The Sunday Mail
ALL is set for the launch of a foundation, the Charles Chiriseri Foundation to honour the late Apostle Charles Chiriseri who died in an accident along the Harare-Bulawayo highway last year.
The foundation, set to be launched on Friday will be run by a board of professionals as a separate entity from His Presence Ministries International church, which the late Apostle headed together with his wife.
Aimed at building and sustaining grounded marriages through mentoring programmes as well as supporting widows and children, the foundation will be introduced at a pre-launch breakfast meeting.
At this breakfast meeting, the idea behind the formation of the foundation will be explained as well as the unveiling of the logo.
The official launch will then be conducted at the memorial service cum conference next month where Apostle Chiriseri’s friend, Dr Nevers Mumba is expected to attend.
“We will condense our normal four day conference into one day which is Easter Friday. We will commemorate his legacy and officially dedicate the foundation to God,” Pastor Pertunia, the widow said.
Pst Pertunia, said the foundation was born out of the pain of the loss the family, church and nation suffered.
“So as a family we dedicated that we let go and let God which means basically to accept that now I have no husband, my children have no father and my church has no male apostle. And the nation has no father, has no man of integrity who really as a wife I would say is a true man of God.
“It’s something that the spirit of God has given birth to after the pain. I went to Port Elizabeth for rest and recuperation at the invitation of a friend.
“When I went back to my hotel room one of the evenings, that’s when God just literally told me.
“You know how messages get into your phone on your WhatsApp, literally that’s how God spoke to me.
“And the interesting thing is that this friend of mine actually resuscitated my passion in the sense that she kept saying that ‘oh Sis Pertunia, oh you know your marriage with Mukoma Charles taught us so much. So she kept on repeating it.
“I think on the third or fourth day I said maybe let me hear what she is saying. She said, ‘you have to teach others how you did it’. I said but now I am single, I have no husband how do I teach couples?
“And she said something which I thought was profound which really gave birth to the Chiriseri Foundation concept. She said, ‘you are now more qualified to speak on marriage than some of us who are still in marriage but do not know what tomorrow holds. Whereas your marriage started right, you lived your life right and your marriage ended right. So you have a full story to tell.
“That is what wowed me out of the useless pain of the loss I was feeling for my husband and it envisioned me,” she added.
Apostle Chiriseri died at the age of 59 in September last year while Pst Pertunia sustained severe injuries after their vehicle overturned as he avoided hitting two cows on the 388 km peg along the Harare-Bulawayo highway.
The couple were known for their passion to foster strong marriages and inculcate biblical principles in families.
Before he passed on the couple had written a book tackling marriage issues titled, “The 12 Foundations of Marriage.”
Pst Pertunia said the foundation will take care of widows and children of pastors.
“For my experience I suddenly realised there are so many pastors’ wives out there who are just not as privileged as I am and as bold as I am to actually tell the truth as it is that we actually moved from five cars to zero because of the work of God.
“We practically sacrificed our lives, our cars and our time. Right up to the last day of the accident we were working for God.
“I came home after the two months and threw open the gate and I said wow! We have zero cars! It was like a realisation. But you know it was not a wow of regret. It was a wow of realisation.
Pst Pertunia added that The 12 Foundations of Marriage was written out of painful experiences of ignorance she went through with her late husband.
