Demon-possessed man bursts into prayer meeting, confesses to killings

By Mark Ellis —

Church members and community leaders gathered for a three-day prayer event in response to the recent murders of six young women in western Kenya.

During the event, participants prayed six hours each day for three days.

“As the prayer was going on, this 29-year-old man ran into the meeting and started confessing all the past killings of the six girls that he had killed in the maize plantations,” a local ministry leader told Christian Aid Mission (CAM). “This man was so confused and possessed by demons, and as we prayed for him, he cried and groaned in pain.”

The local missionaries prayed earnestly for deliverance and salvation, as more people were drawn to the meeting by the commotion – including some determined to hang the killer and burn his body, the leader told CAM.

“We called the police, who arrested him for interrogation to find more of his friends who had been committing the killings,” he said. “This man was charged in court, and in court he confessed Christ, saying that he will not kill again and now is born again.”

After his arrest, the attacks on young women and children that terrorized the town came to a stop.

“Praise the Lord for his salvation and for the Lord revealing and exposing him,” the leader said. This demonstrated the power of the local church to bring healing and restoration to the town, the leader said.

Another town in western Kenya experienced a dramatic turn-around when local missionaries saturated it with the gospel, he told CAM.

“We are seeing the transformation of young people getting saved as they hear the gospel,” he said. “Also, we have started sports clubs to reach many young people in the villages with the Good News of the kingdom. The church plants have been the lighthouses of these villages.”

As more than 600 youths got involved in Christ-based sports teams, drug dens closed down in the surrounding villages, he said.

“In one known drug den, a young man went back to his car mechanic vocation just because of this outreach in sports,” the leader said. “Also, the area’s chief has allowed the church to preach the gospel even during the evenings, which previously had been cancelled. Praise the Lord.”

The ministry recently distributed more than 780 Bibles in native languages, including Swahili Bibles to a mother named Rose, who began reading them with her family every evening at the dinner table.

“The family started a prayer fellowship, and later on a home fellowship was planted in this home,” the leader said. “Mama Rose said they had never had a Bible in the home, and it was those first Bibles that brought transformation.”

Kingdom Expansion

The ministry planted 22 churches among once unreached people over a six-month period, he said.

During that time evangelistic events and other outreaches resulted in 1,500 people putting their faith in Christ, in spite of intense opposition in some areas.

“We are receiving testimony of salvations and house church growth even in these hostile areas,” the leader said. “In northeastern Kenya where Islamic forces and terrorist groups have burned down some churches and houses of Christians, we have moved two families to another town.”

Reaching people with the gospel has endangered four native missionaries working in dangerous areas, and the ministry is renting a safehouse for them for six months before they return, he said.

“The four pastors that are being housed in a safe place are being protected also by the community also that we are reaching out to,” he added.

Churches have grown and multiplied through the discipling of new Christians and mentoring of new leaders. Ministry leaders instruct every home church pastor to develop at least three other leaders tasked with starting a new home fellowship, he said.

Along with the sports evangelism, which resulted in the planting of three churches, relief aid and health programs have opened doors to establish new fellowships. Workers offered help against jiggers, or sand-fleas, which can move into the skin and cause itching, inflammation and intense pain.

“Our recent anti-jiggers campaign opened the doors for us to plant four churches among the Luhya and Saboti tribes,” the leader said.

Health programs include efforts to curtail female genital mutilation (FGM) and rescue girls threatened with the cruel and painful cultural practice.

“Our ministry has moved 12 girls to a safe place,” the leader said. “In the sponsorship programs for the rescued girls, so far we are sponsoring 30 girls to go to school, both at Shalom Preparatory School and various high schools in Kenya. Pray with us for this huge need of taking care of the girls that have been affected by the FGM scourge.”

To learn more about Christian Aid Mission’s work, go here