Meet the ISM Students - Update November 2010

We are pleased to be able to introduce to you some of the students of the International School of Missions as of November 2010. Also, see the article Preaching Heresy No Longer from the In Touch Mission International Monthly September 2011 Edition for another ISM student testimony.

Muhindo Kisolu Jeremie

Born: 1982

Birth Place: Masambo, DRC

Nationality: Congolese

Marital Status: Single

Testimony:

Naturally, people used to tell me that I am a rebellious boy. In some ways, yes! It is true that I was rebellious. My parents could not manage me; my school teachers were tired of my dirty characters. The only thing that I valued at that time was my personal kind of independence. It became too complicated for me that I even thought that my parents were disturbing my liberty. Then I decided to leave home and I went on the streets far from the family environment. From there I became worse that no one except my co-street kids could bear what I was doing. I then became a serious drunkard, smoker, adulterous… and everything that you can imagine a street person doing.

Then, the very important night of my life came. On 19th January 2004, I was walking on a street near a Christian church where people gathered that night for their overnight prayer. When I passed near, a voice came in my heart asking me: “why don’t you just enter this church and see what is happening?” For many hours I stayed around and did not have yet the right decision. Then, I went toward the door, I knocked, I pleaded those people to open for me. When they opened, I felt joy in my heart and the mood in the room was so strange to me that I was interested to follow what was to happen next. But surely God used that particular situation to transform my life. That very night, at around 10.00PM, I gave my life to Jesus Christ and I have never regretted the decision I made that day.

After that my family received me with a great joy and soon after I was baptized. I began to serve in the local church choir and now I am an evangelist. I want to make sure that all the people out there experience the joy that I have now in Jesus Christ. This is why I am at the International School of Missions.

Mbazumutima Gedeon

Born: 1987

Birth Place: Muyinga, Burundi

Nationality: Burundian

Marital Status: Single

Testimony:

I became a Christian since 2004.  First of all, my parents were not Christians and me also. Then in 2003 November, I was in P6 and I was together with other Christian children. They told me about Christianity even I looked at their behaviors and I saw that there was a difference between me and them. In that same year 2003 November, my father died and I got many problems. Those friends of mine whom we were in the same class came to visit me and told me the story about Jesus. At that time I believed and become a Christian.

Three months later, because of my good behavior which I showed into the family, my relatives began to believe. My present relationship with Christ is that my family believes Jesus one by one because I was the first in my family to receive Jesus. But at this time we are ten children alive in my family. I’m the fourth. Praise the Lord; all of us are now Christians, only my mother is left. That is my present relationship with Christ. I spend one hour in personal devotion, 30 minutes in Bible reading and 30 minutes for prayer. I read the Bible three days a week.

My work left is to advise everyone I meet about Faith and then to show them the benefit which is in living under the guidance of Jesus Christ. My plan is to become a Preacher and Teacher; I want to go back to my people and testify to them what Christ is doing in my life and what He can still do in their lives. I want to be a helpful tool of God for all the suffering people. I want to work to support Widows and Orphans through a ministry kind of NGO.

Appolinaire Zagabe

Born: 1985

Birth Place: Bukavu

Nationality: Congolese

Marital Status: Single

Testimony:

I thank the Lord for saving me from sins. Before being a Christian, I was struggling in sins. God and sin did not have any meaning to me. I was doing bad things, as drinking alcohol, doing any kind of sin without fear of God. One day, In 1999, I was coming from the football ground, with some friends, we met a man of God who was teaching the Word of God, and he started to teach us. In his teaching he showed us who God is, his love to man, and what He requires us to do. I was really touched that day when I heard who is God, and I decided to give my life to God, to serve Him in my life.

That same year, I joined a Baptist Church in our village in Congo and I got baptized. Then, in the year 2000, I joined the church choir. Through the church choir, I started growing in my spiritual life and experiencing victory over sin. In 2002, I moved from Bukavu to Goma where I continued serving the Lord as a youth leader. And God has used me in other ministries. I joined the University and became the Student Coordinator in North Kivu Province. God enabled me to start a ministry among the orphaned and elderly, which is still continuing up to this day.

