Ordination of Six Sudanese Covenant Pastors
- from the Evangelical Covenant Church web site

A new denomination of 250 churches with 40,000 people has developed in South Sudan over the past three years!  Beginning when refugees from the war in South Sudan arrived in Sioux Falls SD, a network of Sudanese Evangelical Covenant Churches has grown in North America. The Sioux Falls Church was the first to organize and they then sent mission teams to other cities to help organize churches.  There are now Sudanese congregations in Sioux Falls SD, Des Moines IA, Omaha NE, San Diego CA, Fridley MN, Calgary AB, and Rochester MN.

Soon word began to pass to the refugee camps in Ethiopia and they started to organize Covenant Churches there.  The circle of church planting continued to expand as congregations were started in the Upper Nile region of South Sudan itself.  Today there are 200 churches in South Sudan, with 50 more in Ethiopia, half in refugee camps.

The new denomination was organized in January 1999 with an office in exile in Gambella, Ethiopia, near the Sudan border.  Sudan has been at war for over 40 years.  The intensity of the war has again increased in recent months in the area of the Covenant Churches.  Over 3,000,000 have died from the war, famine and disease; 4,000,000 have been displaced. Hundreds of thousands have fled to neighboring countries where the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) has established refugee camps.  These camps provide basic security and minimum food and health care.  Many have lived in these camps for years with no hope of returning home until the war ends.

The Northwest Conference took the lead in assisting the Sudan Mission because of its involvement with the Sioux Falls congregation.  Many churches and individuals have given gifts to the Northwest Conference Sudan Mission Fund to help bring resources and encouragement to the Sudanese Churches.  Covenant World Relief and Covenant World Mission have also joined in the Sudan Mission.  Coming along side the Church leaders in Africa, we are listening to their requests and plans for their Church.  In response, we are helping them with a number of projects, including the following:

• Scholarships in Ethiopia: 9 have graduated from Bible School; currently there are 6 in Bible School (3 years); 4 in Christian Education College (3 years); 4 in Seminary (2 years).
• New clothes for 7,500 children in the refugee camps, setting up sewing projects and teaching refugees in the camps to make the clothing; a new project for another 7,200+ began September 2000
• Arranged a donation of clothing for another 12,000+ in refugee camps that initiated other donations to clothe a total of 122,000
• Ordained their first pastors
• Emergency food for the churches in South Sudan
• Garden tools and seed to help them grow their own food in South Sudan
• Fishing nets to help people feed themselves
• Dugout canoes for the six conferences in South Sudan
• Support monthly to denomination leaders and the office in Gambella
• Copies of the first Complete Bible and hymnals in their Nuer language
• A medical fund
• A tea shop for Covenant Women in Gambella to raise funds for their ministry
• Grain mill and powerboat for the denomination as practical help and economic development projects
• Resources for pastors and leaders
• Other gifts for children, youth and women's ministry
• Drip irrigation training project