A One-Day Church
The Gratitude Church
(image) Left: BETTER THAN NOTHING: Before Maranatha Volunteers, members in Kibeto, Angola, used the best avaliable materials to build a house of worship.
(image) Right: ROUGH ROAD: Materials for the church building in Kibeto had to be transported slowly and carefully.
How many people does it take to make a church a church?
Ask church elder Jos? Manuel. “It only takes two to make a congregation, but at least 30 or 40 would be much better. But if you do not have a proper building, it’s hard to keep the believers believing!”
Manuel’s church is just beyond a baobab forest in the hillside village of Kibeto, Angola. There’s been a congregation of believers in Kibeto for about 25 years. Sometimes the group is small, and at other times it has grown to a “more respectable” 30 or 40 members. That’s when they moved from under the giant baobab tree into their new church.
They built the church themselves: the walls, the roof, the pews, and the pulpit.
Then the winds came, blowing away the roof and much of the wall. After members reinforced the wall, the hot Angola sun made the worshippers feel like “baked potatoes” inside the steel walls. One by one they slipped away to the shade of the baobab tree.
Meanwhile, far away in Ecuador, Adventists were celebrating Maranatha’s successful completion of more than 220 church buildings. They came to two large Sabbath celebrations, one in Quito and the other in Guayaquil.
“We have received so much,” said the members, “that we want to give our best to God, and ask Him to use our gifts to build a church somewhere else in the world.”
The members in Ecuador sold crops, goats, and many possessions of great personal value. Those offerings were just enough to fund the cost of a One-Day Church with “nonbaking” cement-block walls, real wooden pews, and a “nonflying” roof for the congregation in Kibeto.
Kibeto’s new church will truly be the Gratitude Church. And it will fill rapidly!
ASI and Maranatha Volunteers International fund and facilitate One-Day Church and One-Day School projects. Since 2009, more than 1,600 One-Day buildings have been built around the world. These stories come from Maranatha storyteller Dick Duerksen.
