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AFRICA
Missions in
Decades By Eric Bohman
patient labor were required to see even the
first signs of spiritual fruit.

As a result of a perpetual missionary
presence for nearly five decades, there is
a strong, growing, and thriving national
church. A well-trained national leadership
exists with plans for another church nearly
30 miles away! Josh Mead and his family, the
current missionary there, have been blessed
to see the spiritual harvest of the Gospel
seeds that were planted decades earlier.

It has been said that Christianity is not
measured in years but in decades. How much
more is that statement true on the foreign
mission field where it can take many years
of prayer and labor to see God’s glorious
light break through the powers of darkness!
“Fruit” from the Gospel may be seen in a
short amount of time, but it typically takes
decades for the “fruit that remains” to be
seen. Obstacles abound because the evil one
will be sure of that, but it is only through
the grace of God and the perseverance of
His servants that long-lasting, effective
ministry can be produced. Today, the need
is not just for more laborers but for laborers
who will be committed for the long term so
that these obstacles can be overcome and a
firm Christian foundation laid for future
generations. In a day when short-term missions has
become popular and multiple mission trips
have, in some minds, replaced the more
“traditional” method of missions, there
is still a lot to be said for the long-term
approach to missionary work. Decades
of ministry on the field prove it! There are
many ministries that have demonstrated
that decades of missionary labor are not
only important but also necessary for the
perpetuity of the national church. Below are
just a few of many examples that reveal the
significance of missions in decades.

Senegal It was in the mid-seventies when BIMI
Missionaries Ron Bragg and JB Godfrey
with their families arrived in the country of
Senegal, West Africa, a country that was and
still to this day is 97 percent Islamic. Years of
4 Ivory Coast
As in Senegal, it was likewise in the
early seventies when the first BIMI
missionary began his ministry in
Abidjan, the capital city of the Ivory
Coast at that time. Through a series of
struggles, political unrest, and several
government coups (one of which was
successful), there have been five decades
of faithful missionaries in and around
Abidjan. From those early roots 35 churches
have now been established! The largest
is just ten miles outside the former
capital in the town of Bingerville where
Missionary Bob Mach has labored for