BIRTH OF FIRST RADIO STATION IN D. R. CONGO

On July 4, 1991 our license was signed into law by 

President Mobutu! 

As we revisit July 4,1991 each year, Kathy and I are very thankful to have lived several zenith events where we have experienced the Holy Spirit's intervention. Despite our frequent incapacity and simplicity as we live through this Age of Grace, we realize we are nearing the end times and the end of the Holy Spirit's working alongside believers in the Body of Christ. 

In our legal application to the government, we named our station "Cherith Radio" memorializing our difficult experience, which seemed to parallel the Prophet Elijah's tutoring by the Holy Spirit at Cherith Brook near the Jordan River. Later, Fred Bahler, Kathy's father named it Radio Kahuzi after Mount Kahuzi--Parc National de Kahuzi-Biega, the highest peak and home of the silverback gorilla near Bukavu. 

Kathy and I, along with Fred, had begun our "Tent Making Ministry" (self support) with the Lord's direction which took us through the Cherith Brook experience bringing into our lives a professional couple, Wim and Lita, of Coka Cola Company, with facilities in Bukavu. We were personally invited to minister to them. They were of two different world religions, and considered us as "Holy People." However, the Lord used them to minister to us physically with food and fellowship as we shared the Gospel and Christ's presence and testimony. They also listened and were ministered to by our radio broadcasts, which had just begun. 
 

We chose our logo for BESI, representing the "Widow of Zarephath" and her son written about in I Kings 17: 1- 12. She is represented in our logo carrying a bundle of sticks and the embers of fire on her head with which to prepare their last meal. Having only enough flour for one cake and a little oil she shared and ministered to Elijah the Tishbite during his time of discouragement and famine. The story teaches us is to keep our eyes, our heart, and, our mind on Jesus Christ, so that the Holy Spirit can walk and work effectively beside us!

Though we had requested and developed the dossier for a broadcast license over five years of working through each layer of the government's administration, Kathy and I had no earthly reason to hope and no real idea what the Holy Spirit was preparing for the DRC, (formerly, Zaire) until the 4th of July, 1991, when we saw the American Ambassador and the Cultural Affairs Officer on National Television, presenting a golden American Eagle to President Mobutu as they said good-bye and left the country. 

Our Permit, signed that day, ended the state monopoly on television and radio! We believe the Lord led President Mobutu to end the Party State and change the Constitution, opening the Nation to the first multi-party elections and to Freedom of the Press, with BESI's permission as a private national broadcaster in Shortwave and FM. Over the twenty-six years since we received the first license, more than a thousand radios and TV stations have flourished in the DRC, and the Lord has created wonderful stories of conversion and reconciliation of warring groups through our broadcasts and listener responses. Many times militant, and warring factions took the time to listen to the News and programming of Radio Kahuzi. 

 Mai-Mai Commanders who came 
to faith in Christ while resting in the 
hills above Bukavu preparing to 
overrun the City and Radio Kahuzi.

One such testimony is of the conversion of two commandos on Christmas Day in 2000, after a third of Bukavu had fallen into their control. After hearing the Word of God (in their own heart language) over Radio Kahuzi they repented, laid down their weapons of war, and returned home to Fizi Territory five hundred miles to the South. There they constructed a church to the Praise of the Lord Jesus Christ. "So then faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the Word of God." Romans 10: 17. 

Through these years of war and conflict, it has always been a moment-by-moment test between the flesh and the spirit-–to be absorbed by the problems weighing heavily all around–carnal, or, by walking in, or by, the Spirit. Keep Looking Up to the Lord, living above it, so to speak, as the Holy Spirit continues doing what He will always do, if we let Him and have confidence in Him--and not to be distracted in ourselves, or our circumstances.  

This labor of love is possible only because of you, our Partners and Prayer Warriors and BESI Representatives of Radio Kahuzi helping to keep our feeble hands raised in prayer for Him to accomplish His directive will in our lives and ministry.

We always appreciate and need your prayer, as today, again, the reports are that several military groups have control of different cities, or territories in opposition to one, or another armed group, or political power.  

The huge Banros Canadian Gold Mines closed two days ago, and will be evacuated to Bukavu tomorrow, as the national army has fled before the feared Mai-Mai at Saramabila, near Kayembe, in the Plains of Maniema Province where Kathy grew up. To read more...

A special friend of our ministry would surely be dead if he and his family had not fled and been evacuated a few days ago! The Lord cares and encourages us to always place our confidence in Him–despite the poor circumstances around us!   

Keep Walking by the Spirit! And, Keep Looking Up!

In His Love and Care,
Richard and Kathy McDonald