Testimony
About us...
Sharyn and I have been married for 28 years, we have 3 sons, 2 daughters-in-law and we are expecting our first grandchild in December.
We were both privileged to grow up in a Christian home and through the teaching at home as well as at Sunday school and church we both gave our lives to the Lord at a fairly young age. Both continuing to grow in the knowledge of our Lord and Saviour as we grew up. We were married in 1989 and lived life in Boksburg (east of Johannesburg), serving the Lord together at Boksburg Baptist Church. In 1999, I started attending The Baptist Theological College in Johannesburg, where I obtained an Honours Degree in Theology, majoring in both pastoral and missions studies. During this time Sharyn did studies in Children’s Ministry. During my four years of study, we both sought the Lord as to where He wanted us to serve Him. We both felt that Africa was where we were being called to and eventually the Lord led us to Samaria Mission, which is a ministry of Christ Baptist church (Polokwane, Limpopo Province, South Africa). My greatest desire in ministry was to come alongside rural churches and help them to grow into God glorifying, growing churches.
We moved to Polokwane to join Samaria Mission in January 2003 and we have continued to serve with Samaria Mission since then. When we first joined the mission I focussed on learning the area of Church Development, spending a large part of my time traveling to the churches that Samaria Mission had helped to plant and build church buildings. Sharyn started to serve as mission secretary at the end of 2004. At the end of 2007, I was appointed as Mission Director of Samaria Mission, during this time I continued to head up the church development area of the ministry. I served as Mission Director until February 2018, I stepped down in order for me to concentrate on church strengthening and especially on ministry on the field. Due to our extensive travels Sharyn is also relinquishing her role as secretary.
Our ministry...
Our ministry takes us to rural Mozambique and Zimbabwe.
In Mozambique; our focus is on teaching pastors and church leaders along the Limpopo corridor, due to the civil war in Mozambique some of these men are semi-literate. Samaria Mission has two teams that go out on a monthly basis, we have 2 training hubs where we spend time teaching these men, our goal is to see them growing in their knowledge of the Word to become faithful men with godly characters who shepherd their people and teach them the Word of God that they have been taught. Sharyn spends each afternoon with some of the key ladies from the church, the goal of teaching these ladies is to ensure that they are able to teach the other women in the church, as well as the children. In the future Sharyn and I will be teaching both training hubs, as other ministry opportunities in Mozambique open up for our colleagues.
In Zimbabwe; we helped start The Chief Shepherd Bible School in Chikombedzi, Zimbabwe in August 2017. I work alongside my colleague, Member Ngobeni and the local Pastor, Simon Vurago (a graduate of Christ Seminary, a ministry of Christ Baptist Church). We are currently half way through the first year of a three year programme. The focus of this Bible School is to teach pastors and church leaders of rural churches, many of these men would be unable to attend any formal training institution, either due to a lack of finances or life commitments. The Chief Shepherd Bible School is a daughter school of Christ Seminary, Polokwane.
It is a huge privilege to be a part of these ministries and we are grateful to the Lord for calling us to work with Samaria Mission and these rural pastors.
And he said to them, "The harvest is plentiful, but the laborers are few. Therefore pray earnestly to the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into his harvest. Luke 10:2 ESV