Africa: Red Moon Rising impacts Zambia - 4 Jan 2005
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Peter Ravensdale writes from Ndola, Zambia where he is living and working amongst some of the poorest people on the planet. "In Sub-Saharan Africa, people are dying at a rate greater than both world wars rolled into one or any plague in history. It's worse than the Asian tsunami disaster and it rolls on endlessly, day after day." An Architect by profession, Peter |
recently abandoned lucrative contracts in Saudi Arabia because "My wife and I felt God telling us to quit everything and take all we had to Zambia. In worldly terms," he says, "it was complete madness. But here we stand." Peter continues...
"Red Moon Rising is one of a series of "tours" God has been forcibly (and gratefully) taking me on to fundamentally change my understanding. I think 24-7 is one of the most important things happening and I believe it will grow in importance as the world heads into more difficult times.
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"My wife and I came to Zambia with a vision - to create a community of young people and give them the facilities to change their lives and the community around. To empower them. At the beginning, my thoughts were very secular but my wilderness experience showed me that we must depend on every word that comes from God and that comes from prayer. I began to see that |
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there is no life without a well in this earthly wilderness. Anything we try to do without his direction is in vain. | |
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Nothing works here - schooling, healthcare, jobs, justice, integrity... and yet there is such a hunger for God. You see it everywhere |
"You will appreciate how Count Zinzendorf and the Moravians interested me (as well as many early Christian Communities). Through prayer, these people learned to dig from and draw from a well - individually and as a community. Only with the watering of the word could creativity, wisdom and many other wonderful elements begin to grow. Such early Christian community models are far more relevant in a place like Zambia. Nothing works here - schooling, healthcare, jobs, justice, integrity... and yet there is such a hunger for God. You see it everywhere. |
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It's like the dry season we have in Zambia - everything turns to kindling wood. You can't help feeling that some spiritual spark could begin an unstoppable firestorm that would sweep towns, cities and the entire country... and then spill over. Yet many of us have been agonising over the disunity and lack of action - "something" seems so close and yet it never seems to take off. |
You can't help feeling that some spiritual spark could begin an unstoppable firestorm that would sweep towns, cities and the entire country... |
24-7, 24-7, 24-7... just can't get it out of my head and my heart. It seems as plain as the nose on my face that this is the spark... and it leads to so much more. Here's something that unblocks the wells. There is no life without water.
In Sub-Saharan Africa, people are dying at a rate greater than both world wars rolled into one or any plague in history. It's worse than the Asian tsunami disaster and it rolls on endlessly, day after day. There's no contest here - that's just the way it is. I feel a real urgency because what we will build is going to be desperately needed. It is already.