"Just keep your eyes on the horizon," was the advice I followed on the 3 hour ferry trip to Zanzibar. The boat kept on launching itself over big waves, tilting dangerously from side to side. Inside me my stomach was doing the same tilting and sloshing against the sides. It wasn't very pleasant to say the least. Today, after 11 days on the Island, I'm back in Dar Es Salaam after surviving another grueling ride. This time I kept my eyes on the TV in front of me and Jason Bourne whacking a few bad guys around.But what happened in Zanzibar the last 11 days? No one could have guessed.
For one the main electricity line to the Island is damaged and has left the island without power for the last 2 and a half weeks. The president promised it would be back on before September. Meanwhile its crippling the whole island's economy and making life fairy difficult.
On our first day on the island I felt led to go back to the place where we stayed last year, called Bububu. We were there for approximately 15 minutes when we found our men of peace (not man of peace). David, a Christian, immediately invited us to his brother Clay (an unbeliever's) house were we slept for the next two nights. Since then we've become good friends with Clay. He's a local dive instructor and has been organising everything we need.
But the real man of peace is Sadat who we met on the same night just in front of Clay's house. Since then Sadat has become known as the guy who sounds Christian but is Muslim. It's unbelievable. He is a self-professed Muslim but speaks a lot of truth and is virtually on the edge of giving his life to Christ. We are all praying for him. He speaks very good English and interprets all our Bible studies for us. When we disciple the young believers he translates as well and even motivates them.
Sadat is a teacher in a private school in Bububu. The interesting thing is the school rents the exact same building the Global Challenge team stayed in last year. (Since then its been converted from a guest house to a school). It was in this building that we started praying for Zanzibar last year and were I strongly felt God wants to do something in Zanzibar. It is also where Anne-Marie prayed for me and commissioned me for Explore Africa. Crazy! And I never even planned on going back there.
The first night on the Island I had a very powerful dream. In this dream I was in a room with two Muslim women. They both turned around and lifted up their shirts to reveal whip marks across their backs. Ugly scars crisscrossing over the skin. They then started crying. I woke up and found myself crying as well. The next morning we found out that the school was temporarily closed because one of the teachers had hit a Muslim girl across the back because she had a relationship with a boy. The parents sued the school and the court case is still on-going. I was stunned. Somehow the dream was an indication of what had happened but up to now we don't know exactly how to respond to it. We're praying for God's lead.
Since then three other people have given their hearts to the Lord. One of them is a Muslim Background Believer called Abdul and the other his friend Simon. They were both baptized in the sea. I baptized Abdul, the first person I've ever baptized, and I thank God for the opportunity.
We've been meeting with them and some other believers in a Bible study every night and we're seeing the fruits. People are blown away by the simple idea that you can study the bible. Even believers! We're amazed at the low bible knowledge among the Christians. The group has grown to a place where we can split into two and we are excited about the prospect. We are, however, weary of just attracting more Christians and trying hard to open more doors into the Muslim community.
In our last Bible Study on Thursday evening we teached about the Communion or the Lord's Supper. Since bread is very scarce, especially with the electricity failure, and juice is very expensive we've been using a Coconut during communion. Breaking open the hard shell is very symbolic of the punishment Christ suffered and pouring out the coconut water symbolic of his spilt blood. It's very effective and on Thursday night the Holy Spirit touched every single body in the meeting. Believer and unbeliever. Sadat was the first to say something was different, even though he didn't participate in the communion. I remember how he sat with the bowl of coconut in his hand, thinking long and hard if he should take some before he refrained in the end and passed it on.
It was interesting that a lot of people witnessed that they felt very cold. It's always very hot and humid here and so we think it was the Holy Spirit's way of touching them in such a way that they knew it was different.
Yesterday we broke into two teams . One going to the north of the island and one going south. It was in the south that our team came to a village that was remarkably very friendly and open, unlike any of the other villages or towns. Here we met Muha, a christian, which was also strange, and was interested to hear that he has to travel to Stone town every Sunday to go to church. Imagine the look on his face when we told him he could have church in his house. So we are thinking of sending two or three team members there for a week or so.
So why am I back in Dar? We're getting two more team members, Ester and Rone McFarlane, who are flying in from SA tonight. Can't wait to go get them.
Please pray for Abdul and Simon, Sadat as well Mohamed and Ali- two other Muslims that has been coming to our Bible Studies and are very interested.
Willem
(Names used for Muslims are pseudonyms)
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