By Ronald J. Sider

This summer, my wife and I hosted a very special visitor, Rev. Philip Owasi from Western Kenya. Rev. Owasi stayed in our home for several days while in Philadelphia to attend the annual conference of Christians for Biblical Equality. They had given him a scholarship because his Master’s thesis had persuaded his two-million-member denomination, the Kenya Pentecostal Assemblies of God, to ordain women for the first time in its history.

After accepting Christ in 1972, Philip became an active youth leader in his church. But when he told his Dad about his call to ministry, his father became angry. People considered pastors to have one of the poorest jobs for educated persons. His father refused to give him a single shilling for his theological studies.

Fortunately, he was accepted at the Pentecostal Bible College in Nyong’ori, Kenya, where he graduated after four years in 1983 with a Diploma in Bible and Theology. Over the next twenty years, Rev. Owasi pastored several congregations.

From 1996-1997, Philip studied in India at the Allahabad Bible Seminary and received a Bachelor’s in Theology. Philip has a passion for education. He wanted to study further, and was accepted at Wheaton College; but he lacked the money to come to the U.S. Then, unexpectedly, in September, 2000, Philip received a scholarship to do an M.A. in Theological Studies in South Korea.

When Rev. Owasi traveled to South Korea, he left behind a thriving congregation of about three hundred members. Earlier in his ministry, he had not understood the connection between evangelism and social ministry. But slowly he learned how to combine them. His church implemented a Child Development Center in cooperation with Compassion International. Today that program ministers to over 250 needy children from poor families.

An amazing thing happened while Philip studied in South Korea. As he puzzled over what topic to choose for his Master’s thesis, he felt drawn to the topic of women’s ordination. A Canadian professor suggested that he contact Christians for Biblical Equality in the U.S., and they sent him a number of good scholarly books on the topic. Initially, he confesses, “I was just like any other man in Africa who believed in patriarchal leadership in every place.” But his views began to change as he studied the Scriptures. It began to bother him that his own denomination trained women theologically but then refused to ordain them. So he decided to write his thesis on “Women’s Ordination: With Special Reference to Pentecostal Assemblies of God in Kenya.”

When he returned to Kenya in late 2002, Rev. Owasi went to his denominational headquarters, showed them his new degree and gave the top leaders a copy of his thesis. When they read the title, they were shocked! They wanted to know why on earth he had written on this topic since never in its history had the denomination ordained women. Philip just asked them to read the thesis.

The leaders studied it for two years. Somehow, the General Superintendent changed from a traditional to an egalitarian approach. Many continued to oppose the ordination of women when the General Superintendent put the issue up for discussion with the top church council. But the leader persisted and in April, 2005, for the first time in its history, the Pentecostal Assemblies of God in Kenya ordained twenty women!

In December of 2004, Rev. Owasi started a new church plant with twelve people plus himself. In less than a year, the church has grown to about one hundred members. Two former Muslims have come to Christ. The congregation has an active youth department training young people to do evangelism. The women’s department helps women serve the Lord, care for their households, and start small businesses. The church managed to raise enough money to buy two tailoring machines. With these they expect to begin dressmaking and making school uniforms for nearby schools. Rev. Owasi and his congregation dream of many projects in evangelism, health care, community development and education.

Rev. Owasi’s church has a special need that I want to share. No Pentecostal Assemblies of God church in his town has a church building anywhere large enough for their district conferences. Rev. Owasi’s church is growing fast and he dreams of building a church building that can seat 600-700 people. Given the rapid growth of his congregation, they will soon need that space.

But Rev. Owasi’s members are not wealthy and they don’t have the $85,000 needed for the building. (In fact, $46,000 would pay for the first phase of the building.)

As I listened to Rev. Owasi, I told him that I believed there were some American congregations in the ESA network who might be delighted to partner with his congregation in his building project as well as other areas of holistic ministry.

So I invite you to think and pray about the possibility that God wants your congregation to partner with this faithful, hard-working pastor (he has even found time to complete all the course work for his Ph.D.) and his congregation in Kenya. If you are interested, write to me (ESA, 6 E. Lancaster Avenue, Wynnewood, PA 19096; rsider@eastern.edu), and I will be glad to put you in direct contact with Rev. Owasi. It would be so easy for a few U.S. congregations to help Rev. Owasi’s congregation realize their dreams.

10/29/05