Malawian man Yankho’s personal struggles began when his father passed away. Only a teenager at the time, he had barely begun to process his grief over what had happened before his mother had remarried and his stepfather moved in.
Initially, things were fine but slowly over time his stepfather changed and revealed his true colours to Yankho. His stepfather began to insult Yankho, which escalated to serious verbal abuse. This made Yankho long for a new family and in a bid to feel a sense of belonging, he joined a group of youths that soon led him to a life of excessive drinking. He looks back and sees that this was like trying to quench fire with fuel because it only worsened his situation. His stepfather eventually chased him out of the house resulting in him squatting in a shack.
Yankho was miserable, lonely and trapped in alcoholism.
On the morning of October 23 2023, Yankho’s life was drastically changed during the Lilongwe Adziwe Yesu mission.
It was not a good start. In fact, the mission volunteer who struck up a conversation with Yankho quickly realised he was drunk! But the missioner persisted. Yankho showed he had previous knowledge of the Bible, but thought these were just stories from a book. But he kept on referring to Paul’s conversion story as he encountered Christ on his way to Damascus, and eventually revealed that he, too, had been hearing the voice of God calling him to repentance.
“In the past few days, I have been dreaming about heaven,” Yankho told the missioner. “In the dreams, I saw the sky open and then, a sharp voice came out of it. The voice said that I should repent but I ignored it. I would simply go back to sleep again. I have been troubled but I have been ignoring it.”
The missioner gently helped Yankho to understand this truly was God calling out to him, and Yankho soon realised, “I cannot ignore the call anymore. I need Christ and I am ready to dedicate my life to him.” Yankho humbly surrendered to God!
But Yankho’s story doesn’t end there! After he prayed with the missioner and received Christ, he took the missioner to his home and showed him where he was living. On their way back, he called his friends who were playing pool to come and hear about the message of the Christ that he had received. In the beginning, they ridiculed him, chalking this unexpected behaviour up to his drunkenness. But later they too came to believe and gave their lives to Christ as well.
While his newfound faith is a strong foundation, Yankho must make many changes in his life to get it back on track and to honour God. Please pray for him, that he will be able to overcome his alcoholism, connect with a good church, and learn how to discern God’s voice and will from the Bible.
Rwanda is one of the countries that African Enterprise (AE) has a presence in. AE Rwanda runs missions and programs to share the hope-filled news of the Gospel of Jesus Christ in this country that bears many deep scars.
Kicukiro District is one of three districts in the Rwandan city of Kigali. In July 2023, it was the site of an African Enterprise mission that saw over 850,000 people reached and 2000 people turn to Jesus.
Pastor Jonathan is a parish leader in the Kicukiro District of Rwanda, which includes five sectors. Before the mission, churches in his area were facing limitations and challenges from the authorities and some were worried about how people were going to hear the gospel because of this. For example, Jonathan explains, “Our churches were not using amplified instruments due to government regulations regarding sound levels in the church.”
Jonathan and others were initially concerned that the inability to make their presence known in their churches was going to stop people from coming.
“But in such a time,” Jonathan says, “God brought AE and we did missions together.”
African Enterprise helped pastors like Jonathan and other local Christians see the need to get out of their churches and reach people, instead of relying on broadcasting loudly from within the church. And that’s exactly what they did: in a huge program of mission activities, much of which took place in areas where many Christians would never think to go.
After the mission, Jonathan said, “We have seen God doing wonders in our district and we have learnt that sinners and non-believers need us to find them where they are, not waiting for them to come to us.”
Pastor Jonathan also explains that AE helped the church before the mission began with training and prayer sessions in Kicukiro for churches from all denominations. “All this has come to show us that in Christ there are no divisions based on a certain affiliation,” he says.
“In my experience as a pastor, I see that this can be a trigger to the fight against divisions in churches and conflicts based on different church affiliations. We ask that you might help us even in the process of follow up and discipleship because we have a multitude of people who gave their lives to Christ,” he shares.
Praise the Lord for the work of AE and Pastor Jonathan in the Kicukiro District and pray for continued unity between churches as they seek to overcome government limitations, share the gospel and follow up new believers.
On 21 October 2023, Stanley’s life was changed forever. A former prisoner, Stanley heard the gospel thanks to the Lilongwe Adziwe Yesu mission’s Serve the City cleaning exercise in Malawi.
Often, AE missions will begin with a component of serving the city, where teams will clean streets or feed the hungry, in order to demonstrate Christ’s love and build goodwill. In Lilongwe, the team embarked on street cleaning, which is where they met Stanley, who came to ask why this big group of people were so joyfully completing such an unpleasant task.
After hearing why they were there, Stanley shared his life story with the mission team.
