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This
page will feature true stories that underscore the
reality of spiritual warfare in the world today.
Come back every month to read the featured story
of the month.
The story for this month is as told by George Otis
Jr. in his book “The Twilight”
In the early 1980’s, before Uganda’s
war-weary citizens had an opportunity to recover
from the nightmare of Idi Amin Dada, the nation
was once again plumed into chaos. This time the
conflict was between the Ugandan Army, lead by Milton
Obote (Amin’s successor), and the National
Resistance Army, lead by Lieutenant General Yoweri
Musevani, who in January 1986 became president of
Uganda. During these civil wars an estimated one
million people were killed.
For more that five years, poorly trained soldiers
became a law unto themselves. Raping and killing
as they pleased, they received hardly a reprimand
from their military masters. Eventually the emboldened
soldiers began to assault Christians openly in the
streets of Kampala.
The activity in one district, a burned out ghost
town nicknamed the “Beirut of Kampala,”
was particularly vicious. A one-time shooting gallery
for the military, the remaining husks of the community
had fallen under the control of a small band of
mentally unstable thieves and killers. The local
kingpin was a notorious witch by the name of Musoke.
Normally this ransacked neighborhood would hardly
be considered a promising location for church-planting,
but Ugandan evangelist Robert Kayanja rarely thinks
in normal terms. At the tender age of 22, this young
firebrand followed the call to God into an urban
zone that had been forsaken by all but the devil
and his allies.
“When the holy spirit drew me into this area
in 1983,” Robert explained in a recent interview,
“I was alone. Then Charles Lsubuga, who is
now my associate pastor, joined me. Eventually we
became four, and then five. Everyday we covered
the entire area with prayer, petitioning the Holy
Spirit for a spiritual breakthrough.”
Results came grudgingly. Musoke, who wanted nothing
to do with God, became incensed when he learned
that these Christian intruders were not only praying
for his customers but burning the witchcraft charms
he had given them. Barging into one of Roberts evening
meetings, held in an abandoned house, he screamed,
“You are not supposed to be here! This territory
belongs to me. If you don’t leave, I’ll
send my armies to evict you. Then you will die!”
“When the people on the neighborhood heard
these threats,” Robert remembers, “they
warned us to get out. Musoke’s power was very
real and they knew it. Everyone consulted us not
to get into a confrontation.”
A few days later, Robert and his fellow parishioners
encountered the first of Musoke’s “armies.”
Approaching the house for a late afternoon service,
they found every door and window covered by a massive
swarm of bees.
“There were thousands of them,” Robert
recalls. “It was like a bee factory. We couldn’t
get in. everybody in the neighborhood said it was
Musoke’s doing. And once again advised us
just to collect our property and get out. The problem
was, God was the one who had called us here, and
we did not feel comfortable leaving on the basis
of fear of threats. Our only alternative, however,
was to cry out to God-and this is precisely what
we did. It took about eight hours but the bees finally
moved away from the house.”
The battle was just heating up. The very next morning
the church property was enveloped by the pungent
odor of burning meat.
“The smell was so strong,” Robert recalls,
“it gagged you. There was no getting away
from it. Many of the local people told us it was
a demon. We did not doubt it, because we could see
Musoke starring at us about 25 yards away. “The
next assault came on a Sunday morning-I think it
was November 11 [1983]. A swarm of flies just came
from nowhere. It was what you might expect if one
hundred dead bodies had been rotting for a week.
The flies were everywhere. You had to cover your
nose and mouth so they didn’t get in. for
the third time, the people said to us ‘You
better get out of here. This man is going to kill
you.’
“In fact, it was this very Sunday that Musoke
came in to deliver an ultimatum. He said, ‘I
will give you three days. If you have not left by
then, my snakes will come and you will die.’
About twenty of us were in the midst of a worship
time when he walked in to pronounce this death threat.
“People were very frightened. They had never
seen anything like this before. My associate, Charles
Lsubuga, said ‘This is too much.’
Shortly after this, Charles was struck with a partial
paralysis. It was so severe that he was unable to
walk without the aid of two sticks. Since there
was no accompanying fever, and the condition descended
on him suddenly, we naturally suspected Musoke’s
witchcraft.
“To make matters worse, Obote’s soldiers
came looking for me. As I was not at the house on
this particular night, they began to hit Charles
in the back. This only compounded on his physical
problems. Before they left, the soldiers looted
everything-our cups, saucepans, utensils. This caused
many of the people who had been coming to fellowship
to run away.
