President/Founder of Jesus Alive Ministries, which is in 21 African nations with over 11 million salvations
Their Christian Discipleship Program (CDP) is 50 hours of DVD biblical teaching translated and dubbed into over 50 African languages |
Guest Bio
Proclaiming the Living God in Africa
CBN.com
–NEW LEASE ON LIFE
Gambling, Grand Prix racing, and good times rolling capriciously bankrolled by his successful tobacco farming and other business ventures once dominated Peter Pretorious' life. But his perspective changed when his father suffered two serious heart attacks in one hour in 1979. While breathing machines kept his father alive in intensive care, Peter realized the limitations of medical science and remembered a healing he had seen at an Oral Roberts meeting 17 years earlier.
When Peter phoned a local pastor for help, the pastor came to the hospital and prayed for Peter's father who was miraculously healed. A few weeks later the same pastor shared the Gospel with Peter and his wife. The couple both accepted Christ. Three weeks after committing his life to Jesus, Peter started a church on his tobacco farm for his laborers.
JESUS ALIVE MINISTRIES
Peter founded Jesus Alive Ministries in 1982 to spread the Gospel throughout Southern Africa and the rest of the world. Over the years, more than 11million people have accepted Jesus. Peter says he continues to anticipate the great evangelistic move of God throughout the world.
Six years ago, Jesus Alive Ministries conducted two years of research to determine the numbers of people that were not being reached with the Gospel in Africa. They learned that 57% of people live in rural villages. The researchers found if residents of those rural villages live within 20 km of a city, a reasonable amount of ministry work was being done, and many of those people had heard the gospel. However, if they lived further than 20 km from a city, almost no people had heard the gospel. As a result, Jesus Alive ministries changed their ministry strategy and began sending teams to work in the villages. Peter says since then, ministry has been quite impactful. Whereas Jesus Alive used to have outreach meetings that drew 60 or 70 thousand people, their work in villages with a population of only 5,000 proved more impactful than their city work. Sixty percent of people that made decisions for Christ through their work in the villages completed Jesus Alive's discipleship program.
Along with working with people in rural areas, local pastors in these areas were trained by Jesus Alive staff to become effective in their villages. The training is given in 56 African languages. In 2006 Jesus Alive trained three indigenous evangelists and supplied them with necessary equipment, as well as support staff. Under the oversight of Jesus Alive, these teams were sent into their own native countries of Kenya and Tanzania initially and the Democratic Republic of the Congo later on, to begin evangelizing the rural villages.
In each village Jesus Alive prepares and trains church leaders, holds a week of powerful, daily village and school outreach meetings and establishes a discipleship center. Since 2006 Jesus Alive has recorded more than 2.1 million decisions for Christ through rural evangelism.
Over the years, Peter has seen God perform several miracles through the ministry. For instance, in Mozambique, a woman was totally paralyzed for 18 years. Peter says, "She stood up for a few moments, the power of God hit her and she just took off running. Twelve people were totally healed that day." Peter said he has also seen an 8-year-old boy who was born blind and without eyes, with no cornea or pupil, receive new perfect eyes in Swaziland.
Peter said, "A lady from the United Kingdom visited us some years ago and she was writing a book about revival in Africa. She wanted to know about miracles that had happened. I told her she could sit with our team and go through the testimonies on record. She came to me after a few days and asked me if I had any idea how many totally blind people had received their sight at the crusades to which I answered I had no idea. She said that they had counted a 152 from the testimonies."
JAM INTERNATIONAL
Peter also founded JAM International. This ministry fights against hunger and malnutrition in Africa. The ministry provides nutritious meals to more than one million children through their Nutritional Feeding Program at schools. JAM has also implemented water sanitation and agriculture development programs. Peter said, "The Gospel is not just by preaching, it's by demonstration of the love of God. We've got involved in the social side as well."
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