Erlo bars

Erlo Stegen (born March 1, 1935 near Durban ) is a missionary of German descent with South African citizenship. He is the founder and leader of the global evangelical mission community Kwasizabantu and the spiritual leader of this free church .

Life

Erlo Stegen's ancestors were sent to Africa as missionaries by the Hermannsburg Mission in the middle of the 19th century . As their descendant, he has a strictly Lutheran background. Born on the Paardefontein family farm near Durban, he was a traveling evangelist from the 1950s to 1970 before founding the Kwasizabantu missionary station. First, the Stegen family proselytized among the Zulu in what was then Natal , today KwaZulu-Natal . The name KwaSizabantu means "place of help for people" and existed as a field name even before the mission. He was picked up by the Stegen family.

Starting in 1980, Erlo Stegen founded independent churches in Europe based on the mission, with a focus on supporters in Germany and Switzerland. Today (2006) Stegen heads the South African mission and his older brother Friedel Stegen heads the congregations in Europe ( Mission Kwasizabantu Germany ).

Until his death, Stegen worked closely with the theologian and missionary Kurt E. Koch , who strongly supported Kwasizabantu in Germany.

In 2013 the “North-Western University Zambia” awarded him the Chancellor Medal for his humanitarian work in poor rural communities.

Publications

• with Ingetrud Birkenstock: Breaking Iron Doors: Awakening among the Zulus with Erlo Stegen , Schulte and Gerth, Wetzlar 1979, 7th edition 1982, ISBN 978-3-87739-506-6 .

literature

• Joachim Rosenthal: Kwasizabantu. Erlo Stegen and the awakening among the Zulus , CLV, Bielefeld 2000, ISBN 978-3-89397-456-6 .

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Chancellor's Award for Rev. Erlos Stegen , ksb.org.za, article from May 23, 2013.
2. ↑ NWU awards Chancellor's Medals ( Memento from May 18, 2015 in the Internet Archive )