Specific Prayer Brings Specific Answers and Specific Glory to God!

Below is a letter from one of our leaders - I am including it for you to get a feel of what is happening here in our lives and in our work in Cape Town, South Africa. The Lord spoke to me at the beginning of the year to "build my church". I felt the impression that it is a year to establish our "church of simple churches" in greater strength to be an apostolic resource church for movements to Christ to be ignited in Africa, the Middle East and India.

There are 43 small groups of seekers being discipled in what we call D-Groups (or sometimes we call them "discovery Bible studies"). It is from these disciple making groups that new churches are born and leaders are discipled and equipped. For example, I meet with a group of young Malawian leaders each Wednesday night for training from the book of Acts.

Our vision is "Jesus worshipped by all peoples of the earth". And our goals are three fold: making disciples, training leaders who in turn ignite church planting movements to Christ. Notice what is stated in the letter below: specific prayer brings specific answers and specific glory to God... wow, that is a great invitation to pray and worship God. May He receive more glory!

Thanks for your prayers! We believe it is a year of breakthrough!

All Nations Cape Town is buzzing with many exciting developments!

An assessment of our work in the communities of Masipumelele, Red Hill, Ocean View and Bo-Kaap has given us insight into what God has already done and what we are still believing Him for. Many words have been spoken that this is the year of breakthrough, so please stand with us that we will have the breakthrough the Father wants! 

Recently I felt a calling on our Red Hill team to pray more specifically for the breakthroughs that we want to see. I felt that if we pray specifically, we will get specific answers and then God will get specific glory. It be clear that he is the one who answered the prayers! If our prayers are too general and vague, we can't see God's answers that clearly. So because we want Him to get much glory we want to pray specifically for breakthroughs in Red Hill and the other communities.

In total there are now around 43 D-groups all over the 4 communities we are working in. 9 of those are in Red Hill.

A D-group is a group of people who are gathering consistently with us for Bible study, but the majority of the people are not yet baptized believers. We're counting around 12 churches in All Nations church, including the simple churches our long termers are gathering in - such as our team! The way we count a church then is when a group of people love Jesus together, are baptized and enjoy communion together. A healthy church love God together (worship and prayer), love each other (pray for each other, serve each other with spiritual gifts, forgive each other etc.) and join God on his mission to see people come into the kingdom (share the gospel, pray for and reach out to their neighbours and family). We're believing God that our 9 D-groups in Red Hill will become churches by the people being born again and being baptized. Another important factor for healthy church planting is to raise up of local leadership in these groups. This will require leadership training and mentoring.

Please pray with us this year for breakthroughs!

Twelve Years of Running

Below is the story of one Muslim who has come to faith in Jesus. He was discipled to faith by one of our All Nations church planters in a Muslim land. This church planter is a new believer, an African, who is growing as an effective leader and church planter.

12 years of running away from the Lord........

One afternoon while I was sitting in a recreational park in the largest city in this Muslim land, a certain guy stared at me to the point that I was not even comfortable. He asked me if I had studied at his school some years back. My answer was definitely no, because I was never been at his school. I told him that I am live in South Africa. He asked me what I am doing in his country, so I was frank with him and told him that I was doing a religious research on WHY JUDAISM, CHRISTIANITY AND ISLAM believe in all the prophets since creation and when it comes to JESUS they part ways.

He told me that he had done a more similar research and he was convinced that Muhammad was the last prophet from God and he wanted me to believe that. While he was still talking I was asking God why he did not find you when he was searching for the truth. So I knew he had missed God some way, but it was never too late. It was around 6pm, when he was about to go the mosque for prayers.

I said to him with confidence '' I pray that one day you will come back.'' and after I had said this statement he told that actually he met Jesus in a dream some years back. I wanted to ask him more about his dream but that time he was rushing to the mosque for prayer. So we met after 2 days and he told his dream...

Ishmael is a teacher by profession. When he was about 12years old, he met Jesus in a dream fighting his enemies, and he asked Jesus  ''why are you fighting for me because I am unclean''. Jesus told him that He was the one who will make him clean, the following morning after the dream he felt the joy and peace, the sad thing was that there was nobody to interpret his dream, even though he shared with everyone in his family. Ishmael was convinced that Jesus was a Muslim, because of the Islam belief that Jesus was just a prophet not Son of God or a Savior.

When Ishmael was growing up, he wanted to be devoted to God. One day he visited a Sheikh (a religious leader of a mosque) seeking for the interpretation of his dream, but the Sheikh gave him unsatisfactory interpretation. The Sheikh told him that the Christians would love and persuade him to join their religion, but that he must refuse. So Ishmael started advancing in his Islamic studies and became very radical and he was convinced that Muhammad was the prophet of God. As our friendship started growing we became transparent to one another.