“After finishing secondary school, I managed to undertake a short course that landed me a decent office job. I began to accumulate wealth for myself from the money that I saved up. In spite of the progress I made in acquiring assets, I was involved in financial malpractice at work which led to my being arrested. Because I did not have disposable income, I ended up selling all of my assets in order to make bail. After the case was closed, I realized that I had nothing, no job, and no money to sustain myself”, he shared.
After this, Stanley had to restart his life and became a vendor at Lilongwe Bus Depot to make ends meet. He has since struggled a lot coming to terms with the decisions he’s made in the past and was convinced that nothing good could come from him.
But on 21 October, after the the Lilongwe mission team had put down their cleaning tools, a preacher got up and publicly shared the gospel – and Stanley was immediately captivated.
“The preacher talked about God’s mercy and how everyone qualifies for it. It was hard to believe that I could ever be forgiven for all the wrongs I did,” he told the team after the sermon. “That prompted me to surrender my life to Christ. It was the first time after my arrest that I felt forgiven. I am grateful to God for His mercy and the clean slate He has provided me”, Stanley said joyfully.
As we read in Mark 8, For what shall it profit a man if he gains the whole world and loses his soul? Stanley is glad that he was saved from losing his own soul and he believes that he has found all that he needs in Christ. Praise the Lord!
In late 2022, African Enterprise (AE) ran a mission in Lusaka, Zambia titled ‘Lusaka for Jesus Mission’. Streams of people from across the world joined over 2000 local missioners from around Lusaka, and 150 from other provinces across Zambia, for 11 days of theological training, teaching and evangelism.
The missioners were briefed on the AE Stratified Evangelism model, given mission welcome packs as well as a schedule of events and information booklets for the people they hoped to convert during the mission. The Stratified Evangelism model aims to proclaim the gospel across every level (strata) of society through three pillars:
- Preparation – engaging and working with local churches in effective evangelism
- Proclamation – strategically preaching the gospel across the city
- Preservation – support the local churches as they welcome and support new believers
One of the local missioners in attendance was Pastor Francis Chanda.
This was Francis’s first introduction to AE. He is a local pastor appointed by his church, Woodlands Baptist Church, to participate in the Lusaka Mission. Francis committed his life to Christ in 2012 and had gone on to study at the Baptist Theological Seminary in Zambia. Following his training Francis was employed at the Woodlands Baptist Church in Lusaka, Zambia as the youth pastor.
One of the speakers at the mission was Dr Lutangu Lubasi, the Regional Team Leader of the African Enterprise Southern Africa Region (AESAR). Francis was particularly impacted by what Dr Lubasi had to say.
“I was greatly impacted by what Dr Lubasi shared with us,” Francis recalled. “I learnt about Stratified Evangelism and this approach captured my heart. Seeing Stratified Evangelism was a game changer for me.”
Each day of the Lusaka mission the Stratified Evangelism teams met together for training and prayer, ready to go out across Zambia to evangelise the message of Christ’s salvation.
“My passion and calling for evangelism and mission was confirmed upon my life and I also learnt the effectiveness of personal evangelism. I saw many people visit our church during the Lusaka Mission. But I was particularly encouraged to see two of the many people who visited our church and made professions of faith, become members of Woodlands Baptist Church,” Francis shared.
Francis is now one of 40 trainees that are being trained in evangelism by AE. This training has impacted him tremendously. He shared, “This training has stirred up my spirit and awakened me in the area of evangelism. I can now say I am equipped as an evangelist to share the Gospel of Jesus and win souls to the Lord.”
In May of 2023, Pastor Francis was selected as one of 18 missioners from Zambia to participate in the Mutare mission in Zimbabwe. This trip to Mutare gave him great opportunities to practise what he had learnt in the evangelism training during the Lusaka mission. He now looks forward with great anticipation to participate in future AE Missions.
Pastor Francis is doing great work in Zambia as he is equipped both theologically and with practical training to evangelise! Praise God for the work of Pastor Francis and his continued enthusiasm for evangelism. Pray for him as he continues to work as a pastor and seeks more opportunities to share the gospel of Christ with others.
Today, Benoite’s life is all about Jesus, but she says that until recently, her life was characterised by conflict, alcohol and neglect.
The Rwandan lady admits that she was living without hope and without God. Her alcoholism was controlling her whole life, and her relationships with her four children, her husband, and her neighbours were damaged.
“I just spent almost the whole day only spreading rumours about my neighbours, and in most cases such rumours were influenced by jealousy and characterised by jealous words.” Benoite says. “I started realising that I was in conflict with my husband because of the big gap created at my home.”
“Not only has that lifestyle affected me, but also my children since I hardly spent any time with them. Neither could I take the time to prepare balanced food for them, nor take care of their sanitation and their cleanliness, nor did I consider their education to be of any importance,” she confesses.
