Prophet Tom Tirivangani was born in Zimbabwe. The grace of God has always been a big factor in his life. Even at a time when Tom did not walk right with God, God walked right with him. The hand of God was upon him. His uncle Peter in the early 1970s when Tom was a young boy used to call him in his local dialect, “Thomas mudzidzi waJesu”, literally translated as Thomas, the disciple of Jesus Christ. Prophet Tom had the marks of the discipleship of Jesus Christ right at the very beginning of his life. Brought up by very strict parents, discipline, love for others and hard work were the virtues Tom’s parents insisted he must develop. The love that Tom’s parents had for others in the community influenced him greatly. The family home was often a place of refuge for many of the poor people in the community. His mother was always giving something; If it is not salt, it was cornmeal, one day it may be clothes, and another day it may be money or work. Prophet Tom Tirivangani remembers vividly from 1976-1979, during the height of the war for independence in Zimbabwe his father’s three-bedroom house in Highfield, Harare housed six families. “How six families were able to share a 3 bedroom house for 3 years is the mystery of what love can do”. He never heard his father or mother complain. We ate together, slept together, and played together. Little did Prophet Tom Tirivangani know then that God had enrolled him in His own college, right in his parents’ home. We as men, have our own colleges but real men of God, ought to enter the University of Jesus Christ, where the Holy Spirit is the perfect schoolmaster; every challenge in life is a test that ought to be taken if one has to qualify as a man of God.
However on the other hand Tom used to struggle with his dark past. Satan knows those whom the Lord has prepared for himself. His agenda is to eliminate them before they know what God wants them to be. At the age of 5 years, little Tom almost died having been struck with measles by Satan. At the age of 16, he survived an attempted murder of his life by one of the messengers of Satan. Tom refused to place charges against the perpetrator insisting on forgiving him. Tom surprised the police officer when he said that this act of evil must be left for God to judge. This has become a pattern of His life, never to hold a grudge. “Whatever people say about me cannot change who I am. I am what God says I am. None of us can ever outgrow our need for forgiveness. I need to forgive as I seriously need to be forgiven. Remember this, of him that hopes to be forgiven, it is required that he forgive. I owe everything to the grace of God”. The grace of God guided him out of his troubles. The grace of God was also upon him at school. Popularly known as “Professor, Bookworm”, Tom was highly respected at Howard Institute for his academic prowess.
This continued even in law school. He was on top of his law class and received the University of Zimbabwe book prize. He attended the University of Warwick for his LLM degree and got a bursary to study for a PhD at the University of Greenwich in the UK. But today all this counts for nothing to him compared to the salvation he received. “That I am saved is the greatest thing, to me the greatest thing has already happened, it is my salvation nothing that I will ever do will surpass that”, However at the height of his career Tom drifted away from the Lord. “I was in a dark pit of sin. I was the chief of all sinners. I saw no way out. I recognized I could not help myself. I needed God. I cried out in my distress to the Lord and he heard me. Miraculously God visited me one night; I had an encounter with my savior. There was no human preacher but God himself. That night the chains were broken and I was free and my life has never been the same again. Grace found me when sin had bound me in a prison. The real victory of faith is to trust God in the dark.
Today I am a servant of God, on God’s part an act of his grace and on my part an act of gratitude to God, “what could I render unto the Lord for he has done[ Psalm 116:12]”. “Called, tried, set apart and chosen by grace and grace alone”, according to Acts 13:2, is how Prophet Tom Tirivangani describes his calling and vocation as a servant of God. Truly this is a vision unlike any other. A man cannot serve God while he is still attached to the world. Literally, the servant of God must deny himself and forsake all to follow Christ. Prophet Tom Tirivangani left a career and business as a lawyer to follow Jesus Christ. It was by no means easy, a decision taken in tears. He still feeds on those tears today. It is true that many follow Jesus into the breaking of bread but few to the drinking of the cup of his passion. Many desire to rejoice with Jesus, but few are willing to endure anything for Him or with Him. Those who truly want to walk with Christ must face a life of loneliness, few friends, persecution, and trials. But for those who endure the reward is eternal life. Prophet Tom Tirivangani has endured name-calling, persecution and hostility in the city of Hamilton, surprisingly from those he prays for most. Asked why he still prays fervently for those who revile and persecute him, his response is this, “A true man of God’s response must never be based on fluctuating emotions but on the word of God. Christ who said pray for your enemies was himself humiliated by His enemies. We must never be controlled by what we hear or what we see. To do so is to fall into the schemes of the devil. Those who know God will never put their trust in man but in Jesus Christ. But it is important to acknowledge that those who know the grace of God will never ignore man, because, by His divine grace, God can turn an enemy into a friend, a prostitute into a woman of God as was the case with Mary Magdalene, a persecutor like Saul of Tarsus into a great and mighty man of God, Apostle Paul. Remember God’s grace can turn yesterday’s enemies into tomorrow’s allies. Prophet Tom says, “Instead of revenge I choose the path of love”. It is therefore clear that no amount of rejection or hostility releases the Christian from his responsibilities to act in a loving fashion. Come to our church and experience the true Love of God!