I heard that Inocencio had planted eight churches since leaving GWC eight years ago. I wanted to see for myself.
Mary (not her real name) was waiting for us at the border and drove us back to Chimoio where she had arranged for us to stay. The next day we went to “Mary’s church”.
Inocencio explained: Mary learned the Bible and was part of Inocencio’s training programme in Quelimane. She moved to Chimoio, where she failed to find a Bible-teaching church. So she started a Bible study in her home and when it got too big, bought a plot of land on the edge of the city and started building a church to hold about 300 people.
She still leads that community and has since added to the land and is building a guest house. It was my first inkling of how this church planting movement was happening.
I quickly learnt that Inocencio’s ministry has resulted in 18 new churches (yes 18!). I met the pastors of several of them. The story was the same: they came to know Christ, studied the Bible, did the GWC Explore correspondence course, started a Bible study in their home, then built a church.
Outside the city centres they are not troubled by building inspectors. One pastor had built a wattle and daub church which is full with his 70 members. All around the church were cement blocks – thousands – which the people were making so they could build bigger.
