Shalom Ministries, Rwanda

Let us start with the words of David.

In Psalm 118, verse 17, David said, and so we do this morning.

Psalms 118:17

I will not die but live and proclaim what the Lord has done.

Father in heaven, here we are at your appointment.

Lord, we humble ourselves very much.

We do not want to speak our opinions, our feelings.

We want to be the Holy Spirit's mouthpieces.

May you bless your people here present today through the wondrous work we have done in our lives, to the glory of your name and to the building of the testimony of your precious people.

In Jesus' name we pray and believe with thanksgiving.

Amen.

We are Shalom Ministries Rwanda, which is a non-denominational yet interdenominational Christian organization.

Me who's speaking here, I'm Solange Uituze, and my job mainly today here is going to be the translator.

I'm blessed to be with the three wonderful ladies.

I'm gonna start with the president of the board of directors of Shalom Ministry, Mrs.

Gaisimen Zaramba.

Please stand and uh lead the church.

Next to her, there is uh Drosela Undouwimana, she's the coordinator of the ministry.

And next to her, we have Mrs.

Colette Mukandori, she's responsible of the Department of Conflict Prevention and Resolution.

We represent a big congreg a big uh not really congregation, a big group, but they trusted us enough along with the Holy Spirit to come and be their messengers.

So, who in the world is Shalom Ministry Rwanda?

So we thought we could share with you a bit of the background situation from which uh the Holy Spirit brought up a Shalom ministry.

Can we go to the next slide, please?

Rwanda is a tiny country located in the East African uh side of Africa.

We are bordered to the north by Uganda, to the west by uh Republic Democratic of Congo, to the south by Burundi, and to the east by Tanzania.

We are a very tiny landlocked country, really with the size of Maryland, the state of Maryland, with 11 million people.

And so that is really one of the most densely populated country.

And out of which 80% of the population is in the rural area, and that leaves us with a very small landholdings, where over 60% of the people have less than maybe an acre and a half.

That's it, for the household, not as an individual.

Our capital is Chigadi.

We are known, our nickname is a country of a thousand hills.

Out of some of them host the mountain gorillas.

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Unfortunately, though, we also are known as a country, like the lead pastor has said, that has seen the atrocity of the genocide that claimed over a million lives of innocent people between April 1994 and July 1994.

It was a literally valley of dry bones.

And really, uh, because maybe we don't have so much time, but the context is historically Rwanda was populated by three groups of people, the Hutus, the Tutis, and the Twaati W A.

And because of some power struggle, we ended up in the genocide in 1994.

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So really the consequences of genocide were so uh bitter and so heavy, especially the survivors were left wounded physically, emotionally, spiritually, and mentally.

Many of the widows and orphans were traumatized, others suffered from homelessness, and several of them have lost their loved ones, including the spouses and the siblings and extended relatives.

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Really, the period of after genocide was a very sorrowful period characterized by mourning, anger, despair, and especially intense hatred towards the assassins.

And it was not easy to introduce God's love during that period because people were wondering the relevancy of God's existence.

They have never heard of a God who's able to intervene in terms of trouble.

And so, really, the whole idea of God was somehow obsolete.

And and more so that many people refuse to go back to churches because how houses of God have become the slaughterhouses of humankind.

So many people died in churches.

And so, how are you going to tell someone to come back to pray, to come back to God?

So it was almost impossible to do so.

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But uh God made a way where there seemed to be no way.

In that situation of confusion and intense pain and hatred and turmoil, a group of widows in Kigali, which is the capital of Rwanda, they used to meet and curse and mourn and cry because that was the only opportunity to have a pity party.

They have never had an opportunity to do so.

But out of among those women, one of them was saved before the genocide.

And she started to pray and introduced the idea of yes, we can cry, but cry to the Lord Jesus, the Prince of Peace, instead of just cursing and you know, living our misery.

So they started a small group of women.

Some of them are going to tell their own stories by themselves.

And so uh next please.

One day, uh Shalom ministry started as a small group of women or widows, and they they they started praying in their bedrooms.

And now today, uh Jehovah's Shalom Prayer Group started as a prayer group.

They gradually found inner peace in their broken hearts, which led to healing, forgiveness, and reconciliation.

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Today, uh members of Shalom Ministries are no longer only widows, there are all those people who are truly seeking inner peace for various reasons.

They are going to talk about it in a few minutes.

So several of them became faithful servants of the Lord, and they are fervent in their praying and their studying of the Bible.

Every Monday and Wednesdays they meet to pray and they study the word of God.

