In the time and reign of Idi Amin in Uganda (1971 – 1979), the challenges to Bishop Festo Kivengere (AE East African Team Leader and Co- Leader with Michael of AE) and the churches other Bishops were immense and frightening. Amin became one of the most brutal dictators of the 20th Century and some 400 000 people were slaughtered during his reign. He started out looking like a benevolent dictator and Festo and the other Bishops sort of tolerated him but gradually he became more and more brutal and he made life cheaper and cheaper.
Those who opposed him were ruthlessly assassinated and multitudes “were disappeared”, as locals put it. So the major requirement in Festo, other Bishops and the Church as a whole was courage in facing the dictator’s threat. All of this raised very acutely the assorted issues relating to Church and State. And how long and how far the Church continues as per Romans 13:1, to “submit to the powers that be.” Clearly Festo could not sanction revolution or attempt to see the dictator overthrown violently, but clearly they had to figure out at what point the Church could no longer sanction submission to state brutality. Festo and his colleagues knew that Jesus had said “render to Caesar the things that are Caesars and to God the things that are God’s.”(Mark 12:17) The challenge for Festo and others was to discern at what point Caesar was asking people to render to himself the things that were God’s. In early 1980 Archbishop Janani Luwum (who was also AE’s Ugandan chairman), Festo and the other Anglican Bishops drew up a very bold document challenging Amin about his behaviour and where he was taking the country. This infuriated Amin and he ordered the assassination of Lawum in cold blood. It was clear that Festo had now become no. 1 on Amin’s hit list and all the local Christian brethren urged Festo and Mera to flee at once. This they did through forest tracks leading to the base of the mountains separating Uganda from Rwanda. Festo and Mera courageously trekked up the mountainsides during the night till finally they crossed the border into Rwanda where they received a huge welcome.
Festo and Mera then went through to our office in Nairobi which they found flooded with Ugandan exiles and cries for help. The new challenge now was to Festo’s heart and conscience as to what his response would be to these exiles. Because Festo was so well known and so well loved these exiles turned to him and to AE rather than to major aid agencies. There and then effectively, Festo and AE Kenya / Unganda launched RETURN (Relief, Education and Training for Ugandan Refugees Now). In the end this program ran for several years and AE funded over 300 International University scholarships for Refugees who qualified. Some later ended up in new governments in Uganda and felt they owed much to AE.
Festo and Mera then travelled on via London to AE’s office in California. But in London Festo faced and awesome spiritual challenge in terms of his attitude as a Christian to Idi Amin who had terrorised his country, sought to kill him personally and driven him and his wife into exile. In a Good Friday service at John Stott’s All Souls Church, Langham Place , London, Festo and Mera attended a Good Friday service. Festo’s heart was filled with bitterness, almost hatred, towards Idi Amin but in the sermon Festo heard Jesus’s words from the cross: “Father forgive them, for they know not what they do.”
Festo then heard the voice of the Lord saying to him: “My son, if Amin had been in that circle of soldiers crucifying me, would I have said ‘Father, forgive them all, except this big Ugandan below me.’” Festo’s response became determinative for the rest of his life as he responded to Jesus saying “Lord, I am here and now forgiving Idi Amin.” Immediately he felt a huge release in his soul and he was flooded with the joy and peace of the Lord.
For the rest of Festo’s days the message of forgiveness and reconciliation became even more central to his whole life and being and ministry. His new posture even led him into writing a small book called I love Idi Amin. A reporter in a press conference asked him how on earth he could write a book with this title. Replied Festo: “I may not like Idi Amin but if I am a Christian believer I am obliged to forgive him, love him with Christ’s love, and want the highest and best for his life.”
Another reporter asked: “If you were standing face to face with Amin, and someone gave you a revolver, what would you do?” “Well,” replied Festo, “I would hand the revolver back and say this is not my weapon. My weapon is love.”
The next big challenge Festo faced in conjunction with our USA board was to be practical and raise vast sums of money for the ever developing needs in Uganda. Warwick Olson, then director of AE, Australia, proceeded to launch and AE office first in Australia and then in UK though which these Ugandan monies could be channelled to the needs back in that country. Through these years of Festo’s exile from Uganda Michael travelled with him in many places ranging from USA and Canada through to Australia, several countries of Latin America, Egypt, Liberia (West Africa), and even South Africa. Festo’s message of love and forgiveness melted hearts everywhere and Michael felt ever after the immensity of the privilege he had had of ministering around the world with this great brother.
