God Moving At Maranatha

A Vision to Reach the World

I recently spoke by Zoom with our missionaries in Uganda, Mike and Marianne Botting. I was inspired by their God-sized vision for missions.  Our missionaries don’t just want to reach Uganda with the Good News of Christ. They want to reach Uganda in order to reach the whole world.

The Botting’s vision hasn’t always been this big. Their original goal was to reach the Acholi people in Northern Uganda. But then, God used a providential accident to expand their thinking. Their house burned down, and their mission organization told them to use the tragedy to take a fresh look at their mission.

As they sought the Lord, their dreams began to grow. They wondered: What if God wants to use the Acholi people to reach people from other tribes? When they shared this possibility with their ministry team, the group grew excited.

But God wasn’t done expanding their vision.  They attended a conference that challenged them to consider Uganda’s place in reaching the world. They learned that by the year 2060, 42% of the world’s evangelicals are expected to reside in Sub-Saharan Africa. That is nearly half of the world’s evangelicals! What a tragedy it would be if this significant segment of the church failed play their part in sending missionaries to the world’s over 7,000 unreached people groups! It was this thought that catalyzed the worldwide vision the Botting’s have today.

While this dream is exciting for our missionaries, at the same time it gives them pause. There is a battle raging over the soul of the African church as many false gospels, particularly the prosperity gospel, circulate around the continent. The outcome of this battle will determine the answer to the question: “Which gospel will Africa bring to the nations?”  So, along with their new vision for mission mobilization, this missionary couple has recommitted themselves to their core focus which is disciple-making.

Looking back on their vision-expanding experience of recent years, Marianne says: “It took a bush fire burning down our house to light the fire for the nations in our hearts.” Please pray for Mike and Marianne.  If you want to support their ministry, there are two projects that especially need funding: the Jesus Film discipleship ministry and the School Discipleship ministry.  Contributions can be made through the church. If you write a cheque, it should be made out to Maranatha and earmarked for the Bottings, indicating specifically the name of the project you are supporting.

– Pastor Tom