August Kast And The Mount Tabor Mission Station
Profile by Dr CUTHBERT CHIDOORI
My First General Conference of the Assemblies of God
The Congress on Mission and Evangelism held in Durban
W F P Burton and some Congo Missionaries
Nicholas
Bekinkosi Hepworth Bhengu
– His Youthful Dreams
– His Preaching
- Bhengu and Education
- Bhengu and Money
- Miraculous Experiences
- Spiritual Happenings
- The Sanctifying Spirit of God
– His Departure
Bhengu’s “Isinthunzi”
- Government and Politics
– Some Faults, Virtues and the Burden
of His Heart
President Lucas Mangope of Bophuthatswana
William
Frederick Mullan
The Fairview Assembly
Fred Mullan and the Gifts of the Spirit
A Miracle and a Vision
The Revival in Norwood
James E Mullan
Paul O Lange
William Branham in Durban
Oral Roberts in South Africa
Billy
Graham in Salisbury and Durban
The American Missionaries from Springfield, Missouri
C. Austin Chawner and the Portuguese Work
August Kast and the Mount Tabor Mission Station
Colin
La Foy and the Coloured Leadership
The Work in Zimbabwe
Mauritius and Reunion Island
Special
Answers to Prayer – 1
Special
Answers to Prayer – 2
A Beautiful Square with Good Vibes
Prayer and the Hippie Revival
The Young Turks
Tensions within the Group
The Split
of 1981 – Part One
The Split
of 1981 – Part Two
The Beginnings of the Faith Movement in South Africa
The Statement of September 1989
The Charismatic Renewal
The Start of the Pentecostal Revival World Wide and The Swedish Pentecostal Assemblies
Epilogue
APPENDIX 1 : How to be Filled with the Holy Spirit
APPENDIX 2 : The National Church by Nicholas Bhengu
APPENDIX 3 : Article from the Argus 5/02/1981
APPENDIX 4 : Pointers to the future of the Assemblies of God in the New South Africa (10/06/94)
In the remoteness of the Lesotho mountains 40 miles more or less is not a great distance. The Paris Evangelical Mission at Morija was thus considered to be a near neighbour to the Mount Tabor Mission. Though the Paris Mission has no official connection with the Assemblies of God, it is worth noting that it was started by the 19th century pioneer missionary Alfred Casalis whose daughter led the famed Moshesh to call on the Lord and urged him to receive baptism from her father.
JOHN AND YVONNE STEGMANN
The family Germond has played
a part in the mission for more than a century. Ted Germond grew up there
and served as a doctor in their hospital for 28 years, becoming the medical
superintendent. Mr Germond Snr, Ted’s father, was an educator whose
distinguished wife outlived him by a number of years, passing away in
full possession of all her faculties in her 96th year. One of their two
daughters, Yvonne, contracted polio-myelitis at the age of seven, being
so severely afflicted that she could not walk. She had to learn to walk
again. All her life Yvonne has been condemned to wear steel callipers
and to use a walking stick. In spite of this infirmity, she grew up loving
the outdoors, the African bush, and the game. She learnt the names of
trees and collected the semi-precious stones so abundant in certain regions
of southern and central Africa. Seeing her on overseas tours managing
the rough terrain of ancient ruins and monuments in Israel and Italy
I often thought, “She never feels sorry for herself; she never
expects help from us; she is as agile as a mountain goat; she’s
full of grit.” I believe she even managed to ride a horse. Her
chosen mount bore the unusual name of Bayonet.
I first met Yvonne and John Stegmann in 1956 in the city hall basement
in Durban, where the assembly was then holding meetings. I had grown up
in that assembly, starting in the days when it was called the Glad Tidings
Assembly. From there I had been sent to the Cape where I ministered for
several years. Now I had returned to my old home assembly. This was my
first service on returning. Most of the congregation were strangers to
me, for in the intervening years the assembly had grown. Thus when I saw
this bright looking young couple come in, she wearing slacks and a snazzy
beret and leaning on a stick, I thought they were regular members of the
congregation. But I was wrong. They were looking around for a church to
settle in. In their previous church they had been deeply grieved, for the
minister there had tried to heal her leg by prayer even to the point of
rebuking a demon which he supposed was in her. He pronounced her full of
unbelief and sin when he failed to work a miracle. Such obtuse fanaticism
is hard to credit since Yvonne has a face as expressive as an angel’s,
alive with innocence and feeling for others.
For their part, the young couple thought that I was a long-standing part
of the church they were visiting. So we were all in the same box. We all
were newcomers thinking the others were long-standing members. Happily
the young couple liked the service and joined the church. Subsequently
we became good friends, going on holidays together, sharing many interests
and ultimately becoming close associates in the ministry.
Yvonne Germond was now Yvonne Stegmann. Her husband John
entered the ministry within a few years of that first encounter. He served
in several
congregations
including McChlery Avenue, Harare, the church I had erected by the skills
of the Portuguese builders from Brother Folgado’s assembly. He spent
several years there, packing it to the doors, for he was an excellent preacher,
an intelligent administrator and a popular leader. Through his leadership
and administration a number of new congregations came into being and new
ministers were launched into the work in Zimbabwe. He was one of the first
of our ministers to obtain a degree from UNISA and I asked him to take
charge of the Theological College of South Africa, the correspondence Bible
school which I had started. He was elected onto the General Executive.
When the then General Secretary, Louis Potgieter, died in 1978 John was
appointed General Secretary. He filled the office with distinction until
a few months before he passed away in 1991. Throughout his life he had
suffered with intestinal problems. For three years prior to his death he
suffered increasingly from a debility which the doctors attributed to overwork.
His end came through an obstruction in the bowel which had to be cleared
surgically. Only then was it discovered that he had internal adhesions,
one apparently from birth. Doubtless these had contributed to his ill-health
and death. He simply had become too weak to pull through the operation.
John and Yvonne Stegmann were not merely cultured and amiable people universally
loved. They played a part in the unfolding story of the Assemblies of God
which has to be noted.