August 2024 Newsletter
Training Africa’s Next Generation of Spiritual Leaders
Students are back on campus!
AIU seeks to finish the year strong.
After a three-week break, we have resumed the third and final term of the 2024 academic calendar. Our students took time to visit their families and engage in various ministries during their short break. All of them returned to campus the weekend before classes resumed on August 19. We praise God for their safe travel and arrival!
We are so excited to have started this last term which features several significant events for our campus. Among them will be the graduation ceremony of our 2024 class of seniors, which is scheduled to take place on October 26.
We are thankful to God for all the local professors who are leading our students through various academic courses. These professors have given tireless effort to instill biblical knowledge and pour into the lives of the young men we are training. We deeply appreciate their dedication and service to the university.
Pray with us for a successful academic term and that our students will have the zeal to continue learning from God’s Word. Also, pray with us for good health and God’s continued provision in the lives of our local professors and students.
The picture above shows the first student assembly for Term Three, which was held in AIU’s Carey Chapel. The assembly aimed to welcome the students who had returned from break and to encourage our students to finish strong in their last term of the year.
New Training Partnership!
Indigenous People’s Technology and Education Center (ITEC) helps AIU equip pastors for community ministry.
We are excited to announce that the Indigenous People’s Technology and Education Center (ITEC) is now partnering with AIU to equip Christian leaders for effective gospel ministry.
ITEC is a Christian organization that offers practical training focused on equipping indigenous believers with tools and skills to meet needs and share the gospel in their communities. To achieve this, ITEC works with trusted international partners and mature believers, teaching them new skills that apply to the needs in their communities, giving them a door to share the gospel. ITEC’s training categories include dental, medical, mechanical, film, mission transportation, and farm training.
AIU has already benefitted from these trainings. From August 19-23, ITEC conducted a farm training at AIU, which was attended by 24 Gospelink pastors from across Zambia. This farm training was intentionally scheduled to prepare participants for the upcoming farming season, typically November through March.
The AIU farm training focused on conservation farming, a method that uses fewer farming inputs and is thus more cost-effective. The knowledge acquired from this training will help Gospelink pastors to become good stewards of the resources God has entrusted to them. Additionally, pastors can share what they learned from the ITEC training as an avenue for evangelism in their communities. Upon completion of the training, each participant was awarded a certificate in conservation farming. To God be the glory for the meaningful partnerships he has brought to AIU!
“The knowledge we gained from this training is so valuable and will greatly help us in our farming ventures. We hope to implement this farming method in our different locations and share our knowledge with others. We hope this program will continue even in other parts of Zambia.”
Cornmeal Distribution!
Generous giving supports AIU community outreach.
We are so grateful for God’s continued blessings in the ministries of AIU. Recently, through the donation of our generous supporters, several impoverished families in local churches were blessed with gifts of cornmeal and cooking oil.
Most of Zambia and southern Africa at large saw very little rainfall in the 2023-24 farming season, resulting in a poor harvest. As was the case across the country, many villages surrounding AIU were negatively impacted by this drought. The sparse harvest made life difficult across the region, since most families depend on cornmeal to make food, such as Nshima – a Zambian household staple.
Providentially, God laid it upon the heart of generous donors who helped provide bags of cornmeal and cooking oil for impoverished families in different local churches. AIU’s outreach department facilitated the purchasing and distribution of the supplies to those in need. The included pictures show some of the beneficiaries of this generous gift.
“We are so thankful for this timely gift. We had no harvest in our fields this year because of very little rain. This help will forever be remembered. We are so thankful to all those who contributed so that we could be helped in this way.”
This practical help touched the lives of many, and they praised God because they were met at their point of need. We extend our sincere gratitude to those who gave generously.
Transportation Need!
New vehicles needed to support AIU’s mission.
Vehicles play such a significant role in the day-to-day life of AIU. That said, transportation continues to be one of the major challenges our university faces.
The campus is in urgent need of replacing three Toyota Landcruisers that have been used by the campus for many years. They are being used daily to transport students, staff, guest lecturers, and visiting mission teams. The same vehicles carry materials from Lusaka which are needed to support the AIU’s operations. They are also used to convey patients on behalf of the Chifundo clinic (our clinic on campus) and to transport ministry teams every week in the community.
