Career Planet

How do students get ahead when their high school doesn’t even have a telephone? South Africa’s government offers a basic education, but it is up to schools to provide enrichment classes. Most students don’t have access to computers in their homes or in their schools. How will they keep from falling behind?

Karin Chisholm, with an IT background, and Heather Adriaanse, with 20 years in financial services, formed a company to meet just this need. Calling it Career Planet, the two women connect with schools desiring to provide their grade 11 and 12 students with career research opportunities. They take their learning kiosk to schools, where students participate in workshops followed by online research.

More about the workshops and learning kiosk next time…

Vision for Zambians

As the mother of five children, Jennifer says that God has nurtured her to have a big heart for people. Her church members reach out to the community to help families. They pay school fees and buy uniforms for orphans and vulnerable children to attend school. The Zambian government approves of the church’s vision because few children are able to afford to go to school in their township.

Jennifer’s church also has begun a program to raise up women to start small business ventures. Church people train the women and help them start their businesses, teaching them marketing or tailoring skills. The women then are able to set up small shops in order to earn income for their families.

Pastor Jennifer

When Jennifer asked her father about attending Bible school, he released her to go but gave her no money. God, however, raised up other people to support her and all her fees were paid. She completed Victory Bible College, also earning a diploma in tailoring and design. Although she lovingly prays for them, Jennifer’s parents continue to oppose her. Over the years, however, all her sisters have come to know Jesus.

Immediately after Bible school, Jennifer pioneered a church. She also met and married her husband John Nkandu. Both Jennifer and John are pastors in two different townships. Pastor Jennifer finds that the endurance she learned as a teen has given her fortitude and stability for the ministry.

After 24 years of pastoring and seeing God work miracles in her congregation and family, last fall Jennifer Nkandu was elected general overseer of the 22 Foursquare churches in Zambia. As Pastor Jennifer says, “God does wonders!”
More about Pastor Jennifer’s vision tomorrow…

Jennifer endures persecution to follow Jesus

Raised in a Catholic family, Jennifer always wanted to become a nun. When she found Jesus, though, she found God had other plans for her life. Unhappy she left Catholicism, her family chased her from home. But as Jennifer says, she serves a God who cannot fail her. Her pastor found a sister in the church to take care of the young persecuted girl. Her parents went to court to try to take her away from the sister, finally bribing the judge to hold her in prison. The other prisoners said, “You say you are suffering for Jesus, but why don’t you just deny Him?” After a week she was released for lack of charges.

Back at her parents’ home, Jennifer found that they had burned her Bible and other Christian literature and then forbade her to pray. She would hide in the flower bushes to pray. There she heard God reassuring her to keep on praying, telling her “I am with you.”

Knowing God had called her to be a pastor, Jennifer planned to go to Bible school.
To be continued tomorrow…