In Angola we worked with Missionaries Ron and Donna Mueller. The main purpose was to train individuals on how to lay out a foundation, assemble trusses, and erect buildings. The two training sites were in remote areas with the farthest away being about 800 miles away from the capitol city of Luanda.
Africa Tabernacle Evangelism (ATE) is a ministry created to provide African churches with their own building structure; establishing church members with a place of worship and a center for ministry within their community.
ATE began in 1991, during a time of great anticipated growth of the African church. With church expansion there would be a greater need of church buildings in which congregations could meet. The desire was not only that more individuals would come to know Christ, but that they would also have a permanent place in which they could continue to grow in their new relationship with Him. So, the solution to this need came in the form of a few, quite heavy, steel pieces.
Or what we like to call… a tabernacle.
With these free-standing steel structures, an African church is provided with a home and permanency in a continent that continually experiences change.
You do not have to board a plane to help an African church in need of a building (although that opportunity is always available), but you can show your love through prayers and giving. Finances are most often ATE’s greatest setback, and also one of the greatest ways you can help. Often churches or individuals will travel as a team to Africa to erect the structure that they helped pay for, along with also doing ministry within the surrounding community.
Africa Tabernacle Evangelism, with the vital help from churches and individuals across the U.S., has been able to help several churches in Africa. But there are still plenty of opportunities to help many, many more African congregations.
