Report from BHW Mozambique Partnership Facilitators Following Visit 24-27 June

Key Person: Talsamo 

Recent Events

Activities

The work continues to grow and develop, and more Koti people are coming to know Jesus than ever before.

Cell Groups / Home Churches
There are now around 300 cell groups (home churches/houses of prayer) meeting across the region.

Barnabas Leadership Team
The Barnabas team is the core leadership group based at the House of Prayer in Angoche. It consists of 29 leaders, mostly husbands and wives, who meet every Tuesday and Thursday to pray, encourage one another, organise events in Angoche and discuss the ministry across all the zones.

Wednesday Bible Training
Every Wednesday from 9:00 am to 12:30 pm, up to 90 leaders gather for Bible training. They travel from more than 60 different zones, with some making a journey of up to 150 km each week by boat, motorbike or bicycle. They take what they learn back to their villages, where many oversee up to 10 cell groups each and train other leaders in turn.

House of Prayer Services
The House of Prayer holds a Koti-speaking service on Saturday mornings, with around 330 people attending. At the same time, about 350 children take part in the children’s programme. A Portuguese-speaking service is held on Sunday mornings and is attended by around 100–120 people.

Madrassa Literacy Groups (MOZ04a)
Each day the team runs 45 literacy groups, teaching between 25 and 100 children in each group to read and write in their own Koti language. The only textbook available in written Koti is the New Testament and Psalms. The classes are held for 30 minutes before and after school and are reaching around 1,200 children.  There are also a few Madrassa groups teaching adults how to read and write Koti.

Baptisms
In 2025, there were 1,220 baptisms across the wider ministry area. Of these, 500 were from Angoche township and 68 were from the House of Prayer itself.

So far in 2026, there have already been 29 baptisms through the House of Prayer in Angoche.

Because of the growing number of beach baptisms, the government now requires the team to apply for permission beforehand and provide the names of everyone being baptised.  

Evangelism
This week, 24 of their young people are visiting the nearby islands to share the gospel. So far, 11 people have put their faith in Jesus, and three are preparing to be baptised. The team were even invited to share from the Bible at a local mosque where three people wanted to put their faith in Jesus.  These people were followed up by a visit from the Sheikh from the mosque saying they can’t believe in Jesus. 

Talsamo was also greatly encouraged by the recent visit from a team from Grace Vineyard. During their time together they witnessed miracles and saw God working in powerful ways. Grace Vineyard has also funded the purchase of land and a house, which has now been completed and is being used to accommodate visiting teams.

Gardens
Talsamo says that quite a few of their people have gardens around their homes and that some do not need to purchase vegetables now. After a previous visit from Grace church, Molula helped them with this. She was here again with the recent team. We wondered if it might be a good idea to get her to come here and continue the training and push it out further into the community. For further discussion. She has been FFF trained in Zimbabwe and has a great little farm.

New Leaders

Fahamo is Talsamo’s brother. He has been married to Faustian for eight years, and they have two children, aged 7 and 4. Fahamo gave his life to Jesus in 2020. Before that, he was a Muslim and lived with his brother, who showed him great love and often shared with him that Jesus is the way of salvation. Because of his Muslim background, accepting Jesus was a huge struggle. To avoid the pressure, he moved out of his brother’s house.

One night while he was asleep, he woke up after hearing a voice say, “Follow Me.” He couldn’t get those words out of his mind and wrestled with them for a whole week.

One day he borrowed a Bible and opened it at random. The passage he read was Jesus saying that people would speak badly about those who follow Him, but those who do will receive everlasting life. That was the confirmation he needed, and in 2020 he decided to follow Jesus.

Not long afterwards, a man from the local mosque asked why he hadn’t been attending anymore. Fahamo explained that he was now a follower of Jesus Christ. The man replied that he was lost. Instantly, Fahamo remembered the Bible passage he had read about people speaking against those who follow Jesus, which encouraged him to stand firm.

The church leaders helped him grow in his faith and understand more about Jesus and His mission. As he matured, he developed a strong desire to share the good news with his Muslim friends. Today, Fahamo is part of the leadership team where he lives almost everyone is Muslim. He says God has placed him there to care for people and tell them about Jesus.

“This mission is the work God has given me to do.” 

Personal Stories

Laura's Story

Laura is married to Subaer and shared that she grew up as a Muslim. Her neighbour, Talsamo, began talking to her about God and telling her about Jesus, encouraging her to follow Him. Laura said, “At that time I was living in darkness, but once I heard about Jesus, I began to love Him. I now believe I am saved, and I thank God.” 

Later, Talsamo invited Laura to serve at the Centre by helping with the cooking, and she was happy to do so.  Her husband helps her with this.

After Laura started following Jesus, her family noticed that she was going to church. Because she was an adult and married, they did not say much about her decision. In fact, they are now happy for her because they have seen how much her life has changed for the better. 

