MESSIANIC COMMUNITY IN UGANDA (MCIU) REPORT ON THE ACTIVITIES OF THE MCIU

Reporting time: March 2015 – May 2015

“Restoring the faith of the apostles, the prophets and the early church to today’s

believers”.

REPORTING BY:

PASTORS JOHN SWAGA and EMMANUEL BAMWITE

Email: john7swaga@gmail.com and bamuel6@gmail.com

Iganga Messianic Congregation

P. O. box 60, Iganga

Mobile telephone: +256 772 527931 / +256 774 403660

Spreading the knowledge of Torah of God as expounded and revealed by Yeshua Ha Mashiach, equipping believers for a life of Holiness and pursuing a love and involvement with the covenant people of God, Israel

Introduction

The Messianic Community in Uganda (MCIU) MCIU has been around since early 1990 and has undergone many transformations over the years as God has been leading.

The Messianic Community in Uganda (MCIU) is a ministry that seeks to restore the faith of the apostles, the prophets and the early church to today’s believers. We believe that this lost faith is comprised of knowledge and practice of the Torah of God and faith in Yeshua Ha Mashiach (Rev 14: 12). We believe also that the Torah as expounded and revealed to us by Yeshua Ha Mashiach did equip believers for a life of Holiness in bible times and still does so to this day.

Among the primary doctrines of our commitment to God is teaching the importance of Israel in God’s salvation plan and her continued role in God’s redemption plans for the whole world. To this is added a zeal for the Feasts and a commitment to keeping Shabbat, the Kosher laws and many other practices out of LOVE for Our Heavenly Father. We as such are zealous for Israel and are daily involved in prayers for her wellbeing.

MCIU is an umbrella organization of Messianic congregations in Uganda which are torah observant, and love Israel. It consists of brethren from different Christian church backgrounds; i.e. Lutheran, Pentecostal, Anglican, Catholic, Seventh day Adventist, Isa Masiya, and Presbyterian who have now been brought together by the grace of Yeshua. As a consequence, harmonizing the teaching of the word has been a bit of a challenge but we do thank God that He has placed in each of us a love for Israel, and the desire to learn the scriptures from a Hebraic perspective. This yearning has led us to the saving grace that is offered freely to all by Yeshua Ha Mashiach. We are also on the path to learning God’s torah and practicing it in our lives. What many consider a burden - the heritage of Israel spoken of in the scriptures has become ours as we desire to identify more with the covenants and with the people of God.

In this walk of learning the New Torah truths, we are thankful to Yehovah who sent us Dr. David Sloss who for four years in a row has been teaching and ministering to our pastors in each of our last 4 Annual Messianic Leaders Conferences. In this time, we have been able to learn from torah in the books of Deuteronomy (Devarim), Leviticus (Vayikra), Genesis (Bereshit) and Numbers (Bamidbar)

As we move through 2015, it is so beautiful what YHVH is doing in our midst. The Ministry continues to grow as more and more people turn from evil to YHVH. The desire to serve the LORD our God continues to be strong amongst us, in spite of the occasional challenges which threaten our unity in the Messiah. We trust that ultimately though, good will prevail if we continue to allow ourselves to be used by YHVH in obedience to his torah and the leading of His Holy Ruach.

The Messianic Community in Uganda has come a long way from its earliest humble beginnings when most of the doctrines where humanistic in orientation and contrary to the torah (sometimes in outright condemnation of those who expressed their love for God by being torah obedient) to today when we have confidence in most of the core teachings of the ministry. This has not happened overnight but God himself has humbled us and brought us to a point of repentance and a change in our ways. We continue to pray that He unites us more and continues to lead us to more truths.

State of the Ministry:

The Messianic Community now has grown to 39 Congregations scattered across 21 districts in Uganda.

Of these, six congregations that is, in the one in Kituuto, Tororo, Buusi Islands, Bukanga, Bumbo and Kamonkoli have been able to acquire land and construct permanent structures.

Seven have acquired land but have not as yet constructed permanent structures (Iganga, Kamuli, Buteraniro, Budaka, Lwatama, Gogonyo, and Bukhayaki) while the rest of the congregations either use

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rented premises or house fellowships (Home groups)

As of now, there are over 1000 souls (men, women, youths and children) in all the congregations in the Messianic Community. The challenge has been how to raise a generation of saints who understand the righteousness of God, are zealous for torah (Acts 21:20) and are committed to Yeshua – the author and completer of our faith in this evil and corrupt generation.

The map below shows the relative distribution of the congregations in Uganda. Most of which are located in Eastern Uganda.

DISTRIBUTION OF MESSIANIC CONGREGATIONS IN UGANDA

Leadership

As can be shown on the map above, the pastoring burden is big and the people equipped with the word to share are few. Many of these people are going without being adequately reached although they are one with us and profess love for Yeshua, God’s torah and his righteousness.

Pray for us that God may raise up more workers while giving us wisdom to effectively minister to those under our pastoral care.