“To combat the spiritual forces that were
coming against us, we established a ‘Wailing
Wall’ outside the church. We circled our property
and prayed every evening for about six hours. When
the soldiers came again, they found us praying.
Herding us all behind the house, they placed guns
to our heads and asked ‘Where is Robert Kayanja?’
When I stepped forward and said, ‘I am the
one,’ the soldiers responded, ‘No, you
are just a schoolboy.’ God had confused their
minds, you see.
“The next day we took Charles to Mulago National
Hospital because he couldn’t walk and was
in terrible pain. He stayed there for six months.
After performing a series of tests, however, the
doctors could not understand the nature of his illness.
Even so, they predicted that Charles would never
walk again. It was very discouraging.
“When my father and mother heard about Charles
and the raid on our church, they joined the chorus
of voices urging me to leave. ‘God wants you
to save these people,’ they said, ‘but
he doesn’t want you to die in the process.
It’s too dangerous.’ While I understood
their concern, it was as if the Holy Spirit had
glued me to this deadly place that the devil called
his territory.
“At this point there were only four of us
left in the house. Charles was in the hospital and
my other associate, Godfrey, had gone to pastor
a church about two hundred miles away. Still, we
continued our campaign to bind the powers of darkness.
One Rwandan lady came faithfully everyday for nine
months. She couldn’t understand our language
but she wanted to pray. When the Holy Spirit came
on her, tears just rolled down her cheeks.
“A month later, Musoke gave me a second ultimatum.
This time I was given seven days to live. Almost
immediately my body started to produce a heat that
was incomprehensible. It was like my blood began
to boil. The church members kept me alive by soaking
a towel in a basin of water and laying it on top
of me. But my temperature was so high that the towel
would completely dry in five minutes. As with Charles
before me, the doctors were baffled. They could
not find any disease in my blood.
“At that time an old neighbor lady came to
see me. She was an alcohol vendor and we used to
borrow her cups to drink tea. The purpose of her
visit was to tell me Musoke had dispatched his strongest
demon against me-a mayembe. She added that this
demon comes like an ill wind, and that if I did
not have God on my side, I would have already died.
“Other people were convinced I was going to
die within 24 hours. Even I was praying earnestly
because I could no longer eat or drink. It was a
real battle.
“A little while later I began to see snakes
coming up through the concrete floor. As they entered
the room, some were transformed into recognizable
creatures-lions and leopards, for example-while
other became monstrous and horrifying entities.
One creature had multiple eyes encircling its head.
Whenever it opened its mouth, something resembling
miniature transport aircraft emerged. It was quite
amazing. Other entities had skeletal feature, fish-like
scales or twisted, scarred faces.
“The behavior of these demonic creatures varied.
One group of evil-looking skeletons danced and screamed
at me, while various animal apparitions sat boldly
on the edge of my bed. Other entities moved constantly
about the room. While some suggested this may all
have been delirium brought on by my high fever,
this explanation fails to account for the fact that
others in the house also saw there creatures, often
reacting to them with loud exclamations. No, these
manifestations were all too real. The fear was so
strong you could touch it.
“In the midst of this struggle, which lasted
for two days, I was taken up to heaven in a dream.
There I was handed a sword, which I used to fight
the demons that were assaulting my mind, body and
spirit.
“At one point the battle became so intense
that the people around me thought I was losing my
mind. A few minutes later, however, I suddenly regained
full health and consciousness. At this very moment-it
was one o’clock on a Sunday afternoon-the
few remaining shopkeepers in the Kabusu trading
center heard a loud noise. When they came running
outside to investigate, they found Musoke lying
dead in the intersection of Kabusu and Masaka roads.
Although his head was still connected to his torso,
his face and body were split down the middle-just
as if he had been struck by a thundering sword.”
“Two weeks after Musoke’s death in mid-December,
Charles was discharged from Mulago Hospital with
a clean bill of health. Throughout the neighborhood,
and especially in the bars where Musoke had gone
to drink, people were stunned that the master’s
witchcraft had been defeated so completely.
“After this blockage was removed,” Robert
recalls. “People began flocking to the church.
It was like the heavens just opened. The living
room filled quickly, and then the second room. Soon
we were forced outside, and eventually into a temporary
shelter. Within three months of Musoke’s death,
our fellowship had grown to about a thousand people.
“By the mid-1900’s, the Miracle Center,
our main church, was hosting about seven thousand
people on Sunday morning. And the numbers continue
to grow. Two hundred and thirty-six branch fellowships
were planted in this same period, and at least six
dead people have been raised to life.”
SEPTEMBER 2005 FEATURED STORY
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