“I began with Coram Deo, and this impacted me beyond what I can explain. I came to know the right mindset. I came to realize that people were dying poor and hopeless, just because of the lies that they believe in. I came to know the ability which God created me with; I know that all the wealth lies in human creativity, human innovation, and human imagination.”
Every so often at DNA, we come across a story that seems almost like it was pulled straight out of the Bible. A story that reminds us that even in the darkest moments, God is always there, working behind the scenes. Recently, we heard the story Ajabu, a Rwandan whose life demonstrates the faithfulness of God.
In 2001, when Ajabu was thirteen, a neighbor falsely accused him of raping her daughter. Though it was illegal for a thirteen-year-old to be put in prison, his neighbor bribed officials to arrest him. Like Joseph with Potiphar’s wife, Ajabu was thrown in jail without a trial, without a lawyer, and with no hope of ever getting out. He stayed in prison for years.
“I suffered to the extent where I complained and felt like life was useless and meant nothing, I was seeing life where there was no reason to live. But as I kept praying and putting my trust in God, I could hear a voice of encouragement. And I gained strength. The Lord was with me every single minute until the end of prison life.”
In prison, Ajabu learned new languages, continued his schooling, and joined a church. In 2010 Lawyers Without Borders contacted him and offered to help. In 2011 Ajabu went before a judge for the first time. It was clear to the judge that Ajabu was innocent and on August 17th, 2011, he was released from prison.
“For me, I count that I was born in 2011. That was when I started life on earth!”
But the world outside of prison was not the same as he had left it. Ajabu’s father had left the country and started a new family elsewhere. Ajabu’s mother was overjoyed to see him, but could not afford to pay for Ajabu to finish his schooling. He took some computer classes and got a certificate, but other attempts to officially complete his studies ended in failure.
The local church recognized Ajabu’s gifts for worship and evangelism. In 2016, the church ordained him for a pastoral position within the church. In 2017, the local churches held a conference about the kingdom mindset. Ajabu led the worship for the conference. As a result of the gathering, a man named Jerry Loyd was led to invest in a business training center for job readiness. And so Work 4 A Living came to Rwanda.
Work 4 A Living is a ministry created by Ena Richards of South Africa to help youths prepare to work with a kingdom mindset. The Rwandan charter needed a leader. A local pastor named Pastor Dennis recommended Ajabu, and together the two of them went through the Coram Deo Basics course required by Work 4 A Living and hosted locally by Trinity Education. This was followed by a two-week training in Nairobi and Ajabu became the first certified Work 4 A Living facilitator in Rwanda.
“I came to know how culture, parents, and belief system has impacted many lives and led them to the wrong decision making and thinking. I learned of the impact of animism in our economy, I came to know about dualism, which is popular in the community, and I found that a Biblical Worldview is a right Worldview that we need if we want to change the world and ourselves.”
Soon, Ajabu became a facilitator for Trinity Education and the secretary-general of Dream It, Rwanda Ministries. He sees how God taught him patience while he waited in prison. He saw how God chose seemingly unqualified people to represent Him to the world. He experienced the many ways God blessed him—that he was not cut off because he was poor.
Ajabu sums it up this way: “Now, many young people, mature people are coming to our center for training. The community is being impacted holistically. There is hope for the community’s development. The start can be small but the end becomes big.”
