Celebrating 25 Years of God's Protection and Blessing

​It was in April 1982 when the Lord opened the way for the first Frontline Fellowship mission team to cross the border into Marxist Mozambique.

At that stage, Mozambique was in the grip of an anti-Christian dictatorship that had already desecrated, burned down or confiscated over 5,000 churches. Bibles were banned. Evangelism was forbidden. All missionaries had been expelled. Mozambique was suffering the effects of famine and a vicious civil war.

In the light of these facts, and because 85% of the population adhered to animism/witchcraft, with a further 2½ million of its people Muslims, and with a Marxist government, Mozambique was widely considered to be one of the most difficult mission fields in the world at that time. Mozambique was also described by mission research agencies, including Operation World, as “the least evangelised country in the Southern Hemisphere.” Numerous publications described Mozambique as: “closed” and “unreachable.”

At that time Mozambique seemed as impenetrable to the Gospel as the walls of Jericho, yet I was convinced that God who had opened the way for His people – through the Red Sea and through the Jordan River – would enable us to bring the Scriptures and the “Jesus” film to Mozambique.

“Be strong and of good courage…only be strong and very courageous, that you may observe to do according to all the Law which Moses My servant commanded you; do not turn from it to the right hand or to the left, that you may prosper wherever you go. This Book of the Law shall not depart from your mouth, but you shall meditate in it day and night, that you may observe to do it according to all that is written in it… Then you will have good success. Have I not commanded you? Be strong and of good courage; do not be afraid, nor be dismayed, for the Lord your God is with you wherever you go.” Joshua 1:6 – 9

When I rode out of Johannesburg for my first cross-border mission trip to Mozambique, I had only R40 left for petrol and travelling expenses. As I crossed the border into Mozambique I had less than R10. Although I had a four-reel copy of the 16mm Jesus film, I had no projector and no generator. Nor did I know a word of Portuguese. Neither did I have a single address or name with whom to make contact.

This first Faith mission was typical of many future field outreaches, which had to be mounted with almost no resources and against all odds.

Yet, the Lord has consistently proven the truth of Hudson Taylor’s statement: “God’s work, done God’s way, will never lack God’s supply.” From the very beginning of Frontline Fellowship, our faith has been firmly fixed in God alone – for guidance, provision and protection – and He is faithful.

“Got any rivers that you think are uncrossable? 
Got any mountains that you just can’t tunnel through? 
God specializes in things thought impossible, 
And He can do what no other power can do.”

Now, 25 years later, we can look back on hundreds of successful mission trips, many thousands of services and outreaches, hundreds of thousands of Bibles and New Testaments distributed, in over 100 languages, many thousands of church leaders, pastors, teachers, chaplains, medics and evangelists trained and many more prayers answered and miracles experienced than we could possibly catalogue.

Truly God has multiplied the few “loaves and fishes” that we were able to consecrate to His service and He has fed multitudes of desperate Mozambiquans, Angolans, Zimbabweans, Rwandese, and Sudanese with the Bread of Life and satisfied them with streams of Living Water.

We can only rejoice as we recall how God has consistently protected our missionaries as we paddled across crocodile infested rivers, drove over landmine endangered territory, rode through ambushes, preached in Communist military bases, sang in prison cells and ministered under artillery and aerial bombardments. God has protected us through all danger, guided us across uncharted territory and provided for every need.

If you are in the Cape Town area, please do join us for the Frontline Fellowship Mission Rally, 7:30 PM Thursday night 29 March in the Pinelands Town Hall (Directions) .

If you are not able to attend the Mission Rally, please join us in thanksgiving to Almighty God for how the walls of Marxism in Mozambique have crumbled, how literarily hundreds of evangelists and missionaries have poured into this land was once “the least evangelised” and the most “unreachable” country in the Southern Hemisphere. For how our mission managed to frustrate the reckless obsession of Angolan dictator, Agestino Neto, who claimed that he would ensure that there would not be a Bible on the face of Angola! (By God’s grace, there are tens of thousands of Bibles that our mission has delivered into that once Marxist stronghold.)

We praise God for how peace has come to war devastated Sudan. That the bombing of churches, hospitals and schools in Southern Sudan and Nuba Mountains has come to a halt. That missions and ministries are now able to freely fly into the Nuba Mountains, which were once a no-fly zone. That these beleaguered brethren, an island of Christianity in a sea of Islam, have survived the decades of Jihad and scorched earth by the National Islamic Front government.

For the fall of the Berlin Wall, for the collapse of Communism in Romania, for the tens of thousands of Muslims won to Christ in Northern Nigeria, for the move of God’s Spirit in the Communist chaos of the Congo, for how Zambia has moved from being a socialist nation which used to host Marxist terrorists who ferried landmines, surface to air missiles and other weapons of death across the border into neighbouring countries, to commit itself to being a Christian nation - which now sends missionaries, evangelists and Bibles across the border, even smuggling in food for Christians suffering in Marxist Zimbabwe.

For these and so many other answers to prayer we want to give all praise and thanksgiving to our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ.

“And you know in all your heart and your soul that not one thing has failed of all the good things which the Lord your God spoke concerning you. All have come to pass for you; not one word of them has failed.” Joshua 24:14

Dr. Peter Hammond
Frontline Fellowship
PO Box 74
Newlands, 7725
Cape Town, South Africa
Tel: 021-689-4480
Fax: 021-685-5884
E-mail: admin@frontline.org.za