And every other Saturday, first and third Saturdays, they pray and fast, to pray for issues related to peace in their homes, in the local churches, and the body of Christ as a whole.

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When God expanded the group Jehovah Shalom, it grew to become a legally recognized, officially recognized Shalom ministries as we know it today.

So it had to have a kind of a legal framework upon which it is operating today.

So our vision is to become a worldwide instrument of peace of God to the broken-hearted.

And our mission is to restore hope of living in peace and to support economic and social development.

Because many of our members are people I could call the marginalized, or the people who are beaten up by life.

So once they receive Christ, it is our responsibility to find alternative jobs for them to live a decent and honest life.

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So our objectives are threefold: to sustain peace, unity, and reconciliation through evangelism, to support community socioeconomic development, via income-generating activities and promote Christian counseling and fight against HIV AIDS.

We accomplish our objective through three main programs, which are evangelism, trauma and Christian counseling, and socioeconomic development.

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One of which Pastor has talked about.

It is a vegetable Christian foundation, which helps us to gather the donation from here in the United States, but we are trying to expand our cooperation into exchange of expertise.

So people who want to help us with whatever expertise they have to help us further the kingdom of God is welcome through the Veso Christian Foundation.

We also work with the Northern Christian Counseling here.

We saw their office here, and they are helping us in training our members in soul care.

Because in a devastated country like ours, we really need people who know what to do, much the science, but also with the gospel of God, because Christ alone is able to bring about real and genuine healing.

So we really thank all the partners we have here, especially North Dakota, and mainly because of our sisters, Shalom Ministry America.

They are the ones who connected to us, and we are so thankful for that.

We also operate with local churches in Rwanda because, like I said, Shalom Ministry is not a church.

We allow ourselves to be used by the Holy Spirit to bring people to the Lord Jesus, but then we plug them back into the local churches so they can grow and be baptized and be used in the kingdom of God.

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So some of the achievements are listed by through those three main programs.

And in evangelism, so far the Lord has enabled us to bring 308 souls to Christ.

Concerning trauma and the Christian counseling, like I said, we are having a soul care training.

It is an online class for our members.

And that one is sponsored by Northland Christian Counseling Services here.

So may God bless you and expand your ministry so much.

Now they go out to counsel all the needy people, especially the widows and the orphans.

Next.

For the social and economic development, these are the list of the main achievements, but the list is not exhausted.

One of those we do is building up what we call self-help groups.

So in those in those in those groups, we in our governance structure we have the assembly, the General Assembly, the Board of Directors, the local committees, and the local groups, the cells, which are the unit of mobilization and where people grow.

And so within those cells, it is usually made of seven and twelve people.

And so when it grows too big, it displays to become another cell.

And so not only do they do learn the word of God, but they also think of ways to be economically self-reliant.

And so they come up with some projects, we help them to do some business plans and to find some kind of seed money to help them start their businesses so they can be self-susta-sustained.

And so the pictures down is where a trainer is putting a flip chart on a tree, and the other picture is where they are learning under the tree.

The projects of kind of entrepreneurship skills.

So we still have mega means, but that does not prevent from doing what we are supposed to do.

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Number one is the creation of a shalom center, a shalom ministry center.

Because so many people are now inquiring, requesting from our services, it is becoming extremely difficult to reach out for every one of those.

And so we are praying and believing and hoping that if we get that center, it could serve for those purposes that are there.

And we are dreaming of expanding Shalom ministries into other countries because we notice that not only the survivors of genocide need God's peace.

Everyone really needs peace of God.

We are thinking of putting a Christian counseling school and building 10 more houses of vulnerable people.

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So the number one challenge is lack of permanent offices and insufficient fees and funds to cover for all the expenses and non-implementation of activities planned because of limited resources.

And we have also lack of staff and volunteers to carry out those activities because we can only afford a number of a very key, few key personnel on a full-time basis.

Next, please.

And so if the Lord is putting you on your heart to partner with us in any way, really, it could be by praying for us, by donating your your your your your money or by donating your talent to your time, please feel free to contact us on the contacts that are listed there.

Now, um I would like to talk now from a kind of a personal standpoint.

I'm going to call the ladies to give their testimonies on how they found forgiveness and inner peace from the from the shalom ministry, but I guess since I have the mic, I would like to briefly talk about myself.

So I was born in a family of I had my dad and my mom, and we were six children, I was the second.

And uh during the gen uh and I grew up in a kind of a devout Christian family.

In 1994, I was 19 and I lost my dad, my older brother, and my younger brother, and my many extended family members.

