The modern cityscape of Harare belies the soaring inflation that has
afflicted Zimbabwe’s economy since 2007. Official currency
struggled to keep up, culminating in the largest value
banknote issued at a staggering 100 trillion dollars

Our 40 years as Elim missionaries in Harare

Geoff and Erica Saunders are retiring and returning to the UK after serving as Elim missionaries in Zimbabwe for more than 40 years. Elim Prospect Church in Harare interviewed them and kindly provided us with a selection of highlights

Geoff, where did you receive your call to be a missionary?
I suppose that comes in stages because you can’t be called until you’re a believer, and I became a Christian in my first year at university studying mathematics.

Then, a few years later, on a Christian camp Loren Cunningham was the speaker and he challenged us to take up missionary work. At the end of his message, he invited those who wanted to give themselves to missionary work to stand and I stood up.

I went for careers counselling at the end of my university course and told the counsellor I wanted to be a missionary. He said, “It would be good if you become a teacher. As a maths teacher you can go anywhere. Lots of countries are closed to missionaries, but if you become a maths teacher you’ll have the opportunity to get into a country and then exercise whatever ministry you can.”

So I trained as a teacher.

You started your missionary work in Zimbabwe in the early 1980s, just barely two years after the Vumba Massacre. Were you not afraid to come to Zimbabwe?
No. I don’t know whether it’s the carelessness of youth, but I wasn’t.

In fact, I was teaching in London in 1978 when those missionaries were murdered and I heard the news and my reaction was, we can’t allow the devil to win. If they need teachers to take their place, then I’m willing to go.

As it turned out, the Elim Missions Board decided to close the school at that time and it didn’t reopen until 1981. I actually came to Zimbabwe in 1980 in response to an advert placed by the government in the UK seeking teachers to come to this country.

I had initially thought I’d come for two or three years and then return to the UK, but the contract was ‘you come to Zimbabwe and we’ll pay you to come but we’re not paying if you go back’. So I wasn’t afraid.

In fact, I met Elim missionary Peter Griffiths as I was leaving a meeting at Saint Michael’s in Mbale. He said to me, “Geoff, will you teach at Emmanuel next year?” And I said yes because I’d actually been waiting for someone to invite me.

You were one of the pioneers who established Elim Church Assembly in Harare. How did this happen?
Elim had been working in the rural areas with the aim of reaching the people beyond where the gospel had already been preached, then in 1990 a guest speaker challenged us to move our work into the cities. He explained that this was the pattern Paul used – he went to the centres like Ephesus and then the gospel went out from those places where he planted churches. So he challenged us to open churches in the cities, beginning with Harare.

The church leadership agreed and asked who would be willing to go to Harare to become the pastor. I volunteered and found employment at Gateway High School. But before I came to Harare, we used to meet together with some university students, including Erica who was a nursing student at the time.

I came to Harare and we began to look for a place and Scripture Union allowed us to use a room where we met for several months. We began looking for a place to meet and found the African Methodist Episcopal Church Chapel. We met there for many years.

How did you manage to build the church in Prospect, where land is very expensive?
That’s by the grace of God. We wanted to have our own premises, and we looked. Through Peter Griffiths I knew a man in urban planning, so I approached him and I asked, “Is there anywhere in Harare where we can find a place to build a church?”

He told me there were two sites that could be available in the Prospect area. So we came and visited this site and decided we’d make an offer. The asking price was more than we had, but Elim UK had donated a car to us for the District Chairman’s use – I was the District Chairman. So we worked out how much we would get from selling the car and went back. Our offer was way less than the asking price for the land, but by the grace of God it was accepted.

Why do you enjoy taking the back seat in the church?
One of my favourite verses in John’s Gospel is when John the Baptist says, “He must increase and I must decrease.” My aim is to lift up Jesus Christ, not to make me more important.

In coming here as a teacher, my motivation was to assist the church, not to become the boss or the leader, but to enable others to take the work forward.

What is your hope for Elim Harare?
The church shouldn’t be dependent on missionaries, but depend on God. And the church should continue to go forward with God’s hand upon it.

My wish would be that the church would continue to grow with the leadership that is being developed. We believe those people will carry on the work of God and it will go on.

This article first appeared in Direction Magazine. For further details, please click here.

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