Dear Members and Friends of IBCZ,
During September, and for a couple of weeks more, the emphasis at IBCZ is on engaging with our Missions and Missionaries. This week we focus on Africa For Christ, another mission that we pray for and support. Jeremy Sieberhagen, AFC’s Mission Director will be sharing with us on Sunday and bringing a message from Luke 15, “To Seek and To Save”.
As South Africa and as other African Countries were gaining their independence in the 1980’s, massive urbanization was taking place. With drought and crop failure often occurring in rural Africa, the migration of people to the cities to find work, food and shelter added to the urbanization. Squatter camps (informal shacks built with iron sheeting and cardboard) sprang up overnight as millions of people moved into the cities of Sub Sahara Africa. These shack towns have between 50,000 and 500,000 people and initially had no churches, clinics, or schools.
Africa For Christ was born during these years and sought to plant churches in these least reach places of Africa. We are in 11 countries with 80 church planters. Over 970 churches and preaching points have been started in South Africa, Swaziland, Lesotho, Namibia, Zimbabwe, Zambia, Malawi, Ghana, Togo, Angola and Ethiopia.
Our mission is to identify, empower and equip gifted people to plant healthy churches throughout Africa, in partnership with the wider body of Christ, focussing on under resourced communities. We partner with church planters for a period of 5 years, during which time we provide financial support, training, and regular accountability for their ministry. The financial support is on a diminishing basis, with the aim of each church plant reaching self-sustainability at the end of the partnership. Each church planter is required to send a bi-monthly report to AFC and this report is made available to supporters, donors, and sponsors.