Greetings in Jesus name. My name is Owro Charles, I am from Nigeria. Currently, I live and work in Italy but my parents are living in Nigeria. Here in Italy, Christianity is different because of the Roman Catholic teachings, which are predominant.
Because my parents are Christians I had the opportunity to grow up as a Christian and to understand what Christianity is really about. I accepted Jesus as my Lord and personal Savior and was baptized as a child. I have continued to walk with God to this day.
My ministry dream is to become a successful preacher. I know the Bible says that he who wins souls is wise. My dream is to make sure I preach the gospel to the world.
Most of the time people call me pastor, but I call myself an evangelist. I want to really move with the word of God to all parts of the world as a church planter, not as a residents pastor.
My church has played a very important role in my studies, they have encouraged me and prayed for me. My family has also really encouraged me in this because they know I have a ministry dream and this is one opportunity for me to bring it to pass.
A scholarship is very important to me because it has been a very big challenge for me to study more about the Bible. Money has always been an issue whenever I have tried to attend a ministry school, but with this opportunity, I will be able to complete my course, in Jesus name.
I need prayer to be able to complete my studies and to fulfill my ministry dreams.
My name is Nana Kweku Bennie, born in the year 1981 and I live in Ghana; From Ghana ministry training online at CLI. I am currently residing in a town called Asankrangwa in the Western Region. Fortunately for me, I was born into a Christian home. My parents were very devote Christians so it was a matter of course that my siblings and I had to attend church every Sunday morning. Thankfully, that upbringing stayed with us and when I graduated from the children’s ministry into my teens, I gave my life to Christ. This took place on 16th November, 1996. On the day, I stood before the entire congregation and prayerfully said the sinners’ prayer. On the 24th of December of the same year, I received the Holy Spirit baptism. Hallelujah!
It is a well-known fact that Ghanaians are very religious and Christianity is the dominant religion here. Since Christianity is the dominant religion, there is minimal religious or political opposition to church activities. There are lots of cooperation between the various Christian denominations here which actually creates a conducive environment for ministry. We have a very high illiteracy rate and this affects peoples understanding of issues. With low or no education, it becomes difficult to inculcate modern ideas which usually is a break-away from the status quo.
My dream for ministry is to stay on the course that the Holy Spirit has been leading me on ever since I sensed a calling upon my life. I have graciously been gifted with a wonderful teaching ability and understanding that in the coming years, my desire is to write books, journals and write ups explaining key biblical truths to the Christian community both locally and internationally. My prayer is also that during my teaching services, the Holy Spirit will manifest His power to deliver, heal and encounter people in exceptional ways.
I tend to identify myself as youth leader because I love to work with the youth. Most of my activities in my ministry has been centred on the development of the youth. I hope to continue in that line even if I progress into other offices in ministry.
The Bible makes me understand that out of the mouths of two or three witnesses, a something is established. There have been more than three prophecies concerning my work as a minister of the gospel during prayer meetings. Before these prophecies, I have had dreams where I see myself ministering to people in diverse ways.
In Africa, one key challenge to effective ministry is witchcraft and black magic. These present strong battle grounds in the spiritual realm. If one is able to engage an effective spiritual warfare to defeat these spiritual hood hogs, you will have a successful ministry. The other challenge is ministry training. If you ever wanted to upgrade your knowledge in ministry, you have to leave your post and enroll in a Bible school and stay on campus. This serves as a big barrier for further studies.
I have the backing of my Senior Pastor who has been a constant source of encouragement to me. Also since I will not need to travel before undertaking this course, my team of executive and study group are excited about the course and after completion, others have expressed interest in enrolling at CLI.
By the grace of God, I have been married to a woman who has been my prayer partner for many years. She is really interested in my ministry and this phase presents a new opportunity for ministry.
Enrolling at CLI has really actualized the adage killing two birds with one stone. Once I secured a scholarship at CLI, I have been relieved from the burden of having to make a savings of a specific amount for at least five years in order to enroll in a bible college. In this way, my family’s finances have not been affected much. However, if I need to stay on campus to undertake my course at the bible college, it means I have to stop working altogether. In short, a scholarship from CLI has helped me realize my dream of ministry training and at the same time working along the way to support my family.
