Category: General

The dear brother I lived with in 1996 has just sent me this. It’s happening RIGHT NOW. The Central African Republic has been a living hell for months now. The international community are belatedly responding, but will it be too late as the CAR has seemingly become a failed state. Pierre wrote just now: “Armed groups sowed panic today before retreating towards the end of the morning into the hills surrounding the capital, Bangui, leaving behind the population abandoned to themselves. As always, reprisals have followed. All the Muslims from Km5 (a district) came out with their weapons. They set […]

So our worker Jean-Claude shows up with his customary smile and cheeriness on Saturday. We actually call him ‘God-Bless-You-Jean-Claude’ because his every sentence ends with ‘God bless you’. He’s such a nice man. So kind. So gentle. Deeply holy. Would never steal, always reading the Bible, just top notch holy Joe – and on his T-shirt, there’s an irate golfer throwing his clubs into the lake with the caption ‘Life is Crap!’ GBYJC was happy to be photographed and I’m as yet undecided about telling him because it’ll mean he won’t wear it anymore and that’ll mean a few less […]

Right, folks, this is the other entry in my new devotional book that I have doubts over whether to include. Essentially, I think it could have the wrong intention with some people – instead of stirring them up, it could leave them feeling discouraged, or confused as to why stuff like this doesn’t seem to happen much any more in the West. So, please tell me if I should just remove it, I suspect that is what I’ll do but am interested in your comments before definitively binning it. WWJD or WDJD? John 14:12 “I tell you the truth, anyone […]

So folks, my new book, a 365-day devotional on choices, is almost ready. There are a few entries I’m thinking of discarding, so I wanted critical feedback from you. The following one sounds theologically dodgy – or does it…? Permission to be totally forthright, it’ll help me make my mind up: Road Map or Tour Guide?John 16:13 “But when he, the Spirit of truth, comes, he will guide you into all truth.” Sometimes in Christian circles we are given false choices – the Bible or the Spirit, conservative or charismatic, Word-driven or Spirit-led. They constitute a false dichotomy, but let’s […]

I have in front of me pictures sent by a friend of dead bodies, raped girls, burnt houses – of Christians. (If you’re new to this blog, scroll down to read other posts – this is no loony right-wing Christian rant. I love Muslims, whilst hating what is often perpetrated in their name) What is going on in the Central African Republic is at its root an attempt at Islamisation by Seleka rebels. It is so profoundly frustrating, angering, and despairing for Christians in the CAR, and for me as a distant observer, that the international community has sought to […]

Her life began down a toilet. Back in 1994, as the war continued to wreak havoc in Burundi, a nurse was in the public lavatories of a hospital when she spotted something down the toilet. It was a premature baby that had been abandoned, and somehow it – no, she – was still alive. The nurse fished her out, cleaned her off, and contacted my friend, Chrissie Chapman, who was the only person in Bujumbura taking in abandoned babies or orphans at the time. Chrissie took her in when she was five days old and gave her the most beautiful […]

WARNING OF GRAPHIC IMAGES – Horrific indeed, I tremble and feel sick as I put them in. They are at the bottom if you want to avoid seeing them;  but it’s reality, and seeing it just makes me want to pray more… Another reason for posting this is that tomorrow is the International Day of Prayer for the persecuted church, so do please flag it up where you are. The below comes straight from Open Doors, a superb organisation working with the persecuted church. My pictures though, not theirs. Do sign up directly to their updates at www.opendoorsuk.org Hanna lives […]

I love living and working in Burundi, but sometimes I hate it for what it throws up. Today, within minutes of getting to the office, I had an old friend show up. He was emaciated, haggard, shabbily dressed, and obviously not in great shape. I knew it wouldn’t be a mere social call – rather he’d be the first of a number of daily knocks on the door from people needing money.   I’d helped him with some eye surgery a few years back, so I asked him to take off his shades, and was shocked to see a bare […]

Greetings! Many of you are already thinking of Christmas presents, and have written asking if we have our usual ‘alternative’ ones. The answer is yes, so here are some options – and we’ll get you a card to send to the relevant person: How about a goat for £25/$40 for our transformational pygmy outreach? Milk, manure, and meat for the poorest of the poor, whose life-expectancy has shot up from a low of 27-years-old into the forties since we first got involved five years ago. Or how about £50/$80 for a child’s annual school fees, so a young life can attend […]

Are you an 8-cow saint? I’m working on a daily devotional which will be published next year, am 310/365th of the way through, so nearly there. Thought I’d share a taster today: Deuteronomy 7:7,8 “The Lord did not set his affection on you and choose you because you were more numerous than other peoples, for you were the fewest of all peoples. But it was because the Lord loved you…” Johnny Lingo was a wealthy young entrepreneur living on the Polynesian island of Nurabi. He was in love with Mahana, who lived on the neighboring island of Kiriwadi. Objectively speaking, […]

