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Elmer Deal

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Out of the Mouth of the Lion Vol 1 and 2
The first and second volume of Elmer and Mary Deal's life and ministry in the Congo.


Order your copy here
http://www.shop.craigcountybaptist.com/
How we survived four civil wars to minister over 50 years in the Congo. Here is the story of the lives and ministry of Elmer and Mary Deal.
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 Mary and Elmer Deal - 2007
 

Missionary to Congo Since 1957

Video - Elmer and Mary Deal - Fifty Plus Years in the Congo

                         We give Him all the honor and praise for using us so greatly in His work all around the world. 
 
News from Congo:

 

July 4, 2011

"The future is as bright as the 
promises of God"
                                                  William Carey


    Please allow me to reminisce about our over 50 years working in Africa.  On our way to Congo D.R.  from Brussels, Belgium in August 1959 we touched down in Niamey, Niger.  Before becoming a Missionary I worked for American Airlines and I was amazed when the D.C. 6 landed on the dirt runway.  Also. it was unusual to see people standing along side the runway watching the plane land.  That was our first contact with Africa and we knew then that it was going to be an interesting and exciting place. 

     While there, we bought our first souvenir and we still have it today.  Mary and I were the first Missionaries of the BBFI to establish a work in Africa.  When we arrived in the capitol city, Kinshasa, Congo we didn't have anyone to meet us as we didn't know anyone.  We were excited to arrive in the country where God called us to serve Him. We soon learned that the  unknown would be a great challenge.  

    Although while we were in Belgium we were able to take the colonial course that the government  of Belgium offered. The Congo was still under the control of the Belgian Government.  We studied the Customs and Culture of Congo, Pedagogy, and French, which turned out to be a great help and blessing  when we traveled across Congo searching out the place where God wanted us to start a work.  Also, while in Belgium we met a lot of Missionaries who assisted us in our travels.  

    After many interesting days of travel in a V.W. mini bus we arrived  on the western shore of the second largest and deepest fresh water lake in the world, Lake Tanganyika. It is located, with a series of other lakes, in the Great Rift Valley coming all the way down into Africa from the Gulf of Aden.  When we arrived in Kalemie we knew that was the place God wanted us to settle and start our work. 

    We started meeting in different villages all around the Kalemie area and Chief Mwavi in Lubeleyi Village invited us to start our first church in his village.  He gave us a nice piece of property across the road from his house to build our first church.  And from that humble and difficult beginning we have spread out over all of Congo and established 164 churches and missions.  Each church has her own local pastor and leaders.  We just concluded our annual conference, the theme was, "Think what we can do together!"  All the pastors left with the challenge to think about all the things we can accomplish together to advance the work of Christ.  A famous quote by William Carey, Baptist Missionary to India, applies well to the work in Congo, "The future is as bright as the promises of God". 

    Thanks for all your support and prayers for the work here in the heart of Africa. 


Working together for Him,

Elmer L. Deal
(The drums of Africa will always beat in my heart)


July 23, 2010
 

 

Patience has Proven to be the Key to Success in the Congo

 

A well known proverb expresses that patience overcomes everything. The world is his who has patience.

 

We worked and prayed twenty five years before we got our non profit association recognized here in Congo. We have prayed and waited on the Lord fifty years to send out our first Missionary. One of the churches here in Lubumbashi is following the example of the Apostle Paul. The Kabalo Avenue Baptist Church is sending out its first Missionary.  Pastor Matembo Paul's son, Mack, has been called on by the Lord to step out by faith and become a Missionary like Paul and follow the example in Acts Chapter 13. The church is sending him out.

 

 At the General Conference we set up a Missions Office with a Missions Director, Secretary and Treasurer to be a service center to send out Missionaries. We are praying that more young people will obey God and go out to preach the Word of God like Paul did on his Missionary Journeys. Missionary Mack Matembo is very qualified and passed all the tests. He spent four years attending the Baptist Bible College in Zambia and received his BA Degree from the Louisiana Baptist University.  He has finished three

years internship in a church here in Lubumbashi. So we are expecting great things to happen in the future ministry of our Missionary sent out by the churches here in Congo. 

 

Thank you for your prayers for the Missionary Ministry of the Congo Baptist Bible Fellowship and all the churches working together to advance the Lord's work here in the dark continent and other places around the world as the Lord leads.

 

Together In His Great Service,

 

Elmer L. Deal

(Mark 16:15)

  

  

 February, 2010

     I want to share with you some goals and projects in the Congo for 2010. I hope you will join us in prayer that we will stay strong and healthy and be able to accomplish many of these worthwhile projects.
 
    The first project is to enlarge the Bible Institute in Lubumbashi and our goal is to get it recognized so we can give degrees that are acceptable anywhere in the world.
 
    The next project is to help build a church on a property the Fellowship owns. They already have a long-house church that is packed out and rooms for Sunday school and six years of school. It is located near a family of the President of the Congo and some of the children already attend the church and school. Our goal is to help build a nice church in which anyone would be comfortable to worship the Lord.  The opportunity is so great that we feel we must share our burden.  
 
    Please pray with us about our up coming elections in the Congo BBF. We must elect seven new trustees before we have the big election for our four main leaders. President, Vice President, General Secretary and Treasurer. This year there are going to be some very important meetings that will determine the future of our work. Your prayers will be appreciated.
 
    We have two nice tents that Dr.John Rawlings gave us when he was Pastor of Landmark Baptist Temple. Our aim is to use them in a great way in villages to start and establish many new churches. Our goal is to plant as many new churches as possible all over the vast country of Congo.
 
