Since we sent funds to the churches a week ago, we are getting LOTS of pictures today from our distribution system. The cover photo is a picture we just received this morning, and it is from Bethel Baptist Church in Petauke. This church, the second largest in our system, and this community have a very special history with Shoulder 2 Shoulder. Since it is sort of a quiet week otherwise, I thought it would be fun to just highlight some of that history.
Let's go all the way back to the beginning. In late 2020, we were just laying out a vision of 2 Corinthians 8 in Zambia. Petauke and Bethel Baptist Church were among our original relationships. One of our first clean water projects, in February of 2021, was at Grace Bible Baptist in the Petauke region. When we provided our first inputs in the fall of 2021, a handful of farmers in Petauke were included.
One of my favorite memories of Petauke dates back to our first trip to Zambia in August of 2022. Rog and I and our friend Scott were there for 10 days. We had landed in Lusaka, done our first feast in Chongwe, driven right past Petauke on our first trip further east, where we had feasts and leadership meetings in Chipata and Mambwe. Then we stopped in Petauke on the way back to the city. We arrived in the afternoon and sat down outside with our original group of five pastors in Petauke. Keep in mind, at this point I had been in relationship virtually with a few of these guys for nearly two years at this point. But Rog is typically more quiet in the virtual realm. We sat down and Rog started sharing with them the vision from 2 Corinthians 8. A couple of our pastors looked at each other and said something like, "I thought Rob was the guy, but Rog is the one doing all the talking!" Those that know the two of us might appreciate that one.
The next day we went to Bethel Baptist Church for our leadership meeting and feast. We held it at the small building on the left in the picture - because the big building on the right was only about 4 feet high. They had been building it one block at a time for months at that point.
Fast forward to my second trip to Zambia in August of 2024. Americans Carl and Jon, along with Zambian American Lipshed, were with me. We had our leadership meeting in the small building on the left, but when we finished, we went next door for a service and the feast. The block walls were nearly complete, but there was no roof. We sat in a corner of the open building, and it was HOT!
After we returned to the States, Jon passed that story along to his friends in Indiana and we soon had funding to complete their roof. You can now see the completed, much larger, building on the right. And while you are looking at the picture, consider there are 52 families represented in that community that will have food they otherwise would have lacked with their meals this month.
When Tracy then first brought his Iowa agronomy education to Zambia in November, 2024, it was in Petauke. We brought leaders in from many of our other regions, but the training was done in Petauke, and half of the first group of Zambians to receive this education were from this region.
Finally, spring forward to January, 2026, and six of our trainers and twelve of our training plots are in and around Petauke. More than 2,200 small growers are being trained in these methods that we believe can transform their ability to care for their families.
All this with help from 145 American families. Who can say where the story of S2S and Petauke will go over the next five years!
