Monthly Archives

March 2026

April 2026: Highlights and updates

By Impetus, Malawi, South Sudan, Uganda, UK

Read about some of the key highlights from recent months, offering a glimpse of how APF partners are training leaders, strengthening communities, and helping the church in Africa to flourish.

Grant to Rural Diocese

APF provided a grant to the ACK Kapenguria Area Bishopric in Kenya to support their relief and mission programme in remote Konyao. The funds covered costs for missioners serving rural communities and builds on recent joint mission work with the Karamoja Diocese amongst the Lorow–Alale region. Dave met with Kapenguria’s Bishop, Samson Tuliapus, while visiting Kenya during March.

Dave met with Kapenguria’s Bishop, Samson Tuliapus, while visiting Kenya during March

eVitabu Development

Jonathan Haddock, APF’s eVitabu app developer, is undertaking a major rebuild of our African church leader online library and resource hub. When finished, the new version will run on Apple iOS and Windows devices as well as on Android. In April, Jonathan will dedicate a full week to working on the rebuild – the biggest update since the app’s launch in 2018.

A new eVitabu user from South Sudan

Growing Greener Monitoring

In Malawi, the team from New Life Christian Church in Blantyre have been busy monitoring how well the communities have been adopting their conservation agricultural training and the impact on this year’s crops.

Mr Ndasalapati from Balaka says his crop only survived the recent the dry spell because he followed the team’s advice.
Project leader Hunta Faita visits a participant whose maize was well mulched and fed with compost and home-made liquid fertiliser.
March 27, 2026
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The “Africanisation” of APF

By Training

From new African trustees to a growing network of Training Partners, APF is intentionally embedding African leadership and insight at the heart of its mission. In this article, Dave Stedman reflects on the progress made over the past few years in this important area of change for the charity.

Two years ago, I wrote an article for Impetus in which I posed the question, “How African is APF?” Since then, we have sought to become even more intentional about this. Some highlights include:

  • A bi-annual conference for our most committed and active African Training Partners (ATPs), providing an opportunity to listen and learn from one another, share experience, identify challenges, and find solutions together. The bi-annual ATP conferences also help formalise previously ad hoc relationships and provide an opportunity for the wider APF team to enjoy inspiration, fellowship and worship together. The next of these will take place in Nairobi in September.
  • Two Africa-based trustees have joined our board, bringing valuable cultural insights and perspectives to our discussions and decision making. Rose Mugabi from Uganda brings deep expertise in enabling women’s leadership in Africa and Kingston Ogango has recently accepted the role of vice-chair of the board of trustees. Personally, I greatly value Kingston’s advice as an informal sounding board.
  • A network of ATPs across multiple countries now receives annual grants that enable them to deliver pastor training programmes and other initiatives that support local Christian leaders. While this approach has proven very cost-effective for the charity, reducing travel expenses for UK personnel for starters, it also helps our partners plan better, draws on their local knowledge and creativity and gives them more confidence in our commitment to support their work.
  • Increasingly, ATPs (and our Africa-based trustees) are conducting in-country and cross-border monitoring and evaluation visits that were previously carried out by UK personnel. This shift has both reduced costs and enhanced cultural understanding.
  • ATPs are also exploring and establishing local partnerships that would previously have been unlikely because APF lacked any permanent presence on the ground. For example, Lawson Limau in Zambia is pioneering a link with the Christian Broadcasting Network Southern Africa to introduce the Superbook discipleship training programme for children in Zambian churches.

Trustees: Rose Mugabi and Kingston Ogango
  • Likewise, Daniel Deng Bol in South Sudan is able to mobilise volunteers to assist in coordinating and delivering eVitabu workshops. This would not be possible without Daniel’s local connections and visibility.

For a long time, as I mentioned in the conclusion of the article in 2024, my aspiration has been to see an African Director of Operations (or similar) working alongside the existing UK-based team. Such a role would help secure these gains in the long-term, embed them in the DNA of the charity, and accelerate the ‘Africanisation’ of APF.

Beyond strengthening the leadership and support of our ATP network, I am convinced that despite the reality of widespread poverty across the continent, there is also considerable resource within Africa itself.

In the long-term, APF could be substantially resourced from within the continent. That is a healthy ambition if we are to increase the reach and influence of the mission – especially eVitabu – in the years ahead. Realistically, however, this potential can only be fully realised by a senior African leader set apart to develop it.

