Mozambique ‘24 - Ben
Nacala, Northern Mozambique November ‘24
As part of the HS41 Missions Training I headed over to Nacala Mozambique with a small team from Iris to serve at the base for a week. This was a great opportunity to meet the team there, and while Tash had a great experience of every day life in Nacala back in September, I was able to experience the ministry and outreach in Nacala.
As a teenager I had visited South Africa and a few other African countries and the experience had stayed with me some fifteen years as some of my favourite memories! Felt like coming home, I had really missed it!
At the time we travelled to Nacala there was some unrest in the cities, and thankfully we were able to travel in and out safely, and were hosted with such love by the missionaries and Mozambican team.
When we landed at the small local airport, the heat hit us as we left the plane. We had arrived at the hottest part of the year, and the humidity was high. We made our way through baggage claim and a friendly Chris greeted. He led us to his 4x4 and we loaded our bags onto the roof. We drove the 10mins or so to the base, and we were immediately struck by the beauty of the whole scene. The bay in Nacala is a beautiful rich blue, the coral reefs stretching out along the beaches. The area is very poor, with almost all buildings left as concrete frames. The base itself has been brilliantly renovated, and designed as a retreat centre for missionaries and pastors. It’s a beacon of light in a dark place. It’s very peaceful there, and there is always some kind of wonderful food being cooked.
The other missionaries greeted us warmly, and we settled down to a briefing for what the week would look like. “Tomorrow will be village immersion, you will be going into the village with some Mozambicans but I have asked them not to speak English to you, so you can learn how to communicate using some local Makhuwa phrases.” This sounded hilarious!
We were shown around the base, the highlight for myself being the large prayer room. The entire the second floor of the base has been dedicated as a place of worship and prayer, looking out over the ocean its a beautiful place to spend time. The accommodation has also been renovated to a high standard and we were shown to our room, we felt so blessed to be there.
The next day was village immersion. It was 35C and around 90% humidity, so walking down the dusty dirt street made you sweat until you were wet through in a matter of minutes. We were asked to walk the 20mins up hill to the local village, find a specific house and then receive further instructions. It was hot work, and when we eventually reached the house found a kind of treasure hunt was in place. We were sent out to find all the necessary ingredients to make a local meal for our hosts. We bought firewood, ground cassava root and whole leaves, cooking oil, salt, and carried water from the local well. Because of the heat it was genuinely exhausting, even for the fittest among us. Later it was explained, that almost everyone in the village is a subsistence farmer; they live hand to mouth on the work they do during the day. It was a wake up call to the harsh reality of how the Mozambicans live.
The next day we were invited to visit a local church for outreach, and headed out in Chris’s 4x4 on the 25 minutes of potholed dirt roads to a nearby village.
When we arrived the brothers and sisters were singing beautiful worship. We couldn’t help but be moved, tears filled our eyes as we experienced the tangible presence of Jesus.
We then headed out across the village, following the Mozambican pastors on foot. They stopped to pray for a lady, and suddenly people started falling in the dirt under the power of God. I did not know these people were Muslims, the area we were ministering in was 0.02% Christian.
The pastors led these people to Jesus and provided them with a solar bible. The sheer transformation in their face was enough to know they’d genuinely given their hearts to the Lord.
These same people then attended church on Sunday, asking for prayer as their families had kicked them out for following Jesus. The reality of the joy and suffering of following Jesus was shown openly to all. It was a truly humbling time, and their joy… their joy is like nothing we’ve ever seen. The joy of the Lord IS their strength.
“Be cheerful with joyous celebration in every season of life. Let your joy overflow! And let gentleness be seen in every relationship, for our Lord is ever near.”
Philippians 4:4-5 TPT
There were so many stories from this trip, that in some ways seem too precious to write about. But above everything I must write that the most incredible thing we saw was true deep love for Jesus among the Mozambican people. One of the most incredible things I experienced, was the love I experienced for the Mozambican people and the love with which they embraced me. They are family now, and we have been nit together by the Spirit of God. At the end of the earth, forgotten by most of the world, Jesus has revealed Himself to these people in the most profound ways.
The churches in Nacala are being planted weekly, revival is a cheap word. What’s happening there is total surrender to Jesus, and deep love for Him. It costs those who follow him everything, and still they choose to follow. Iris promises nothing to people, no financial incentive, no food aid incentive. And regardless, their love for Jesus is spreading like a wildfire throughout the province.
As we flew out of Nacala we watched the bright blue waters of the beaches, and the huts of the villages grow smaller as we rose into the air. It felt like leaving home, like leaving family. After a few days of travel I was reunited with Tash and the kids back in Egypt, it was wonderful to relay stories from our different trips. Together as a family, we continued the training for the last few weeks in Egypt.