Michael Cassidy is the Founder of African Enterprise (AE), and has been involved in evangelism, teaching and leadership ministries since 1962, the year he launched AE with a mission to Pietermaritzburg, South Africa. Since then, he has led numerous missions to cities throughout Africa, as well as in other parts of the world, including Australia, Belgium, Costa Rica, Israel, Nicaragua and Panama. To further the accomplishment of AE’s mission – Evangelizing the Cities of Africa through Word and Deed in Partnership with the Church – he has established evangelistic teams in Congo (DRC), Ethiopia, Ghana, Kenya, Malawi, Rwanda, South Africa, Tanzania, Uganda and Zimbabwe and support offices in Australia, Belgium, Canada, Germany, Great Britain, Ireland/Northern Ireland, New Zealand, Switzerland and the United States.
He has also been involved in South Africa in behind-the-scenes facilitation of initiatives which have brought together a wide spectrum of political leadership in dialogue. These efforts have been widely acknowledged as important contributions to the miraculously peaceful South African election in April 1994. In 1996, at the request of President Nelson Mandela, he and other church leaders were deeply involved in spearheading Project Ukuthula, an extensive and successful peace initiative in KwaZulu-Natal in the run-up to the province’s local government elections. Most recently, he has been involved with the Marriage Alliance of South Africa, an interdenominational Christian concern seeking to keep marriage in South Africa heterosexual and monogamous.
Michael has written numerous books, including A Witness For Ever – The Dawning of Democracy in South Africa, which recounts much of the work of some of the backstage players in the run-up to South Africa’s 1994 election, as well as a two-month devotional called Michael Cassidy’s Window on the Word. Some of his other books are: The Politics of Love, The Passing Summer, Chasing the Wind, Bursting the Wineskins, The Relationship Tangle and Where Are You Taking the World Anyway? African Harvest by Anne Coomes tells the story of both Michael Cassidy and of the African Enterprise ministry. He has most recently written Getting to the Heart of Things – Reflections on Christian Basics and What On Earth Are You Thinking for Heaven's Sake?
Michael was born in Johannesburg and grew up in Maseru, Basutholand (now Lesotho). He was educated in South Africa at the Parktown School in Johannesburg and at Michaelhouse School in the KwaZulu-Natal midlands. He holds a Master of Arts in Modern and Medieval Languages from Cambridge University (1958) in England. He earned a Bachelor of Divinity from Fuller Theological Seminary (1963) and received an honorary Doctor of Humane Letters from Azusa Pacific University (1993), both near Los Angeles. In 1983 he was admitted to the Order of Simon of Cyrene, the highest honor accorded a layman by the Anglican Church of Southern Africa. The Rotary Foundation of Rotary International made him a Paul Harris Fellow and he received the St. Michael’s Award from Michaelhouse School in 1997. He and his wife, Carol, live in Pietermaritzburg and have three children and eight grandchildren.
Stephen ended up as a street kid, scavenging food from garbage cans and sleeping under a bridge. As he got older he earned a small amount of money collecting golf balls at a whites-only country club in the racially segregated Rhodesia of that day. Simmering anger at the racial injustices of the country pushed Stephen into violent behavior and an openness to involvement in a Marxist revolution in Rhodesia. Illiterate and unschooled, he became a leader in a gang of teenage thugs in Harare called the Black Shadows. His gang perpetrated acts of small-time rebellion and sought to foment chaos in the hopes of toppling the white government.
Because Christianity was seen by many young blacks as the religion of the white oppressors, Stephen had also become hostile to the church and to God. One evening, on their way to blow up a bank in Harare, Stephen and his cronies came upon an evangelistic tent meeting. Opting instead to blow up the tent meeting, they went inside for a few minutes to listen to the preacher. That was all the time God needed to touch Stephen’s heart. The preacher’s words seemed to pierce down into the depths of his being, both convicting him of his sins and drawing him to Christ. He staggered forward to the stage, grabbed hold of the preacher’s feet and began to sob. That evening, he committed his life to Christ.
In the following years, Stephen was discipled by a number of Christian leaders, including Patrick Johnstone, a British missionary best known as the author of the prayer guide Operation World. He learned to read and speak English. And he became a bold and irrepressible evangelist, working first with the Dorothea Mission, preaching all over southern Africa. In 1982, he joined African Enterprise, becoming Malawi Team Leader in 1986.In his work with AE, Stephen has preached the Gospel all over the continent and around the world. He shares the Good News with virtually everyone he meets, whether passport agents at customs checkpoints or fellow passengers on the London Underground. He lives in Lilongwe, Malawi, with his wife Rachel, with whom he has five children.
