Doing Evangelism in Douala

The highlight of the Annual Meeting every year for me is the time we spend listening to reports from the local churches in Cameroon. We give each church a total of three minutes to give a short account of what they have done and are doing in their community. Most of the congregations also submit a typed or handwritten report.

I find the reports to be very interesting; sometimes humorous, other times disappointing. But never dull!

Thus, I thought I would share some of the reports with my blog audience. This first report comes from Pastor Sampson Ashu, of Horeb UMC in Douala, an English-speaking church in a French-speaking big city (Please note that I have tried to maintain the spelling and grammar of the original report, with corrections made only to make understanding clearer):

"Horeb UMC’s report begins by thanking God for all he has done and continues to do in the life of his church.

"Also, we continue to magnify the name of the Lord Jesus Christ for the global board of ministries through which the lord has passed to get us established …

Evangelism/Good news

"For evangelism to be effective, Rev. Wesley provided the Pastor with a Honda Motor with which he had to put evangelism as a priority in the church. Pastor Ashu bought a football with which he used as an evangelistic weapon to evangelise both children and youths respectively.

"Moreover, through evangelism, Horeb has given birth to two prayer cells; one at Moungo bridge with 8 members and the other in the pastor’s house having 6 members. The plan is that all the cells meet monthly at the main church to enjoy the fellowship of both at Ngwelle main church.

Problems

"The problems we are having in the church are those of a brother who we call XXX, for he goes about telling others that if the members of the church council are not paid by the mission, the entire church should not give tithes in the church, and nobody should attend any church convention. This problem the mission Director has started seeing into it since 2006. Our prayer is that a seminar should be held in Douala as it has been held in Yaounde to educate the church council members as to how the UMC is in operation in other countries. If the mission will not look into this problem, no matter the number of parishioners, if tithes are not given, then the objectives of the said church are not attained.

"Finally to fold up, we expect and promise to do more as the Grace of God will give us the ability to do so through the leadership of the Holy Spirit.

"May God bless the Mission Director and his family in their stay in Cameroon, the Bishop for West Africa, United Methodist Churches, the General Board of Global Ministries in the United States of America for the vision God has planted in them to win souls for Christ in Cameroon no matter how long this is going to take for it needs patience to achieve a good thing."