INTRODUCTION AND GREETINGS
The current administration, the teaching and the non-teaching staff, and the entire student body of the Kenema Bear Valley Bible Institute, under the guidance of God Almighty, here by send our profound greetings to every one of you, our worthy supporters and great workers in the Lord’s vineyard. Your selfless support (especially during this stressful COVID period) for the training of more preachers in Sierra Leone for the betterment of the Church is duly acknowledged, and may the good Lord continue to favor you and provide more for your families in Christ’s name. We wish you a blissful and a purposeful new year.
This being the first report of the year, we are very glad to inform you that the Lord has been so mindful of us in this school. Your prayers have been so helpful to us. So many activities took place at Kenema Bear Valley Bible Institute, Sierra Leone within the month of January 2021. The breakdown of those activities is given under the following headings:
STAFF UPDATE: Kenema Bear Valley Bible Institute continues to operate with two permanent staff/instructors (the Dean of Students, Peter Barnett and the acting Director on ground, Peter Sahr Makundu) together with the temporal staff who come to lecture on invitation. Two instructors (Robert P Dahn and Anthony Joseph Yillia) were invited to take two courses in the month of January.
STUDENTS UPDATE: The KBVBI (Kenema Bear Valley Bible Institute) has fourteen students currently, all of them are intact and in good condition of health and are faithful in pursuance of their course in the school. However, on the 9th January, 2021, one of the students (Eric B Kaimba) was involved in a car accident while he was returning to the campus in preparation for the resumption of school on the 12th January 2021. He sustained some major injuries but was taken to the hospital for proper medical attention. But glory be to God, he responded to treatment and continued with his academic activities.
ACADEMICS/CLASSROOM ACTIVITIES: In January, two courses: Marriage and Family Life and the Old Testament Wisdom Literature were covered. These two were covered only because our end of year break lasted from December till January 10th. All the fourteen students attended the classes and the instructors gave in their best. Our courses covered 35 hours per course (7 hours each day).
EVANGELISM: To keep with the purpose of God for mankind (that all may be saved) and in accomplishing one of the objectives of KBVBI (to carry out the great commission to evangelize the lost world), the students and staff were involved in vigorous evangelism in the month in question. The administration of KBVBI held an evangelism seminar on the 20th January 2021 at the school campus. This seminar was intended to ignite, encourage and to teach the students certain rudiments that are required for a successful soul winning. As a result of God’s grace and our evangelistic efforts, 2 souls were baptized and 4 Christians were restored back to the Church. Moreover, the campus Church that began some four years ago but ceased to exist was as well restored and we started it again. And in fact, the number is increasing with our prospects and our converts alike, so that the space at the school campus could not contain us. We made a move to relocate the Church to another place where there is enough space and can be easily accessible by our prospects. We rented a Court Barry at Gbenderu section of Kenema where we started worshipping on 31st January 2021. Furthermore, we received 120 cartons of tracts and preacher’s boxes from our supporters in the USA through the instrumentality of Steven Ashcraft, the coordinator and Robert P Dahn, the Director of Ganta Bear Valley Bible Institute, Liberia. Those tracts are so useful to us and we remain appreciative to the supporters. We have shared some of them with the local congregations around us.
KBVBI’S RELATIONSHIP WITH THE LOCAL CONGREGATIONS: As it is almost certain that the existence of Kenema Bear Valley Bible Institute depends greatly on the collaborative efforts of local Churches of Christ in Sierra Leone, the administration gathered the preachers in local congregations in Sierra Leone to discuss the issues that will make the school to move forward and make impact in the entire country. The meeting was held for two days, the first being on the 15th and the last being on the 22nd January 2021. The first meeting was attended by 11 preachers from different parts of Sierra Leone, and the final was attended by 28 preachers. At this meeting, were also Robert P Dahn and Francis Musa (the two Directors of Bear Valley full-time programs in Liberia and Guinea) who served as representatives of Mr. Steven Ashcraft. The meeting was successful and the relationship between the school and the local Churches was strengthened firmly.
A STUDENT’S PERSONAL PROFILE: ERIC BORBOR KAIMBA
Eric B Kaimba is one of our students of the Kenema Bear Valley Bible Institute here in Sierra Leone. He was born on 24 December, 1957 in Bo, Southern Sierra Leone. He is married with two children all being baptized and are faithful members of the Church of Christ. Brother Eric, though born in Bo, Southern Sierra Leone, relocated to Sengema, a village in Kailahun District, eastern Sierra Leone. While he was there, he and his family were members of Christ Apostolic Church for many years till 2018 when some Church of Christ members from Kailahun town penetrated Sengema village and preached the undiluted Gospel there and some were won to Christ including Brother Eric and his family. Since then, he has been faithful in the things of God and, through his effort and the help of other brethren, a congregation was established in Sengema where he serves as the preacher. He is a very zealous brother and he has indicated interest for a Gospel campaign to be taken to his locality, and by God’s grace, we shall be there in March.
CONCLUSION: On the whole, the month of January has been a busy month for us and has been a successful month as well, especially with the activities that were carried out. We are grateful to God for the 2 souls being converted, the 4 Christians being restored, and the campus church being revived back. Once again, we thank everyone; we thank our coordinators who spend hours, thinking, reading and putting things in order to see that the school succeeds. As we continue to work together for the expansion of the kingdom of God here on earth (the Church), may our efforts be rewarded by the Creator of the Universe and may there be more successes in the subsequent months in Jesus’s name. From all of us at KBVBI we are saying, “Do have a blessed month ahead!
Thank you so much for reading through.
Peter Sahr Makundu