Stephen says, “Because I look at myself as a miracle of God’s grace,“ so I believe that the power of Jesus Christ to save sinners still exists. If he can change me, he can change anyone... Winning souls for Christ. It’s my calling. It’s my passion. It’s me.”
"I believe Africa will become the fulcrum of world mission in the twenty-first century," says AE Founder Michael Cassidy.
As such, AE is a global partnership that believes in a bright future for Africa under the Lordship of Jesus Christ. Our aim is to proclaim the Gospel to the residents of the major cities of Africa, making a special effort to reach the leadership of the continent, since godly governance can result in major transformations of whole countries.
Our mission – To Evangelize the Cities of Africa Through Word and Deed in Partnership With the Church – is carried out by Africans themselves, who already understand their local cultures and speak their fellow citizens' languages. We reach out to Africa in four ways:
- Evangelism – preaching the Good News of the Gospel via citywide missions
- Reconciliation – ministering healing to those who have experienced the trauma of war and violence and teaching people who have experienced conflict to reconcile and work together for their common good
- Community Development – teaching the poor practical skills through which they can earn a living and equipping them to run their own business and teach others how to develop economic self-sufficiency
- Leadership Training – equipping pastors and laypeople to think biblically and live out their faith in their place of work and influence.
Leprosy maims and kills thousands of unfortunate people each year. Funding the alleviation and cure of this horrible ailment was the aim of my previous work with the American Leprosy Missions, based in South Carolina.But as awful as leprosy is, an even worse disease afflicts far too many of our brothers and sisters, especially in Africa. I’m speaking of the alienation from Christ that causes too many to consult witch doctors, to engage in behavior that destroys their lives, or to treat their fellow human beings with murderous cruelty or neglect. Sadly, the most tragic victims of this are often women and children.
Thus I feel blessed and privileged to have joined the AE partnership as of March 22 this year. While I have been to Africa before, it is still heartrending to learn of thousands of women in Ghana who feel they have no choice but to seek an income via prostitution. Or of women in Malawi whose husbands have left them to care for children with no assistanc
e. And there are so many more shattering stories out of Africa, illustrating the tragedy that can envelop precious human beings when they don't have a Savior to turn to.Yet the Gospel of Christ which AE presents so powerfully and innovatively is astonishingly effective in bringing hope to those who are hurting. We see this happening every day, across the continent. And it’ll be my joy to bring these stories to you, so that together we can enable women, men and children to be healed of the worst disease of all – suffering a life and an eternity without Christ.
Nancy Watson is a native Californian who has been a trial lawyer and now serves as an Assistant Chief Trial Counsel for the State Bar of California, the agency responsible for attorney licensing and discipline in the state. She is the Church Council President of Grace Lutheran Church in Culver City, where she lives, and also enjoys working on the church’s Christian Service Committee.
David Carpenter is Pastor/Head of Staff at Brentwood Presbyterian Church in Los Angeles. He graduated from Eastern College in Philadelphia and obtained his Master of Divinity at Princeton Theological Seminary. During seminary, he was involved in Young Life and spent a year in South Africa during the time when apartheid laws were being dismantled, working with Archbishop Desmond Tutu, the South African Council of Churches and a host of reconciliation ministries. After marrying, he and his wife Yvette took a 16-month honeymoon to 45 countries, meeting with churches and mission organizations. Dave and Yvette have one daughter and live in Los Angeles, California.
Randy Brewer is the President and CEO of Brewer Direct, Inc., a full-service direct marketing agency and fundraising consultancy. Randy has served as a marketing consultant to non-profit organizations, agencies and advertisers and has been helping non-profit organizations raise money for over 25 years. He is an ordained minister with degrees in Christian Education and Youth Ministry from Azusa Pacific University and has completed studies in theology from Fuller Theological Seminary and business management from the University of Phoenix. Randy lives in Monrovia, California, where he attends Restored Life Fellowship.
