First One Day Church in Bunia

First One Day Church in the Far Eastern Province of the Congo

The Adventist message reached the city of Bunia in 1954, when it was just a small village. Up to the beginning of this year, there was only 279 members attending the church every Sabbath. This is an extremely slow growth (about 5 members each year). In April this year, CFM started the program of training members to reach people for Jesus. Thirty members were involved in training. Mzee Morris was among those trained. After the training, he was sent to a small town called Centrale near Bunia city. The family was happy to leave their home village to preach the Three Angels Message to a dark town.
In one months time, Morris and his wife were able to visit all homes sharing tracts and study guides with people going from house to house. Most of the villagers believed the Bible messages. The CFM evangelism team was convinced that the town was ready for the harvest. The date for an evangelistic series was set.  Many people attended the meetings each evening. However only 3 people were baptized. We were amazed with this small result. We did not expect so few people would be baptized. It was below the expectation. After talking to people we found the reason. It was because there was no meeting place. The plan was made to buy a plot to build a church.  Finally, the first One Day Church was erected in Bunia. That same week, six people were baptized.
Today, we have 14 baptized members and 14 are ready for baptism. It is amazing to see how fast the Centrale Company is growing! We pray that the Lord will open the way for us to build more churches in this troubled area of Eastern Congo.
Written by Pastor Msafiri Mtenzi, Evangelism and Church Planters Coordinator