Rev. Robb, Secretary for Global Ministries in the New England Conference, was a participant in the recent General Board of Global Ministries- sponsored Travel Study Seminar trip to Africa. Rev. Robb preached her final sermon to the congregation shortly after her return to the United States. Reflecting on her experience in Africa, Robb spoke of the partnership between the U.S. church and the church in Africa and of our mutuality in ministry.
We have much to give Africa. We can do that through our offerings of money, materials and relationships. We also have much to learn from the people of Africa: much to learn about being the church and what is possible. Africa needs us in our material wealth and we need them in their spiritual wealth. I have heard others speak of experiencing it and now it has happened for me. I have experienced the church alive in Africa.
The Mission Study Travel Seminar Tour participants joined 1000 United Methodist Women in Luanda, Angola as they met for their regular three-hour worship. Their church, having outgrown its space, knocked out some of the stones and extended the wall to allow room for more people to enter and worship. These women meet in their local units every Friday afternoon. Another group from local churches, unable to meet on Friday afternoons, meet before work Thursday mornings. To assure that they don't become divided, the two groups gather as a unit on Sundays bimonthly.
UNICEF recently described Angola as the worst place in the world for children to live. Rural villagers have fled to Luanda for safety from warfare, raising the population to more than 4 million. People are unemployed and live in tiny make-shift shacks. Thousands of orphaned and abandoned children live on the streets. In the midst of "neighborhoods" of the thousands living in these "settlements", the cross and the flame shine brightly.
In these areas of the city, the West Angola Conference has built nine compounds which contain classrooms, a small health center, a kitchen, and a dining room. The children enter the gates of these sanctuaries leaving behind the misery of dust, garbage, and crowds. Inside the compounds are white painted walls decorated with murals of children; trees and flowers growing; and everything is clean. There are few books and materials, but there is peace, beauty, learning, food and health. It makes me so proud to be a United Methodist. Most of the teachers are young men whose enthusiasm and modeling give the students even more than book learning and trade training provides. These young men bring to the children, a vision of hope that there can be a way out of poverty and struggle through partnership with God and education.
I am proud to say that the New England Conference voted a covenant relationship with Angola last year and can share the good news that $250,000 was given at annual conference. We in New England have material wealth and excess but our brothers and sisters of the West Angolan Conference and indeed all of Africa, have a richness of spirit that makes the church alive beyond what we can imagine! Pride in our church and gratitude for God's spirit filled my being when I looked at the cross and flame on the outside of walls enclosing each of the nine schools in various parts of Luanda, Angola. God is working miracles through people who care and give so much!
Further Reading:
Children of Africa: Mission Study Resources
Sanctuaries of Hope, Rev. Marilyn Robb, July 26, 2000
Somebody's Crying, Lord: Angola Reflections,Lucinda and Geneviev Scheldorf, July 26, 2000
A Second Look at Africa, Brenda Wilkinson, GBGM