God has done many good things in my life, and I am now a first year student at the International School of Missions. My present need, is to let God himself lead my life, enable me to complete my studies so that I may serve the Lord more effectively.

Nimbasumba Desire

Born: 1975

Birth Place: Burundi

Nationality: Burundian

Marital Status: Married

Profession: Pastor

Testimony:

I was born in a Christian family where my father was an evangelist. So, my turning point is not so big because I did not experience many things from the “pagan world”. Then, there came a time when I had to take life serious and I decided to give my life to God. From that time I saw my way in the ministry of God. Some years later, my parents and even some of my church leaders backslided. This poor spiritual situation made me ask myself many questions for which I did not have an answer. After contemplation and seeking the Lord, I decided to leave my parents in order that I may serve the Lord as an independent minister.

When I was young, I use to go with my father in many of his evangelical missions. I learned a lot from him especially in the area of church planting. Some of the churches he planted have grown to be very big congregations. Now I have been sent out from my mother-church from Burundi to do the same work which my father did.

My vision has always been that of planting churches everywhere I set my foot; training church leaders so that they may be effective in whatever ministry they are involved in; building churches, schools, hospitals, a trauma healing centers for orphans and widows.

Nsengiyunva Eric Munia

Born: 1983

Birth Place: Goma, DRC

Nationality: Congolese

Marital Status: Single

Testimony:

I am single and above 26 years, I am a Congolese by nationality but residing in Uganda as a refugee. I was born and raised up from a Christian family of which I grew up fearing the Lord. It is with great tears of joy that I am here now to thank the Lord for His love for me. Through His servants that he has chosen to use, there are times when I used to worry and cry especially when I departed away from my family in D.R.C to Uganda alone after the killing of my brother in the ethnic war that was constantly taking place in the Kivu province.

I thank God that I managed to escape from Congo to Uganda. Although when I reached in Uganda I backslid in the situation I was passing through, that was 2003-2005, when by the Lord’s grace I was picked again and called to serve the Lord wholeheartedly. In the year 2006, while I was in my high school, I joined Calvary Chapel Kampala where I started to grow spiritually. I fell in love with singing and worshiping the Lord all the time, and as the Bible says that those who accepted Jesus Christ in the truth as their Savior, the Lord gave them the capacity to become his children. This is what I am embracing as I speak because by His grace that the Holy Spirit always shows me the right path whenever I’m about to go astray. I am very happy and thankful to the Lord that He has opened the way for me to join the International School of Missions. I believe that that my studies will equip me for ministry. It has been my dream and vision to become an International Evangelist.

Kumbuka Bifuko Paul

Born: 1982

Birth Place: Idjwi, DRC

Nationality: Congolese

Marital Status: Single

Testimony:

Before I received Jesus Christ in to my life really was not in a good way because before I was like someone who did not have conscience because my hope was not in God or in Jesus Christ. I was interested in my personal life without God and even my hope was pointing to people or to someone. Really, I had a terrible life. I was not fearing God or fearing sin because I didn’t know what is a sin and what is not a sin and I couldn’t even know what is the salary of the sin. I couldn’t even think about Christian faith because it was not in my mind, and yet as I was born in Catholic family and all my hope was stopping somewhere in an empty place, without hope without faith. Before I couldn’t go to church for prayer but what was pushing me to go to church was benefits like getting girls there and other bad things. I couldn’t even think about our Jesus Christ who died for us and carried all our sins on the cross, because of my sin. I couldn’t pray to God in a bad situation, not even ask for God’s help when I was in need.

One day I went to a Protestant church, the topic of the day really touched me and I felt I wanted to receive Christ that day but I did not. The preacher of the day talked so much things and good for people and even myself I was touched with the word of God, after that I passed other years in my usual habits. In 2004, when I arrived here in Uganda, I spent my life in bad ways still, and on February 2005 as I was staying with 3 children of my elder brother, those children started telling me every day to go to church and pray God, those children were 10,12 and 14 years old.

