The Power of Obedience

When I was in college in Portland, Oregon, I went to a Sunday night service where Celestin Musekura was speaking on the power of forgiveness.

His testimony was incredible. He had been in seminary in Kenya in 1994 when genocide broke out in his home country of Rwanda. He rushed home to be with his family but they had been displaced by the violence and he had to search for them in several refugee camps. In one of the camps, he came across a group of people who were worshiping Jesus. He felt inspired to get up and started preaching about forgiveness and the love of God. Miraculously, while he was preaching, his mother heard his voice and came running forward.

After this, Celestin took the message of forgiveness around the country. It wasn't what people wanted to hear. On several occasions, members of his own tribe threatened and beat him savagely. Once, the police detained him. They suspected he was a subversive agent. After three years of this, five of his family members were murdered in a revenge killing. He says the Lord told him to forgive the killers, so he did. To his surprise, forgiveness benefited him more than it did the killers. It set him free. After that, no one questioned whether his preaching was sincere.

Eventually, Celestin founded an organization called ALARM (African Leadership and Reconciliation Ministries). The question of how genocide could break out in a country that was 90% Christian and considered a missionary success story bothered him. He realized that most people who had been "converted" had never been discipled into a Christian worldview. He began training pastors who could in turn disciple laypeople. He says God told him, “They won’t kill each other if they’re taught that their core identity is Christian,” not Hutu or Tutsi.

More recently, Celestin has been working with public officials--legislators, judges, lawyers, and law enforcement officers--to develop practices of "restorative justice," seeking not just punishment but healing and reconciliation and a better future for the whole community. 

The night I listened to Celestin speak, I wept openly in the pew. He has a strong anointing from God. Everywhere he goes, his story changes the atmosphere and brings hope. There's nothing exceptional about him, though--he's just exceptionally obedient. Jesus told Celestin to love and forgive his enemies, so instead of doing what most of us do--arguing that our case is an exception, making excuses, half-obeying--he obeyed. 

Who knows how many lives have been changed forever because Celestin Musekura obeyed the Lord? Who knows what could happen if we would do the same?