Festo died from Leukaemia in 1988 and he and Michael had a very poignant time together in their last meeting in a Nairobi hospital. Michael and most of the other team leaders and board chairs travelled in a chartered plane with Festo’s coffin back to Uganda for the funeral in Namirembe Cathedral where Michael was one of the main speakers.
“Every good and perfect gift is from above” (James 1:17),
As we draw towards the end of 2021, we want to thank all our faithful supporters for donations, prayers and partnerships that has enabled us to take the Gospel into Africa this year. Thank you to everyone who shared our mission with your church, small group, friends and on social media and who encouraged us along our path. We could not have done it without you. At AE we give thanks for countless blessings received and rejoice in the impact you have helped make in the lives of thousands of people.
As we move into the new year, we value your prayers and support over Christmas and the new year to help all our teams plan missions with certainty. Our 60th anniversary missions planning processes are well underway, including establishing mission outreach in Togo, Zambia and South Sudan. This is a significant move forward for AE to reach out into more countries and cities of Africa, and your support is vital to mobilise churches for mission in each of these areas. Africa is one of the youngest continents on earth, so strengthening our Foxfires youth evangelism teams is vital. Our development programs are assisting hundreds of vulnerable women and children to move off the streets and provide for their families, and water and sanitation programs are saving lives of the very young in slum areas.
In the past year we have seen 2,700 enrollments in the pastor training program. Praise God that through your support we are able to provide online theological education with the support of local and Australian teachers.
We Thank God for:
- Faithfulness to the Great commission, equipping workers in Africa within God’s harvest field
- The readiness to share the Gospel in word and deed to the glory of God, every single day in Africa
- Our partnership in Christ to reach out to all nations in Africa, through all challenges, recognising the very great needs and doing something about it.
- Our supporters, and raising up of support and prayers to fund mission and development in Africa
Please pray with us for:
- Those reached with the Good News, who have made a decision for Jesus, to be faithful in meeting together for church, discipleship and outreach.
- Funding of all our future missions, development, and for the AE coordinators and evangelists
- For all those suffering through conflict, poverty, disease, economic and environmental issues – that God will show a path through of hope, certainty in Christ and healing.
- The leaders of Africa, through the love of God, that all Christians can live a godly and peaceful life dedicated to glorifying God.
- For all team leaders, support office staff, boards and volunteers that they might be blessed in the love of God and sow peace in Christ for a harvest of righteousness
15 December 2021
Dear Special Friends and Family,
I am overwhelmed with embarrassment at the very long time it has been since last I wrote to you all in this way. But life, waywardness, mental laziness and procrastination can all play havoc with one’s plans and intentions. Carol told me the other day not to procrastinate on something, and I replied to her: “Sweetheart, one must never put off till tomorrow what one can put off till next week!” Now with my feeble excuses over, let me give you some of my news for 2021.
Happiness
First of all I would have to say that it has been a good year, and one in which I have experienced a great measure of unusual happiness. And no wonder, because, as I think I said before, I have been locked up in a place I love, in a home I love, with the woman I love, and doing the thing I love, … which is writing.
I have also found enormous joy in just being with Carol for the kind of extended times which were not easily possible over all those years when I was in the full swing of ministry with so much travel. And never before has it been possible after supper, just to listen to the news and then perhaps some fun TV such as the series, When Calls the Heart. We have also got into Heartlands which, apart from some rather silly teenage romances, is all about horses, and I find this particularly enjoyable because I grew up on horses in old Basutoland, and riding was part of my daily life. After these sorts of indulgences, we can each do some letters or general reading. What more could one ask for?
As to general reading, for some years when I was very weakened in health, I did not have good energy for serious reading, but that has now returned and I have been reading history, biography, ethics, and cosmology. At bedtime, after Carol and I have prayed together, I used simply to read my devotional book and then go to sleep. But now I find myself eager to put in a further half hour or forty five minutes of general reading. Then at the end, I do the devotional book, and go to sleep quickly, praise God, with the Lord and His Word in my heart.
All of this adds up to a very rich time for which I cannot thank the Lord enough. Perhaps on top of this I should add that I am increasingly blessed by Nature and Carol’s truly lovely garden. One of my very favourite verses is: “Day to day pours forth speech” (Psalm 19:2).
