Somali Gathering April 2026

Psalm 133 declares to us how good and pleasant unity amongst the people of God is; how it releases an anointed blessing from above. Jesus in John 17, just before he was arrested in the garden of Gethsemane, prays that his church would be one in him, that we would become perfectly one (v23). Jesus sees unity as a key part of our witness and effectiveness in extending the kingdom of God. In it we have a greater understanding of who Christ is and why God sent him, as well as experiencing the love of the Father to a greater measure. It is therefore no surprise to us that the devil does his best to try to keep the church divided and separated from each other.

Jesus sees unity as a key part of our witness and effectiveness in extending the kingdom of God.

Ian Travers and I flew out to Djibouti on Sunday 12th April. We were meeting Adam from Uganda in Addis airport on route. Anna, Debbie and Andrew Holt were going to join us on Wednesday in Ethiopia, but we were going to spend some time with the believers in Djibouti meet with the family of the key leader there and then travel by train down to the conference with the other leaders from Djibouti. It was a great time in Djibouti, that is until we were about to leave to travel to Ethiopia and there was a minor complication on Ian’s eVisa. It would not be an issue in Ethiopia, but the officials in Djibouti were having none of it. They would not let Ian leave until the next day! So, the key Djiboutian leader had to stay behind with Ian, whilst Adam and I took the train journey down! As it turned out they got to fly the next day which in comparison with the train was like business class compared to economy – except it was in fact economy over cattle class!

The leader flying from Somali, and one from Kenya had trouble at immigration in Addis which was unusual, as did Anna and Andrew – which has not happened before. Once Anna and Andrew were through, they then had problems with the internal flight from Addis Ababa to town we gather in –basically the staff wanted a bribe! The devil was doing his best to stop people arriving, but he didn’t succeed, no bribe was paid and the flight was caught with 10 minutes to spare! So, it was obvious with so much opposition something significant was going to happen.

We started on the Wednesday evening by gathering the key leadership team, and before anything else, we prayed that everyone would be filled with the Holy Spirit. Not rushed, but taking time to lay hands on and pray over people, this was a powerful time. Then what followed spontaneously was one of the leaders who had been on the edge of things for a few years, just start thanking us for the faithful work we had done over the last 13 years. He expressed how key this work is amongst the Somali’s, confessing his own previous immaturity and how God was going to bless the ministry going forward. Praise God. After talking through some practical things for the gathering, we prayed God’s blessing on the rest of conference and on those who would be there.

We spent the next few days unpacking the Father Heart of God, Sonship in Christ, the Help of the Holy Spirit, and the call to holiness on the Church. I had two prophetic teaching sessions on Building the Temple of God looking at lessons from the end of 1 Chronicles and beginning of 2 Chronicles. I explored how David and others prepared the way and invested in God’s work for the next generation to build on. I then looked at the variety of unlikely characters God used in the whole process applying it to the Somali situation.

Indeed, this truth was reflected in the variety of teachers at the conference: men and women, from a variety of clans and socio-economic backgrounds. In fact, one of the best talks (in my opinion) was by a Somali Lady who is also a Bible Translator and she spoke on the genuine marks of a true believer. Another talk which will stay with me for a different reason was Mahad’s. He spoke on Preparing for Persecution and it was the powerful (and painful) testimonies of what people had already faced for Christ’s sake that stuck out. One young man’s mother had said to him upon hearing of his faith, “When I die, do not come to my funeral or my graveside, you are dead to me.” Mahad own family, dug his grave, slaughtered a goat, and buried it. They then rung Mahad showed him what they had done and told him, “This is your grave, you dead to us, and we have buried you here!” It was a very sobering moment of the reality these Somali Christians face for the sake of Jesus. That is, until one of my good friends, an older man, who has been with us from the beginning said, “Well Mahad, you can only die once, so if you are dead to them now, they won’t try to kill you in the future!” There is always an optimist in any gathering.

The whole time was such a precious time of encouragement, envisioning and hearing powerful testimonies of Jesus revealing himself to people. One person was an army commander for Ethiopia, he was stationed in Somali as a peace keeper. His convoy of 60 men was attacked by over a thousand Al-Shabab fighters. His car was hit by a rocket and he was knocked unconscious sadly all his men died before the Apache Helicopters came to chase away the terrorist fighters. Whilst he was unconscious Jesus appeared to him, told him that he would not die, and that he should follow Him as He is the way the truth and the life. This lead him on a journey that resulted in him becoming a Christian, having several more miraculous escapes from death, before he got home to his wife and child who he also led to the Lord. God then worked through him to restore to life two people (one of them still in the womb) through a simple prayer of, “The God who saved my life, save this life also!” Extraordinary works of God done through ordinary people who have been touched by an extraordinary God.

I was able to invite one of the former key leaders from the early days, who we had not been in contact with since before COVID, to come along. Previously he had wanted to keep a low profile as his name was known as a Christian and he was getting a lot of heat. However, as it turns out whilst keeping a ‘low profile’ God was doing an incredible work through him; enabling links to regional Government business contracts, using this as a cover to gather and support a further 60 house churches!

Another Somali lady there was telling us how she had set up a business where because of the nature of it people are not allowed to go into that area only the workers can. All the workers are members of her house church, so they can fellowship relatively freely at this place in what is otherwise a strict Islamic area, all because there is no one around to observe what they do. No-one is even suspicious of what they are doing as it is a genuine business that the community understand and benefit from. A real life example of being as wise as serpents and innocent as doves (Matthew 10:16), as they live as sheep amongst wolves there.

Thank you everyone for your prayers, it was a great gathering of just under 40 Somali Leaders who are extending the kingdom of God in some of the hardest places on earth for Christians.