Vivi’s Story

Vivi grew up in a Muslim family following Mohammed. About 10 years ago, she noticed a group of Christians on the island singing together. At first, she did not understand what they were doing and laughed at them. But over time, she became curious and started listening. Little by little, she came to believe in Jesus, was baptised, and became one of the very first followers of Jesus in Busu. 

Her family was not happy about her decision. They blamed her husband and said she was only following Jesus because of him. But Vivi told them it was her own decision and that she genuinely wanted to follow Jesus. 

Later, she and her husband had the opportunity to study the Bible in Nampula. Her parents were angry that she left her schooling to do this. While she was away, her four-year-old son became very sick. She prayed for him, and he was healed. When she shared this with her mother, her attitude began to change. Although her family still does not follow Jesus, they no longer persecute her, and Vivi continues to pray that one day they will come to know Him too.

Vivi said she has seen God change her life in many ways and has witnessed several miracles of healing. “God has blessed us,” she said.

Just a month before we met her, Vivi began suffering severe stomach pain. At the hospital, doctors told her they believed she had a growth in her stomach. She was in a lot of pain and very discouraged. Her brother-in-law encouraged her to trust Jesus for healing. He told her that if she believed, Jesus could heal her. They gathered around and prayed for her. As they prayed, Vivi felt the pain, but she also sensed Jesus touching and healing her. From that moment, the pain disappeared, and she was able to stand and move freely again. She gives all the glory to God for her healing. 

Partnership's Influence within the Community

Many people in the community say that the faith community have great love, and their Muslim families notice how God is changing their lives.

Their success is seeing many come to faith has raised the profile in the community which is causing some issues. 

It is interesting moving about the community with Talsamo. He is extremely well known and obviously is well like. He has favour with the people.  

Ideas for the Future

Next month they plan to open two new training centres, or Houses of Prayer, to help support the continued growth of the ministry.

Several Christians have lost their jobs because of their faith, so the team is looking at ways to create employment opportunities that will help support families and strengthen the church community. We discussed 3 options:
1) Talsamo is excited about starting a small egg production business. He was inspired by the successful chicken project run by Molula from Lesotho (she was on the Vineyard team that visited Angoche and Talsamo went to Lesotho after the visit and saw what she was doing) and sees it as a practical way to generate income. We encouraged him to put together a simple proposal explaining how the project would work and what funding would be needed.

2) The team also has the beginnings of a sewing business. They have nine sewing machines and run three-month sewing courses every afternoon. Chime’s husband services the machines, and several people have already completed the training. Each year they sew school uniforms to give away, but they would also love to start making products to sell. Right now, the biggest hurdle is the cost of fabric. We talked about buying fabric from Nampula so they could begin producing items for sale. Around 50 metres of fabric costs about 4,000 meticais. We also suggested they need to think about ways to create income and not to just give away things they make. And, from the profit to help those who need help. 

3) Another possibility is a small bakery. Talsamo and another team member both have baking experience and could train others, making it another great way to create jobs while supporting the ministry.

We encouraged Talsamo to start small with one or two projects and to prepare some funding proposals if they are serious about getting these businesses off the ground. 

Current Issues and Challenges

Most of the local Muslim community speaks positively about the ministry and appreciates the work being done. However, some people believe false rumours and speak against the gospel, saying that Christians are on the wrong path. 

The government has also begun paying closer attention to the ministry’s activities.

Sharing the gospel with Muslim women requires a lot of wisdom and sensitivity. To avoid misunderstandings or causing offence to their husbands, two members of the team will usually visit together when speaking with women.

Another challenge the church faces is that some Christian young women are approached by Muslim men with offers of marriage or employment, often accompanied by promises of financial security and a better life.

Prayer and Praise Points

Prayer:

1) Protection for Talsamo from persecution – physically and spiritually
2) For leaders to be effective in evangelism and many people would continue to respond  
3) That unsaved people would feel loved and attracted to Christ
4) That the teams that go out to evangelise will make good contacts and see many come to faith

Praise:

1) For many people who are coming to know the Lord –more than ever before.   Most are Koti, some Makua.
2) Recent miracles of healing
3) For lives that are being changed

Comments

BHW has been helping with funding bikes, funding the Madrassa literacy programme, and supporting the evangelists. This is greatly appreciated and they need this to continue to help with the ministry.  

We may get proposals from them about commencing small businesses as discussed above.

Currently the teachers in the madrassas get about MTC1,000 / month, about US$14. Talsamo would like to lift it to MTC1,500. The budget is the same as it was when the programme began and costs have increased significantly since then. We suggest that the amount for the bikes and leadership training remain the same. If it is possible, it would be good to increase the support of the madrassa teachers by MTC500/m. There are 23 of them so the full amount would be US$2,000 / year.