Around Easter 2023, African Enterprise held an evangelistic campaign titled ‘Jesus All About Life’ (JAAL) in Rwanda. This campaign, run in partnership with the Bible Society and modelled on a campaign first run in Australia over 10 years ago, was designed to help communities to hear about the ultimate sacrifice of Jesus for our sins through his death and resurrection during the Easter period.
In Rwanda, the JAAL campaign reached half a million people in schools, universities, public spaces, churches, sports evangelism, radio and television. In just two months, 10,000 Rwandans committed to accept Jesus Christ as their Lord!
Some JAAL events were held near Benoite’s home in the Rusizi District. Benoite decided to go along to an event, and heard the gospel preached.
She says, “The preaching based on John 14:1-6 seemed to be focusing on my life! I decided to commit my life to Jesus Christ as the master of my life as a decision to change. I repented and asked for forgiveness from God, and the preacher prayed for me.”
After Benoite received Christ, her life changed. She shares, “Since then, I have been experiencing more peace than I have ever had before, I have regained my hope”. Benoite has also started to work with her family towards economic stability and relational harmony as a fruit of salvation in Jesus Christ.
Benoite said, “Today, my children, my husband, and my neighbours are living at peace, and they enjoy family life. My children enjoy going to school, and I now ensure that at home I spend more time with them”.
Benoite now spends her time praying, reading the Bible, and goes to church with her children. She also ensures she has time to look after her home and is working to give her family a better life. Now that her life is all about Jesus, she has found a more peaceful, hopeful and meaningful life.
Many of the African Enterprise city-wide missions begin with a component called ‘Serve the City’, in which the mission teams undertake a project to clean or fix up a part of the city. This helps to demonstrate their commitment to the wellbeing of the people they will meet throughout the mission, but also provides some immediate opportunities for evangelism.
During the recent Love Nairobi mission in Kenya, a team from International Christian Centre Imara of 73 people went out to the Imara neighbourhood and cleaned up a ditch of about one kilometre.
As the street cleaning took place, some of the locals stared from afar, while some approached the missionaries and asked questions.
Kelvin’s story
A young man named Kelvin approached one of the evangelists who was cleaning. He asked him who the team was and what made them to come to their neighbourhood and volunteer to clean it up.
The evangelist told Kelvin a lot about Jesus, and that He is the reason which led all of the team, local and visiting evangelists, to participate in the cleaning. As the conversation went on, Kelvin didn’t take long: he willingly wanted to receive Christ as his Lord and Saviour!
Afterwards, Kelvin was interested to join the team in serving the city, but first he asked the evangelist if they could go to his friends and tell them about Christ. So, they marched to Kelvin’s friends! The evangelist shared another story about the mercy and the goodness of God, and 10 people received Christ immediately.
This really lit up Kelvin’s heart and he again asked the evangelist if they could go and meet more of his friends. Not far away, they found them playing drums beautifully. When Kelvin’s friends saw him, Kelvin asked if they could allow the man that accompanied him with to speak to them. Again, the evangelist spoke about Jesus, and again, the friends heard the gospel and asked to receive Christ!
After his friends accepted Jesus, Kevin then joined the team in serving the city and later on he gathered with the team for lunch.
Through Kelvin receiving Christ, 20 more came to the Kingdom. Kelvin has been welcomed into ICC Imaara where he will be discipled as a follower of Jesus.
Henry’s story
Alice is a Kenyan lady who worships at ICC Imara. She decided to participate in serving the city and as she was cleaning the streets of Imara, she kept on praying to God that she would get the chance to speak to someone about Jesus.
While carrying out her task, Alice spotted a man standing behind her and the man asked what was causing Alice to have such a big smile on her face. Alice took the opportunity to tell this man, named Henry, about Jesus.
As it turned out, Henry had previously become a Christian, but had undergone many struggles since then which left him in doubt if God really exists or not. He didn’t understand why God would allow him and his family to undergo such troubles. Henry had lost hope in life, and that day he was just walking in the streets of Imara not knowing where he would end up at.
Henry mentioned that he was a Kikuyu man, so Alice decided to win Henry’s trust by speaking to him in their native language while sharing the gospel of Christ. And after this conversation, Henry decided to receive Christ again and his heart was unloaded and he managed to smile like Alice.
Now Henry too is a new member at ICC Imara. Alice has agreed to keep on following up Henry and assist him to get a job.
During Serve the City, the team were able to reach 150 people, 42 of whom gave their lives to Christ, and the team were also able to give out about 1000 tracts to all that used the Imara Route. A team member shared, “By the time we were done with the cleaning up, we left the neighbourhood clean, and the people of Imara in joyful feeling.”