Due to the rising cost of imported parts which are unavailable in local auto stores, vehicle repair costs have continued to grow drastically, even as our vehicles grow older and require diligent maintenance. We need your help! We plan to replace three vehicles that are the most used. We hope to sell the current vehicles and with additional funding, purchase replacements.
In so many ways, these vehicles are vital workhorses in sustaining AIU’s operations daily. Please pray with us and consider giving toward this important need. If you would like to donate to this urgent need, please click this link: Give to our Transportation Need.
Maize Sheller is Fully Functional!
Critical machinery launches AIU towards self-sustainability.
It is our continued desire to see the development of our farming initiative on campus, which is designed to help our campus move toward self-sustainability. Growth in our agricultural program has increased the need for efficiency in processing different products from our fields, especially corn. Hammermills installed on campus several years ago have made it easier to process our corn for consumption, benefitting not only AIU, but also the surrounding villages. Nevertheless, we continued to face the challenge of shelling our corn to make it ready for processing via the hammermill.
Through the support of generous donors, we were able to purchase a maize sheller to address this obstacle. In June, we shared the news of this acquisition. The sheller has now been installed and we are able to both shell and process corn right here on campus! We are thankful to God and to the sponsors who blessed AIU with this machinery.
The attached pictures show our agricultural team shelling maize using the recently obtained maize sheller. This development will greatly contribute to our production of corn by giving us an efficient way to shell our maize. Pray with us that our agricultural initiative continues to grow as we move toward self-sustainability.
STAFF SPOTLIGHT!
WEBSTER & HITHER SIANSIMBI
Garden Supervisor
Webster is a 2017 graduate of AIU. In November of 2018, he was retained on staff at AIU as the garden supervisor, where he continues to serve today. As the garden supervisor, his daily routines involve overseeing all operations at the garden as well as the campus fields. It is Webster’s responsibility to make sure the cafeteria is supplied with vegetables and to sell the surplus to surrounding villages. Webster also oversees the students who work in the garden.
“It is such a huge privilege and blessing for me to serve in this capacity. Working with the students and other local workers has helped me continue to grow in my leadership skills. Serving in the garden has also greatly helped me grow my agricultural knowledge. I am so thankful to God because I have found my job as an avenue to encourage students from God’s Word and a platform to share the gospel with local customers,”
On May 8, 2020, Webster married his dear wife, Hither, who he describes as kind, loving, caring, and hardworking. God has blessed Webster and Hither with two children, Amon (3) and Amora (1). Webster praises God for his wife and children and desires to continue to see his family grow in the fear of the Lord. Webster is currently a graduate student in AIU’s distance learning program.
Pray with Webster for God’s wisdom and guidance as he serves in this capacity. Also, pray that God would continue to protect his family and that he would lead his family in the fear of the Lord.
STudent SPOTLIGHT!
PAUL MUJUDA
Senior
Originally from Mbala in northern Zambia, Paul is the oldest of four brothers. He was raised in a religious family and went to church regularly, where his father was a deacon.
While in high school, Paul was pressured by his peers to drink beer and engage in gambling activities. Little did he know that even then the Lord had a plan for his life. Two years after graduating high school, in 2017, Paul distinctly remembers having heard the gospel of salvation preached during a church service he attended with his family. The preacher was speaking about God’s call, specifically his call to salvation and his desire for all to be saved. He emphasized that God can forgive every kind of sin. Paul was convicted by the gospel message and placed his faith in the Jesus Christ as his Lord and Savior. Since then, Paul continues to have a great desire to serve the Lord and to enjoy fellowship with other believers.
Shortly after Paul’s conversion, an AIU graduate shared with him about the university. He did not hesitate to apply so he could be equipped for ministry. Now a senior, he considers it a huge blessing to be at AIU.
“I am so thankful to God for the opportunity to study His word here at AIU. The people on campus are loving, kind, generous, and welcoming. The courses I have taken here at AIU have greatly helped me in my understanding and right application of Scripture.”
Paul plans to be a missionary after graduating from AIU, focusing on Muslim evangelism. He also plans to engage in media and graphic design to raise some income to help sustain his ministry and family.
Pray with Paul that he will finish his studies well. Also, pray for his future ministry plans that God would give him the wisdom to be effective in ministry.