Seventh Day Baptist Missionary Society
 

Sierra Leone Trip - December 25, 2006 – January 2, 2007

Purpose: 

    Sierra Leone is located on the Northwestern coast of Africa and nestled among a group of small countries. It covers an area about the size of West Virginia, USA. It is inhabited by people of many religions, of which Christianity is relatively small. There are many native religions, as well as Muslim and Hindu.

      The conference in Sierra Leone was developed under the leadership of Kwabena Opoku from The Gambia. He developed the conference in 2002 along with a friend, Isaac Kposowa. They gained temporary recognition on March 27, 2002 with the understanding that they would develop schools along with the churches. The work appeared to be continuing successfully until the late 2004. Up to that date the USA had sent about $2,000 to help in the schools and a small amount for the churches. In December, 2004, we received an e-mail from the Sierra Leone Conference of Seventh Day Baptist Churches. It stated that Brother Isaac Kposowa and his wife Cecilia had been dismissed and they are to have nothing to do with Seventh Day Baptist Sierra Leone from all the other churches. Since that time Brother Kposowa has caused many problems.

      In 2004 Brother Kposowa lost his office to M.J. Sesay who took it upon himself to develop the schools more. He began to request more funds from the USA to help with the upgrading of the existing schools. Of course, when Kposowa lost his position he took some of the schools with him. He started another “part of the conference” so to speak which was under his control.  But Pastor Sesay worked with the ones that were left. There was a continued competition for funds between Kposowa and Sesay until the Missionary Society decided that they were going to correspond with only one person, which was the elected General Secretary. Anyone else had to go through this person for the request for funds. The final point of the problem came when Kposowa sent the Missionary Society a letter that was supposedly from the government that stated they had to hire three people for staff to take care of administrative cost. The General Secretary was contacted about the letter. It was investigated and discovered that it was false. About the same time the executive committee discovered that Mr. Sinneh, past conference president, was holding church services on Sunday under a different church name. Along with this he was teaching that speaking in tongues and burning incense was necessary for adequate church service and was part of salvation. A conflict occurred between Kposowa, Sinneh, and the rest of the conference in Sierra Leone. Mr. Sinneh and his church were dismissed from the conference. Then they had three people wanting to be the president or general secretary. Mostly the conflict was over money and doctrine. The conference officers requested someone from the Missionary Society to visit them and help to solve the conflict.

Observations:

Arriving in Sierra Leone, I was welcomed by Ms. Judith. Who took me through the customs with no trouble. After I got through the customs I was ushered into the area to pick up my luggage. While there I was approached by a man explaining that he had come to pick me up. However, Judith said that the General Secretary, Mr. Willie Williams, was waiting for me outside. This gentleman was Mr. Kposowa and wanted me to go with him to the hotel that he had set up for me. I had to explain to him that I needed to meet the General Secretary and that he had set up a place where I was to stay. But I thanked him anyway. He was insulted that I chose to go with the General Secretary instead of he and his wife. I met Mr. Williams, and the group that was waiting for me, who took me to the hotel where I was to stay.

      The next day we visited the Lakka church, located on the outskirts of Freetown. They meet in a community building inside a tourist recreational facility. They are eager to gain their own land and building, costing about $3,000. We spoke with the officers of the conference and spoke of the needs of the conference and churches. At Lakka we visited the building where school was held. The name of the school in Lakka is the Joe Samuels School. It has 70 students. The school is held in the community building. Nothing can be kept in the building since it has no window coverings and door locks. That is why they would like to build a church there so that they can use it for the school as well. It would also allow them to increase the number of children that attend.

      On Thursday we were supposed to travel to Bo and Suhn. However, about mid way to Bo the bus we had hired broke down and it took so long to fix it that we had run out of time. Bo was about 300 miles form Freetown. By the time we got there we would not have time to meet with the churches. It took ten hours to get there. Part of the road was very good but part of it was so bad that we could only travel about 25 miles per hour, or less. So we decided to return to Freetown and try again the next day.

      On Friday we were able to get to Bo and Sahn. We visited Sahn first and found that there were many from the village available to meet with us, including the chief, Amman, and the other religious leaders. Each of these men was responsible for a portion of the meeting and it was interesting to see how they worked together. However, it was very evident that the chief was the more important of the three. The meeting was started with the Muslim prayer, then the Lord’s Prayer, then the chief spoke. Last, Pastor Matia, Seventh Day Baptist Conference President spoke. In the Sahn community there are two schools. One in the Magbemas village which is the Vivian Looper School composed of 100 students, all orphans. Inside Sahn is the Daniel J. Mattia School with 241 students of which about 50% are orphans. This school is named after the conference President’s father.  We ended the meetings with dinner before we left for Bo to visit the church there.