Michael Cassidy is the Founder of African Enterprise and Chairman of the Board of Directors of the African Enterprise Leadership Training Center in Pietermaritzburg, South Africa. He was born in Johannesburg, grew up in Lesotho and received a Master in Modern and Medieval Languages from Cambridge University in England and a Bachelor of Divinity from Fuller Theological Seminary in California. Cassidy launched AE in 1962 with the assistance of four seminary friends via an evangelistic mission to Pietermaritzburg. He has since become a significant Christian leader in South Africa and across the African continent, leading hundreds of evangelistic mission and calling Christians together via the South African Congress on Mission and Evangelism in 1972, the Pan African Christian Leadership Assembly in 1976 and 1994, the South African Christian Leadership Assembly in 1979 and 2003, the National Initiative for Reconciliation in 1985 and the National Initiative for the Reformation of South Africa in 2008. Cassidy and his wife Carol have three children and seven grandchildren and live in Pietermaritzburg, South Africa. >>Find out more about Michael Cassidy
Leif Gjestland
Leif Gjestland was born in Swaziland to missionary parents. His African missionary heritage stretches back to the 1850s, when his great-grandparents and then grandparents served the Zulu people under a Norwegian Lutheran mission. A fluent Zulu-speaker, Gjestland graduated from Kearsney College in KwaZulu-Natal and then Natal University in South Africa. He completed an MBA at the University of California, Berkeley, and then started his own software company, which offered products able to capture and tabulate survey data, used in many countries by companies such as Gallup. He and his wife Nan live in Atherton, California, and have three grown children and two grandchildren.
Curtis May
Curtis May is Director of the Office of Reconciliation Ministries for Grace Communion International (formerly the Worldwide Church of God) and a Ministry Development Trainer for church leaders. He is also a former Grace Communion pastor and district superintendent and a current elder and member of the church’s Board of Directors. He and his wife, Jannice, have served in full-time pastoral ministry for 38 years in Baltimore, Maryland; Washington, D.C; Richmond and Norfolk Virginia; and in Los Angeles and Pasadena, California. He received his pastoral credentials through the then Worldwide Church of God through service and studies at Ambassador College, Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary, Regent College and the Biblical Research Institute. He is also certified in Mediation and Facilitation through UCLA and the Western Justice Center Foundation. The Mays have two married children and live in Banning, California.
Sharon Hart Morris May
Sharon Hart Morris May grew up in South Africa and came to the U.S. in 1972 where she earned a degree in psychology from UCLA, followed by a Master’s in Christian Leadership and a Ph.D. in Marriage and Family Therapy from the Fuller Theological Seminary Graduate School of Psychology. She is now a licensed marriage and family therapist and director of the Haven of Safety Relationship Center where she specializes in Emotionally Focused Therapy. She has a heart for working with couples, leaders, pastors, missionaries, as well as training counselors and helping people foster close and secure relationships with their Creator and their loved ones. Sharon and her husband Michael live in Arcadia, California, and have four grown sons.
James Morrison
James Morrison grew up in Chattanooga, Tennessee, and graduated from the University of Tennessee before earning a Bachelor of Divinity from Fuller Theological Seminary and a Master of Theology from Princeton Theological Seminary. He was a chaplain in the U.S. Army before serving as associate pastor at First Presbyterian Church of San Diego, executive pastor at Hollywood Presbyterian Church and senior pastor of Beverly Hills Presbyterian Church. He has made 12 visits to Africa, both as past chairman of the AEUSA Board and in a personal capacity. He and his wife, Sarah, have two children and four grandchildren and live in Pasadena, California.
John Pentecost
John Pentecost was born in Mexico to parents who were involved with student ministries, which stimulated in him a natural interest in working among young people of other countries. He studied cultural anthropology at the University of California, Santa Barbara, leading to a decade of service with World Vision, including two years in Senegal, in West Africa, as part of a large-scale development team. After returning to the U.S., he began work with a real estate firm which provides housing and commercial leasing in the San Gabriel Valley of California. He has been a long-time member of Lake Avenue Church in Pasadena and currently participates in Providence Mission Homes, which provides 43 furnished apartments for overseas missionaries.
John Reynolds
John Reynolds serves as executive vice president of Azusa Pacific University in southern California where he provides leadership for the administration of the university and its strategic initiatives. Originally from South Africa, he has worked in the mining industry and as the global CIO for World Vision International. Reynolds earned his undergraduate and graduate degrees in computer science and information systems in South Africa, and is currently completing a Ph.D. in leadership and organizational effectiveness at Azusa Pacific University, where he also teaches as adjunct professor in leadership, change management, and strategic thinking. Reynolds also serves as President of Doulos International, a non-profit organization providing organizational and management consulting to non-profits and NGO's, and on the boards of Cornerstone Christian College in South Africa and LCC International University in Lithuania. He is married to Carole, is the father of two sons, Dustin and Byron, and lives in San Dimas, California.