Power to Forgive

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Dear friends,

Last week our network of facilitators for the Healing Hearts, Transforming Nations (HHTN) workshop gathered to share how we saw God at work through the workshops in 2023 and to pray together for God’s work of healing and reconciliation in South Sudan. As I (Kristi) looked around the room of people who have been trained within the last couple of years I was humbled and grateful for the gift of working together in pursuit of helping people to know and experience the true life that Jesus came to give us. Several people shared about the deep divisions and mistrust that they encountered between clans or communities, or even within families. But in each workshop, they saw evidence of the Holy Spirit bringing freedom and healing from those wounds and divisions and enabling people to forgive as they looked deeply at the love and forgiveness of God. Raphael reflected that if you tell someone to forgive, they cannot accept it, as forgiveness is so difficult and counter to the culture. But when people see from God’s Word the love and forgiveness that God has for us, they find the strength to forgive.

[ngg src="galleries" ids="1217" display="pro_horizontal_filmstrip" show_captions="1"]The South Sudan Presbyterian Evangelical Church (SSPEC) held a workshop last year in a camp for displaced people near Juba. Abdon, who was trained in 2023, helped to facilitate that workshop. It was his first time entering this huge camp that holds more than 40,000 people, although it sits just on the edge of Juba. He was impressed at how committed and eager the people were to learn, arriving early and engaging with the material. On the final day of the workshop, one man shared that he had been in a deep conflict with his brother and was about to kill him. Because of the teachings in the workshop, he decided to forgive his brother and committed to resolving the conflict. Abdon, who comes from the Shilluk community, shared that it was also meaningful for him to hear one woman confess the wrongs that the Nuer community has done to the Shilluk community and ask for forgiveness. Most of the people in the camp are Nuer, so this showed the deep work God had done in this woman to give her the heart and courage to make this confession.

Our network of facilitators prayed together for God to continue to provide opportunities and resources this year for doing workshops and for sharing this message of healing and reconciliation. As South Sudan prepares for elections in December, we recognize that these workshops are an important means of helping people to heal from the wounds and divisions of the past and to come together as one nation. To that end, SSPEC is planning to bring together pastors and leaders from rural areas for a training in conflict mediation and peacebuilding as well as going through the HHTN workshop. We pray that as they come together for this time of training, they will gain vision and skills to help resolve conflicts and help people experience God’s love and healing from their inner wounds.

Many churches in Juba celebrate baptisms during the Christmas season, and it was a gift for us to be able to participate with a few congregations as people celebrated that sign of new life. On Christmas day, we worshipped with a small congregation that is just a few years old, but there were more than 30 children, youth and adults who were baptized that day. The joy and celebration were incredible! Bob shared more reflections and pictures from that day on our blog which you can find here: https://bobandkristi.blogspot.com/2024/01/heaven-came-down-to-earth.html.

In early January, we celebrated the opening of SSPEC’s Bible School, called the Juba Evangelical Bible School. This school provides practical training for ministry in the church and a foundation of theology for people who cannot meet the academic requirements of Nile Theological College or who are working other jobs. They have a class of about 20 people who are meeting for evening classes at the church office. SSPEC also bought land at the edge of Juba, and they hope to build classrooms and a dormitory this year for the Bible school if God provides the funding.

NTC has started their semester and Bob is teaching contextual theology this year. He was able to attend a one-week seminar in Nairobi in January on “Trends in African Theology” and was grateful for the rich learning and meaningful connections with doctoral students from all over Africa. Bob is also continuing his doctoral research this year with interviews for his final case study.

When we returned to South Sudan in December, our colleagues here were grateful to hear of the prayers and the interest in South Sudan among the churches and friends whom we visited. Please continue to pray for God to bring healing and peace to people in this land of South Sudan, including more than 400,000 newcomers who have fled the ongoing war in Sudan and are struggling to survive in South Sudan. Your prayers and financial support are vital to our accompaniment of partners here, and we are grateful to you for joining us. We know that Jesus, who came to bring the good news of salvation into the suffering and oppression of our world 2,000 years ago, continues to be our source of hope and life in our broken world today.

By God’s mercy,

Bob and Kristi