South Sudan
This article was originally published in the December 2017 edition of ITMI Monthly.
During this season of giving, we asked ITMI partners to give you their heartfelt answers to several questions. These are from Jahim and Gisma Buli. May their answers bless and encourage you!
The best, most impactful book I read this year was...
The Social and Financial sections of the Seven Areas of Life Training (SALT). The first missionaries who came to [what was then] Sudan taught our people to receive from them.
They did not teach them how to work with their hands to support themselves, the poor and the work of God.
I found my life was so challenged, especially in the financial area.
I was convicted.
After I read the book, my mind was enlightened. Though I have read it before, this time the words are fresh and new to me as though I have never read them.
I pray God helps me to apply what I learned about money and relationships and teach those under my leadership. After I came back from Kampala I trained several churches in the “Financial Area of Life.”
I shared the four chapters:
1. Earning Money Honestly
2. Giving Money Generously
3. Spend Money Wisely
4. Invest Carefully
Now, I can witness that God is changing people’s lives through what I have learned first and then taught to others. As I have benefited from what I have learned, I have to teach to others to benefit also.
Jahim reads from the Bible as he teaches.
The training was attended by many!
After the training, this woman shared, "I have wasted time. I wish I knew all all this before. I have used money in a wrong way, but now I know to the pririoty in spending money. My family's needs are first, not wants."
The thing I’m most thankful for this year is...
The thing I’m thankful for God this year is that God is changing lives through the power of His Word. People who have attended the trainings have started small scale businesses and are now supporting God’s work.
Before, they expected help from the church, but it turns around that the believers are supporting the church after they have learned from the Word of God.
I believe in two years, the church may be able to send people to unreached areas within South Sudan!
What is one way your ITMI supporters directly made an impact for God’s kingdom this year?
The one way my ITMI supporters directly made an impact for God’s Kingdom this year is the financial support they have sent for trainings that I have done.
All that I shared is because of their kind support. I am just a mouth piece of someone thousands of miles away who could not come to this part of the world.
The lives of people who have been changed and transformed are counted on your behalf.
Thank you for your thoughtful and generous support given me and my family, we are grateful and wanted you to know how happy and grateful we are.
Please know that what you have given is being stored away for eternity in the Kingdom of Our Father. Thank you all.
The Buli Family
