Testimony
of
Lawrence Tsimese

God Has a Plan for Me

‘For the LORD is good; his mercy is everlasting; and his truth endureth to all generations’.

So saith the psalmist (Ps 100:5). Indeed because of His mercies we are not consumed. I was not consumed in the days of my ignorance but He had mercy and drew me to Himself. This is a rather short testimony of how the Lord found me. Read on…

My name is Lawrence Kojo Tsimese. I was named directly after my father’ so most of my schooling days I had signed junior as part of my name. I had a rough transition from childhood into adolescent life. My late parents were all Roman Catholics so from childhood I was brought up as a catholic. I had a strong desire to know more of my religion so I took all my catechism classes very seriously at both levels of first communion and confirmation sacraments. Everybody close to me thought I would one day become a catholic priest because of my dedication to the teachings of the church. Nevertheless there was a vacuum in me that wasn’t filled and made me feel very empty. I thought the answer was to become much more deeply involved in the doctrines and teachings of the church in order to gain more understanding in spirituality.  Therefore, when I left home to an all boys catholic secondary school, I enrolled in various church groups on campus just to find answers to the growing emptiness I felt within. I was with groups like the ‘Legion of Mary’, ‘Sacred Heart of Jesus’ and the ‘Altar Boys’. I was excited, I knew that I was going to have a greater understanding of spirituality and have greater power. But all the prayer rituals and proclamations did not help. I was like any ordinary person on campus. I participated in most of the ‘sins’ on campus.

I began to question my faith when during my third year in secondary school my mother became ill and died. The nature of her sickness defied all known medical treatments. We knew there was something spiritual about it because someone had cast a spell of sickness on her and had even openly boasted about it. If only I knew what I know today it would have been a different story. All that the catholic Reverend father could do for her was to give her holy water to sprinkle in her bedroom and recite the full rosary (all 15 mysteries). She did all these faithfully because she wanted to be well to take care of her children who were still young. I was the eldest of her 5 children (my father had other five children) and was only 15 years old. The church that I leaned onto could not fight a small witch’s spell and my dear mother died just like that.  Four years after the death of my mum, I suffered yet another major disaster in my life during my second year in agricultural college when my father also joined his ancestors. He was diagnosed with esophagus cancer (the cancerous growth was deep down his throat) and there was little the doctors could do for him. I was now an orphan. My paternal family was not sympathetic towards my siblings and me. They were much more interested in his property than in our wellbeing. Something had to happen otherwise I was going to lose faith in God. I felt disappointed in life.

One Sunday morning, whilst still in college, I prayed to God in my own words and asked him to be my helper and guide for the future. I had no one to look up to whilst my brothers and sisters were looking up to me.

There was a group on campus known as the Scripture Union. They met every Sunday evening at the college’s cafeteria for fellowship meetings. Until that faithful Sunday evening I had refused all invitations to attend their meetings because to me they were anti-catholic and therefore I did not want to have anything to do with them. But behold the appointed day for the Lord had come and that Sunday evening I found myself at the meeting. What a powerful experience that was. For the first time in my life I felt the convicting power of the word of God preached. It was like a hammer that knocked out all the religious pride in me and I yielded my life to Jesus Christ. It was such a beautiful experience that I have never had before. My old self gave way to a new man in Christ. I had a sudden strong desire to read the word of God and to pray and praise God. That emptiness I used to feel no longer existed. I have become a new creation and began to have new friends of the same calling. Other friends shunned my company because I had become part of the scripture union group. I didn’t care, because I did not want to give up my new found freedom. If the Son therefore shall make you free, ye shall be free indeed (John 8:36).

After college, I went home and continued attending church at the local Catholic Church where my father was a member. It was always a dry experience whenever I went to church. It was therefore a relief when I learnt that a very small unpopular group called the charismatic renewal met in the chaplet every Wednesday evening for bible study and prayer. I joined them at once. There I started growing spiritually. They took me through the Life and Growth in the Spirit Seminars and put me in leadership position. Then the group experienced a spiritual growth explosion as well as a phenomenal numerical increase from only 7 members when I joined to well over one hundred within nine months. The church authorities were alarmed and came up with all kinds of measures and standards to gain doctrinal control and stifle the Spirit. It was not possible. Who can control the Holy Spirit when He is working in the lives of men to bring them to the saving knowledge of God? They were mistaken. God was at work liberating His people. They had no option but to throw us out saying that we were anti-catholic in our way of doing things. We were not bothered; we even rejoiced that on account of His name we were thrown out. More than 90 percent of us found bible believing churches and joined and are still serving in the vineyard of the Lord today.

The Lord had not finished with me yet He opened the door for me to come to the US for an educational program in June 2002. Then in 2003 I came into contact with Steve Atherton of The Fishermen Ministry. During the period of acquaintance we saw how the Lord had orchestrated our coming together. Steve had prayed for God to send someone to the institute where I had studied to preach the word and crush the principalities that controlled it. Without knowing what I was into, every action, thought and word of prayer on the premises of that Institute indeed crushed the Institute’s controlling forces and today it is no more. I enrolled to go through discipleship under The Fishermen Ministry and ever since then the Lord had been dealing with me in a different dimension. Last July, I visited the Grace Ranch and met with Ricky Davis Eutsler. The experience was fascinating. God’s plan for my life at this stage is about to be unveiled. The nations are now before me to go in His power to minister His word to all whom He will bring my way.

Blessed be God forever.