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Meet Rapula and Kedi – church leaders in Gaborone, Botswana
Vida Li Sik • Mar 04, 2021
Rapula Malejane has been in the full-time ministry since 2016, while his wife Kedibonye (Kedi) works for HOPEww while overseeing the women’s ministry in the church in Gaborone, Botswana. It is a challenge to ensure all the members of the church are taken care of during the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic and to maintain fellowship amidst the restrictions in place. The country’s vaccination programme will only kick off at the end of March.
How and when did you become part of the church?
Rapula:
I was living on campus at the University of Botswana in 1996 and longed to find God and a church that truly obeys Him. I used to visit a church where there had been physical fights, and I felt they were not serious about obeying God. One weekend, I went shopping at a mall in Gaborone, where a member of the Botswana International Church of Christ invited me to a midweek service close to there. But I didn’t go because it was outside campus. Weeks later, I accompanied a relative to a store in town, and went to the music section while I waited. Just then, another brother invited me to a Bible talk on campus. I found that convenient enough, so I went. I started studying the Bible shortly afterwards and was baptised in June 1996.
Kedi:
My sister Miracle became a disciple while studying in London. She reached out to me by doing a crash Bible study in 1992 when she returned to Botswana for my brother’s funeral. A few months later, when I had just started studying at the University of Botswana, she and the late Joshua Diane took me through the conversion Bible studies. When I compared what I learnt to my lifestyle, I was very ashamed, even though I had thought all along that I was living out a Christian life. Every Bible study brought a new challenge, it was as if I was reading the Bible for the first time. They baptised me in April 1993.
What Bible verse convicted you the most during your Bible studies?
Rapula:
There wasn’t any specific Bible verse. Rather, one thing that convicted me was the way the members of the church lived out what they were learning from the Bible. My favourite Bible verse for years now has been John 12:24 “Very truly I tell you, unless a kernel of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains only a single seed. But if it dies, it produces many seeds.”
Kedi:
There wasn’t a particular scripture, but it was the Light & Darkness study. It was sobering to realise that I’d been lying to myself, thinking I was on the right path.
If you could ask a question from any character in the Bible, who would that be and what would be your question?
Rapula:
One of my favourite people is Joshua, son of Nun. I would ask him to describe the journey under the leadership of Moses. Then I’d ask him to describe the leadership transition from Moses to him and beyond that.
Kedi:
David. I would ask how he kept it real with God, and why he thinks God considered him a man after His own heart.
What three words would you use to describe the church in Gaborone?
Rapula:
Searching for truth.
Kedi:
Resilient. Passionate. Family.
What is your favourite family activity?
Rapula:
Traveling together.
Kedi:
Traveling to unknown places or just being on vacation, collecting memories together.
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