From fear of demons, to freedom in Christ, a pygmy tribe takes the Gospel to heart in the Republic of Congo.

Congo-Brazzaville–The scene a year ago: Pygmy Chief Moketu is the 65+ year old head of the Babongo Pygmies, the most feared sorcerer in the tribe. In turn, he himself lived under the constant fear of the local demon spirit, Mwiri.

Hope Builders International’s Dewald VandenBerg’s first stop in the jungles was Moketu’s village. As he heard the Gospel, he gave his heart to Christ, paving the way for the whole village to hear and accept Jesus as Savior.

Excited by his new life, Moketu sent messengers ahead to smooth the path for the coming evangelists.

The end result, HBI’s Johan Gous, was “What we thought would take three years, took seven weeks. It was eleven weeks that he was on the trip, but the last seven weeks, the doors were just really opened and he could really bring the Gospel of Jesus to them.”

The next step was finding a place to meet in order to disciple and teach the new Christians. It seemed an insurmountable task, and one that would take time to accomplish. The plan, to move as funds came in, with the first step to assess their progress in September.

Gous says the ‘how’ of plans to build discipleship and training centers met the ‘who’ and ‘why’ under God’s timing. “This partner of ours moved in and said, “Here are the funds to go and put up the two training centers. Instead of going back to the Babongu in September, the way we planned, Dewald is actually leaving again on the third of May.”

The teams are thanking God for the opportunity to be involved with this budding work of God and ask for continued prayer that God’s will is fully carried out among this newly reached African people.