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In August a team will begin work amongst the unreached Maba people of eastern Chad. The team will be lead by Ann Fursdon and includes Catherine Grier and the Bright family from Canada. We asked Ann and Catherine to share their thoughts on this upcoming team.
Ann shares:
In early April I moved from established church medical work in Bebalem, southern Chad (in health centres and in Bebalem hospital training nurses and midwives), to work in a large town in eastern Chad where the church has no medical work. Why? Well, in July 2014 I taught several times about mission amongst ethnic groups which have little access to the gospel, in the hospital and in a local church. Teaching others about this kind of mission made me re-evaluate my work. Although I still believe that the training of African believers (medical workers and others) is very important, it seemed right to go myself to unreached people groups, as an example, hoping to encourage others to do likewise, or to support those who do go.There are very few local churches in Chad with such a vision.
Ann Fursdon and Catherine Grier will be working amongst the unreached Maba in eastern Chad.
The AIM Chad team is seeking to make the gospel accessible to a number of people groups who currently have little or no witness amongst them. This includes a group, called the Maba, living in the region where I now live, a group with a population of about 300,000 amongst whom there are fewer than 10 Christians. In keeping with AIM’s vision to encourage Africans to mission, we hope as a team of four to work amongst this group and also with local churches (currently almost entirely made up of southerners posted here by government or NGOs) and in student Christian work at the two universities here. I personally hope to use my medical skills in the local government hospital which also trains doctors, hoping to do good there, make contacts and encourage doctors of the future to a broader vision of living for Christ.
Midwifery in Chad
Joan MacKenzie works to train local Chadian women in basic midwifery so they can go on to help women in their villages through pregnancy and childbirth.
Please continue to pray for the health education project as we finished teaching in three villages in early June. We have been encouraged by the involvement and interest of a number of women, although not as many as planned. It is now the hot season so please pray for extra energy and good ideas for communicating to women ways of keeping healthy in pregnancy and beyond. Pray for wisdom for the best date for when we plan to broadcast the need for every pregnant woman to have antenatal care. We hope to have a wall painting, some drama and perhaps a radio broadcast.
Catherine shares:
I worked in southern Chad from 2011 to 2014, training church-going nursing students to go to unreached people groups. God has called me to go now myself and live and witness among an unreached people group in eastern Chad.
The Maba are one of the largest non-Arab people groups in Chad. They are traditionally animist, although when they were invaded in 1635 the people became Islamic and this is now a large part of their identity. The people live in fear, using amulets and charms to ward off evil and sickness.
I will be part of a team which will start living in Abéché in August 2015. To start with I will have the opportunity to teach English to adults in a school set up by WEC and will spend time language learning; first Chadian Arabic and then the Maba language. Through this I hope to start building friendships with the Maba people who are based in the town. Then, I hope to be able to start translating some Bible stories into the Maba language and to start doing some Bible story-telling among the women. There is a church of southerners in Abéché and I hope to be able to be able to work with some of the members, with the goal of them joining us in reaching out to their Chadian neighbours.