Trip to Mozambique July 2013

The day of our trip arrived. We traveled: Adaia & Jessica from Brooklyn, NY. as representatives of the Church Edén. Pastor Erwin & Estela from First Baptist Church of Passaic, NJ.

Here in Washington D.C. before check in. At my left pastor Erwin, his wife Estela and then Jessica.

Here in Ethiopia waiting for a connection flight to continue with our trip. From left to right: Adaia, Jessica & Estela.

 Jessica's experience:

 

 Adaia's experience:

     

 

Pastor Erwin preaching with visual demostrations

Erwin giving away Bibles to local leaders.

Children showing their production.

Countdown for our trip to Mozambique

Dear friends of “We Love Mozambique”:

We want to say thanks for all who showed your appreciation and affection regarding the dinner show on March 16. 

You can see the video of: "We Love Mozambique Dinner Show":

We started the countdown for our trip to Mozambique. We’ll go on July 3^rd, as a team of 5. We ask for your prayers, that we may be a blessing to the local people: Adaia Elizabeth Henriquez and Jessica Maldonado from Brooklyn; Erwin Izeppi, Estela Izeppi and myself, Daniel Martin from Passaic. Juan Carlos Fioretti from Argentina is joining us there and is planning to stay for 3 months.

We will be visiting several churches and connecting with several projects. Among them are:

• Medicine Development Project, ANAMED.

• The Infants Nutrition Project.

• A non for profit association for orphans.

• A preschool, ESPANOR.

• Translation of the Bible in the Takuani language.

• Production and promotion of music and videos.

• Bibles for Mozambique.

• Jesus Film.

• Leadership Training Program SEAN (Study by Extension for All Nations).

We will be holding conferences on family, children, marriage, and leadership in various communities.

We will be taking glasses, musical instruments, speakers, laptops, baby clothes, projectors and DVD players for the Jesus film. Do not start gathering anything without notifying us, because we have limited space and want to optimize the available space.

We need your money donation to buy:

• 2 motorcycles ($ 1,556 each) for pastors Massamba and Goncalves. Both have great responsibilities and are ministering to congregations more than 60 miles far from each other.

• 2 power generators to project the Jesus film ($ 450 each).

• Reconstruction of precarious houses made of mud and straw for widows and orphans ($ 106 each).

·        3 projectors for the Jesus Film ($350 each).

• Bicycles for pastors and community leaders ($ 116 each)

• Registration for 1 year, primary school ($ 50 each).

• Registration for High School, 1 year ($ 106 each).

• Mosquito nets to prevent malaria ($ 5.3 each).

• Blankets for the poor: ($ 12-18 each)

• 1 Bible: ($ 6.95 each)

• Powder milk for orphaned babies ($5.30 each per week)

As you can imagine we cannot cover all needs. But if you think you can contribute for some specific need, please contact us to coordinate the aid. With each contribution, there will be one less person suffering and it is a way we can show the love of Christ in a tangible manner.

Proverbs 19:17 says, “Those who are gracious to the poor lend to the Lord, and the Lord will fully repay them.”

A dream I want you to pray about is to be able to create a data base of orphans (and an institution that will protect it) to help them to get in contact with the people helping them. In this way we may build relationships that extend over time and encourage these children to see the future with hope.

Daniel Martin

Write me an email to danielmartinusa at hotmail.com

PROJECTS AND INICIATIVES

A clinic we build and a bicicle-ambulance the government gave to us

 (Think of how could you be involved in any of these areas…)

Medical attention. Clinic building.

We were sent to fulfill the need of medical attention. We saw patients and treated them at the local hospital and in rural areas.
We started to build a clinic in Nambuzi and contact CANZIBE a Non for Profit Organization from the Netherlands, which is now building hospitals and wells for the communities in the Milange district.

Nutrition Program.
    

Undernourished child

It is aimed to orphaned babies (mother died at delivery) or babies from HIV+ mothers. Local volunteers supervise their growth and provide powder milk and special food preparations to improve their chances of survival.
      

Children Project.
     

    
After realizing that children where not a priority in 
their value system, we started a process of rising awareness. We invited Cristina & Carlos Mutazzi, Christian educators specialized in children, among many others, to focus on children’s needs and to help churches to be aware of the importance of children, and to prepare leaders to work with children. We can already see the difference. Churches are aware of the need. They are teaching children and reproducing the training of leaders of children. They use music and drama as tools for communication. 

