The Sunday Mail
Zimbabwe Media Commission chair Godfrey Majonga is a well-known personality and an inspiration for the disabled.
However, little is known about the people who drive him forward. I caught up with his Ugandan-born wife Grace, a God-fearing woman. I said to her: “After the tragedy that befell your husband, you could have deserted him like some spouses do. You are not Zimbabwean, but you decided to stay on here. Where do you draw your strength from? Where does the inspiration come from? What spiritual power do you tap into?” Below is an abridged version of Grace Majonga’s testimony on the goodness of the Lord.
***
This is a long story. When the tragedy that befell Godfrey and the family happened, I can say I wasn’t really a born-again Christian. I was very young, only 31 years old, and been married for seven years. I had two little girls – Caroline my eldest had just started Grade 1 and Fungisai, the little one, had not started school.
This tragedy happened overnight. One day, things are going on well and the next day I woke up to this tragedy.
I don’t know if this was how God called me. I remember that the first thing that I did was to call upon God.
I cried out, “Oh my God, what am I going to do?”
I looked around and to be honest with you, nothing made sense. I just cried to God and before I knew it, people I did not even know started calling saying “we are praying for you”. And I remember one woman in particular. I don’t know if it was an angel because I never got to meet her since she did not want to meet me. She just said she was going to pray for me and that she had been praying for me.
I asked her where she was because I wanted to meet her, and she said “no”.
That’s when I realised that there is a God up there and that’s when I gave my life to God in 1988.
The minute I did that, a friend said, “Grace, I am coming over to pray for you,” and I told her that I just pray that my husband gets well and I am going to be with him, and I want him to survive, even in a wheelchair.
I said that although at the time there was no sign that he was going to pull through. And I was here on my own, no family except my two little children.
I didn’t know where the energy came from but the minute I tapped into this power and accepted Christ as my Saviour, somehow power just kept on coming and I tell you, one day at a time God was giving me this energy.
It wasn’t like it was all there.
I remember teaching my kids a song. All of a sudden we started singing: “Lord do not come to my house, I’m unworthy. Speak . . . ” I think it was our prayer.
Every morning I would sing it with my little girls. We just started praising God. I also taught them another song: “To God be the glory!”
Just praising even though Godfrey was in hospital. I sang with the kids in the car, everywhere. To this day that’s our song.
At my daughter’s wedding she said, “Mummy, we have got to sing that song.”
I will say that God has been very kind to me. He was waiting for me all along, but I guess that we were all too busy with worldly things.
The tragedy was as if to draw my attention and say, “Grace, I am here.”
And I accepted Him.
I remember when I was getting married and saying the vows “in sickness and in health”, but I never really paid attention. I didn’t really understand them and didn’t know that sickness would come.
I woke up one day and we were in sickness and all these worldly things had vanished. We had nothing left and now I know that when you don’t have God you won’t survive. I am glad that I accepted Him as my Saviour because He is walking with me every step of the way.
He is a miracle-working God and when He really comes on board He can do things that you don’t expect.
I didn’t know where my help was going to come from. There I was: my husband in hospital. Mind you, he had just changed jobs and was still on probation and we were not on medical aid.
And to this day I still have a letter which his boss wrote confirming him as a permanent employee, two months before he was supposed to be confirmed. And by confirming him, he was actually putting him on medical aid. This took care of the hospital bills. Because he was now confirmed, his employer said they would continue paying fees for the children. And they said I could also use the company car. It was a miracle.
More miracles happened.
It was miracles throughout when it comes to the children’s education and Godfrey’s rehabilitation to enable him to work. God has multiplied whatever I had in the house and it has always been adequate, just like the miracle of the five loaves of bread and two fish.
Godfrey underwent rehabilitation in Zimbabwe and the UK and I expected him to come back walking, but it was not like that. I asked God and He told me that Godfrey was now walking spiritually. He is whole now, you are whole and the whole family is whole.
With God’s things you just have to pray and start moving. You don’t remain where you are. I feel that God used this tragedy in order for us to realise that He is God and to bring us together and use each other to heal. I have seen God’s goodness.
If you look at me and say “how do you manage”, I will stand there and brag that with God nothing is impossible. He is a glorious God and deserves all the honour and praise.
He has provided me with everything, and the joy that is in my heart, I really can’t explain it and I am not even pretending.
I also tell my friends that as I look after Godfrey, I don’t feel the burden. It can only be God, and I am enjoying my marriage. God showed me things that I didn’t know about, and He said I should just believe in Him.
I have an Anglican background. My husband grew up in the Catholic Church. That’s where we fellowship – Rhodesville Community Church. But I do a lot of interdenominational work because I believe in the church of Christ. That’s what drives me. I do any work in any church if I am required to do so.
You remember the Great Commission? I believe that all of us are ministers of the gospel wherever we are – in our marriages where we should minister to our families, husbands and relatives. We all have a ministry and I think that all women have a ministry. The power of positive thinking and faith has carried us through.
