President's Testimony

Despise not the days of small beginnings . . .

Four community-based health care facilitators were training thirty participants at a conference in Mombasa, Kenya. As one of the facilitators, I began to have a unique and profound experience beginning on the eve of this event. This was no regular group. The participants were church leaders drawn from the Coast Province of Kenya. They did not just discuss health in its physical dimension, but talked also of spiritual well being. They shared in-depth what the word of God commissioned them to do.

By the second day I knew God was speaking to me. I took an afternoon to seek Him in prayer and the Word. It stretched into the evening and night. I began to see how God had been preparing me for this encounter! Indeed, during the Sunday church service on the eve of the conference we sang the worship chorus, "We are standing on holy ground" and tears began to course down my face as I sensed the holy presence of God. He did set me up for the week.

That afternoon, evening and night, as I spoke to God by the shores of the Indian Ocean, I was commissioned yet again. "Establish for My use a Christian Health Organization to be headquartered in Ethiopia. This organization will do what was discussed this week. The nations of the continent of Africa are your mission field. Implement holistic ministry, bringing health to the poor through the local church. Use this as a tool for evangelism. This organization will draw its name from John 10:10 (...that they may have life and have it in abundance). Its purpose will be Psalms 96:3 (Declare the Glory of God among the nations, His marvelous deeds among all people)." That was on April 18, 1993. And that signaled the birth of Life in Abundance (LIA) International.

I first committed my life to ministry when I graduated from high school and entered into a covenant with God that I would serve Him. Soon afterwards, in 1982, I received a specific call to medical missions - to feed, treat and minister deliverance to the needy. Holistic ministry! After graduating from medical school, I pursued a masters program in public health which equipped me further for health projects among and with the poor. Now here by the shores of the Indian Ocean, God was showing me in a more specific way how He was going to use LIA International.

Since that landmark day in 1993, God has faithfully guided this ministry. He has divinely brought together people He had appointed to this vision, even before He called me. After the initial piloting of innovative strategies, LIA Ethiopia was established in June 2000, followed by the LIA International head office also in Ethiopia. At that same time, work started in Sudan, and then in Kenya. We now serve in seven countries in Africa.

We have experienced much favor from God. His hand has been evident beyond doubt. Exactly nine years from when God first spoke, on April 17, 2002, LIA International was incorporated as a 501c3 religious non-profit in California, USA. This serves as the LIA support raising office. He watches over His Word to fulfill it. And He continues to write this story.

Florence Muindi, MD, MPH, Founding President