The Rev D. B. Macleod, the Rev A. B. Ndebele and Mr Dick Vermeulen met in Nairobi on 7th December and proceeded the next day to Sengera in the Kisii District of Kenya.
There are services held regularly in six different places by the three African men. The attendance at each place varies from thirty to sixty. The two ministers held services in each place and in addition gave further tuition to the three preachers, in the main doctrines. There is a great need for someone from Scotland, New Zealand or Zimbabwe to go to Kenya to give systematic instruction to the three men.
The small hospital still awaits staff. The Roman Catholic Church is doing its best to prevent our getting a Permit for the hospital. They have a clinic which deals only with minor cases. The local men are anxious that our hospital should open as the journey to other hospitals is too great for the ordinary people to undertake without transport.
On the Day of Prayer the people gathered together at Sengera. There were about one hundred present. The weather was cool with rain falling for about two hours each afternoon.
The Rev Ndebele was kept busy helping a few of the men to put prose psalms into verse. It is hoped to put some of the psalms into a small booklet, eventually.
Nursery schools are still carried on and at least one Adult Literacy class. Some of the people are unable to read.
In Malawi the weather was very hot. On New Year’s Day the Rev D. B. Macleod took a service at the Mozambique Refugee Camp. It is possible that the people will have returned home before next New Year’s Day as there seems to be a prospect of peace in their homeland.
The following weekend the two ministers went to the North Shire Valley to hold services there. They stayed in a Guest House beside the river. The hippo munched grass around the Guest House during the night, lions roared in the Park across the river, bullfrogs and other noisy creatures carried on a serenade until dawn. Both ministers enjoyed travelling together, preaching the Everlasting Gospel of Jesus Christ.
They left for Zimbabwe on 11th January. Mr Macleod spent one weekend at Ingwenya and another at Mbuma. Mr Dick Vermeulen stayed on in Malawi and then returned to New Zealand via Holland.
Since beginning to write these notes we have heard with great sadness of the death of one of our African ministers, the Rev B. B. Dube, who passed away in hospital in Bulawayo on 5th February, 1991, after some months of illness. This is a great and unexpected loss for his family and for the congregation at Zenka, and for the Mission at large.
J.N.
(We regret that the above was held over from the March issue. Editor)