Less than a month ago, you guys were praying for our incredible courageous evangelists (thanks so much for that!) as they went about Burundi serving communities, building houses, washing wounds, preaching, healing, casting out demons, and more. Here’s the topline summary from Onesphore, founder of Harvest for Christ: “From 3rd to 17th August, we sent out 761 evangelists in 42 teams around the country. 39,753 people were reached with the gospel, of whom 18,218 gave their lives to Christ. Numbers are down a little on previous years because we didn’t preach exclusively, but also did service projects (SG – down?!!! […]

Our massive summer outreach has come to an end today. There will doubtless be many more amazing stories to share, but I thought I’d paste the blog of my very good Canadian mates Josh and Nadine, who were two of only four white people who joined the c.760 Burundians in the bush over the last two weeks. It’s a great read. If you want to follow them regularly, you can subscribe at www.joshandnadineinburundi.com. Nadine writes of last week: For the past 8 years, Harvest for Christ has sent out hundreds upon hundreds of young Africans to go out into the […]

The amazing work continues in Burundi! There are 6 days to go, and this’ll be the last update from me until the full results come in a few weeks from now, but it’s just so encouraging to share, and key in terms of prayers yielding fruit. Here’s the latest from Onesphore, who writes: “Bururi province is a historically ‘religious’ and therefore quite resistant area. But in Kiremba one of our teams met a family whose 7-year-old girl was blind, crippled, and her tongue hung limply outside her mouth, so she was unable to speak. They washed her and prayed for […]

Hot off the Press from Onesphore in Burundi, he writes:   Hello  Simon!   Here are two selected testimonies from a whole load of stories of what’s going on this week around the country:   Our team were reaching out to the people of Busoni in Kirundo, who were seemingly quite resistant until they came to a deaf/dumb man called Kinuma. He’d been in that condition from birth. Everybody knew him. The evangelists prayed for him, he was healed, and began to speak. Word got around the community and a crowd gathered. Our guys made the most of it, preached […]

As a reminder for your prayers, hundreds of our guys are out in the bush these next two weeks in Burundi, and below is from Onesphore, founder of Harvest for Christ, who wrote to me the following: “We’ve sent all the young evangelists out now, on busses, motorbikes, bicycles or on foot walking many kilometres to declare the Good News. My heart is full of joy. It’s marvelous and incredible. A team of seven has already tasted prison for a few hours, as police suspected them of being trouble makers when they boarded their bus. The Governor came immediately and […]

PLEASE PRAY! For the next two weeks, we are sending out about 761 young evangelists in 42 teams around the country to do preach the gospel and serve the community. To me it’s the most obviously exciting and fruitful activity we do, and is as stunning as anything going on around the world. Last year those 2 weeks of saturation outreach saw about 19,000 people come to Christ in coherent one-on-one conversations. And yes, we are committed to follow-up as well. It’s our 8th year of doing this, and the only year I didn’t ask you to pray, we had […]

A number of you are requesting to know our summer movements, so here they are below, do come along or invite others to come and listen at one of the venues, it’ll be great to see you: July 1st – 925am from Brussels, Terminal 1, pick up by Tracy, back to hers to collect our car and then drive to Southampton July 2nd – Meeting with Ambassador in London and a foundation to discuss potential support July 3rd – Simon tests in London at Interhealth. July 4th – Lizzie and kids dental, then to Whites for Trustees meeting July 5th […]

Yesterday was a very exciting day in my calendar, one that had provided focus for the last nine months. Coeur d’Alene Idaho Ironman 2013. It was the culmination of many hours of training, discipline, focus and anticipation. It was the day to determine whether I could stretch myself further physically than I ever have done before. Would I have what it takes, I always wondered – and so I wanted to experience the sheer mental and physical exhaustion that comes from doing an Ironman, which is 2.4miles of swimming, 112miles of cycling, and then 26miles of running. But it was […]

I will never forget last week. As many of you know, I’ve been ill for quite a while (9 weeks in all, much of it spent in bed), and last Monday I was meant to be leading a group of ten cyclists around my adoptive country (just got granted citizenship!) on the inaugural ‘Tour du Burundi’. On the Saturday night before we were due to begin, I bathed the kids, and felt exhausted just from that limited effort. I was weak, had sporadic fevers, had endured the added delight of ongoing heavy flu that week, and was feeling very low. […]

Sunday – I phoned Ladd and told him to get ready to lead the team. The realisation has dawned on me that I simply can’t do this thing. I don’t know how my fatigue thingy is going at the moment because this week’s flu has masked it. I’ve got blocked ears, am churning out masses of snot, have sporadic sweats, have been pretty much lying in bed for the last two months so my muscles have been wasting away, and feel faintly dizzy all the time. All in all, however keen I am to do the ride, it just doesn’t […]