And uh because I was a kind of dad's little girl, the passing of my dad was almost unbearable.

So I decided to live my dad's life.

I wanted to fit in my dad's shoes, and I quit going to school so that I can be the breadwinner of my family.

And so I I pretended to be happy and strong because I wanted to kind of appear strong.

But when I go back in the night, I could really cry and weep and wonder why all this happened.

And so I told my God, I'm like, you are either a mean God, or you are a powerless one, or you don't even exist.

Maybe it's a fairy tale.

And so I I decided to, and and funny enough, I still go back to go to church, not because it means anything, but it was a way of connecting with my past.

But God was no longer relevant in my life.

And so one day we went to an orphanage place to visit those two children, and many of their the children there, their stories started there at the orphanage.

They did not know their previous history.

So that really hit me home.

I'm like, maybe I'm being too hard with God.

At least I know who I am, I know my dad, I know my background.

And I, in a way, led myself through the Holy Spirit back to Jesus.

So I told him, I wanna come back and please do not disappoint me anymore because I thought he did.

But I guess it was it was a misconception, and I praise him today.

So when I joined the church, there came an opportunity to start talking of forgiveness.

And so I I I told the Holy Spirit, I am not going to talk about forgiveness when I don't believe it, even though I'm still in church.

I don't want to be kind of a liar.

Standing in front of people, talk of forgiveness when in my heart it's not the case.

And so I the Holy Spirit put in what I call Jesus' intensive care unit for six months.

So he really checked me in in his ICU and he started training me all by himself.

And he gave me some verses that I would like to share with you guys.

One is in Romans 3.23 that all of us have sinned and fell short of the glory of God.

And that the sins, the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life through our Lord Jesus Christ.

And the Holy Spirit was telling me to stop praying the victim card because in God's eyes, victim or not, we all of us, if not by God's grace, we are guilty, really.

And he was like, only Jesus is the victim.

He paid everything.

There is nothing you can do, go through that Jesus has not been in.

He has been orphan, he has been a refugee, he has been anything you could be passing through.

He was betrayed, everything.

And so um another verse was in Jeremiah 17, verse 9, that uh the heart is deceitful above all things and desperately wicked.

Jeremiah 17:9

Who could know it?

And the Holy Spirit was telling me, you think you are perfect, but it just was a matter of my grace, because your heart is desperately wicked, it's not any different than any of those people.

And another verse was in John 10:10 that the enemy comes to steal, kill, and destroy.

John 10:10

The enemy has come to steal my joy, my future, my dream for the future, my joy, my happiness.

But Jesus has come to give us life abundantly.

And it's like you have to choose, you have to set it aside, give it all of that to me, and let me be your God.

Let me be your Jehovah Shalom give you the peace of that surpasses all understanding.

And last, he showed me that even those who killed people were actually deceived.

Satan has robbed them their humanity, their sense of reasoning.

And he's like, Why don't you repress that hatred with compassion?

Start praying for them for their salvation.

And so, really, it was six intense months that I praised God.

God that after six months I was ready to go now talk about forgiveness until today.

And I thank God so much.

That was me talking of forgiveness from the perspective of uh a little girl who was often by genocide.

But I'm gonna call upon uh Coletum Kandori, she is a widow because of the genocide.

So she's going to be talking in Jarwanda and I'm going to be translating so she can uh talk very uh comfortably.

I greet you in the name of Jesus Christ.

I am glad and humbled to be here today.

Telling you the wonders the Lord has done.

Before genocide, I was happily married and I had three boys.

I had two parents and all my siblings.

During the genocide, my husband was killed.

I restayed with the one, my last born who was one year old.

They killed my dad and mom.

They killed my in-laws.

And five out of my seven siblings were killed, and so we remained three of us.

On my husband's side, there were eight children.

All of them were killed except one.

These are close family members.

The genocide expanded to extended family members.

I remained alone with my little son.

After genocide, it was a difficult time of mourning and weeping.

I had so much pain that I could do anything but cry.

And I also had three more orphans that I got from the extended members who died.

And so I started looking for some job so I can raise those four children.

But even at work, I was kind of a dead working woman.

Because my heart was severely injured.

I lived like that for eight years.

But after I knew, I was introduced to Shalom Ministries.

And I was able to live joyfully, and I meant it.

So Job 14, verse 7.

Job 14:7

And I'm inviting, encouraging everyone who's wounded, offended by something to give all your burdens to Jesus.

He can handle anything and everything.

So that was Colette talking of uh uh how Shalom Ministries helped her to recover her healing, both spiritual and physical.

So I would like to invite uh Mrs.

