Tag: N’dolera

One Seed, Part 4

We’re telling the story of the missionary couple, David and Svea Flood. The story is adapted from their daughter, Aggie Hurst’s personal account, but the story is really about so much more than their little family. Today we begin Part 4. If you missed earlier portions of the story, you can find them here: Part 1, Part 2, and Part 3.

One Seed
Part 4

A few years later, the Hursts were attending a high-level evangelism conference in London, England, where a report was given from the nation of Zaire (the former Belgian Congo). The superintendent of the national church, h4c-davidsvea-floodrepresenting some 110,000 baptized believers, spoke eloquently of the gospel’s spread in his nation.

Aggie could not help going up afterward to ask him if he had ever heard of David and Svea Flood. “I am their daughter.”

The man began to weep. “Yes, madam,” he replied in French, his words were translated into English. “It was Svea Flood who led me to Jesus Christ. I was the boy who brought food to your parents before you were born. In fact, to this day your mother’s grave and her memory are honored by all of us.”

Sobbing, he embraced her in a long hug before he continued. “You must come to Africa to see, because your mother is the most famous person in our history.”

In time that is exactly what Aggie Hurst and her husband did. They were welcomed by cheering throngs of villagers. She even met the man who so many years before, when she was less than a month old, had been hired by her father to carry her down the mountain in a soft bark hammock.

Of course, the most dramatic moment came when the pastor escorted Aggie to see her mother’s grave. She knelt before the white cross in the soil of Africa—the place of her birth—to pray and give thanks.

In the church service later that day, the pastor read from John 12:24…
“I tell you the truth, unless a kernel of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains only a single seed. But if it dies, it produces many seeds.”

He followed with Psalm 126:5, “They who sow in tears shall reap in joy.”

So, that’s the conclusion to this 4-part story of the One Seed.

It took forty years before God’s amazing grace and His real plan for the village of N’dolera was known to Aggie Hurst and then to her father. It seemed all was lost, but God wasn’t done working.

When we are in deep discouragement, we need to remember the story’s not over yet. One chapter may have ended, but God is still at work.

If that’s what one seed can do, isn’t it amazing to think about all those other seeds that have been planted over the years?

The story of God’s sovereign work is not over. He’s still planting seeds. He’s still growing believers.

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Prayer Requests:
 *Please continue to pray for the political situation in the DRC.
 *Pray for nearly 50,000 Christians who have been displaced by Islamic militants in the North Kivu province.

© 2016 Hope4Congo

One Seed, Part 2

Today we continue the story of the young missionary couple, David and Svea Flood. They left their home in Sweden to minister in what at the time was Belgian Congo. The year was 1921. Things were primitive and discouraging for them. Svea died after giving birth to a baby girl. David blamed God for ruining his life. He left the baby girl in the care of the Ericksons (another missionary couple ministering in Congo) and returned to Sweden. Click here to read Part 1.
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No matter how dark things get, we need to remember God’s not finished yet. David and Svea Flood’s h4c-davidsvea-floodstory is adapted from their daughter Aggie’s personal account.

One Seed
Part 2

Within eight months both the Ericksons were stricken with a mysterious illness. Some believe they were poisoned by a local chief who hated the missionaries. The couple died within days of each other.

The nine-month-old baby Aina was given to an American missionary couple named Berg, who adjusted her Swedish name to “Aggie” and eventually brought her back to the United States at age three.

The Bergs loved little Aggie. They were afraid if they tried to return to Africa, some legal obstacle might separate her from them. At that time, they’d been unable to legally adopt her. So they decided to stay in the United States and switch from missionary work to pastoral ministry.

Aggie grew up in South Dakota. As a young woman, she attended North Central Bible college in Minneapolis. There she met and married a young preacher named Dewey Hurst.

Years passed. The Hursts enjoyed a fruitful ministry. Aggie gave birth first to a daughter, then a son. In time her husband became president of a Christian college in the Seattle area, and Aggie was intrigued to find so much Scandinavian heritage there.

One day around 1963, a Swedish religious magazine appeared in her mailbox. She had no idea who sent it, and of course she couldn’t read the words. But as she turned the pages, all of a sudden a photo stopped her cold. There in a primitive setting in the heart of Africa was a grave with a white cross and on the cross was her mother’s name, SVEA FLOOD.

Aggie jumped in her car and drove straight to a college faculty member who, she knew, could translate the article. “What does this say?” she asked.

The instructor translated the story:
It tells about missionaries who went to N’dolera in the heart of the Belgian Congo in 1921… the birth of a white baby girl… the death of the young missionary mother… the one little African boy who had been led to Christ… and how, after all the whites had left, the little African boy grew up and persuaded the chief to let him build a school in the village.

The article told how this now grown man gradually won all his students to Christ… the children led their parents to Christ… even the chief had become a Christian. Today (1963) there were six hundred Christian believers in that one village.

Because of the willingness of David and Svea Flood to answer God’s call to Africa, because they endured so much but were still faithful to witness and lead one little boy to trust Jesus, God had saved six hundred people.

That little boy, as a grown man, became head of the Pentacostal Church and leader of 110,000 Christians in Zaire (formerly the Belgian Congo).

At the time Svea Flood died, it appeared, to human reason, that God had led the young couple to Africa, only to desert them in their time of deepest need.

But that wasn’t the end of the story. It’s only the end of Part 2.

Join us next week for Part 3 of the Floods’ story. So you don’t miss out, click on FOLLOW US. In the page that opens, fill out your email information on the right hand side of the page. Our posts will be delivered directly to your email inbox.

© 2016 Hope4Congo