    Thank you for your prayers and support for the Lord's work.
 
 In His Great Service,
 
 Elmer L. Deal
 Your missionary
 
 
 



We started out in the Belgian Congo.  It was changed to the Republic of Congo. Later it was changed to Zaire.  Now it is the Democratic Republic of Congo.
 


A visit by American pastors  
    
 

Amidst the people we love.
 


Sixteen came for salvation at the
Kabalo Ave. Baptist Church
 

Biography of Mukendi Cikala Jean
 
 
My name is MUKENDI CIKALA JEAN.   I was born on October 13, 1956. I underwent all my studies (primary, secondary and university) here in Congo (DRC), Africa. I graduated in English Department at Lubambashi University in 1983 and I started teaching English grammar and texts plus phonetics in a high school. I hold an Associate diploma in Theology and I am a Teacher of Genesis at Elmer Mary Deal Theology Institute.
 

In 1984, I got married to Beatrice Mwadi Kazadi with whom we have eight children (4 boys and 4 girls). In 1986, I accepted the Lord Jesus Christ as my personal Saviour in a very small church (Katuba Baptist Church) under the pastorship of Stephane Tshibambe, my pastor. Some months later, I led my wife to the Lord and finally the whole family. My wife and I were baptized in 1987. Since then we have been faithful to the Lord and to the church.

 


In 1989 I was appointed deacon, and that same year I was also appointed official interpreter of the Bible Baptist Fellowship of Congo. I started interpreting for missionaries Don Bowles and Elmer Lee Deal, the hero of the Baptist movement in Congo. I served 13 years as a deacon and in 2002 my church sent me to evangelize and start a new church in bel-air city (Lubumbashi Congo).

 
        With the helps of God it was something done, and today we have Bethlehem Bible Baptist Church under my pastorship. The church building was provided by Rev. Elmer Lee Deal. Apart from that I have been General Secretary of BBFI Congo for 10 years, and Interpreter for 21 years.
I was ordained Pastor on June 20, 2004.


 
 
 


Biography of Elmer Deal:


SALVATION:  I was saved during the morning service at the Tulsa Baptist Temple, February 17, 1952.


EDUCATION:  Graduated from Baptist Bible College in Springfield, Mo.  Attended SMSU (also in Springfield) and The University of Brussels, studying the French Language, culture and customs of The Congo.


INTERNSHIP:  High Street Baptist Church in Springfield and Tulsa Baptist Temple in Tulsa (My sending Church)


MINISTRY:  Approved in 1957 to go to Belgian Congo, which is now known as The Democratic Republic of Congo, where we started scores of churches in over fifty years of service.  In between our many trips to Africa we traveled extensively in the US, Canada and Europe speaking in Churches and Mission Conferences reporting on the work that God has accomplished.  Additionally, we taught Missions at the Baptist Bible College in Springfield.


RESULTS:  Over one hundred fifty churches and missions established in the heart of Africa, witnessing thousands accepting Christ as Savior and following Him in baptism.  The churches, missions and parsonages have their own local pastors and leaders.


MY LIFE VERSE:  (I Peter 5:7)  Casting all your care upon Him, for He careth for you.


PRAISE TO GOD:  (Psalms 126:3)  The Lord hath done great things for us; whereof we are glad.   (Mark 16;15)..,Go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel to every creature.       






Testimony of Mwape and his Wife

 

My name is MWAPE MONJI, and I was born in Rwashi- Lubumbashi / Katanga on December 13th 1980. When I was born, I was crippled with club feet, usually, when a baby is born crippled, the parents take him to the forest and leave him to die, but my parents loved me and wanted to keep me. When I was a baby, my parents took me to Mitwaba in Kisele, where I grew up. I didn’t have a chance to go to school because I was crippled; it would have been hard for me to go to school because the children 



would laugh at me for being so crippled. It was a very difficult life in Mitwaba, and I suffered a lot so I decided to come to the city of Lubumbashi. I was 18 years old when I arrived in Lubumbashi.

 

To have my life, I taught myself how to repair shoes. When I was 23 years old, I met Mary Mbonzo and we were soon married and we had a daughter named Anny. We lived in a very small village house with dirt floor and thatch roof and it leaked very

badly when it rained. I continued to repair shoes to take care of my family. I had a box I carried some old shoes to advertize my business. I would go to a busy corner in the town and set up my box to repair shoes. Sometimes, people would bring their shoes by to be repaired and I would make a little money. It was difficult because the store owner nearby would see me and discover that I was crippled and perhaps also had mental problem. They would chase me away from that area.

 

One day, I set my box up across the street from the Bible Baptist Mission, they had a school there and they came out and chase me away. A lady named Jeannette, who kept the office clean, saw them chasing me away, and she asked me what my name was and I told her and asked me what I was doing. Then she told me to come to the mission gate and set my box up there and the Baptist Mission would love me and no one would chase me away from there. Missionaries and Christians coming to the office and invited me to come to the Baptist Church that was next door and there I got saved in 2001 and was baptized in the New Testament Baptist Church in 2002.

 

My wife and daughter started going with me to the church every week and she was saved in 2002 and baptized in the New Testament Baptist Church in 2003.

We have both been faithful in serving the Lord. The pastor invited me to become a choir member which has been a great blessing to me. The Bible Baptist Mission has been good to me. They got me a new pair of special shoes that would fit my deformed feet and also provided me with a bike so that I can travel to my home which they also bought for me and my family.

 

I am thankful for the Bible Baptist Mission that has saved my life both spiritually and physically.