Ishmael was staying with his workmate and flat mate named Gerald, the two were always quarrelling. Gerald was drunk a lot and brought girls home. So the two were not getting along.

One evening Ishmael phoned me to meet him. He wanted me to give him some advice regarding the issue between him and Gerald .So I gave him as much as God had given me, from that day Ishmael began trusting me with some part of his life. The following morning Ishmael was sick in bed and he called me to come and visit him at his home. I went to his home and spent more than 6hrs with him, something by my nature I don't like, but I believe it was God who put His special love in me to reveal to Ishmael.

After sometime Ishmael told me how loving and caring I had shown him especially when he was sick. I had to be honest to Ishmael, I told him that by my nature I would not be able to give him the love and care but that it was only Jesus who was changing my heart.

From that day the level of trust was high, He shared some terrible things that had happened in his life. The things he is never proud of, at some point he wanted to commit suicide. Due to Ishmael's protection I will not write some of the things.

Ishmael told me that all his life, he had been searching for peace, but he was not finding it .So I told him bluntly that only Jesus could give him peace. This was very hard for Ishmael to start believing and trusting in Jesus because of all the investment he had done in Islam. At some point I was tempted to push and force things just to see him come to the knowledge of Jesus. At that time things seemed to be still. Then God reminded me that He is the one who draws people to Himself not me. So I left everything in His hands.

It was on Thursday a week before we left the country when Ishmael called me to his office and told me that he had asked God to confirm if Jesus was to be worshipped rather than just a prophet. So he gave God 3 days to confirm it, and God met him in a miraculous way right then! On the following Sunday Ishmael was baptized and he now follows and believe in Jesus Christ as Son of God not just a prophet.

A Warning From The Lord

It's not easy when you receive a warning from the Lord regarding false teaching, but the Lord gave me just that kind of warning recently. I was impressed with Paul's warning to the elders of the church in Ephesus (Acts 20) to guard the flock against wolves in sheep's clothing, and God spoke to me to be on guard against false teaching coming in to our churches. 

There is an abundance of false teaching in Africa (ancestor worship, extreme prosperity teaching, witch doctors, multiple-wives, very domineering authority robbing people of their priesthood, witch doctors in the church, "don't read your Bible" kind of teaching, etc.). Sadly, there is not just false teaching among the African indigenous churches, but there is also a lot of false teaching coming from the West.

To help our African emerging leaders and church members discern truth from lies, we have found it important to put an emphasis on reading the word with a focus on simple obedience, discovering what God is saying in inductive Bible study, then obeying the word as God speaks to one's heart.

By obeying that "one thing" God emphasizes to be obeyed, we see people grow in knowledge of truth and spiritual maturity. We believe and teach that false teaching gains a foot-hold primarily through lack of obedience to the simple and obvious truths of the gospel, particularly as it relates to daily life: how I treat my wife/husband, honesty, sexual purity, taking responsibility for my choices, sharing the gospel, loving one another, forgiving our enemies, rejecting lies about ourselves and God, refusing to submit to witch doctors and elders who practice ancestor worship, etc.

The theme that is growing in my heart for this year for our movement here in Cape Town, and other parts of Africa/Middle East, is to "build the church". To build it on solid Biblical foundations, to equip our leaders with "heaven's resources" to live anointed and Holy Spirit empowered lives, and to train leaders who can build healthy, multiplying churches.

Please pray for us as we enter this year, would you? We are waiting on God this week, fasting, worshipping, seeking fresh power from the Holy Spirit to see breakthroughs in our churches and our work among the poor and the lost, needing discernment and protection from the enemy without and our weaknesses within. We are confident in his grace and power and need your love and prayers.

Thank you.

With gratitude,

Floyd and Sally

P.S. A few days ago I spent two hours discipling three young Malawian leaders about "church planting leadership" from the book of Acts (they are economic refugees here in South Africa). I have been mentoring and coaching them to plant churches back in their own land some day, encouraging them to get a vision to go back to Malawi and plant churches. What a privilege to invest in young men who want to learn! They asked about the need to plant churches even though there are many people back in Malawi who are Christians already - but in name only. They understood the need for right foundations in building God's church. I walked away from our time together thinking that that is why God brought Sally and me to Africa, to invest in teachable, passionate Africans who will give their lives for the gospel!

The Seven Top Joys Church Planters Experience

1. Seeing new believers worship Jesus for the first time!

2. Creating new wineskins that surprise non-Christians with how cool church really is!

3. Pioneering in faith for the impossible, then seeing God do miracles!

4. Being part of a church planting team united in the same values and vision!

5. Raising up new leaders who find their destiny and calling in making Jesus known!

6. Investing in new disciples who are hungry for God!

7. Seeing a movement of reproducing churches born and multiply!