They spent 17 years at Vanga, but their service ended on a rocky note. “Dr. Leslie had a relational falling out with some of the tribal leaders and was asked not to come back,” Ramsey says. “They reconciled later; there were apologies and forgiveness, but it didn’t end like he hoped.” “His goal was to spread Christianity. He felt like he was there for 17 years and he never really made a big impact, but the legacy he left is huge.”

In 1912, medical missionary Dr. William Leslie went to live and minister to tribal people in a remote corner of the Democratic Republic of the Congo. After 17 years he returned to the U.S. a discouraged man – believing he failed to make an impact for Christ. He died nine years after his return.
But in 2010, a team led by Eric Ramsey with Tom Cox World Ministries made a shocking and sensational discovery. They found a network of reproducing churches hidden like glittering diamonds in the dense jungle across the Kwilu River from Vanga, where Dr. Leslie was stationed.

With the help of a Mission Aviation Fellowship pilot, Ramsey and his team flew east from Kinshasa to Vanga, a two and a half hour flight in a Cessna Caravan. After they reached Vanga, they hiked a mile to the Kwilu River and used dugout canoes to cross the half-mile-wide expanse. Then they hiked with backpacks another 10 miles into the jungle before they reached the first village of the Yansi people.
Based on his previous research, Ramsey thought the Yansi in this remote area might have some exposure to the name of Jesus, but no real understanding of who He is. They were unprepared for their remarkable find.
“When we got in there, we found a network of reproducing churches throughout the jungle,” Ramsey reports. “Each village had its own gospel choir, although they wouldn’t call it that,” he notes. “They wrote their own songs and would have sing-offs from village to village.”
They found a church in each of the eight

villages they visited scattered across 34 miles. Ramsey and his team even found a 1000-seat stone “cathedral” in one of the villages.
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This rare, awesome, phenomenal, and remarkable event is both an opportunity and lesson to make God our priority when experiencing or observing it while recognizing His handiwork.  At the same time, it’s also an opportunity to see how the spiritual realm replicates the natural realm with practical application to life and to our personal lives.

One of the benefits of aging is awareness that some events will be the last of their kind in one’s life.  Admittedly, some may consider it a downside.  But those who are realistic accept and take it in stride.  For many Christians and, hopefully, the majority, opt for realism as they anticipate the blessed hope promised in God’s Word and to be at home with the Lord.
At my age, the total eclipse on April 8, 2024, will definitely be the last of its kind in my life.  Having observed it behind the prescribed lenses with others was an awesome experience—awesome both naturally and spiritually.
Naturally, its rarity and astronomical appearance amazes and delights our natural senses.  To think we can anticipate its occurrence in advance and be equipped to observe it healthfully with no damage to our eyesight, as well as considering the distance involved, seems almost miraculous. The heavens are vast and most spectacular.
Spiritually, to consider the Creator, who awesomely and majestically created such an ordered and vast universe, and regularly scheduling such a phenomenal occurrence, brings only adoration and praise to be known of Him and to know Him. Realistically, how can anyone observe the heavens and believe they randomly occurred without a great Designer? Additionally, the personal thoughts and spiritual lessons that come through such an event and moment in time are edifying and thought-provoking.  I am always surprised when unassumed or non-previous spiritual lessons come to mind, as it did on this occasion.
At this late stage of my life, two spiritual lessons came out of this natural event and phenomenon—lessons that never occurred to me previously:

The least sliver of the sun’s light left in an eclipse still provides the daylight to which we are accustomed, which attests to its incomprehensible power and radiance.
The sun is not eclipsed or darkened by some evil, as the moon is good and provides light at night. 