One day I got sick and when they saw that I am sick, they went to church and after that they came back home with a pastor and when they arrived home, that Pastor started telling me that the children told him to come and pray for me. That pastor started telling me about Jesus and after we read some verses and he prayed for me. After all this, that man invited me to his church, on Sunday I went to his church, I met that Pastor and he was really happy to see me. After the service, he talked to me many things concerning God’s love, how He is faithful, graceful, powerful. After 3 weeks that Pastor was following me and telling me about the love of Christ again. Finally in 2005, I received Jesus Christ as my personal savior. From that day, I knew that a man is separated from God because of sins, and that Pastor gave me some verses to read, like Romans 6:23, 3:23, John 14:6. And after that, I asked Jesus Christ to come in my life, and now I am a Christian and I know that God is everything for me. I value the word of God in my life more than ever.

After I have received Jesus Christ in my life, many things happened to me, as anyone can see himself. I am now living a good life, a holy life, because my past life before receiving Jesus Christ was very bad, now am living in God’s Word and promises, and yet all my hope and faith is in Jesus Christ. The great thing is that my new life is leading people to Christ, since 2005 up to now, really God has brought many people to Christ through my testimony and the way God has changed my life. From that year (2005) I got involved in ministry in a group of intercessors In 2006 I started leading youth department and secretary of the church, and in 2007 I was a leader of intercessors group. So now I am growing in faith, my life now is preferable to many people, just because I am of Christ. All my focus is on God’s work, as the Bible says. My future plan is to do all my best to reach everywhere in the world, teaching the Word of God and testifying about God and His love to us. I pray to the mighty God to help me with his power, so that I can manage the plan I have in ministries. Now, as I am here at the International School of Missions, I will make sure that I will move here with something to help me in the ministry and that is why I am here. I have many plans about God’s work, but let God fulfills the promises He has said to me and all will see how great God is.

Muzerwa Christian

Born: 1976

Birth Place: Bukavu

Nationality: Congolese

Marital Status: Single

Testimony:

I was in a place called Bukavu in 1988 in a crusade. The preacher was Evangelist Reinhardt Bonke. By then, I was in a seminary planning to become a catholic priest. When I heard the Evangelist preaching from the Bible about worshiping idols, I took his message personally because every year in May, there was a church service night in the cemetery of the dead priests. All seminary students were obliged to attend this service. We would recite the name of the dead priests and ask them to pray for us. When the Evangelist preached that there is no relationship between the living and the dead, I was then liberated and I got saved. All my family who were Catholics rejected me. I left the seminary and went to stay with other Christian friends for about three years.

My life has been transformed though the reading of this scripture in John 8: 31, which says “So Jesus said to those who believed in Him, if you obey my teaching, you are really my disciples” verse 32 “You will know the truth and the truth will set you free.”
As a result of what God has done in my life, many members of my family are turning to Christ. In 2001, I ran from Congo to Uganda because of war. By God’s grace, from that year up to 2004, I received a scholarship and completed a Diploma program at Lake Victoria Christian Centre, a school of Evangelism and Rural Development. I have since been able to plant two churches, one in Kampala and another one in western Uganda. I am in charge of the Department of Evangelism in our church and also a member of the Elders’ committee.

When I finish my studies at the International School of Missions I hope to work in refugee camps preaching the Gospel of Jesus Christ using the Projection of the movie about Jesus’ Life (Matt.28:18 – 20). My focus (targeted audience) will be victims of armed conflicts, people who have been internally and externally displaced, orphans, people infected and affected by HIV/AIDS.

Katembo Vyambwera Fanny

Born: 1971

Birth Place: Butembo, Congo

Nationality: Congolese

Marital Status: Married

Testimony:

I became a Christian in 1986. I took this decision during a evangelical campaign. Since then, despite all struggles and difficulties I underwent, by God’s grace, I stood fast. Then I became an Evangelist, a Teacher. I was involved in many of their programs and project; first as a Teacher, than as a school Director. All this happened in church that preached a false doctrine. I was an active minister in that church, until the Spirit of God touched me, when one of the Christian pastor who is related to me came, preached to me again and I got saved by the truth. Now, four times a week, I do Bible study, and I have a personal devotion time. I am surely convinced that God has called me to be a witness to nations. That is why I feel like I will be an effective teacher, preacher, servant after I have completed my studies at International School of Missions.