Igreja Deus Connosco (“God With Us” Church).

The church where we first started teaching.

It was an animist church called "Itopia", which mixed the worship of spirits of the dead, witchcraft and other occult practices, with the Christian faith. When they discovered that Christ was big enough and more powerful than all the spirits, they decided to follow Christ and abandon the pagan practices. They had 22 churches when we contact them and now they more then 100.

Pharmaceutical Project.  

Teaching how to prepare a treatment for malaria.

Teaching how to dry medicinal leaves

It is know as A.NA.MED project. Action of Natural Medicine. Visit http://anamed.net/  It was started in African countries by Hans Martin Hirt, a pharmaceutical professional. He started a project to develop techniques of pharmaceutical preparations that can be done in a simple environment (without the need of sophisticated laboratories). They teach people from African communities to be involved and learn the process. It is aimed at health workers but it is available to lay people that are willing to be trained and work with responsibility to help themselves and others.
           
We brought this project to the Milange area after realizing that with our approach (modern medicine, one doctor and no hospitals) it was not enough for a population of 350.000 people.

Multimedia Project. 
Local Music and Video Production.

During our time in Milange we met two important local composers, Dominique Domingos and Gonçalves Murimaoca. They produce music in Portuguese, Chichewa, Lombwe and Marenge. They both had a spiritual experience with God while we lived there. They changed their approach to music and their message.
     
Now they are eager to share God’s word and to share their experience in order to allow others to experience the transformation only Jesus can work in us.  Each one of these musicians has a recording studio. They also contribute to the local radio, produce CDs of music and video-DVDs.

Leo Quinteros, is a Christian Music and Video producer. He is preparing materials and training to cooperate with these musicians. We want to help them to improve their work and to equip them to go to radio and TV.

Jesus Film.

This project was started in the area by Juan and Adriana Palacios (Argentinean doctors and missionaries) before we lived there. One of the main leaders of this project is Rodrigues Domingo. We use the Chichewa version of the Jesus Film based on Lucas. We went to areas where the Jesus film was not known and we projected it on a big screen for everybody to see. Rodriguez gave a message of salvation in Chichewa. Many understood the message of God and many started to follow Christ since then.
      

Rodriguez and his family

Rodriguez with the old projector.

   
The old projector is not working anymore. We want to equip Rodriguez with a projector, DVD player, battery, screen and bicycles to enable him to continue with this project. The Jesus film is still an important tool. Because of the high level of illiteracy, the message is better understood when they can see and hear it in a movie.

 

“Biblias para Mozambique”

The Bible is central and basic to the Christian faith.
There are many people in Mozambique without the chance to read the Bible. Many churches have only one Bible, others have no Bible at all. Even some Christian leaders have to rely on copies or pages of a Bible. We want to help churches and Christian leaders to have their own Bible. We want people to be able to read the word of God to allow him to talk to them trough it.     

   
We rise awareness through social media and church gatherings and rise money which we send to the Bible Society of Malawi. The Bibles are mostly in Chichewa. Christians leaders travel to Malawi and transport the Bibles to Mozambique for distribution. We were able to distribute around 1.500 Bibles in the first year of this initiative (Dec.2011 to Dec.2012) (around $12,000 USD) with offerings from Argentina and the US.  

Theological Training Project.

Because of the fast paced growth of the churches (many more people follow Christ and many more new churches are founded every day), there is a big need of theological training. We started a continuing education program for the church this year.
We need Christian teachers and pastors to help us to contribute with the teachings to help the Mozambican church to grow healthy. You can donate 2 weeks or more of your time to contribute with training seminars, or conferences in which we could gather leaders from different churches of a particular area to attend.

Radio Project.

The initiative was started by Zeca Domingos, a young local pastor, who has more than 40 churches and is passionate about sharing the Good News of God. He wants to start a radio ministry as a multidenominational initiative. He presented the project for Radio and TV to the local government, which approved it, and now the project was sent to the Communication Ministry in Maputo to be evaluated.
We are in the process of surveying the area for clues and needs to know how a new could look like. Which approach should we take? Which population should we focus on? etc.
In Argentina is Marco Antonio Luna, who has a dream: to plant a radio in Mozambique. He is busy investigating and preparing the equipment and technology needed to run a radio.
My sister, Karin Martin is a Communication specialist. She is assisting me with the project.
Rev. Jaime Vega, Pastor and Christian Communicator will contribute to this initiative.
A South African missionary, Kobus, recommend us to start buying air time from the local radio “Tumbine” and producing programs for it.
30 minutes cost 23,00 U$D.
6 months of daily programs of 30 min. could cost 1.155 U$D.