I find when I look at the garden that I feel the Lord and experience afresh the revelation of His Supernatural Creativity. Orville Dewey, a devotional writer of yesteryear, once wrote: “A new day rose upon me. It was as if another sun had risen into the sky; the earth fairer; and that day has gone on brightening to the present hour. I have known other joys of life, I suppose, as much as most men; I have known friendship and love and family ties; but it is certain that till we see God in the world – God in the bright and boundless universe – we never know the highest joy.”
Family news
Carol is well and in good shape. We walk every day to keep our blood oxygen up and I am fed on a very healthy diet by this great girl. We also try to have one dinner date out per week where we can observe Covid protocols. Carol is incredible the way she does all of our family admin from finances and bills through to funerals and wills!! We find it quite a battle to know to whom we should leave our family plastic, or our coffee mugs, or our two silver teaspoons! Carol still does flowers regularly for our local church and these lovely arrangements we are able to see in the excellent online YouTube services we receive from our Church of the Ascension. Carol has not been able, because of Covid protocols, to keep up her Bonginkosi work in Sweetwaters, a nearby township, amongst the poorest of the poor. Her garden is her particular delight and this year I think it excels all other preceding years.
Thankfully, we are also able to be in touch by phone daily with our kids and Cathy rings very faithfully from the States every day. The Scott family in Chattanooga are in quite a few transitions. Jonathan has a new job, and Cathy gets increasing responsibilities as CEO of the parachurch ministry The Bible in Schools. This involves raising money for salaries of Bible teachers where the government won’t fund the activity. Cathy has turned into a remarkable fundraiser and this year her budget is three million US Dollars. Andrew, now 21, is training to be a pilot, and Cameron moving towards the end of his high school years.
Gary and Debs lead very full lives, with Gary still having cricket coaching jobs and Debs having an ever expanding ministry, along with Jackie Moll, into the lives of women, and especially young mums. This is called Strongest Story (Writing a Stronger Story with Your Life). More info at www.strongeststory.com/. The big thing in that family is that Joshua has come up here to Michaelhouse for his last two years of school. We are delighted that he is a school prefect for next year, and Vice-Captain of the First Eleven Cricket and its opening bowler. We love going to watch him play and having him for weekends.
Martin and Sam press on merrily with their lives in Johannesburg, Sam teaching, and Martin being CEO of a rubber factory with some 250 workers. Very demanding. Martin has become a class act game photographer and they relish in regular visits to his father-in-law’s game farm up near Kruger. Their three kids are all excelling and bless us with messages saying, “We love you to the moon and back!” I said to Samantha the other day, “It’s not fair for one family to have two future Miss South Africa’s!”
My sisters, Olave and Judy, are still in good health, and likewise their families. This is a mercy indeed.
On the work front
I am thankful that I have finished my two Lockdown books; Deep Waters of the Disciple and Great is Thy Faithfulness. These will both, Lord willing, be published next year and please pray with me that they will touch many people. We are also republishing my book A Witness Forever about the South African ’94 elections and this will be out in a few weeks’ time. This is intended especially for supplementary reading along with our new documentary, The Threatened Miracle of South Africa’s Democracy which is based on the book.
This documentary was launched on September 24th, South Africa’s Heritage Day, and coincidently my 85th birthday when Theuns and Charlene Pauw and AESA gave me a truly marvellous day. Martin and his two girls, Jessica and Emma, came down, but Sam stayed in Johannesburg to support Mattie who was playing for a regional team in a big cricket tournament. Coming back to the documentary, the mantra at the end of it is “DO YOUR BIT.” This is the film’s strong challenge to all South Africans to become involved, each person, in seeking to make a contribution to the rescue and healing of South Africa at this rather perilous time. We would profoundly appreciate it if you would be willing share the YouTube link for this documentary with your family, friends, church groups, and spheres of influence.
The vision for this 90 minute film came from Charlene Pauw, wife of SA Team Leader Theuns, and the Producer was Frans Cronje, brother of the late Hansie, and Producer of Angus Buchan’s Faith Like Potatoes, who has done a really marvellous job. In fact, the film has been placed among the award finalists of International Christian Visual Media. The awards will be announced at a ceremony in Nashville, Tennessee, in February next year. This is a feather in the caps of both Frans and Charlene.