Ministry work continues to be curtailed by too much poverty especially among the believers. The rural nature of most of the congregations under the MCIU and the high numbers of children to adult ratios means it is becoming hard to adequately meet both the spiritual and material needs of the congregants in all these congregations.

The numbers of people who cannot afford a basic secondary education for their children has increased. This in spite of the introduction of the government programme called Universal Secondary Education.

Although this programme has helped somewhat, falling standards in public schools, moral degeneration in the same institutions means many Messianic brethren are not enthusiastic about sending their sons and daughters to these schools. This has resulted in the net numbers of Messianic brethren who are actually able to send their daughters and sons to private schools becoming small owing to the low income levels in most homes.

MCIU is headed by an executive committee which comprises of these individuals:

Pastor Moses Kyaterekera who is both the Overseer and Head Pastor of Buusi Islands Congregation,

Pastor John Swaga who is Vice Overseer and Head pastor of Iganga Messianic Congregation,

Pastor Emmanuel Bamwite who is Secretary to the MCIU executive and Assistant pastor of Iganga Messianic Congregation

Pastor Wasoita Joseph who is the Treasurer MCIU and Assistant Pastor Buusi Islands Messianic Congregation

Committee members include:

Pastors Charles Waibiru who is Head Pastor of Kituuto Messianic Congregation

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Masaba John Michael who is Head Pastor of Mission Cell Messianic Congregation, Tororo

Daniel Muwanika, who is Youth Leader and is currently with Iganga Messianic Congregation,

Noah Ephraim Bamwite, who is Elder of Mbiko Home Fellowship

Zevirio Byakika, who who is Head Pastor of Bukanga Messianic Congregation

and Elder Namere Kayanja who is Chairperson of the Women’s Ministry Team in MCIU and stays in Buusi Islands Messianic Congregation

Reaching the vulnerable in our midst

For a long time, we have had needs cropping up all the time in the everyday lives of our brethren like divorces where a believing wife or husband is divorced by his spouse on account of his/her faith. This has put an undue burden on the family unit and has affected these families and their ability to stay focussed in their walk with the Messiah as bitterness, resentments, fault finding become the main issues that they dwell upon instead of seeking healing and forgiveness as Yeshua teaches.

Also, believers have been separated from their extended families because of the new found faith in the Messiah. Many of the practices like Shabbat keeping, keeping a kosher diet are frowned upon by even Christians in many of the mainstream churches they have left. In Uganda, this means losing family support and privileges like access to family land which in many cases is communally owned and its ultimate consequence is poverty. Others have tales of being orphaned early in life due to the political instabilities and mayhem which are part of Uganda’s past and others have a low level of education and do not therefore have access to the highly paying jobs in the local economy.

Cases of orphaned children who need support, elderly women who are responsible for their grandchildren who have lost fathers and mothers are not too rare either. It is clear that these children need to have a decent chance of living a meaningful life but under these circumstances that would be hard to realise.

MCIU YEAR PLAN

MCIU has an annual program which we follow as we try to reach our goals of reaching as many people as possible with the torah as expounded by Yeshua and awaken them to the Jewishness of their faith.

A copy of our Year Plan has been attached to this report.

THE CONFERENCES

As part of our call to educate, teach and reach out to those within the community, we currently have three annual conferences which are held once every year. These are:

~ The Annual Messianic Youth conference

~ The Annual Messianic Leader’s conference and

~ The Annual Messianic Women’s Conference

These conferences are held in January, May and August respectively in each year

Some of the Women Leaders who attended the Annual Messianic Leaders Conference 2015

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The respective categories from all our various congregations come together to share testimonies, to encourage each other and to learn from anointed men of God as well as from visiting guests whom God sends to us to minister to us.

At the time of reporting, both the AMYC and AMLC have already been done and both the Youths and the Leaders were ministered and left these conferences with renewed vigour and a desire to do more for God as we strive those in the local culture as well as cause healing and transformation within those who are in the congregations these leaders minister to daily.

THE LEADER’S CONFERENCE

This year the conference was held at Mwana Nursery and Primary School in Iganga town from 3rd to 8th May 2015 under the theme “Expounding on the Book of Numbers”

Dr. Sloss with pastors John and Emmanuel during a lunch break at the AMLC – 2015 which was conducted from may 3rd – 8th

This week long conference was attended by 86 leaders including women leaders, pastors, youth leaders as well as elders from the congregations within the MCIU

Most of the teaching was done by Dr. David Sloss of Baraka International Ministries who for the fourth year in a row has stood with us and has shouldered the burden to train us and equip us for service in our respective congregations.

Dr. Sloss with the Messianic Women Leader’s Executive as they were contemplating plans for the next Women’s conference in August this year

We continue to be challenged and amazed at Dr. Sloss for the level of commitment and amount of energy he expends each time he comes to these conferences.

He is a humble servant of the LORD who in spite of the fact that he has to teach all day long, he has the strength and the patience to do it. We know this would be nearly impossible for any other person considering his age.

