Then Jesus came to them and said, "All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age." Matthew 28:18-20
In America we tend to think of the value of an education strictly in monetary terms. What do we have to spend to get that education and what kind of job can we get with that education and what will we make? This thinking even comes through in our games. My children have often played the game of Life. The first decision that a player has to make is whether one is going to go to college or start working right away. Certainly education does play a big role monetarily, whether it increases our earning power or puts us deeply in debt. However, Jesus' words showed that education goes far beyond money, indeed it can translate into freedom and life! This is not only so for spiritual education but also for the core of secular education, what we used to call the 3 Rs (reading, writing and 'rithmatic). Ignorance of how to read and write will consign one to a life of ignorance and poverty. Ignorance (or rejection) of Jesus' words, which are life, consigns one to spiritual darkness, slavery and death. Jesus commanded that His disciples go and teach. We tend to focus on the "go" and the "make disciples", and not as much on the "teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you". I think that is because the going and the making disciples (evangelism) makes for exciting or interesting newsletters while teaching is a long, slow, patient process. All of this takes money, but the teaching really needs long term support because it is a long process. Zion Bible College could really use some more support right now and that is what I'm blogging about here - what is the value to you of helping educate others to help them be free?
Education is something that Christians, historically, have been passionate about and been the pioneers in, because of Jesus' words. The Sunday School movement began in 1781 in Gloucester, England, when Robert Raikes, editor of the Gloucester Journal, saw the need for education fir the children of factory workers in order to prevent them from descending into a life of crime and so they could learn the Bible. Factory workers worked 6 days a week and their children worked alongside them, up to 13 hours a day. Sunday was their only day off and Mr. Raikes observed the children running around wild and committing petty crimes, This motivated him to organize a class on Sunday morning and use the Bible as the reading text.
This leads to Zion Bible College (ZBC) here in Swaziland. In 1902 a missionary named Daniel Bryant came from the Christian Catholic Church in Zion, Illinois and began evangelizing among the Zulus in Natal Province, South Africa. Daniel was only able to work among the Zulus for a few years, but during that time he led about 5,000 people to the Lord. Trouble in his home church and loss of funding led to Daniel being recalled to the U.S.A. The amaZioni (also known as Zionists), as they called themselves, continued to evangelize and spread the message. A big problem though, was that they didn't really have access to the Bible in their language and they didn't have access to theological training. Therefore, in time, the amaZioni became syncretist, mixing elements of Christianity with traditional African religion, and continued to spread their message throughout southern Africa. Zionists were viewed by traditional Christian denominations in much the same way as the Jews of Jesus' day viewed Samaritans. The amaZioni were left as spiritual orphans, living in spiritual darkness. Thankfully God doesn't forget people or write them off. He stirred a hunger among some of the Zionists to begin reading the Bible and to realize that what they believed didn't line up with the Bible. In the late 1980's, some of the Zionists wrote to the church in Zion, asking them to send Bible teachers. The church in Zion partnered with TEAM (The Evangelical Alliance Mission), a long standing mission agency, to reach the Zionists. They realized that the best way to reach the Zionists and bring them to embrace all of Jesus' teaching was to provide inexpensive, readily accessible, Bible education to pastors and other church leaders. The work began in South Africa and spread to Swaziland with the creation of ZBC in Swaziland in 2004.
The mission of ZBC of Swaziland is to prepare and equip a new generation of leaders, within the amaZioni churches, who will stand against the flow of culture to embrace the pure gospel of Jesus Christ (taken directly from Zion Bible College of Swaziland Statement of Faith). To do this we ask prospective groups to find a place we can use for learning and to organize at least 25 students in the area who are interested, and we will send a teaching team to organize a class. Each class meets 1 day a month in their location and attends class for 7 hours (6 hours of classes plus breaks). Today we have around 30 classes meeting all over Swaziland, including some of the prisons. ZBC has about 1,400 students registered and we average 1,000 in attendance each month. We have 8 main teachers and 4 new teachers in training as well as a part time office staff of 3 to handle all these students. Two of the teachers (Brett and myself) and one of the staff (Brett's wife, Evelyn) are missionaries while all the rest are Swazis. The Swazi staff are paid from ZBC funds and student fees. ZBC has worked hard to keep costs low so that as many people as possible can attend and learn a lot of what Jesus commanded (the Bible). It costs ZBC about $4,000 (E56,000) a month to operate and teach all of our classes. For a long time there were supporters in the States who helped with the operational costs and so we kept the student fees really low (E20 which is about $1.43 per student per month). Now those supporters can no longer help. ZBC is raising student fees to E40 ($2.86) per student per month beginning in August. That means we will be collecting around E40,000 ($2,860) per month in student fees. While $1.43 to $2.86 (E20 - E40) is insignificant to most Americans, please keep in mind that many of our students make around E1,000 ($71) a month and have to use that to pay for everything. Many of our students don't even make that much and cannot afford the increase. In addition our students in the prison classes can't pay anything. We don't want to turn any students away and we have been asked to expand our prison classes from 3 to 6 or more. For most of our students this is their only option to attend a Bible college and learn the Bible. We have already had to close a couple of our classes due to the loss of support and when these students were told, some of them cried.
So ZBC is creating a scholarship fund to create an opportunity for everyone who wants to, to be able to attend the college. Support is needed to offset the difference between the cost of teaching each student each day (E56 or $4), and the fees that the great majority of our students can afford (now E40 or $2.86). We do not want to turn away any students or close any classes due to lack of funds. Please pray for ZBC and we all appreciate your consideration of support for the scholarship fund. Financial support can be directed to TEAM at:
https://secure2.convio.net/team/site/SPageServer?pagename=donatenow&did=6843
Any support given at the link above will go only to ZBC. For more information about Zion Bible College in Swaziland you can look us up on the Web at this link:
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