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STEPHEN LUNGU was once a gang leader who despised whites and hated God. He is
now CEO of African Enterprise, a leading evangelistic organization. He was in
B.C. last month, speaking at various churches.
Born in Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe), Lungu was abandoned by his mother, shunned by
his father and abused by an aunt. By age 12, he was living under a bridge and
eating food from garbage bins. Angry, bitter and addicted to drugs, he became
leader of a gang, the Black Shadows.
In 1962, when he was 20, Lungu and his gang were on their way to bomb a bank. They
encountered an evangelistic tent meeting, and decided to use the bomb there
instead. Fortuitously, they sat in the tent for a few minutes.
A preacher began to talk about the life of Christ. Lungu found he could identify
with Jesus, who had also suffered rejection. The preacher spoke of Christ’s love, and God’s judgment. Lungu felt the preacher’s finger was pointed at him. He found himself walking toward the altar.
“I was under the conviction of the Holy Spirit and I was crying like a little
child,” he told BCCN. He asked the preacher: “Can your Jesus save a sinner like me?”
That night, he said, “Jesus . . . came into my life, and my whole life was transformed.” He was finally set free from the “intolerable burden of pain and hurt and evil that haunted me, and I experienced
such joy and passion that I could not stop talking about God.”
He eventually reconciled with his parents, and led them to Christ. He spent
several years as an evangelist. In 1982, he joined African Enterprise in
Malawi.
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“My passion and my calling is to continue preaching the gospel, as I’ve got faith that God can change other people’s lives as he did mine. There is an emptiness inside someone who doesn’t know the Lord Jesus.”
Regarding his past suffering, Lungu said: “God did this to demonstrate his power of salvation in my life. God was preparing
me for now, as I lead the ministry. I went through tough situations – which have given me strong shock absorbers for my spiritual life . . .
“I believe in a God who does impossible things.”
Info: africanenterprise.org. – Lori Pederson
November 2009
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