I have also been privileged with a few others to launch a South African Christian Leaders Forum (for discussion and action) and a Christian Leaders Fellowship (for dialogue, interaction and prayer for one another and the country). We meet monthly with growing numbers and I think this has the potential to be a very useful and relevant contribution to the needs of both church and nation at this time.
On the wider Pan African front, Stephen Mbogo, our International Team Leader, is most admirably leading the work forward. In fact, AE has launched two new teams, the first in Southern Sudan, a desperately needy country under Rev Alex Aggrey. The team is focussing into evangelism among Members of Parliament and trauma healing among students. The second is in Zambia under Dr Lubasi who is now serving also as Southern African Regional Team Leader, and securing strategic cooperation between the teams in Malawi, Zimbabwe and Zambia itself. Their reach will also extend to Angola, Mozambique and Botswana.
The team in East Africa also coordinated, just this last week, a three-day virtual evangelism training conference drawing in some 31 countries, including South Africa which was represented by AESA Team Leader, Theuns Pauw. And I will be happier still, Lord willing, to see next August, first in South Africa, and then in Zambia, our 60th anniversary celebrations of the first mission to Pietermaritzburg. There is huge planning going on for this and in South Africa it will include another Mission to Maritzurg, and in Zambia, another mission to Lusaka. How good is our God! All of this I find gratifying and it makes my heart happy and ready for a nunc dimittis.
Health
I guess some of you out there may be wondering how we are going with our health. Carol’s, as I said, is remarkably good, and I feel pretty okay most of the time. Sadly I do still struggle with shingles (two and a half years now), or perhaps what I should call its aftermath in Post-Herpetic Neuralgia, otherwise called Neuro-Pathic Neuralgia. This is a trial indeed, and I long to be delivered from it. I do rattle the Lord’s cage on it a bit, but I know He has His own purposes in leaving me with this struggle. My leukaemia is stable and non-aggressive and every four months I go for two days to the hospital for Polygam Immunotherapy. My little congregation of nurses in the hospital all seem to be doing quite well and greet me like a long-lost pastor when I go there! My Myasthenia Gravis (Google will help you!) is kept under control by medication I take every six hours every day. I continue to see the medical fraternity as God’s special agents in the world for His healing and loving care.
Heaven and Home
I suppose being 85 it is not surprising that I think a lot about Heaven. And I must say it excites me tremendously and fills my heart with glorious hope and anticipation. C S Lewis, one of my special spiritual friends, from whom I read a daily extract in a CSL anthology, writes: “Hope is one of the Theological virtues. This means that a continual looking forward to the eternal world is not (as some modern people think) a form of escapism or wishful thinking, but one of the things a Christian is meant to do. It does not mean that we are to leave the present world as it is. If you read history, you will find that the Christians who did most for the present world were just those who thought most of the next…. They all left their mark on Earth precisely because their minds were occupied with Heaven. It is since Christians have largely ceased to think of the other world that they have become so ineffective in this. Aim at Heaven and you will get Earth ‘thrown in’. Aim at Earth and you will get neither.” So I am enjoying aiming at Heaven and finding Earth joyously thrown in!
In my new book Deep Waters of the Disciple, I have a final chapter on Heaven – At Last! This chapter opens: “I have to say that I am incredibly excited about Heaven. And I must agree with Peter Pan that ‘to die will be an awfully big adventure!’ And I must think of the unimaginable and inexpressible wonder of what is to come when I reflect again and again on Paul’s words ‘Eye has not seen, nor ear heard, neither has there entered into the heart of man, the things which God hath prepared for them that love Him” (1 Corinthians 2:9 KJV).
So if a student in a varsity mission ever said to me, and some did: “All you are into is this pie-in-the- sky stuff”, then my reply would be: “But suppose there IS pie in the sky?” The question is central, says my chapter, “to our life on Earth, bringing us, as it does, a world-view of breath-taking significance: telling us that this life is just a preliminary, a prelude, the cover and title page, and that that there is more to come, as C S Lewis says in ‘The Great Story which goes on forever, and in which every chapter is better than the one before.’” And we will know that at last we are Home!
