His Work Among the Luo People Of Kenya Go ... and make disciples of all nations Matthew 28:19
August 1, 1994

Dear family in Christ,

Hello from Kenya! We've just arrived back in Nairobi after 19 days of tooling around Madagascar and trying to gather as much information as possible. Traveling in a foreign third world country where one does not know the language is quite an experience. Doing it with two children, one of them less than a year old in exhausting, but an adventure nevertheless. Now we'll be praying for guidance as we try to sift through the data and make conclusions and decisions regarding the Malagasy people, and our possible future there. Overall, it was a very good trip. The survey report and video sent by Beau Crump (deacon in charge of missions at the Henderson, Texas church of Christ, who made a survey trip to Madagascar last July) were very helpful to us. A hearty thank you to him for all his help is in order. Thank you Mr. Crump! We are still praying for you and for the Henderson church as you launch yourselves into this new work for the Saviour. The Henderson church in Texas has committed themselves to assembing and sending a team of missionaries to Madagascar in 1996. At present, the church of Christ is not established in this country.

Our trip started out a bit rocky. Imagine yourself entering a country where you have no personal contacts and are not part of a touring group, and where you don't speak the language. Very very little English is spoken in Madagascar. Malagasy and French are the national languages. We had written to the Scripture Union (an organization dedicated to teaching the Bible to the Malagasy people) and received no reply from them even up to the day we were flying out. We attempted to telephone them from Nairobi and were finally successful after several hours of persistant calling (the phone system in Madagascar is worse than the system in Kenya, if you can imagine that!). The phone call left us even more unsure of what we would find upon reaching Tana. They (the Scripture Union), as it turned out, misunderstood the phone call and were not at the airport to meet us when we arrived at 11:30 at night. But before we even realized our predicament (the possibility of spending the night in a strange airport with two hildren), a very thoughtful Baptist missionary who lives in Tana whisked us out of the airport, took us to Le Flambeau (the Scripture Union guest house), woke them out of bed, and had us settled by 12:30. Emilien, the director was out of town, and we never did get to meet him, but his assistant Jose and his wife were very helpful. They drove us right into Tana the next day and introduced us to the travel agent that the Scripture Union normally uses. That travel agent, very quickly found us a driver and interpreter for the duration of the visit. Stacy found (with her 17 year old French) that she could understand almost all that she was hearing, but she was unable to respond in French. The travel agent found us very reliable people.

We had the opportunity to visit Tamatave (a coastal town, and center for the Betsimsaraka tribe of people) for two days. We spent three days on Ile. Ste. Marie (a remote island, also home of 15,000 Betsimsaraka people, and where hardly a vehicle exists. A missionary with a bicycle could conceivably reach all these people in one day. They live all along a 25 mile narrow stretch of coast and the rest of the island in uninhabited natural rain forest.). Three days in Antsirabe (Madagascar's claim of an industrial town. We saw two creameries and a beer factory.), and the surrounding area. And the remaining time, we were in Tana (short for Antananarivo and capital city of Madagascar, home of 1.2 million people) . We were very disappointed in that we were unable to go all the way to Tulear (extreme southern town in Madagascar). We just didn't have time. Especially because we felt we needed to be in Tana on Sunday the 17th to attend an interdenominational missionary fellowship so that we could gather info. from Americans actually working in the country.

If you like, we will be happy to send you a copy of our detailed report that we will send to our sponsoring church. We must remind you though, that at this point we are still not at the decision making stage. This next month, we will report what we found in Madagascar. Then in November, we plan to survey Burkina Faso. After that, we will be praying a lot, making comparision studies of the four countries (Tanzania, Namibia, Madagascar, and Burkina Faso) and then make a decision about our future. We can give you some surface conclusions though. There are about five things that struck us about Madagascar and the Malagasy people. 1.) Madagascar is a vast country. Vaster than we even realized. Most of it is unaccessible by road. (Both the Missionary Aviation Fellowship and the Heliomission organizations are operating in Madagascar. They will fly missionaries to and from remote or unaccessable areas for a very reasonable fee.) A twenty family missionary team could not reach all the Malagasy people. .) There are many different tribes of Malagasy (18 tribes to be exact) but there are two major types of Malagasy. They are the city Malagasy, and the bush Malagasy and they don't relate much with each other. Our interpreter was very much a city Malagasy. She was unable to relate much to us about the bush Malagasy and admitted that she herself did not understand them. 3.) The city of Tana is especially carved up by denominational christianity. When the church of Christ enters Tana, they will be playing the Aquila and Priscilla roles (teaching the way "more correctly"). There are several areas of bush Malagasy who are unchurched. Missionaries entering there would begin by teaching Christ, his death and resurrection. 4.) It is our opinion that almost no Malagasy (city or bush) have heard a clear representation of the gospel. There is a crying need for the gospel (as the Bible teaches) to be taken there. We applaud the Henderson church for taking on this work. And we pray for them daily in their eforts. And 5.) It is our opinion, and our interpreter among others vehemently amened it, that a mission team would first have to learn Malagasy in order to work anywhere in this country. French, would not be enough, and would not be the "heart" language of it's people.

Now, here's the big news! We were able to find all three of the WBS contacts that were sent to us by the Henderson church. Two of them were baptized into Christ on July 19th. We praise God for that experience and opportunity. Must admit, we were a bit reluctant at first, what with not knowing the people at all, and with being totally out of our element. Not to mention the fact that we had some reservations concerning how to approach them. We also were unsure about baptizing them and then leaving them without a support group, but Hanitra Rakotomalala and Tsiriharivony Raharinjatovo were determined to be baptized and seemed to really understand the meaning of baptism. Tsiriharivony even came to the guesthouse where we were staying along with her mother at 7:00am complete with her change of clothes, and that even before we met her face to face. Of course, both of them will need further teaching. We encouraged them in the idea that they are making a lifelong commitment to Christ and his teachings. An we gave them each others address and encouraged them to try to do some Bible studying together. Lygie Razafintsalama, the third WBS contact, was a little reluctant to give up the idea of a baptism of sprinkling. She did say, however, that she desired to study with someone who could teach her more about the Bible. She may come around yet. Now, we pray daily for these three souls out of a country of 12 million, who have taken the first tentative steps to being Christlike. I'm sure we peaked the curiosity of our driver and interpreter too. Who knows? Maybe they will be future Christians someday.

I would be more than willing to make more trips to Madagascar over the next two years, in order to maintain what has been started there. We feel a real need for those contacts to be reached again and supported in their efforts as new Christians. My interpreter and driver were more than willing to help again, and I know where to find these three women. Please continue to pray for our new Malagasy sisters in Christ, and remember their need for further teaching in the interim (between now and the time a team will enter Madagascar in 1996).

That's it, literally in a nutshell! We have a ton of information to sift through and lots of praying to do. We are praying for you. Let us know if there is anything else we can do for you. More detailed report coming soon.

Yours in Christ,
 

Barry