Would you help us grow a relationship with this new IM partner that God is using in manifold ways to grow the Kingdom of God in West Africa?
Over the course of the last five years First Baptist Church of Kennett Square has grown in relationship with the Good News Baptist Church (GNBC) of Lomé, Togo and their evangelical outreach organization, the Good News Soldiers (GNS). God has grown what began as the occasional sharing of prayer requests over instant messenger into GNS being recognized as an official NGO in Togo and, very recently, a recognized partner of International Ministries (IM). It is in the context of this brand-new relationship with IM that the following proposal is made.
GNS is a network of churches and volunteers in Liberia, Côte d’Ivoire, Ghana, Burkina Faso, Togo, Benin, and Nigeria. Their ministry takes the good news of the Gospel to small villages throughout these countries in a number of ways, including:
- running vacation Bible schools
- discipling local leadership
- childhood education
- teaching people to make soap from available materials for their own hygiene and for sale to support their families
- distributing soap and masks in Togo during the COVID-19 pandemic
All of the activities of the ministry are funded by the modest income of the Afangbedjee family and that of the volunteers they have recruited throughout West Africa.
To support these ministries, the people they minister to, and the churches in their network we propose the following to the churches of ABCOPAD (and beyond, if God is willing):
- collect gently used musical instruments and sound equipment to fan the flames of musical worship in West Africa
- new musical instruments are extremely expensive locally
- many churches worship without instruments or pay very high rental fees to rent them for Sunday morning.
- many churches are open air and quality music is a major draw to those who would not normally attend worship
- collect gently used technology (e.g. laptop and desktop computers, printers, and unlocked mobile phones) to support outreach and education
- much of the developing world accesses the internet through mobile phones
- these ministries and their people are very active on Facebook and other social media platforms and providing quality content through these platforms is much simpler on a computer, as opposed to a smartphone
- collect money to:
- offset the cost of a 20-foot shipping container to leave from the port of Philadelphia and arrive at the port of Lomé (GNS headquarters and a convenient point of disbursal), roughly $2,250.
- support the purchase of raw materials for the soap and mask ministry
- support the ministry of the Afanbedjee family (Rev. Raymond Afangbedjee is the executive director of GNS and pastor of GNBC)
First Baptist Church will gladly serve as the collection point for these materials and the donated funds. Given the current state of the world, the timing of the actual shipment is fluid, but we hope to begin collecting donations immediately. We entreat you to prayerfully consider how you might help us grow our relationship with a new IM partner that God is using in manifold ways to grow the Kingdom of God in West Africa.