Marriage and Family Initiative.
   

    
Promiscuity and polygamy are endemic in this area. The children are left by themselves during the day at the mercy of anybody who wants to approach and harm them while their parents are busy farming.
Many Not For Profit (NGO) and the government are trying to rise awareness about AIDS and other sexual transmitted diseases. We, as Christians, know that a healthier solution is sound marriage and family values. We help churches to understand the importance of marriage, fidelity, healthy sexuality, responsible parenting, etc.

Cooperatives.

The main business of the area is agriculture. The area allows a big production of corn, beans, peanuts, potatoes, etc. Now the cultivation of soya beans is growing fast.
A big problem arises when they come to sell the product. Because they are small farmers, they cannot negotiate the price with the big exporters and they are obligated to sell the product at a low price when there is a big production and when the hunger time starts  (October to March) they are obligated to buy from the same companies at 4 or 5 times the original price.
We want to send specialists in Cooperatives to train them and to allow them to organized themselves to gather and store their crop, to negotiate as a group of farmers, and to be able to choose to sell when the price is more beneficial for them.

Orphans Project.

This is a country of young people and there are many orphans everywhere. Almost every family is rising its own children and some more from another family whose parents died. AIDS is increasing this problem. When parents die, the community gathers to decide which family is going to be responsible for the children left alone. It could be grandparents, relatives, or neighbors.
There is an organization called OJC (Christian Youth Association) which is focusing on helping these adopted orphans to prevent them getting involved in self-destructive behavior (prostitution, drug abuse, theft). They teach them about the love of God for them. They organize musical competitions. They help with educational materials so that they can go to school. And they teach them working skills (agriculture, carpentry, build houses, etc.) to help them to be self-sufficient in their future.

It would be great if we could create a database through which we could associate each child with someone from another country (like a sort of tutor from the distance) so as to write, encourage, counsel, pray, help financially, etc, with the intention to compensate the lack of  stimulus from the parents they don’t have.

New initiatives:
We welcome new ideas and suggestions that could improve the lives of people, to help them grow and break the cycle of poverty. By doing so, we want to glorify God by sharing His principles of love and justice for all.



Contact Information:

Email

Phone: 347-659-6022   I receive SMS. I cannot answer calls during week working hours (6am-3pm).

Our YouTube channel


Friend us on Facebook. See activities on “Biblias para Mozambique”
Follow us on twitter:  @danielmartinusa

Why Milange?

Zambezia province

Music is very important in the African culture.

Milange is one of the Districts in the Zambezia province (Population 3.5 million). And is also the name of the main village of the district. Our family lived there for 5 years.    

The Milange District population is: 420.000. There is only one General Hospital. We were the only doctors in 2002 but now there are 2 native doctors. Most of the medical work is done by nurses and medical technicians.  Most of the people rely only in witchdoctors and healers. People can buy illegal medicines in the markets (stolen, expired or bought without a license).
     
Milange is in the physical center of the country. It is strategically situated near the Malawian border, between important mountains which gives the area a nice weather most of the year. It has a fertile soil. Politically it is at the center, since to the south it is predominantly FRELIMO area and to the north it is predominantly RENAMO area. The same happens religiously since the South is predominantly Christian and the North is Muslim.  

Why Mozambique?

Working together we can help to build our future

Ba o-bab, typical tree in Africa. It is a very slow growing tree

Quick facts:
    
Located at the southeast of Africa. Its capital is Maputo.

Bantu people settled in the area of Mozambique in 300 BC. Being good farmers propelled a population explosion and expansion. They also traded with Arabs and Asians trough the Indic Ocean.

In 1498 Vasco da Gama introduced Portugal to the Indian Ocean trade. In 1530 he established the Portuguese control of the area.

Between 1500-1700 African tribal chiefs, Arab and Portuguese sold One million slaves from Mozambique.

