Kassim Kavuma preaching and praying along Mutaasa Kafeero, Luwum street in Kampala, Uganda’s capital.
Every evening at 3pm, Mr Kassim Kavuma, a street evangelist, sets up a table with some Christian books, a speaker and amplifier as he gets set to preach the Gospel in Kampala.
Amid the noisy city packed with taxis, boda bodas, crowded sidewalks and traffic-heavy lanes, Kassimu pulls out his Bible and proclaims the Word along Mutaasa Kafeero, located at Luwum Street.
Unbothered by the scorching afternoon sun, Kavuma reads verses from his battered Bible with the ease of a seasoned preacher. The heat of the day does little to slow the verve with which he declares Scriptures in the local language, luganda.
Drips of sweat roll off his face as he calls on passersby to repent and accept Jesus Christ as their personal Lord and Saviour.
Mr Kassim Kavuma has been proclaiming the Word of God on these streets and other areas in the central business district, including Wandegeya and Kalerwe for seven years now.
In 2014, on his way back home to Nateete, Mr. Kavuma had an encounter which since then has set his life on fire for the Gospel of Jesus Christ.
“I still remember that day vividly. I was going to get a taxi near Nakivubo to head back home, when I heard prayers in Nakivubo. I was then led by the Spirit to go and listen what they were preaching,” Mr Kavuma spoke to Uganda Christian News.
“There was some more clarity and light as the preacher was talking on stage. Everything that was being said it was like they were speaking directly to me. When they called people to get saved, I found myself standing there to get born-again.”
Kavuma who grew up from an Islamic family attending an Islamic madrasa (religious school), where he studied the Qur’an and learned classical Arabic from an imam, was now a born-again Christian.
However, this was not well received back at home.
“I knew what had just happened, I couldn’t go back home. I slept there (Nakivubo stadium) that night during the prayers and the following day I went with other Christians to the prayer mountain in Sseguku,” Mr Kavuma recalled.
Kavuma says it was a catalyst for him to study the differences between Islam and Christianity. None of his other friends had shared Christianity with him.
As he studied Islam, he became frustrated with the “loveless relationships” in it, but Christianity has had answers to his many questions, he said.
“The Bible accounts come from 40 different witnesses,” Kavuma said. “The Qur’an has only one, Muhammad.”
Kavuma says it was all about obeying the laws and impressing his parents during his life time as a Muslim.
A year later lone after getting saved, Kavuma started door-to-door preaching and later shifted to street evangelism.
“From that time I got saved, I experienced great love in me. I was worshipping God in Spirit and truth and I felt that great desire to have other people experience what I was experiencing,” said Mr Kavuma.
Even after being banished from his Muslim family, Kavuma says he has still been a force of transformation in his home by God’s grace.
“Two of my brothers are now also born-again Christians. I believe even other members of my family will also join us.”
Mr Kavuma is always joined by another preacher Paul Mukasa.
Mukasa who is a medical records officer told our reporter “a calling is more than a profession.” Mukasa explained he was called by God while in his first year while a medical student at Paramedic school in 2014 to start street evangelism.
Kavuma is a married man and a former news editor at one local broadcaster. He says he was laid off during Covid-19 hard times. He now works as an electrical technician who does on contract basis and if he has no job, he is proclaiming the Word on streets in the central business district.