      Because we had started so late in the morning we were not able to spend a very long time in Bo. We felt that we needed to get back to Freetown to prepare for the Sabbath. In Bo we met with the church and discussed the needs they have. In this church the chief of the district is a member. He donated the land but a building needs to be erected. The cost of the building will be around $2,000. This will be a larger building than the building in either Lakka or Sahn. The school in Bo is named the Margaret Bond School. The schools are named for people active in the Seventh Day Baptist denomination and connected with missions. This school has only 85 students. There are no orphans connected to this school yet. They are looking to use the new building as the school building as well.

      We returned to Freetown and arrived about 12:00 midnight. The next morning they were going to pick me up at 8:00 AM but were not able to get there until close to 10:00 AM. We went to Lakka for church where they had planned a service for all the churches in the country. We were going to begin the services at 10:00 originally but ended up beginning about 11:30. That meant that we extended the service over the lunch time.

      After we ate lunch we held a baptismal service. During this service we baptized 31 new Christians. Most of them were young. It was a real blessing to see the young people getting baptized. I was surprised when one of the observers requested to be baptized and the pastor agreed. Later he talked with her and got her name and address so that he could visit her and discuss the responsibilities of being a Christian with her.

      The orphans of the schools do not pay fees. So the amount of funds that come in to the schools is controlled by those whose parents can afford the fees. Because of this there is a shortage of funds to operate the schools. Some of the teachers have not been paid for several years. The materials that they have to work with are not in good condition and all of the schools need chairs, desks, and chalk boards. The children wear uniforms and the orphans are supported by the schools. The cost of a uniform is $5. The school fees amount to about $50 per year per student. The teachers’ salary is $50 per month. If you feel a need to help in this area we would appreciate any donations you could spare.

      HIV/AIDS is terrible here. Also, they have only recently come out from beneath the perils of war. Many of the orphans have lost their parents because of the war and HIV/Aids.

      On Sunday we met at Lakka again to talk to the leaders of the conference. They had invited Pastor Kposowa and his wife who took the opportunity to attend and defend their beliefs. Mr. Sinneh refused to meet with us. Again, we took time to discuss the beliefs of the Seventh Day Baptists and the polity under which we work. There were other topics of discussion they wanted to discuss such as; state of the dead,  food laws, baptism, ordination, communion, and the Trinity. All of the discussions were acceptable and understood by those attending with very few questions. I appreciated Pastor Matia and his work in translating what was said.

Conclusions:

I found the problems that were in the conference pertaining to leadership were not as difficult to solve. Mr. Sinneh did not go along with the final decision and, as a result, brought a suit against the conference. He felt that the conference did not remunerate him adequately while he was in office in the conference. He thought that the USA was sending funds to the conference for his salary that the conference was not giving to him. It appears that he does not know the polity of the USA conference very well. He does not listen to our explanations and continues to press for the law suit. This means that the Sierra Leone conference will need to raise enough funds to pay the lawyers to fight the suit. This will cost around $3,000. The suit involves a payment of about $500. I have a difficult time understanding the objective of the suit. Whether he loses or not he will be required to pay lawyer’s fees plus the time required of him. If he loses he will also be required to pay court costs. We need to continue to pray for this situation.

      I can see that Sierra Leone conference needs funds to take care of the educational needs of their pastors. We have sent them the TIME program developed by Rod Henry as well as the CALLED program developed by the Board of Christian Education. This will be a “stop gap” for the training of the pastors  and the lay leadership but will not take the place of formal education. We continue to pray that fund will come in so that they will be able to educate their leadership. I am in hopes that they will be getting in touch with Central Africa Conference about their Bible College.

      I feel strongly about the future of the young people, especially the orphans. They all appear to have several hurdles to cross in their lives. They are in a country that is suffering from the HIV/AIDS epidemic resulting in a definite loss of adults and, therefore, support for them as well as the government. So many of the orphans have Aids and will not reach maturity. Of those that do few will be educated beyond an eighth grade education. Most will only get primary education. I pray that we can do something that will help those children in the churches of the Seventh Day Baptists.

      Their outreach is hampered by the lack of published materials. We could supply them with tracts, books, etc. but the cost of these products and the shipping is great. These funds could go into their work more efficiently and effectively through the purchase of a computer, printer, and photocopier for their office. This will allow them to translate materials for their members as well as develop new materials to be used by them.

      The purchase of these items would also open up to them the opportunity to earn funds through a business center where they could gain income as well as offer employment to a handful of the members. The business center is a valid project and many can be seen in the business section of Freetown. However, we saw none in the outskirts of the town. Funds to purchase or rent office facilities for the conference would allow them protection for the business as well as their conference office. All of this would cost about $10,000. May we pray that these funds be donated for this purpose.

      I can see a very successful conference in Sierra Leone in the near future. They need some help through encouragement. This we can give them through our prayers and donations. They are hard workers and delight in the gifts given them by our God. They look forward to a time when they can be well known in the country by the number of churches they have. Their churches are full of members committed to God and His work.