Uh Drosella to talk about how through Shalom Ministry she was able to forgive and also to find through reconciliation with the people who otherwise she couldn't have really reconciled with.

Yes, uh praise Jesus.

I am so glad to be here this morning because I'm about to talk of the majesty and the might of God.

As we have heard, I am a widow because of genocide.

Uh my husband was killed when we were only seven months uh uh in marriage.

All my my siblings died.

Uh, uh to uh my my my brother and my sister and their families, all of them died.

And the siblings of my my husband likewise were killed.

After genocide, uh not uh we did not really lose only people.

All the wealth and the houses were destroyed and stolen.

After genocide, I was wondering how I'm going to move forward with life.

I was wondering what is my worth.

And I was asking God why did he spare me?

But I thank God today because I know now why I was sparing.

I became a mother to the parentless.

And I'm one of the founders of Shalom Ministry.

Today I'm so happy to be alive.

After those many tears, so much hatred that was in our hearts.

I was wondering if forgiveness is possible.

Even though I was saved, forgiveness was far away from me.

Even when I went to church, pastor was preaching about forgiveness.

I walked out of the church crying.

But God is powerful because I knew Jesus.

And I found so many other widows who did not know Jesus.

I asked God that at such time like that to be used by him.

I asked the widows from my workmates that let us cry to Jesus.

We offered our tears to Jesus and our hearts were healed.

We did not really have time for weeping, but we gave our tears to God after he has heard us, he healed our our our our hearts.

After he healed us, because of his word and the power of prayer, the peace that surpasses all understanding came back.

Love was come back.

And while we were thinking it was not possible, shalom ministry started in our bedrooms because they did not want to go to church, because they did not trust the people even in church.

We thank God today that everyone now has a home church.

And they are they are they are servants of God in their respective churches because of the grace of God.

And today, we have forgiven.

We are reconciled to those who who have uh me who's talking to you.

I have a ministry to go visit the prisoners of genocide.

No one else could enable me to do so.

But trusting God, praying, reading the word of God, fellowshipping with others, the Holy Spirit will enable us.

What the pastors were telling us, God taught it to us and we are doing it.

Thank God that in Shalom ministry today, we are people of all kinds.

It's no longer only widows who are members.

Our God is powerful.

We cannot express in such a time like this.

Yes, our homage.

She is not a widow, she is married, she's gonna talk about it, and she is the president of the board of directors, and she's with the permission of the pastor, she's going to also share the word of God with us today.

Hallelujah.

Hallelujah.

I thank God so much for this day.

And I'm so uh thankful that you have given us this time in your church.

We thank God so much.

And we thank the leadership of the church.

And we pray back for the people who prayed for us to be here today.

We are humbled, we are humbling ourselves, asking for many blessings for you.

Like they said, I'm not a widow.

I'm married.

I have a husband with five children.

Two girls and two boys.

I thank God for that blessing.

Is not a subject for only widows.

All people need peace.

Be it a child or a grown-up, be it an educated or uneducated people, all kinds of people.

Everyone needs peace.

And the peace we need is the peace of Jesus.

Because that is the everlasting peace.

And that is the one that brings about joy.

I'm going to tell my testimony, but through the scripture.

I'm going to talk about the power of prayer that brings healing.

That brings healing, forgiveness, and reconciliation.

Those three words go hand in hand.

The power of prayer helps us to be healed.

After we are healed, we forgive.

After we forgive, we reconcile with us.

And you cannot really concile with someone you have not yet forgiven.

And that is why I say that all three concepts happen through the power of prayer.

The power of prayer.

It means it requires to change the strategy of prayer.

We need to pray like in a corporate prayer in a church.

But you also have to have your particular time of fellowship with God.

Because that is from where you get the power.

Like I say, I told you I'm married.

And before I was saved, I passed through hardships.

My marriage was unstable.

I nearly divorced.

But because of wonderful plans of God on my life, on our life, during my process of divorcing, because I had so much sorrow in my heart, God visited me.

When he visited me, I was saved.

But I remained with a big problem of forgiveness.

And that I should be able to build my marriage while I'm still sorrowful.

Because the idea of divorcing was out of the equation because I was saved now.

Like the word of God says, in 2 Corinthians chapter 2, verse 2 Corinthians chapter 5, verse 17.

2 Corinthians 2:2

If anyone anyone who's in Christ is a new creature.

And I'm unable to forgive my husband.

What can I do?

I did nothing but getting closer and closer to God.

And that is how I joined Shalom Ministries.