Observing the eclipse where I live it was not total.  It ended with a very, very thin sliver of its radiance that continued to give the day more than enough light.  It occurred to me that no matter how much the light of God’s divine revelation or the Gospel is denied, hidden, or persecuted, there is always enough to bring its light to our attention and to that of a lost world.  In other words, it will continue to transform lives bringing knowledge of our Creator and atonement, redemption, and salvation through Jesus Christ.
Secondly, this thought came through as never before.  That which obstructs the light of the sun in an eclipse is not some evil.  It’s something normally considered good, that is, the moon which provides light during the night.  What can we learn from this?  It’s possible that what obstructs the light of God’s Word and the Gospel of Jesus Christ is often not some great or evident evil, but rather much that appears good such as priorities usurping God’s place and priority in our lives—priorities such as loyalty to family or friends, loyalty to work or other activities, loyalty to nation, prioritizing good works extraneous of faith, perhaps prioritizing political allegiances, and many other priorities.  True, evil darkens God’s light, but this eclipse reminds us that even perceived good can darken the sun’s/Son’s light in our lives.
Are we able to recognize that not only evil but much that appears to be good and positive can so prioritize itself obstructing God’s holy light and goal, which is to bring glory to Him and to transform our lives to be obedient to His will?
This rare, awesome, phenomenal, and remarkable event is both an opportunity and lesson to make God our priority when experiencing or observing it while recognizing His handiwork.  At the same time, it’s also an opportunity to see how the spiritual realm replicates the natural realm with practical application to life and to our personal lives.
This last phenomenal astrological event in my life poignantly reminds me that I must not only discern good from evil but good from priorities.  My highest and principal priority is to be God solely, my heavenly Father and Creator, God the Son my Redeemer and Savior, and God the Holy Spirit my Sanctifier to live to God’s glory.  My triune God demands my total adoration and focus as a total eclipse demands my total awe.
“Not to us, O Lord, not to us,But to Your name give gloryBecause of Your lovingkindness,Because of Your Truth.” (Psalm 115: 1)
I am grateful to God for allowing me to live long enough to see this phenomenal event and to learn these lessons.
Helen Louise Herndon is a member of Central Presbyterian Church (EPC) in St. Louis, Missouri. She is freelance writer and served as a missionary to the Arab/Muslim world in France and North Africa.
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Ephesus was a center for the practice of magic (Acts 19:18–19). It welcomed magicians and sorcerers. These were believed to draw power from the worship of Artemis and other occult practices. We might be tempted to say that a false god is “nothing” and therefore no threat (1 Cor. 8:4), but Paul corrects a dismissive approach and warns that demons stand behind idols and receive their worship (1 Cor. 10:20). Hence, Ephesus was a hub of spiritual darkness and demonic oppression.

Paul’s letter to the Ephesians stands alongside Romans as a classic example of his thought. Ephesians is heavenly in its content and expansive in the truths it proclaims, while remaining approachable and pragmatic in its instructions. Here are three things you should know when you read Paul’s letter to the Ephesians.
1. Ephesians is deliberately broad and general.
Unlike Colossians, where Paul had not met the people to whom he was writing, he had pastored the Ephesians for three years (Acts 20:31). During that time, he regularly taught in a public lecture hall, laying a broad foundation of Christian teaching in Ephesus before this letter was written (Acts 19:9–10). So, what Paul writes is not a reaction to heresy (as in Colossians) or to public scandal (as in 1–2 Corinthians), but the essential gospel. Ephesians is gloriously and majestically general. It is a digest, hitting the high notes of the years of gospel teaching he provided as their pastor.
Paul’s balanced summary presents the two great functions of faith: to receive the redemption accomplished by Jesus Christ and to respond in new obedience. Chapters 1–3 lay out the gospel facts. They recount God’s eternal plans to bless His people, to give new life to those who were spiritually dead, to unite those who had been divided and far off into the one church, and to “do far more abundantly than all that we ask or think, according to the power at work within us” (Eph. 1:3–14; 2:1–10, 11–22; 3:20). The first three chapters essentially ask the question, Will you believe?
In the last three chapters, Paul lays out the faithful response to redemption. A person’s “walk” is a motif in the letter. The term first appears when describing how unbelievers “walked” in trespasses and sins (Eph. 2:1–2). But, beginning in Ephesians 4, believers are called to “walk” as a response of faith. Paul calls the faithful to walk worthily of Christ (Eph. 4:1).
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