By empowering African leadership, APF is not just working in Africa, it is growing from Africa.

March 27, 2026
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More Than a Title: What is a Pastor?

By Kenya

 Drawing on a conversation with Edith Wamalwa in Nairobi, Dave Stedman reflects on a simple but important question: what does it really mean to be a pastor?

Allow me to introduce my good friend Edith Wamalwa. Edith was the first person I met when I landed in Nairobi on my very first trip to Africa after I had started working for APF in January 2015.

At that time Edith was the manager of the CLC Bookshop in Nairobi. She really wanted APF to remove the rusting container full of children’s books, picture sets, and other literature that APF had printed and had been storing in the bookshop compound for several years.

Since then we have worked together on a few projects and remained in regular contact through the APF WhatsApp prayer group. Edith currently serves another organisation, but today she is helping me with some administration for the conference APF will be running for key African partners in Nairobi in September.

It has actually been several years since we last spent time together, so we had a lot to catch up on during the few days I have in Nairobi this March. I knew that the pastor of the church where Edith had been a long-serving and very active member had sadly died prematurely a few years ago, and that Edith did not enjoy the same rapport with his successor. Edith shared that, with regret, she had felt it was right to find a new church in which to worship.

Edith Wamalwa is helping APF organise a key partners conference in September
“I doubt the new guy would even notice I have gone,”

I asked Edith whether she had spoken with the new pastor about how she felt. She explained that she had discussed her feelings with her trusted friend, the previous pastor’s widow. Then she added, “I doubt the new guy would even notice I have gone,” and said that he had “not allowed the church to grieve and heal” before moving on with new programmes and ministries. The church was still strong with new people, but the “elderly”, as she described herself, largely felt unwelcome and many had left.

This is sad, but it is also, sadly, very familiar. I could name several churches in the UK and elsewhere where the same is true. In the rush for new initiatives and pioneering projects, the actual people can get overlooked. I may even have made this mistake myself in the past.

Pastors come in many shapes and sizes, with diverse and eclectic gifts, but the clue is in the word. “Pastor” is derived from pastoral and means shepherd: someone who cares for sheep, who protects and guides them; a person who knows their sheep by name, sees when they are lost or hurting, cares for them individually and collectively, and actively seeks them out, sometimes even at personal cost.

There are sometimes good reasons for leaving a church and going elsewhere, but it should never be because “the new guy wouldn’t even notice.”

March 27, 2026
Love1

April 2026 newsletter

By Impetus

April 2026 Impetus.

It is that time of year when APF’s Coordinator, Geoff, is working hard with the independent examiner to prepare the charity accounts for the AGM. I help where I can, but most of that responsibility falls to him. Meanwhile, I write the text that forms the Trustees’ Annual Report.

I am a “words person” and find numbers a bit bland. But sometimes the numbers tell the story very well, and 2025 was an encouraging year.

eVitabu

Since launch, there have been more than 3,000 unique eVitabu registrations. Currently, nearly 2,500 active users across 37 African countries are using the app, collectively reaching perhaps as many as 2 million people as they share its resources with their church congregations and communities.

African Training Partners (ATPs)

In 2025, twenty-four training grants were awarded for formal academic programmes and informal in-service conferences across 11 countries. This included eVitabu awareness events in Cameroon and Zimbabwe for the first time.
During 2025, our ATPs engaged with up to 4,000 pastors and community leaders through both in-person and online training, with an estimated indirect reach of around 400,000 people.

Church and Community Initiatives

Twenty-five larger grants supported projects including study Bibles, bicycles, children’s ministry initiatives, computer hardware, agricultural training, tree planting, and income-generating activities. Many smaller grants also met medical and pastoral needs. Together, these initiatives reached an estimated 85,000 direct and indirect beneficiaries.

We believe this level of impact represents an excellent return on the resources entrusted to us by supporters.

If you are encouraged by these numbers, you can help share the story of APF’s mission to enable effective ministry and community transformation in Africa:

  • Ask your church to invite Geoff or me to speak – we would love to come.
  • Request additional copies of Impetus to share with family and friends.
  • Follow, like, and share our regular social media updates.
  • Pray that the Lord will continue to establish the work of our hands, and those of the dedicated but often marginalised pastors we serve.

Thank you,


Revd Dave Stedman
CEO

Download 'Impetus'
March 27, 2026
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