John Rowse and Moses’ email update April 2023

Greetings from me and my family.

Thank You

Many, many thanks to God for an unknown person’s surprise gift of A$1,500 which came to twenty thousand Kwacha. God answered our prayer as we have always prayed to God for some start-up capital for a poultry project. With this money, we have started by putting up a chicken coop behind our house. If everything goes well, the coop should be ready for chicks within the next two weeks. This will very much improve our family livelihood once it commences. As a family, we are very much humbled by this gesture.

Kay is about to go back for another attachment for three weeks at the General Hospital in Kasama after which she will be sent for further attachments to some Rural Health Centre for eight more weeks before she comes back to the campus to write an examination for the second semester of her first year training.

A Funeral & A Great Opportunity

The funeral of the late, Church Elder Clement Kipumbu, created an opportunity for me to preach the gospel of grace on ZNBC TV for free. Clement died in a road traffic accident in Iringa over 600 km north of Isoka into Tanzania. I travelled to Iringa to bring the body back to Zambia together with his brother who also travelled from Mufulira on the Copperbelt. During the funeral that was conducted at Chilenje Evangelical Church, I was approached by one of the senior officers from ZNBC who attending the funeral. He told me that he had been following my weekly Bemba radio programmes, and that he has been learning a lot about salvation by grace alone.

On asking him about how the programme has impacted his life, Nortrick said that at first he was confused. It was the first time he had heard it but after learning more from me, he has come to understand what it means to be saved by faith apart from the obedience of the Law. Nortrick who had met me for the first time asked me to come and do a 20 minute TV Preaching program and a 25 minute radio programme the following day. This meant that I would miss the free transport scheduled to take the mourners back to Isoka the following day. Thankfully, I was able to find my way back home because of this extra money that came to me. The message attracted a lot of attention from viewers and listeners across the country. Up to now I have continued receiving calls from listeners who are inquiring about how they can receive the gift of salvation.

SDA Interest and Questions

Most of the callers are from the SDA church. One of them, an Elder in the same church called me from Kitwe. He asked me whether or not the Law of God, particularly the ten commandments, has been abolished. He also raised Revelation 12:17 and 14:12 and accused me of being an agent of the enemy of the church whose members are obeying the Law of God. He was fuming with anger when he called. I first tried to calm down. Then I asked him to tell me if he himself had obeyed the whole law. To my surprise he answered in the affirmative. I asked him whether or not he was lying by answering me that way and he said, no. I asked him who he was comparing himself with in regard to perfection in obeying the law, his fellow human beings or Jesus? He said that no human being can compare themselves with Jesus because he is perfect. Then I asked him to confirm with me that he is not perfect but Jesus is. From there the Elder became interested in hearing more. He found himself to be a sinner who deserves to be punished in hell because he is not perfectly obeying the law of God. Then I discussed the gospel with him which he claimed to have accepted. But I discovered that he was still trusting in his obedience to the law when he said that a true believer who committed suicide would go to hell. We will continue the discussion after he has done more research. Pray that he will come back to me.

Training Leaders

Our church in Isoka has continued to enjoy the benefits of the radio programmes. We have continued to meet more new people every Sunday who are receiving the gospel. Because of this we have introduced cell groups that are providing opportunities for the listeners in the community to freely come and hear more about the gospel of grace, especially those who find it difficult to come to our church for various reasons. I have continued empowering the five key leaders in the church with teaching on salvation. These are Webby, Emmanuel, Eugene, Steve and Joel. They in turn are using the same teaching to help the community members through their cell groups. We meet every Tuesday at 5:00 pm. The youth are also excited about the evangelism seminar that I will conduct with them during the Easter Weekend. I will take them out to practise evangelism on Easter Saturday. They will go out with the Big question, “What happens to a true believer who commits suicide?”. The youth in Zambia have been spoiled by the false gospel of prosperity. Our prayer is that the youth in our church will slowly begin to impact their fellow youth in the community and beyond with the true gospel.

Pastors and Grace

As a result of the teaching on ISO Community Radio, I had an opportunity to discuss with over 70 pastors and other church leaders during a meeting. Pastor Kennedy Mayuka stood up and said that he was neutral about whether a genuine believer can lose salvation or not. He also indicated that he was open and willing to learn. “Is what Pastor Makanta teaches on the radio the truth or not? Can someone convince me with Scripture?” he said. The Pastors were only giving their church views and not the Biblical position. Then I stood and challenged everyone to stop leaning on their own understanding and allow the Bible to reveal the truth about the subject. I then led them into the Word of God to find the truth from there. Most of the pastors were convinced and were open to learn more. After the meeting I was approached by two pastors from Pentecostal Churches. They requested that I go and preach at their conferences which they want to hold soon after the rains have stopped. They are just waiting to meet and set dates for the conferences, then a formal invitation letter will be written to me. However it’s unfortunate that there were still some pastors who are opposed to the truth about the gospel. One of them, a bishop, went and told the other pastor who was convinced, that he shouldn’t believe what I teach because that is just my own way of interpreting the Scriptures and that he should stick to what he believes.

My brother, Edward, in Chambishi is requesting me to include them on the programme when you come to Zambia. I told him to organise an inter-denominational leaders seminar for three days through the Pastor’s fellowship. He will get back to me as soon as they discuss the matter as pastors.

We are praying for you and your family. Please pass my regards to Bob, Gary and all the brothers and sisters who are praying for us.

Pass my love on to Kay and children.

Bye for now.
Moses.