Mujawayesu Esther

Born: 1988

Birth Place: Butare, Rwanda

Nationality: Rwandan

Marital Status: Single

Testimony:

I was born in Rwanda in 1988; but in 1994 I lost all my relatives during the genocide except my mother whom I am living with. After I received teachings about the love of God, how He sent His Only Son to die for us and how He can forgive sins; I also saw how God saved me from the genocide, I decided to accept Jesus Christ to come and reign into my life. Some years later when we were about to come to Uganda as refugees, my mother also gave her life to Christ and both my mother and I were baptized. When we arrived in Uganda, I served the Lord in a Christian Church, where I was a choir member. Later, I became a Deaconess in the same church. Now, I am a member of Mission to the Lost Ministries. This ministry has recommended me for my studies here at the International School of Missions.

Mukeshimana Jean-Pierre

Born: 1976

Birth Place: Cyangungu, Rwanda

Nationality: Rwandan

Marital Status: Married

Testimony:

Born in Rwanda, it happened that I never knew my parents. I grew up from my mother’s family where my uncle adopted me. He took care of me, gave me a name, and did for me what a father would do for his children. Unfortunately, my uncle got terribly injured during the 1994 Rwanda genocide and he became handicapped. Since my childhood, I learned that God is the father of orphans, so I got interested in this God who takes care of those who have no parents. I have loved God since then. In the year 1986, I decided to give my life to Christ, got baptized and became an active minister in the church. In 2002, I started preaching the Gospel in my country and many people came to Christ through that ministry. Between 2003 and 2007, I worked in a Secondary School where I helped many students in their spiritual life and many of them came to know Christ personally. In 2007, I went to university in Ngozi, Burundi where I became one of the spiritual leaders of the university. The Lord used me also during this time and many people accepted Christ and were baptized. Now I am serving God in Uganda where as a refugee, I pray God will also use me for the expansion of his Kingdom.

Ndereyimana Gloriose

Born: 1966

Birth Place: Muranvya, Burundi

Nationality: Burundian

Marital Status: Married

Testimony:

Before receiving Christ, I was a going to church without any understanding anything. I was totally ignorant about Scriptures. I was self-minded and I was not caring about my status with God. I was thinking that everything was okay. As I was reading the Bible, one day, the Spirit revealed to me that I am still ignorant; and I had to seek for explanations in order for me to understand the Word of God, understand it very well and put it into practice. I remember a verse which touched me a lot that time, I read from the book of Proverbs that God loves those who love Him and that those who seek Him find Him definitely. These challenges pressed my heart for a time and I decided to give my life to Christ and I was saved. After I received Christ in my life, I changed completely, I began experiencing the goodness of God, the Holy Spirit helped me to read, understand and increase my knowledge of the Word of God.

Kambale Soko Timothee

Born: 1976

Birth Place: Maboya, Congo

Nationality: Congolese

Marital Status: Married

Testimony:

I was born in a Christian family and I received my first teaching about God by my grandmother. Unfortunately, when I was growing, I was backsliding from the real faith and I was adopting a pagan way of life. Because my family was so close to the church, I had so many chances to hear the Word of God but I had no positive response to that. Later on, I started experiencing the wages of sin spoken about in the book of Romans; I was caught doing adultery and I was imprisoned because of that. Then I started looking at the real values of being a Christian, a child of God. God chose the year 1989 to bring me to Himself; I accepted Christ as my Lord and Savior and I was baptized. I then learned to have a personal relationship with God and to have fellowship with others. Then I decided to serve God definitely, to become a full time minister of the Gospel. I went through many training centers, seminars and God has allowed me to serve as Pastor in my local church in Beni, DRC. Now as I am studying at the International School of Missions, I wish to increase my knowledge of the Word of God in order to be an effective teacher and preacher.