When Edda Kumwenda’s marriage fell apart and she was chased from the family home at the age of 20, she turned to friends for help. They talked her into becoming a prostitute.
Edda found herself waiting at roadsides for customers, sometimes standing in rain all night during the wet season and returning to her accommodation empty-handed. She endured this miserable existence for three years. Then one day she met someone who proved to be a real friend. Edda was searching for a woman who was also working the streets and had gone missing when she heard that the woman had given up prostitution and joined a Christian vocational school.
“At first I couldn’t believe it”, she said. “Then I thought that maybe she really had changed”.
She went to the school and found her former colleague. She also found Agnes Kalawe.
“This woman of God preached Jesus to me and asked me to surrender my life to him”, Edda said. “I did so and she prayed for me. I feel that my life is secure now”.
Her new relationship with Jesus has led to another great change in her life. She enrolled in the African Enterprise training project for vulnerable women in Malawi and has learned to operate a sewing machine and design clothing products.
“My ambition is to open my own tailoring shop after I graduate”, she said.
