the church. I believe it sunk deep. I believe the Lord will use this time as a marker in this movement. But still, as we came to a close, it was evident there is so much work to do here.
Over and over this week, we could see how many fundamental truths were missing from the basic construction of their theology. These men who lack nothing in passion for, or commitment to the Gospel, are standing over gaping holes in their understanding of what it looks like to take the personal soul revolution of salvation to the nation-changing revolutions of the Body of Christ living before a nation on the altar of sacrifice. It would be arrogant, to say the least, to pretend I could tell you the exact way church planting should unfold for a people group brand new to the Kingdom. To say that would discount the place of the Holy Spirit in being the teacher and guide and presume that I can see the future and the past through more than just a vague lens. But what I can tell you is that it will follow the patterns of Jesus Christ, the God become man, who bent so low beneath us as to break himself on a cross for the sake of love. I can tell you that if you strip all of the planning and programs away, if the concepts of lowering ourselves beyond the boundaries of our cultural or personal traditions aren't worked into the very framework of our churches, then they are condemned to collapse before the paint dries.
On the final day of the retreat, I laid before the pastors a chance to boldly stare down an ancient adversary. In one of our worship sessions, as the Spirit spoke about releasing gifts through each other's blessing, I saw the husbands washing their wives' feet and then anointing them. I saw them releasing their wives into the place of honor and trust Christ has for his bride, and publicly proclaiming their partners into a role right beside them in raising their churches, not the half-step behind they dare not walk past. And after I went first, praying over my wife as I washed her feet, Ibrahim translated and then took the lead to minister to these men that all we were doing was what Jesus did with the disciples just before he was crucified. And predictably - if not with a hint of disappointment - none of them followed. They didn't have to wash feet because God does the same thing through them if they stand over their wives and lay hands on them.
And herein lies the keys that Ibrahim, and others like him, will hold. No matter what I do, no matter how awesome God moves through us; our team, and our family will always be Wazungu. We will always be white, always be missionaries, and always be one cultural, biological, or one ancestral degree removed from these pastors. And unless the Holy Spirit tears this wall down in a sovereign move (which he may), we will always be one small excuse as to why what we do, or the way we do it, doesn't totally apply to them. But as the fire grows inside of Ibrahim, and we hear him say he feels the Lord calling him to plant the next church in a village alongside these guys, it is evident why he is so close to us and why we are investing so much in him. What began as hiring a tool to help us accomplish our task here in the hopes that he would grow while that happened, has morphed into an all-out blitz to see Ibrahim realize the fullness of Christ so he can be released into the mountains with a fire that will erupt into the atmosphere of the entire Tongwe/Pembwe tribal nation.
When a Tanzanian pastor and his wife finally overcome the traditions and bondage of their own history, everything will change. There will be no more us and them. There will be no more excuses or ways to reinterpret the move of God because it applies differently to different people. Then, and maybe only then, will people start to be totally accountable to what God is doing and saying.
Make no mistake, in no way am I saying I don't believe God is doing a mighty work in and through these pastors. God has aligned us with them for a purpose. I have been in their villages to plant and water seeds, and I have seen the fruit of the Gospel. But the more time we spend together, the more clearly I can see the walls. And the better I am coming to understand the battering ram God is fashioning in Ibrahim and his wife. I am infinitely hopeful for these pastors because there is no end to the hope I have in the Christ who is leading us. But the way I see my victories are changing. No longer do I measure by how many people respond to altar calls, or challenges of faith and humility.
I am learning to measure my victories in the Ibrahim's God allows me to walk with; in the one truly changed person that I am privileged to serve, to lead, and to encourage. I am learning to measure my successes not through how many come and sit on the hillside and are fed in the miraculous moments. It will never be how many I reach that matters to me, but whether or not there is even one like Ibrahim. I will have succeeded if there is just one who dares to step forward in a room full of pastors, with their higher position of respect - in a culture that esteems that above all else - and challenge them to honor their wives and their Lord with a sacrifice their culture doesn't understand. I will have succeeded if I obey the mandate God has given, and if I can show just one to do the same.
With the 2013 ministry season now shifting for us from Tanzania to the States, we are encouraged to see years of work have begun to bear fruit. We are thankful that as we have been faithful to plant and water seed, the Lord has - just as his Word says - been faithful to bring the growth and maturity in many places. But above all else, we are excited that we can see someone like Ibrahim daring to put into action what he is learning, and what we are trying to live out before him. Because it's not us that God is truly preparing to release into those darkened mountains with revolution. We are simply stoking and guarding the flame. It's the Ibrahims he is going to send to light the fuse. And personally, I am glad I have a front row seat.
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