News in Brief
 The new academic year at the Evangelical Bible College of Malawi (EBCoM)
started in September. zm has just taken a big step of faith to support a huge
total of 58 students at the college: the largest number ever. These students
come from eight different church denominations. It is so important for pastors
in Malawi to be taught the trustworthy message of the gospel accurately, so
that they can hold firmly to it when teaching and preaching, and also refute
false doctrine. Although we have many supporters who already sponsor a
student at EBCoM, there is a real need for us to find more.
 The Zambezi Evangelical Church (ZEC) is one of our main partners in Malawi.
It was originally founded by zm but has been independent, self-supporting and
self-propagating for over 50 years. ZEC runs six health centres in Malawi.
These are places where the love of Christ is shown to the sick and needy from
the surrounding communities. It is very expensive to train medical staff to
work in these centres; so zm is partnering with ZEC to support two Christian
students to study for a Diploma of Clinical Medicine at Malamulo College of
Health Sciences. Please contact the office if you are interested in sponsoring
one of these students.
zambesi mission — Gift Scheme
You will find the latest Gift Scheme leaflet enclosed with Update and In Prayer. It
is wonderful to be able to give gifts to one another that remind us of God’s
indescribable gift to us: the gift of eternal life through His Son Jesus. The scheme
offers a range of gifts that you can “give” to friends or relations. They meet a
variety of needs in Africa, and cost from £5 upwards. Don’t worry if you feel you
can’t afford the price of a particular gift — just specify which gift you would like to
contribute towards, and then give what you can. We will provide you with a card
to send out, describing the gift you have made on their behalf. Note – when you
request a card to be sent during November and December, we will assume you
would like a Christmas card, unless you specify otherwise.
We can also provide “giant” A4-sized Christmas cards for churches again this
year. Please ring or email the office if you are interested in this.
* N.B. A small charge is applied to all gifts to help cover essential running costs. We are very grateful for any gift
and shall use it as requested. If we receive more than required for any project, or a more pressing need arises, we
hope you will understand if we use your gift where most needed. A
For mailing purposes we hold your name and address on our computer. They will not be given to any other person or organisation,
but if you prefer not to receive this literature, let us know and we will remove your details from the mailing list.
Mission Director:
Administrator:
Mike Beresford
(address as office)
[email protected]
Richard Brassington, zm, York Baptist Church, Priory St, York YO1 6EX 01904 674748
[email protected]
UK Development Manager:
Dave Brown, Dove Cottage, Church St, Wetheringsett IP14 5PH 01449 766151
[email protected]
Member of:
Hon. Representatives:
(Scotland)
Ralph Gunn, 27 Elvan St, Motherwell ML1 3EN 01698 251445 [email protected]
(S. England)
Tom Jardine, 16 Donnelly Rd, Bournemouth BN6 5NW 01202 468970
[email protected]
(NW. England)
Stephen Williams, 19 Thorpe Field, Tirril, Penrith, Cumbria, CA10 2JN 01768 210172
[email protected]
zm is a charity registered in England and Wales (1078673) and Scotland (SCO39167)
www.zambesimission.org
November 2014 - January 2015
“Submit yourselves, then, to God”.
James 4:7a
Our front cover shows Mrs Mercy Mkwezalamba at the Evangelical Bible College
of Malawi (EBCoM). She runs the course for pastors’ wives. She was a pastor’s
wife herself until her husband died just over ten years ago, so she has a very real
insight into the needs of these ladies. She told me that last year “four women
received Christ during these classes – not only this year, but always. Some also
don’t know how to read or write, but leave not only being able to read and write,
but also to prepare a sermon and speak in front of the whole college”.
Mrs Mkwezalamba said that “after their training their spiritual life is not the
same. They are well prepared to serve God. We also encourage them to love
their ministry”. But she also shared, “to be honest, teaching women is not easy!”
We asked her how she managed to achieve such transformation in these women.
Mrs Mkwezalamba says “I think my secret is that I depend on God”.
May the grace and peace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you.
Myles and Ruth MacBean
zm’s founder Joseph Booth coined the phrase “Africa for the African”. This
concept is at the heart of everything zm does today. zm is an “enabling”
organisation, not a “doing” one: we work solely through partnership with national
organisations. These partners share zm’s primary objective - to preach the
gospel and extend and strengthen the church of Jesus Christ. zm’s role is to
serve Christ as equal partners with our brothers and sisters in Christ in Malawi
and Mozambique. Our relationship with our African partners is one of equally
broken individuals before God: walking together on a road of discipleship,
learning from and supporting one another. We earnestly seek to help our fellow
Christians in Malawi in their God-given mandate to make disciples of all nations
and teaching them to obey everything that Jesus commanded.
In this context, Myles and Ruth MacBean were commissioned on 11th October by
their sending church partnership (Great Blakenham Baptist Church and Mickfield
Evangelical Church) as Church Development Partners with zm. They will be
based in Blantyre, Malawi and will be starting their assignment at the beginning
of November. Myles’s main role will be partnering with the leadership of Zambezi
Evangelical Church to support them as they develop their vision and key strategic
initiatives. Ruth will be partnering with the Children For Christ Ministries team
and using her musical gifts to teach students; she is also hoping to make
recordings of Malawian worship songs, and in time to run workshops for the
creation of new Bible-based worship songs in Chichewa.
The leaflet enclosed with Update provides more information about Myles and
Ruth MacBean and their role with zm and our church partners. It also provides
more information about how to support Myles and Ruth through prayer or giving.
ZEC - Summer Conferences
During August ZEC held national
conferences for the Fellowship of
Youth (FoY) in Dombole and the
Chiyanjano Cha Amayi (Women’s
Fellowship) in Mchinji.
The Chiyanjano event was attended
by over 3,200 women from ZEC
churches across Malawi. Their
focus was on “Jesus Christ, the
Light of the World - Truth and Life”.
Later in the month, over 3,650
young people attended the youth
conference. Our Field Director
Simon Chikwana commented, “The
conference was timely for the fact
that the life of the youth is being
challenged by strong winds of antiChrist and liberalism. The teaching
was centred on the word of God,
holiness, discipleship, counselling
and countering peer influence”.
During the conference a strategic
plan was launched for the young
people which included a Biblebased discipleship programme for
every FoY group in the land.
Ladies from ZEC’s Chiyanjano Cha Amayi
(Women’s Fellowship) at Mchinji in August
Young Christians gathered together at the ZEC
National Youth Conference at Dombole
Gospel Cards, Etc
Once again this year zm will benefit from the sale of Christmas
cards and other cards and gifts available from Gospel Cards, etc.
20% of their Christmas card sales and 5% of the sale of other
items will be given to 30 Christian missions, including zm. To date,
we and other societies have received nearly £300,000 in this way.
The gifts are produced to a very high standard and make excellent
presents for children and adults, whilst the cards are perfect for
sending to both Christian and non-Christian family and friends.
See the enclosed leaflet for further details, or if you receive Update
via email, please go to http://www.gospelcardsetc.com to view the
catalogue. Please can you circle zambesi mission at the bottom of
the form if you place an order? Thank you for your support.