Calisto Odede
Rev. Calisto Odede is Senior Pastor of Nairobi Pentecostal Church and holds a special place in his heart for Ignite, as it was at Urbana 87 that he joined the staff of the Fellowship of Christian Unions (FOCUS), the Christian students’ movement in Kenya. His task was to understand the planning and organization of Urbana conferences and then reproduce a similar one in Kenya. He was the first director of the triennial Student’s Missions Conference in Kenya, COMMISSION, which he led three consecutive times. The convention now brings together students from more than 16 African countries. Having birthed it in Kenya, his vision was to see something similar in South Africa. He played a key part in inspiring us to Ignite 2013!
Calisto continued to serve students with the International Fellowship of Evangelicals Students (IFES) in the English- and Portuguese-speaking Region of Africa. He has given Bible expositions at numerous conferences, including the third Lausanne Congress, Cape Town 2010.
Calisto and his wife Elizabeth are blessed with three sons.
Nigel Branken
Nigel and Trish Branken live together with their 6 children in the inner-city suburb, Hillbrow, in Johannesburg, South Africa. As they stand in solidarity with those facing extreme poverty, Nigel says, “What we focus on is primarily becoming friends to our neighbours and then trying to become good neighbours to our friends. We believe as Christians that God is extremely concerned with the brokenness in our city and nation and that He has called each one of us to get involved in making a difference. To bring change, we need to see the future, prepare for the future and then become the future… or in the words of Ghandi “we must become the change we want to see in the world”. We want to see a world in which the rich do not tolerate extreme poverty and inequality. We want to see many people actually laying down their lives of comfort and convenience for the sake of bettering the lives of others. Seeing people freed from poverty, inequality, racism and exploitation is more important than fulfilling our lust for more things! We want to be part of a society in which people are valued more than things. We want to see the god of consumerism in South Africa bowing it’s knee to a love motivated revolution which results in freedom from oppression and exploitation. We want to see this for all people, regardless of class, citizenship, race or religion. We dream of equality in every sector of society. We believe that if the education system is not OK for a rich kid, it is not OK for a poor kid. The same goes with healthcare, housing, security. The same goes for rural kids and inner city kids. The same for black kids and white kids. We are not more valuable than the least valued in our society. We are doing our lives in a new way. We are going to live our dream and see this reality briefly described above happening around us. We hope others will join us and this will happen around them too. Who knows, very soon, the world can be a different place!”
Website:
www.transforming.org.za
Facebook profile is:
www.facebook.com/nigel.branken
Twitter handle:
@Nigel_Branken