Nairobi, Kenya: Kenyans woke up to the unexpected return of Jesus Christ on June 11, 1988… and in Nairobi’s Kawangware, no less.
A few years earlier, Prophetess Mary Akatsa, founder of the Jerusalem
Church of Christ had prophesied that the Messiah would drop by her
church.
Unprepared Nairobians in Kawangware wept, sprinted hither and thither
while others fell in supplication. After all Jesus had promised more
than 2000 years earlier that he would “return like a thief.”
And here he was: Tall, barefoot, bearded, dressed in white robes, his
head covered in a turban. Strange, sporadic light shorn on top of his
head, feet and body.
The four feet and six inches frame of the self-proclaimed prophetess
stood next to ‘Jesus’ as the crowd went haywire, shouting “Jesus of
Nazareth!”
‘Jesus Christ’ turned to the more than 6,000 worshippers at Muslim
Village, Kawangware, and said: “I shall come back and bring a bucketful
of blessing for all of you.”
But Mary Sinaida Dorcas Akatsa now denies she brought Jesus Christ to
Nairobi. She says the Indian looking man with long beards had “only
came for prayers.”
“But my enemies used his presence to spread rumours and make me look
bad in the eyes of the public,” says Prophetess Akatsa, who rose to
prominence in the 1980s and 90s through her prayers and healing to the
sick and disabled.
Fake Jesus aside, Akatsa’s Jerusalem Church of Christ is facing
myriad issues. Akatsa’s first husband Franco Akatsa died a few years ago
and her current husband of 12 years, she alleges, has been plotting to
oust her from a church she has led for 27 years, besides having wrangles
over church properties.
Akatsa claims to have received death threats from her estranged husband for which she has recorded a statement with the police.
“My husband ran this church since last year with five other women,
but is now forming his own church as they could not persevere the strict
discipline required here,” explains Akatsa.
Among things banned by her church includes not marrying a fellow Church member and adultery.
Akatsa accuses Mulinge of unfaithfulness, adding, “Together with
others they stole the wheelchairs and walking sticks so that they can
use to display them to people with an intention of winning worshippers
whom they will lie to that they had healed people before.
“But I can assure you that they will fail miserably and be punished by God.”
The Jerusalem Church of Christ also bans tithing and offering which
Akatsa says offended the breakaway group that sees it tithing as a fast
route to wealth.
There are also no crusades and worshippers only attend services that have made many not to understand how she operates.
“I spend Sundays at church and weekdays at my various farms and use
the harvests for catering for church members and the poor,” says Akatsa
who is a no nonsense disciplinarian with her worshipers as Jesus was
with his disciples.
Milinge is yet to respond to the allegations leveled against him.
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