Africa – Nandere eastern Uganda church plant, May 2025 – June 8, 2025

After a long time of preparation, including fasting and prayer, Martin and the Harvest Vision Africa ministry coordinated the planting of a new church family in Nandere in eastern Uganda. Pr. Margaret who shepherds the Nansanga church family in that area was led by the Lord to start a church family in Nandere, so Martin began to coordinate that effort which included constructing a place for their fellowship. This is the notes he sent us about their mission. Another pastor will help shepherd the Nansanga family and Margaret will spend the majority of her time for four months preparing the leaders of the new church and others will help to disciple the new believers.

These are the notes that Martin shared from the journey. Because of the demonic presence that existed in the community – please notice the importance of the prayer and “fasting” that was needed.  

“The mission team comprised 54 ministers, both male and female, from different branches of our ministry. We had a place where we all gathered as our mission station. This is where we pray, eat, plan, and we go to sleep in different rooms, huts, etc.Every day, we all woke up around 4 a.m., got ready, and walked to the crusade ground where we prayed in the field from 5 am to 6 am.But 4 people stayed back at the mission station to prepare breakfast for us all. After early morning.prayer we walk back to our place of residence, bath, and get ready to face the day.By 8 a.m., we all gather at our mission station, have our simple breakfast of tea and peanuts, pray together again and divide ourselves into groups of six and walk into the village. The people of Nandere speak a different language from most the team members, but all the same, they understand Luganda, the language widely spoken in Uganda.The team goes to the homes, gardens, roads, the river, and anywhere they can find people and share the good news, health the sick, and cast out demons. Whoever believes is led to confession. As the team is out preaching, the intercessors and myself remained at the mission station, praying and covering them in prayer. Part of the group also remains back to prepare lunch.   By 1 p.m., all ministers return to the mission base. We give reports of our outreach,  share lunch rest, and get ready for out door crusade in the small market in Nandere village.By 3pm, all our sound equipment is set, and  by 4pm the singers begin sing praises and once the sound of music rings in the village, people begin to gather at the market join in dancing and praising God. A few people share their faith and testimony and then comes the evangelist to preach to the crowd already gathered. This ends with altar calls for salvation, healing the sick, casting out demons, and all that God leads the evangelist to do.In most cases, I don't preach in the crusade because I have raised evangelists, so I let them do the work.This week, we had two preachers for the evening crusade: Ivan Obbo and Prossy Amony.By 8 pm, the evening campaign is over, we walk back to our mission base, share a late dinner together, and go rest in our various rooms.The building was completed on Thursday. Teams going everywhere in Nandere to win souls.The next day, the same is done.The total number of those who confessed the Lord Jesus as their savior from door-to-door ministry and evening crusade on all the days of ministry was 507 people.First Sunday service in our new building. The children had their service behind the church building under a mango tree shade since the building was not sufficient for adults and children.Of the 507 who received Jesus, 85 of them came for their first church service on May 25th. Glory to God!!!!When we were praying for the mission, there was a lot of opposition, but the Lord showed us great victory through visions. Surely, this came to pass.Now, in Nandere, there has been great darkness spiritually. There is an ancestral worship called "Lubuya" it has four priests currently. They have had this ancestral worship for over 70 years.Usually, the presiding priest dies, the spirits select one member of the tribe to succeed the deceased one.The current priest is the 9th one since this worship started. The priest has three other elders to support him.  These four are the major witches in the tribe and people come to them to consult spirits.The first day of our evening crusade, the current chief priest (witch) passed by the field.  These priests wear neither clothes nor shoes. The spirits restrict them to wearing only animal skin all their life and keep dreadlocks. This makes them easily identifiable in the community.Also they cannot live in a modern house. They live only in mud huts.So, on the fourth day of the mission, I was feeling sickly. I prayed and went to rest in the afternoon but sent three of our ministers to the home of the chief priest to preach to him. God is so merciful!!. This man received the three ministers listened to them even though he could not receive Jesus, but his children did. He has 4 wives, and two of them gave their lives to Jesus and their kids. In total, 7 people came to Christ in his home. The children came to church on Sunday.The man in the goat skin is the current chief witch.The team is praying for the witch and family.On Saturday early morning, I returned to Kampala and allowed the team to complete the work , do the first service, and water baptism after the service.So after the Sunday service in which 85 of the new believers attended, they were taken to the river for baptism.We baptised 51 new believers, including 5 children of the chief witch.Interestingly, the children and the wives of the witch wear normal clothes, but their father is restricted by demons not to.Since there is limited means of transport in the village, we hired a goods truck and took the new believers to the river for baptism, where 51 were baptised.This whole week, being the second week, we sent two ministers from Kampala to hold evening meetings daily in the New church premises and asked the community to come and receive prayer and new believers' teachings. We know that many more will come to Christ, especially those who couldn't come out in the public for fear of being persecuted by their Muslim friends or family.We are faced with one good problem. A young man called Bakari from a muslim got born again. His family heard it, and the next day, they disowned him and asked him to leave their family land. We have nowhere to put him. He determined to follow Jesus.We are very grateful to the Lord for the privilege of being His co- workers. Thank you very much, Blackberry Church, for working with us to expand the kingdom. We are praying for the next church plant the last week of August this year.General photo of all the missionaries that travelled with me to NanderePart of our team was invited to a nearby primary school. They preached to the children, and 56 of them prayed salvation prayer. Two teachers also received Jesus and were among those who came for our first Sunday service.We caught up with one of three elders that support the chief witch. He was preached to, but he was more resistant to the gospel. We are praying all these four men will come to Christ.In our first Sunday service: 7 souls are praying for salvation. Glory to God.”