The following information is being distributed by Grace Brethren International Missions regarding a memorial fund established on behalf of Chadian church planter and evangelism trainer Dadje Samuel, who died Sunday.
Dadje Samuel died on Sunday, April 25, 2010. Dadje was married to Christine and had 8 daughters, 2 sons and several grandchildren. He was 47.
Dadje was a businessman, an evangelist, and a trainer of church planters. He cared deeply that people who were lost would have an opportunity to hear the Gospel. This passion moved him to invest his life in personal evangelism and in starting a movement of African church planters.
Dadje Samuel grew up in the Bassao area of southern Chad where he came to Christ as a young boy. His father rejected his faith and him. Forced to leave home, he climbed a nearby hill and there dedicated his life to God and asked God to be his Father.
At 16 he went to Nigeria to work as a mason. By 18, he was a foreman. Later he moved to Cameroon where he gained more training as a mason and then began his own business. Dadje was asked by the Chadian fellowship of churches to return to Chad to assist in the many church building projects. He moved to Moundou where he started a successful construction company. He took classes at the Bassao Bible Institute and invested much time in evangelism and church planting.
In 1998, at the Chateau in France, Dadje encountered the ACT Strategy of church planting. He came back to Chad and built his own “chateau” at Kou Bethanie and began the Summer School of Evangelism. Over the last 12 years hundreds of men were trained to minister either as evangelists/church-planters or as leaders in the new church plants.
Due to his apostolic vision there are Chadian missionaries working in 4 countries and with unreached people groups with over 400 new churches and Points of Light started. It was on an exploratory trip to develop church planting in a new country that Dadje became ill. He was hospitalized, but died a few days later.
A memorial fund has been established by GBIM to help with the immediate needs of the family and the funeral. Funds will also go to continue Dadje’s vision of evangelism and church planting. For more information log onto www.gbim.org.