ABA, NIGERIA Sabbath, November 15
By Marti Schneider, On location

People came pouring into the stadium, but no one wanted to sit in the
chairs in front of the stage. Everyone was looking for shade. The day
was scorching hot. But there has been no rain since the meetings opened.
After seeing how the skies poured during the first days, we believe God
has provided a miracle in good weather.

I don't know exactly what happened at the stadium. I did not have to
give a segment on Sabbath morning. Isaac, our driver; Asse, the
cameraman; and a guide went out to a church. You see, I had met a
pastor on Friday at the stadium and I wanted to tell his story on
Saturday night. When I told the people his name, there was a bit of a
buzz in the audience. I'm not sure if it was my accent or if they were
pleased I had said the name or if he is a well-known pastor. Pastor
Emmanuel Chikwendo Ajuzie told me that his father was a farmer in the
Aba area. In 1928 he walked out of Aba, out of Abia State . . . he
walked all the way to Nkwere in Imo State, approximately 50 kilometers.
He presented the Gospel of Jesus there, and when he left two weeks
later, he left a group of believers.

As a boy, Pastor Ajuzie was the houseboy for some missionaries; but
when Pastor Mensa's father took the position, the young man went to the
Adventist College of West Africa which is now Babcock University. I
asked him how old he is now. He showed me his hair that is quite grey
and said that he is 65 years old. He was born before they began to keep
records.

He pastors six churches, the closest "only seven kilometers from the
Aba post office." That is close, and I wanted to see and take pictures
of his church. We rode and rode . . . through town . . . through the
country . . . on and on. I gave up hope of getting back by the time Don
was preaching. The roads were mostly "potholes" with just enough
road to define the potholes. The potholes are not the little
one-wheeled variety we often see in the U.S. Some potholes would be
wide enough to contain the entire car, some were made for buses. We
wound from the far right side of the road to the far left side of the
road. If anyone on foot, bike, motor bike, car or bus appeared near our
planned driving space, the horn was honked. There was a police
checkpoint out in the country. Several vehicles were stopped at the
side of the road. They motioned for our driver to stop. I rolled my
window down and stuck my hand out to shake hands with the policeman. I
think he was surprised to see a white hand and arm offered in greeting.
We are definitely in the minority. He greeted me cordially and waved us
on.

Finally we came to the church, Ovom First Church, already in session.
It was a nice, large church with approximately 500 in attendance.
Babies were sleeping in one corner on the floor. The cameraman went in
and began to take video pictures. The elders came out and lined up to
shake my hand for a bit of footage, and I sat down with the children on
the steps. They flocked around, some snuggling very close to my side
and one on my lap. Word was sent outside that the people on the
platform wanted a full sweep of the camera on them as though they had
been missed the first time. But the pastor was not there.

Our guide asked if we could go to his own church, the Ovom Amasa
Church, just two kilometers further. We went, and there we found the
pastor on the platform. Another younger man was preaching and I'm
afraid I disturbed his sermon. They led me to a front row seat. There
were perhaps 200 or more people present. The pastor came down and sat
beside me for a little while. Then he returned to the platform. When
the sermon was over, he called me up and introduced me to the church and
asked me to greet the people. The appeal song for the sermon was "Would
you be free from the power of sin? There's power in the blood, power in
the blood." They sang in Ebo, I sang in English . . . and God heard us
in both languages.

It was late when we got back to the hotel. Lunch was being served.
Don said he felt God had really blessed him as he preached. Because it
was daylight, he did not have the option of using the teleprompters. It
was a choice of either standing at a computer or working with two-sided
sermon notes - - 30 pages. Because the sun made the computer hard to
read, the decision was not that hard. His topic was "Why So Much
Suffering?"

Don tries to distill each sermon to a one-line, two-part sentence.
"What do I want you to remember about my sermon?" he asks often. The
people repeat the phrases that he has told them. The Daniel 2 image
phrase was, "God knows the future, God tells the truth." The one on
suffering was, "Sin hurts me, Jesus loves me." Saturday night's topic
is on the Second Coming. Jesus is coming! It won't be long!

Good night,

Marti