With all that said, I nevertheless do ask the Lord for extra-long life so that I can drink and fully drain the Cup of Marriage, knowing that in Heaven, “there is neither marrying nor giving in marriage”, something which I’m going to chat to the Lord about in a quiet moment when I’m not deafened by angels singing, and ask Him for a special plan for Carol and me!
And yes of course, I also have a very deep desire to keep ministering the Gospel of salvation and Christian life to as many as I can through writing and preaching, as the Lord enables.
Well, I guess that’s it. So if you haven’t gone to sleep, or hit the delete button half an hour ago, I’d like you to receive Carol’s and my warmest best wishes for a blessed and happy Christmas and a New Year full of joyful and fruitful Kingdom Exploits. After all, we have to “keep working while it is day because the night is coming when no one can work” (John 9:4).
Much love….
Michael…and of course Carol
I guess the very heart of the AE vision that has brought us to this great sixtieth anniversary day would lie in the very nature, context and wording of the Lords clear call to me in Madison Square Garden in 1957 during the Billy Graham New York crusade (photo). Can you imagine. I was visiting relatives in USA during a summer vacation during my university studies in England and was invited by a student in Fuller seminary to go down to some of the crusade meetings. There, night after night, I heard Billy Graham faithfully and clearly preaching the Gospel. I was touched and stirred. In fact, inspired.
One night after one of the meetings I was down in the basement of Madison Square Gardens where people where respondees were being counseled. I was pensively walking up and down and reflecting on what I was seeing. Then, like Isaiah, I can say, “I heard the voice of the Lord…” (Isaiah 6: 8) It was a pivotal moment in my life and the Word was clear and unmistakable. “Why not in Africa? I want you to do evangelism in the cities of Africa.” Over and out! I was startled, even shocked, because I only saw myself as capable of evangelizing young school boys as a Christian School master and I was terrified of public speaking. I tried to protest my inability but the message of the Voice persisted and that night I left Madison square gardens a called man.
And it was on that word and that experience that AE came forth with its vision “To Evangelize the cities of Africa through word and deed in partnership with the Church.” The Lord brought many others to share in this call and that is why 60 years later we are here celebrating the anniversary of the launching of our ministry in the mission to Maritzburg in 1962.
Praise His Name!
Archbishop Fredrick Maaka has commended the recent mission week in Uganda by African Enterprise, saying “the many souls that came to the kingdom is a great testimony.” He also says the closing distance between different denominations, and the ability for churches to sharpen each other in discipleship is a wonderful thing.
The Archbishop believes that building a kingdom mindset is so important, and that unity in the church is powerful. His desire is to see the body of Christ working together, helping as many people as possible receive Jesus as Lord and Savior.
Mission Leader Juliet Matabira believes that the mission’s achievement of reaching over 100,000 for Jesus is a great success. “Seeing churches uniting to work together and getting people saved has been a great highlight for me,” Juliet says. “There are many more Pastors in Jinja that would welcome the opportunity to participate in our next mission.”
A week-long mission effort in Jinja, Uganda has been yet another success story for African Enterprise. A variety of methods were successfully used to engage with the community, including going door to door, street evangelism and a targeted leadership event.
The mission combined leaders from many denominations to promote their goal of unity in the body of Christ. Over 400 evangelists were trained to participate. Church leaders came together to hold a targeted TV broadcast, in which they were able to discuss why unity in the church is so important.
Perhaps some of the most impressive outcomes came from going door to door. In just 6 days, evangelists were able to reach 30,552 people! They also employed methods such as street evangelism and mobile trucks, where public address systems were used in open air to broadcast the gospel message. Preachers travelled alongside and were on standby to pray with anyone who accepted the alter call.
A leadership event hosted by community leaders attracted a large number of attendees from Jinja. The theme was centered around how to be a leader of integrity in this era. At the conclusion of the event, 5 leaders accepted Jesus as their Lord and Savior. Most notably was the Mayor of Jinja himself, Mr. Kaslo Alton Okocha.
Encouraging numbers of people were reached through mass media. Mobile trucks are estimated to have connected with 250,000 people throughout the mission. The street ministry engaged with approximately 70,000 and TV with another 15,000. These figures demonstrate the ability to evangalise safely during COVID. The message was shared with enormous numbers of people in a way that didn’t require mass gatherings.
Despite the ongoing challenges of the pandemic, God continues to equip us with new and innovative ways of making sure we can share the gospel, and have an effective impact on our communities.
