Shalom
Africa
By James Kigamwa, International
Director, Bridge to Reading
The increasing challenges of Christian
workers serving in Africa’s tension belt region
gave rise to the Shalom Africa Initiative (referred
to as Shalom hereafter) in 2018. Ministry
leaders from One Mission Society’s Africa Village
Church Planting ministry, Mercy, inc.’s Bridge to
Reading, and Empowering Lives (self-sustaining farming)
met to discuss ways to tackle the growing challenges.
Shalom provides ministry that intentionally addresses the mind,
body, and soul of Africans. Africa’s tension belt refers to the region
where Christians and Muslims live in close proximity, often
in tension with one another’s beliefs. Shalom provides peace and
hope through sharing the Good News of Jesus, teaching reading,
and training communities how to farm God’s way.
Shalom supports the church planting and discipleship efforts
of the VCP program by providing training in discipleship
and church planting, as well as donating Bibles, bicycles, and
motorbikes. In Burkina Faso, after terrorists attacked our VCP
churches, Mercy responded by providing relief provisions and bicycles
to pastors from the affected churches. One of the church
leaders exclaimed, “What a blessing the bicycles have been to
the trainers. Now, they spend more time ministering to hurting
people and less time walking on dusty roads. They spend more
time training church leaders and less time wondering how they
will get to their students. Providing bicycles for VCP trainers is
a practical way to advance the Gospel in Africa as they serve
hurting people.”
With high rates of illiteracy in many African communities in
this region, reading programs initiated by Bridge to Reading are
well received. VCP-associated churches host these programs in
many rural parts of Africa. In northern Togo, among speakers of
the Kabiyeh language, a VCP trainee and literacy tutor, Danga
Essoham, has a vibrant literacy class. When we visited his class
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