For this we are eternally grateful to Yehovah who has planted such a contrite and willing heart in Him from which we have been blessed these four years.

This year, the teaching focused on the “Book of Numbers”, the Creation Gospel and Family matters.

In each of these teachings, new insights were revealed and messages which can never be comprehended by a non Hebrew scholar were revealed. This brought a sense of the vastness of the riches of the word of God. Pastors left the Conference amazed at how little they knew of what Yehovah has revealed in His word.

We are thankful that Dr. Sloss did not leave it at that, but provided funds to facilitate the conference, provided some Free Bible software to help the pastors in their Bible study, as well as some teachings about

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important concepts in our faith as well as gifts to the people who attended this conference.

He showed us the way of love by the example he left behind. He was always sharing with us and imploring us to do likewise so that Yehovah may bring unto us what he has promised in his word. He shared with us reading glasses, books for the Library, Bible software, pens, Teaching Resources for the Books of Numbers, Creation Gospel and Family Matters as well as other personal gifts.

As a ministry, we cannot over emphasise our appreciation for these materials as well as the spiritual blessings that David, his wife, his ministry partners and all members of his family sacrifice on our behalf. May the grace and peace of Yehovah uphold him always

PROJECTS

To address the growing levels of poverty amongst the faithful, we felt a need to introduce some income generating projects.

These it was felt were to help in meeting the physical needs of the congregants as well as helping to offset other ministry costs.

At present, we have five projects which have been piloted to this effect. They include: Mishkan Internet café, Tomato project, Brick laying, School project and Bible translation project.

a) Mishkan Internet café

Mishkan internet café was set up with funding from Baraka International ministries through Dr. Sloss in 2012.

It was originally set up at Busoga University grounds where the café did not do well owing to a very low customer base. In 2014, moved to a better place where the clientele would meet the running costs of the café as well as meet the repayment obligations we had agreed to in the initial stages of starting this venture.

b) Tomato Project

This project is currently on going. It too was started in July 2014 with help from our ministry partners in Canada through Dr. Sloss.

It was set up as a revolving project whose proceeds would go on to empower other members in the community.

Currently, plans to roll out the project to other areas are underway. It is expected that in August, brethren in Jinja, Kituuto, Iganga and Buvuma will be the next beneficiaries of this revolving project.

c) Library Project

At present, we have three centres where library resources are being kept (Iganga, Mbale and Buusi

Each of these centres is located in the home of the congregational leader.

We are thankful to our ministry partners who have continued to stock these libraries with reading resources so that the learning and teaching needs of the community may be met.

We appreciate Dr. Sloss in a special way for doing the most to stock this library. These resources have been used to reach out to people in the community as well as to use the same resources to minister to those among us who can read.

Sister Ann Nakanjako with whom we are in fellowship now but was previously in a Pentecostal church is one of the many people who have been good at reading these resources and being transformed by what they read.

d) Bible translation project

This project continues in earnest. It is our sincere hope that once the compilation of all the work is done, we shall be enabled to have this work published by YHVH’s providence.

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e) School Initiation project

MCIU has a desire to set up a primary school sometime in the near future. A proposed congregation meeting place is also being set up on this site in the mean time.

Messianic brothers at the site. In the background, the structure that is being put up for the congregation

Plans to make bricks on site are in place. The soils have been mixed and about to be transformed into bricks which we intend to use to kick start the construction work on the school site.

The neighbours to the West of this plot are currently selling their piece and we would have loved to get hold of this plot for purposes of expanding the place where the school will be based.

The current dimensions of the plot (44 ft by 227 ft) are not big enough o meet our projected aspirations for a school project on the land.

The part being sold is projected to cost us some 3500 – 4000 CDN dollars. This additional plot would make the projected school plan have enough land on which to put the structures for seven primary classes as well as kindergarten school.

In reach and Outreach Ministry Efforts

MCIU has been involved in Outreach efforts to share the gospel in a Hebraic perspective.

The work done in Kamuli district has been most promising.

19 people were baptised in late December after they surrendered their lives to Yeshua. Another group led by Kisambu also turned to Yeshua with about 35 congregants. Kisambu continues to be active in sharing the gospel with congregations which were believers in Isa Masiya and \sharing with the m the new truths that we are daily becoming exposed to.

In Namutumba district, a new congregation has been set up under the leadership of Fred Waako, a former member of Iganga Messianic Congregation who has settled in the place. It now has about 7 members and the Lord Is adding to their number as He pleases.

Plans are underway to baptise 16 new people from Kamuli, Iganga and Namutumba. We are glad that YHVH continues to cause us to be effective for His kingdom

Brothers John Michael Masaba and David Mabonga continue to be actively involved in evangelism in Mbale area. They report that new people are turning to the LORD.

It is our prayer that YHVH, continues to reveal His truth in our lives and enable us to be obedient in His word and to live a life of righteousness.