I will need prayer support to stay strong and focussed in accomplishing whatever the Lord has commissioned me to do.
Thanks
THANKING GOD FOR CLI
I’m a woman of forty nine years. Married with three children, my husband is a military officer. I was employed and worked for nineteen years, and I decided to stop because I felt my service is most needed on the field where God’s people are working. The nineteen years that I worked, ten years was used preaching in my church till I stopped the work and still do till now. My children are between the ages of fifteen and nine years and they are still in school.
I am a Ghanaian. Ghana is located in west Africa, and I am living with my family in the Northern part of Ghana. Ghana as a whole has a very large population of Christians and we have freedom of worship. The only thing Ghanaians need are the true word of God or the true Gospel. The Northern part where I live is Muslim-dominated, for that reason is very difficult to convert a Muslim to Christianity, but now that I have acquired this knowledge from Christian Leaders Institute I am trusting God to give me different direction concerning that issue.
My parents played a very big important role in my life with regards to coming to know God. They both were dedicated Christians and they brought up my sisters and I in the same way they were brought up. I am first among seven girls my parents put the fear of God in us through the morning and evening devotions they were having with us whilst growing and our regular Sunday church attendance.
Christian Leaders Institute is a great blessing from God to me and my family because most of the courses were discussed by the entire family. CLI has given me a strong foundation of family life and as a student, I am so much equipped with high education I had in CLI.
The teaching I received together with my calling has given me a very strong confidence and assurance that the Lord is answering my prayers. I thank everybody in CLI so much for the good works you are doing and may the good Lord bless you and your donors.
In Ghana, we have only two institutions that recognize graduates from those institution as those qualified to be ordained so even if you have masters from other institutions in the world, unless you go back to Trinity College before you can be ordained as a minister i.e the Protestants, and Catholic you have to go Catholic Seminaries. Aside these two institutions, it is only few Churches that have their bible schools that they train their members to become Pastors. For this reason anyone at all can make himself a pastor and these people are making business with Christianity in Ghana. Christ is no longer preached, it is only prosperity. The Church, as the body of Christ is not recognized.
For these reasons, knowing that I have acquired high quality education in Diploma courses, I prayed for about six months for God’s guidance in this issue and He actually heard my prayers and directed me to the leaders of different denominations including these national churches which will not have anything to do with me if not God’s intervention and on that day, the body of Christ, believers from different denominations would come together and from there I know the Lord would open and Christ would be preached and they would be interested in my ministry “Presenting Christ”. I am asking God to continue connecting me to those leaders so that Christianity in Ghana will not be only a religion, but that we’ll be believers desiring to know God and His plan for Humanity. Aside “Presenting Christ” I have started a women ministry where I am trying to help women whose marriages are not doing well and also thinking of the youth who have gone wayward.
As I noted earlier on, the people in my geographical area are mostly Muslims with a very large land, so beside the regional capital the rest of the area is scattered settlement with very poor road networks. I am so grateful to my local church to discover my gift of preaching and the prayer support they have given me through my studies, they give me the platform to speak to the women and the youth in the church and this has been so helpful to me.
I want to share this because my passion for marriage has been so great that when I hear of a divorce it makes me sad. Even though I have been born and brought up in a Christian home, it was in my marriage that I had encountered with Christ. As it was my husband God prepared to shape up my whole life, he was very outgoing and could spend several hours outside home and living me alone in the house and this went on for a very long time in our marriage. This could have caused me to live the marriage because my colleagues around us started complaining. Before I married I told God to keep me in my marriage so I started praying for my husband and myself and God heard my prayers and now we are so happy in our marriage to see ourselves as one of best couples in the world. I thank God for what His has done for us.
I will like to confess that this training has made me a very new person, because it has actually affected every part of my life, my intellectual ability, spiritual life and my social life and I know these are going to reflect in my ministry’s future and making it a God glorifying ministry .
It is very important to pray for each other so I want prayer support for God to make Himself great in my life and ministry. May God bless Christian Leaders Institute.