Gospel News — Mar-May 2012

He came to believe in Christ in Mali- which is amazing, seeing it's 99% Moslem and only 1% Christian. He decided to give his life to practical service to others, in the spirit of Christ. He obtained the use of three rooms, owned by a French woman in Paris, rent free. He transformed these into a simple school. His aim is to offer free primary education to poor children. All schooling has to be paid for, and many children grow up unable to read or write. So he aims to provide basic literacy and maths for free. No food is provided, the children live locally with their parents, and they have 87 children enrolled. He has two other teachers, one of whom is Gerald. As Gerald began to learn the true Gospel through Bible Basics, he shared his findings with Damien. Their studies enabled them to put meaning into the words "I am now a Christian... I have come to Christ". They spread the knowledge of the true Gospel to others in their neighbourhood. After an exchange of around 100 letters, it was clear that this group really understood the Gospel and were ready for baptism, hence our visit. It's amazing that an electrician from Nantes, France, should find the Gospel in the Sahara desert of highly Moslem [99%] Mali. But this is the way providence works. It's for sure the first time we've baptized a trans-Sahara rally driver.

After extensive discussions it was a pleasure to take GERALD, DAMIEN & FATAH and another 10 people [brothers MATTHIEU, SAMUEL, SANIBE and LUC and sisters MARIANNE, SEWA, RUKI, MARIE, MIRIAME and JUA] down to the Niger River and baptize them into the real Christ. Duncan baptized Gerald first and then together they baptized Damien, and then the others:

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So an ecclesia was born, with very great joy- we feel this is one of the most beautiful photos we've ever shared on a Carelink message. May they all hold the confidence and rejoicing of the hope [which they so clearly have] firm unto the end:

In a situation where total poverty, malnutrition, lack of education and basic hunger is everywhere apparent, it's so hard to know how to appropriately assist. We agree with Damien that providing basic education is about the best way to go forward, given our limited resources. But it's also important to give people at least something which they can do and achieve, even if they make no real money from it.

Astrid came into her own here with a project involving recycling plastic bags. With no garbage collection, Mali like much of poorer Africa, is