{"id":638,"date":"2013-09-02T06:21:31","date_gmt":"2013-09-02T06:21:31","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.wordproject.org\/news\/?p=638"},"modified":"2017-01-26T22:13:06","modified_gmt":"2017-01-26T22:13:06","slug":"left-overs-from-mozambique","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wordfree.net\/news2\/?p=638","title":{"rendered":"Thoughts"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>by Jorge<\/p>\n<p>As we stopped at a village in the bush in the North of Mozambique&#8230; as we went out of the car to relax, we pulled out our soccer ball and kicked it around a bit until several villager children gathered around us to play too&#8230; As I watched their joy I thought about the approach of church denomination missions in Africa and how it needs to change&#8230;<\/p>\n<div id=\"attachment_664\" style=\"width: 346px\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\"><a href=\"https:\/\/wordfree.net\/news2\/wp-content\/uploads\/ball_village.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-664\" class=\" wp-image-664 \" src=\"https:\/\/wordfree.net\/news2\/wp-content\/uploads\/ball_village-600x337.jpg\" alt=\"Playing ball\" width=\"336\" height=\"189\" srcset=\"https:\/\/wordfree.net\/news2\/wp-content\/uploads\/ball_village-600x337.jpg 600w, https:\/\/wordfree.net\/news2\/wp-content\/uploads\/ball_village-500x281.jpg 500w, https:\/\/wordfree.net\/news2\/wp-content\/uploads\/ball_village.jpg 800w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 336px) 100vw, 336px\" \/><\/a><p id=\"caption-attachment-664\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Playingball<\/p><\/div>\n<p>.<br \/>\nimagine coming to Africa to promote Barcelona or Manchester United&#8230; and encourage people to attend or watch their games, or opening branches and appeal for membership to these clubs &#8230;. rather than bringing the &#8220;ball&#8221; and teach and encourage the practice of the &#8220;sport&#8221; &#8211; where everyone can benefit from the activity \u00a0and exercise&#8230; well, I \u00a0felt quite strong about this &#8211; the church denominational approach to evangelization in Africa [and maybe in other parts of the world] has been more like instituting the club and making members&#8230; creating spectators [and division or club-ism] rather than bringing the ball [the Bible?] and letting people enjoy it, use It for their fun and recreation, health, strength and unity &#8211; also guidance, light, and most of all Salvation in Jesus Christ.\u00a0(the analogy is lost here but nevertheless the truth worth mentioning)<\/p>\n<div id=\"attachment_665\" style=\"width: 346px\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\"><a href=\"https:\/\/wordfree.net\/news2\/wp-content\/uploads\/gloria-school-gifts-mozambique.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-665\" class=\" wp-image-665 \" src=\"https:\/\/wordfree.net\/news2\/wp-content\/uploads\/gloria-school-gifts-mozambique-600x337.jpg\" alt=\"Village in Mozambique\" width=\"336\" height=\"189\" srcset=\"https:\/\/wordfree.net\/news2\/wp-content\/uploads\/gloria-school-gifts-mozambique-600x337.jpg 600w, https:\/\/wordfree.net\/news2\/wp-content\/uploads\/gloria-school-gifts-mozambique-500x281.jpg 500w, https:\/\/wordfree.net\/news2\/wp-content\/uploads\/gloria-school-gifts-mozambique.jpg 800w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 336px) 100vw, 336px\" \/><\/a><p id=\"caption-attachment-665\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">village in Mozambique<\/p><\/div>\n<p>The point is that I think the Christian life is worth living and worth living all the way&#8230; not half way, with some visits to the church on Sunday and sometimes only for weddings and ceremonies &#8230; and I do believe the \u00a0central point, the focus of the Christian life is the Word of God&#8230;without It there is no life. I feel<br \/>\nthat Christians, by and large, promote the denomination and that needs to change.\u00a0The Christian should promote Christ, His Word, not a particular denomination, whatever that may be, anywhere, anytime and all the time\u2026 Every Christian has been given that challenge. &#8220;And I if I be lifted up from the earth will draw all men unto me\u2026.&#8221;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>by Jorge As we stopped at a village in the bush in the North of Mozambique&#8230; as we went out of the car to relax, we pulled out our soccer ball and kicked it around a bit until several villager &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/wordfree.net\/news2\/?p=638\">Continue reading <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-638","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-wordproject_news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordfree.net\/news2\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/638","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordfree.net\/news2\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordfree.net\/news2\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordfree.net\/news2\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordfree.net\/news2\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=638"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/wordfree.net\/news2\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/638\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3149,"href":"https:\/\/wordfree.net\/news2\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/638\/revisions\/3149"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordfree.net\/news2\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=638"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordfree.net\/news2\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=638"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordfree.net\/news2\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=638"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}