Communist and Independence ideas were consolidated into FRELIMO (Mozambique Liberation Front) with the help of Cuba and the Soviet Union. FRELIMO used guerrilla warfare to weaken the Portuguese power and in 1975 achieved the Mozambican independence. Internal guerrilla forces against opponents from the RENAMO party continued until 1992 when they signed a peace treaty.
       

Food market. Business and social center of the comunity.

Issues facing children in Mozambique 
(source: Unicef )

•     Food insecurity affects more than 800,000 people, or more than 4 per cent of the population. About 40 per cent of children under age five suffer from stunting as a result of chronic malnutrition. A prolonged drought has harmed crop yields in several provinces.

•     The HIV prevalence rate continues to increase; 12.2 per cent of 15- to 49-year-olds are estimated to be living with HIV/AIDS, as are more than 90,000 children under age 15. Less than 3 per cent of eligible children are receiving antiretroviral treatment.

•     About 1.5 million of Mozambique’s children are orphans. About 470,000 children have lost one or both parents to AIDS.

•     Less than 40 per cent of the country has access to basic health services, largely due to a shortage of trained medical personnel.

•     Just over 40 per cent of the population has access to clean water. Drought has forced many people to use contaminated water, increasing rates of cholera and diarrhoea.

•     Malaria, acute respiratory infections, diarrhoea and vaccine-preventable diseases claim the lives of many children.

•     Primary school enrolment rates have increased for both boys and girls, but half of all children fail to complete primary school. 

 

The Portuguese promoted the Catholic religion. 1/3 was nominally Catholic during the colony time. Most people worship or fear the spirits of ancestors (Animism).

Today there is religious freedom. The government resigned communist politics and opened to the free market.

Mozambique is one the poorest countries on Earth and is one of the fasted growing economies in the world. Mozambique is poised to become the world’s biggest exporter of coal. Water based energy and massive gas field discoveries make Mozambique a hotspot of energy. Investments are pouring in on an unprecedented scale.

Languages: The official language is Portuguese. Ethnologue lists 43 languages spoken in the country. The main language spoken in the Milange area is Chichewa.
   
Selected indicators for Mozambique:

(Source: Bank of Mozambique, IMF, and World Bank. Year 2006-2008)

•    Under-5 mortality rate: 13.8%
•    Life expectancy at birth: 43 years
•    Physicians per 1000 people: 0.03
•    Immunization DPT and measles: 72% and 77%
•    Access to improved water sources: 48%
•    Access to sanitation facilities: 31% 

We Love Mozambique

Mozambican flag. A parade on a National holiday.

Hannelore examining little babies.

I, (Daniel Martin) felt the call of God when I was 12 years old, while reading Isaias 61. I identified myself with the ministry of Jesus, described in this passage. Only God can work out this type of transformation in people and societies. I would like God to use me and many others to continue His ministry among us. John 3:16 shows that God’s love for us made him give generously His only son for the salvation of human kind. The same way we should be willing to give our best to others to continue Jesus’ legacy.

    My wife Hannelore, and I were involved in mission work in Argentina and we were convinced that the Lord was calling us to become missionaries. In 1998 we started studies at “Seminario Internacional Teológico Bautista” in Buenos Aires. In 2001 we finished our theological degree and moved to Mozambique to fulfill a vacancy as voluntary missionary doctors. We were supported financially by an association of many churches in Argentina. We lived in Milange, Mozambique as a family (with 2 children) for 5 years. We learned from the Mozambican culture and its situation. We saw God working and now we would like to connect Christians outside Mozambique with the people in Mozambique, to improve their lives, to contribute to the growth of the kingdom of God, and to glorify God in the process.

This is an opportunity to respond to God's love. Not only to talk about the transformation that God can do, but to contribute to this transformation. The opposite of love is not hate but indifference.

    While living in Mozambique, we helped to start these initiatives:

•    Medical attention. Clinic building.
•    “Nutrition Project”.
•    Children Project.
•    Pharmaceutical project.
•    Multimedia Project.
•    Jesus Film.
•    Igreja Deus Connosco (“God with us” Church)

After we left Mozambique in 2007, we continued our involvement with the work there. And we started:

•    “Biblias para Mozambique”
•    “Theological Training Project”
•    Radio project.
•    Marriage and family initiative.
•    Cooperatives
•    Orphans projects.
(At the end I’ll describe each one of these projects)