Leading with exemplary diligence
52-year-old Medikolo Sulumbu has been a member of Lipiri Pastors Fraternal since 2017. Sulumbu is a pastor for Last Church in Malawi.
As a pastor, Sulumbu believed that his congregants had the responsibility to provide anything for him and his family.
As such, he became dejected every time the church made fewer contributions. He felt that the church did not need him any longer.
“As a pastor, my mind believed that the church had to take care of my family c since I am an ordained pastor of the church, so I expected considerable amounts of offerings every Sundays and I did not like anything less, ”he explains.
Sulumbu’s mentality only exacerbated poverty at his house. His 46 year-old wife, Nelia Yembekezani says as a couple they even failed to buy notebooks for their children to be in school.
“Because of our over-dependence on church support, we failed to take care of our children. In most cases we struggled to feed and clothe the children, and we could not have savings as a couple,” explains Nelia, the mother of six.
However, when World Vision in Lipiri started capacitating pastors as partners in promoting the child well-being aspirations as touted by the organization, the Lipiri Pastors Fraternal had an opportunity to attend a couple of trainings.
Sulumbu has attended Child Protection, celebrating Families as well as the Biblical Empowered World View (BEWV) training.
It is the BEWV training that has transformed Sulumbu’s home. Today Sulumbu has 25 local breeds of chickens and 10 pigs. He is now a committed a tomato farmer, a commitment he made after the BEWV training he attended in 2022.
The couple now makes an average of MK 3000 ($1.7) a day from tomato sales. Sulumbu and his wife are committed to roofing their house with iron sheet as it is currently thatched. They also look forward to sending their lovely daughter, eight-year-old grade three Agnes to university.
“The BEWV training by World Vision was an eye opener that as pastors we do not have to be poor so that we lead our subjects by example. So the mind-set change training has really changed us. It challenged me to start thinking of ways to make money, and here I am,” brags Sulumbu.
“I produce enough tomato from my home garden where I have made about MK 380,000 ($ 224) through tomato sales, bought two pigs and I now have 10 as well as 25 chickens. I envisage maximizing this venture so that I have may be 40 pigs and 70 chickens by 2025,” he says.
Sulumbu’s wife, Nelia, is grateful to World Vision for opening the family’s economic avenues. She is also a member of a Savings for Transformation group in her village to supplement her husband’s income.
So far her savings exceed MK 100,000 ($59) as she also does a goat meat business where she makes a considerable profit.
“With World Vision, we now lead our subjects by example in meeting family needs. Currently, we also preach about prosperity to our subjects so that they emulate and improve their families and support the children with good education.”
Agnes, the eight-year-old fifth born is committed in school as she gets most of the support. She wants to be a nurse.
“I am so happy that my parents are now able to support me. These days we don’t struggle as before as my parents often have savings and they can provide me with most of the support to be in school,” she says.