Who are you?
It's better not to write our names. This is Niger we're talking about.
I, “S”, was in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic a few years ago, when at a wild meeting in an open field with more than a hundred people, a man came up to me and said, "Get ready for Africa!" I had never wanted to go to Africa!
Years later, on the second trip to Niger, we had the first two baptisms.
“A” was one of them. Our teams in German-speaking Europe then bought him a motorbike. “A” loves to drive to far-away villages. He is incredibly helpful and has a very good reputation among the people there. Maybe that's why they now like to download the first audio version of the New Testament in their dialect onto their smartphones. And sometimes he sends me pictures of the groups that have already been formed.
What do you want to see?
Niger is almost exclusively Muslim.
On my travels I experienced for myself that many people want to learn more about Jesus. Because 74% of the men and 89% of the women are illiterate, we want to go to the villages and show them the Jesus film. We want an audio Bible of the Old Testament in their dialect. We want to be so welcome in every village, that not even the elders of the village will have anything against people being baptized.
But even more, we want every single person to experience the power of Jesus. We´d love to see that they themselves go to the other villages and pray with the people there in the name of Jesus. That people know that when Jesus is preached, people are healed and set free. And if we stumble over one of their everyday problems again, we build them a well or whatever else is necessary.
How did you get this idea?
Once again: I never wanted to go to Africa!
On the plane back from Santo Domingo, a man with a newspaper was sitting in the row in front of me. The headline read: Terrorist Attacks in Niger. At that moment, I knew that my Africa was Niger.
For five years I blocked out Niger from my thoughts . . . but I never forgot it. And during those five years my heart changed. The desire to go to people who had never heard of Jesus, especially in Muslim countries, grew in me. At the beginning of 2018 I suddenly knew: “Now! This year I am flying to Niger.”
God had given me the name of the city and the population group where I should go, but I had no contacts there. So I booked a ticket, a four-week stay, and entered the name of the city on LinkedIn. One person came up who looked like he was from that particular population group, so I wrote to him. When I arrived in the city, he introduced me to his relatives and then I was passed on from family to family. The families were huge. The men did not have only one wife.
“A” belongs to one of these first families.
What challenges do you expect?
At the moment I can only travel to Niger once a year. It would be good if others would join me.
A’s motorbike needs more petrol than he can pay for from his own income. We will try to create better earning opportunities locally; until then we will help him from Europe.
The quite surprising friendliness with which we have been met so far may change.
Furthermore, despite Army checkpoints, on the way to the villages we are always in danger of being kidnapped.
What are you going to do?
In the area where we work, we cannot have online meetings with the new people. The internet is not good enough. So we can only work on spiritual support for A. Pray for him, for the people behind him, for courage, and for freedom to spread the word about Jesus.
We will continue to work on the audio Bible and a printed version in their dialect.
At the end of the year, S will be flying back to Niger.
Because Jesus is not the only thing the people in Niger need, we have also submitted to various foundations our first project application for a water well. Hopefully it will be built this year.