Born in Mhondoro Chivero, I grew up deeply rooted in our traditional practices and actively participating in them. I rarely went to the local churches, and if I did, it was only for fun. After completing my Ordinary level, I moved to Harare in search of employment and further my education. I thereafter then trained as a teacher and later got married.
For six years, I worked out of Harare where my family was based, and could only join them on weekends and during school holidays. It was during this period that I later succumbed to peer pressure and started drinking beer and began cheating on my wife with unmarried fellow teachers in the surrounding schools. I could lie to the ladies that I was not married since I was living alone away from my family in Harare. I left many of them heartbroken when they discovered the truth.
Upon realizing the risk and possible detrimental effects to my marriage posed by living alone, I made strong efforts to relocate to join my family in Harare. I loved my wife so much that I did not want her to suspect anything. I did not want anything to affect our marriage at all. It was the perfect union. My efforts were successful and I joined my family in Harare, favorably things started to move on very well but I did not stop drinking alcohol. I told all the women I was cheating with that I was a married man and did not have any plan or desire to leave my wife. Those who chose to remain were quite aware of the fact that I was a happily married person with no whatsoever intention of leaving my wife or marrying them.
Although I was drinking alcohol and sometimes having affairs with other women, deep inside me I was guilty of not worshiping God. Back home, my mother was an active and respectable member of the Methodist church since her childhood, so we resolved with my wife to join the church. I would attend the morning church service and in the afternoon go to drink with my friends. Later on, we left the Methodist Church to join a powerful emerging Pentecostal church and became very active members there. It is while I was a member of this church that I quit drinking alcohol after encountering the powerful hand of God that transformed our lives. We were now leading a very successful life with ambitious plans for the family.
Tragedy struck in 2019, when I lost my wife after a short illness. The world crumbled on me, my pillar of strength had gone and everything went dark taking an opposite direction. To make the already bad situation worse, her death was immediately followed by Covid-19 lockdown. All our children were at school and I was alone at home. I was so stressed that I reverted to my old drinking self. To be honest, life had become meaningless to me, and I had lost all hope. Church gatherings were not allowed because of the Covid-19 restrictions. To me, beer became my only solution and acted as a pain killer. I used to drink beer alone at home to drown my sorrows and would be there after sleep.
After the easing of the Covid-19 restrictions, I had lost interest in going back to church and continued with my drinking habits. I spent most of my time on social media, particularly Facebook and WhatsApp. It was on Facebook that I came across different dating sites. I joined the sites for fun because I had convinced myself that I would never marry again. Through these sites, I met women and entered into relationships although I knew I was not serious. As a result, I pained and broke women’s hearts who were serious about settling down. I made them suffer emotionally. What surprised me was that during that time, I would dream of myself in a church full of people practicing deliverance and healing people with all forms of illnesses and disabilities. Although I was no longer attending church services, I did not stop praying. I would even pray before going to drink beer or before doing anything.
One day as I was driving along First Avenue, in Waterfalls, I met a certain lady who greeted me as ‘’Man of God’’. I had never seen this lady before, so I thought she had mistaken me for someone. The lady asked for a lift to Parktown and I offered her. I was driving a small white Nissan Vannette lorry. The woman was very humble and was only talking about God. I offered to drive her back to her place after she had finished shopping and reluctantly she accepted. I felt that there was something unusual about this lady. She was very different from the ladies I had known before. After dropping her at her house we exchanged phone numbers. When I got home, she phoned me and asked me to pray before I sleep. At 3.00 am, she woke me up again and asked me to pray. Among all the women I had affairs with, no one ever asked me to pray. She later then told me everything about my life saying I was a great Man of God. She said she had seen that in a vision when she was praying. One day she shocked me when she described to me the setup of my rural home and some of my relatives she had not met or seen. She had dreams and visions about me. At first, I did not take her seriously but she never grew weary of encouraging me to be serious about worshipping God. She completely changed my prayer life. Our friendship was more of praying than anything else. She never stopped addressing me as ‘’Man of God’’ and I also started addressing her as a “Woman of God”.
This woman had a passion for caring for orphans and the less privileged in society. At one particular time, she wanted to turn her home into an orphanage but was stopped when she had a powerful vision of me and her leading a powerful church. One day she heard a voice saying ‘’You can start now! Don’t delay!’’ and she turned her garage into a church, bought chairs, and P.A system. I helped her start a church but did not completely quit alcohol and secretive relationships. I reasoned to be not part or involved in any of her plans.
It was not until two strangers came to me with a message carrying a strong warning to take God’s call for child play. They came at two different occasions but with the same message. One of them came saying she had seen the name WEPSIC written on a banner.
That day marked my total repentance. It became clear that God had indeed chosen me to do his work. We immediately arranged a journey to a go for an overnight worship at a mountain in Bindura. It was at the mountain where I encountered the glory of God. It was a terrifying experience.
Now we are ministering together with the woman as husband and wife. Her story similarly to mine, she lost her husband during the early stages of marriage. Unlike me, she remained devoted to the work of God and never gave up. We are seeing the amazing hand of God in our church. People with different kinds of sicknesses and diseases are being healed. To date, on April 19, 2024, God has healed four dumb and death-threatened through us. It really is amazing how God can transform a person and use him to further the interests and purposes of his wonderful kingdom.
My story is more like that of Saul before he was called Paul. I was living in sin, not thinking of anything Godly but when the glory of God shone one me, I was totally changed and made completely new. IF IT HAPPENED TO ME, IT CAN ALSO HAPPEN TO YOU. God came for the lost. If I read Titus 3: 3-7, I feel like God is speaking to me.