When I saw these widows able to forgive, to forgive the people who killed their loved ones, I cried to God for help.

Help me to forgive.

To heal my wound.

To forgive my husband.

So we can reconcile.

It is not easy, brethren.

But the Lord has enabled me.

He has enabled me and I thank him today.

After that time, it's now ten years.

The answer is not to part ways.

You see, you divorce, but the children need a dad and a mom.

When you call it quit, you're destroying God's plan for your life.

When we read Genesis, in chapters 31 and 32.

When I read these stories about Jacob and his brother Esau.

We see Jacob before praying.

And we see another Jacob after he had had power to pray.

There is the Jacob who's a liar who stole his brother's blessings.

And he went far away.

He went to his uncle Aban.

And when he came back, that is where I wanna dwell, so we can really grab the power of forgiveness and reconciliation.

He wanted to reconcile back with his brother, but in his own terms.

When you want to go through the pathway of forgiveness and reconciliation, using your own schemes, it becomes extremely hard for you.

And you cannot reach it anyway.

It is kind of a kind of mayor lip, kind of lip services and make you feel good that you have forgiven.

But does not go down in the heart.

There is no genuine forgiveness.

There's no genuine reconciliation that is there.

Jacob thought he could ask for forgiveness from his brother through wealth things.

Because he told his servants to go and tell his brother that he has donkeys.

He brings caro, he brings herds of carous.

He brings servants.

That's what he went saying.

But truly, the real forgiveness and reconciliation does not is not bought by wealthy or material things.

It does not come through gifts.

It does not come with a nice words or reverent words you can call him because Jacob was calling Asa his master.

If you have an issue with your spouse, calling him honey or sweetheart does not cut it.

Having a child you have issues with.

That's not what can remove those problems.

Jacob himself thought that is the way to go.

I love the word of God so much.

Because it does really teach us and instruct us.

All of those things he wanted to offer to his brother to his brother was not going to bring forgiveness.

But you have said But you have said I will surely make you prosper and will make you descended, like sand or the sea.

Which cannot be counted.

I think it's not there.

Yeah, that's what I mean.

So let me translate it.

It is where it says, God, I pray that you spare me from Ezra because I'm so afraid of him, so he might kill me.

That is how he prayed before he was know that uh you sp you you you you you spare my life from Israel.

He could not really see his own responsibility.

And he could not remember that he was the one who started the fight in the beginning.

But he was praying, God, may you spare my life.

But because God loves us, God has heard Jacob, but he taught him how to pray otherwise.

Amen.

Amen.

When he said he was going to give gifts, he told his servants to take gifts.

After he learned that sir was his way to meet him, he said, I must put the gifts between him and me.

So that those gifts would soothe his anger and enable us to talk.

Today I want to tell you it's not about, it's not the gifts that solve problems.

It is not nice words you could talk to tell to someone.

It is not about your schemes or your ways that can solve the problem.

The genuine forgiveness comes from the powerful prayer.

Enable you to humble yourself and go face to one with whom you have issues.

So you can have interaction face to face.

Communication is very important when there is such kind of problems.

And with through prayer.

When he went to meet his brother, where there was supposed to be forgiveness and reconciliation.

In 33, it says very well how he went close to him.

And he bowed down in front of him for seven times.

And he hugged him.

That is what healed their hearts.

That is what brought healing for their hearts and their reconciliation.

But before that happened, because God loves us so much.

When Jacob was wrestling with the angel of God, the angel of God broke his hip.

Sometimes God allows us to break our hip.

If he thinks we are stubborn and we don't listen to his ways.

So that you might maybe be limping but be obedient to God.

To get to the to the to the genuine power of prayer.

We did not bring anything else without telling you the power of prayer.

Only that bring a healing of the heart.

Bring forgiveness.

Bring a reconciliation.

It's not nice words or gifts.

And today we need that so badly in our societies.

Parents, we are having issues among us.

Because the way the world system is running is we don't have time for each other.

A parent does not have time for a child.

There's no time for the child for his parents.

All of that are causing strife between us family members.

So for us to solve that problem, we take family vacation.

And truly you are covering up about serious issues and problems.

And then gifts and a nice trait are coming afterwards.

That is why we are going to have a solid Christian marriages and have a genuine unit in family.

May God bless you.

Amen.

But we wish we wanted to sing uh Amazing Grace for the congregation.

We are going to sing it in Chinyargwanda.

And while we are singing it, I think there's going to be some some translation of what we are singing.

So we'd like you guys to listen to us singing while you are watching the word, the lyrics of what it is that you are singing.

Namimana courtira.