Rev. Humphrey M. Kanga started and leads a multimillion social enterprise that provides support to the poor, the sick and the abused children in the community. Travelling extensively throughout the world, he calls for mitigation of these needs by provision of basic needs and supporting education for the less fortunate.
For close to two decades, the organization has greatly helped improve the lives of hundreds of orphaned and poor children in Kenya, giving them shelter, food, clothing, and supporting their education.
Who is Rev. Humphrey M. Kanga?
Humphrey was born and raised in Tharaka Nithi County in a city called Chuka-Kenya. I am the founder and the first CEO of a Christian organization called Kenya Connection Ministries International. In other words, also known as Kenya Connection Kids. This Christian social enterprise has a mission of nurturing and empowering the orphaned and destitute children.
Currently, the organization has built four children’s homes, a technical institute and sponsoring hundreds of children and
youth in primary school, high school, colleges and universities in Kenya. The parachurch organization has built a multi-million Kenyan shillings campus that houses the children’s homes,
the technical institute and offices.
What's Your Journey Been Like?
In the last three years the organization has established a micro loaning program to empower the poorest of the poor in the society through entrepreneurship and giving of loans. This is meant to restore the dignity as human beings so that they can reflect the image and likeness of God in their lives like the rest in society.
This Christian ministry works with professionals and currently we have a staff of 21 workers who are distributed in our various departments. Either as social workers, mothers or caregivers to the children, administrative staff and microloan officers.
I have interest in real estate business. I have also authored two books, the first one entitled The Journey Against All Odds and the second one Rebranding to Win.
Part of my hobbies include travelling. To date I have travelled in over 25 countries and states of the world. I derive a lot of joy visiting new places, meeting new people, experiencing new things, whether challenges or opportunities.
I am a preacher of the word of God, a mentor and a conference speaker.
I am also a philanthropist and I derive a lot of satisfaction in meeting the needs of those in need especially the orphaned and the destitute in the society when I can. That is part of our organizational culture.
I grew up in bigamous family comprising of fifteen children, (brothers and sister), two mothers and a father. In such a large home the resources were meager especially the basic needs of life. The lack of these basic needs weighed very heavily in my heart. At times I felt stressed, discouraged. I grew with lots of questions in my heart. Why others have plenty and others very
little resources.
In class six at an age of thirteen I gave my life to Christ. This happened after I observed the changed life of my brother who upon joining form one got born again. He shared with us as a family how a preacher came to their school, preached the word of God that led him to the realization that he was a sinner and he needed to repent. I was attracted by the joy he had, the confidence in which he shared with us his testimony and the excitement. He seemed so sure about his relationship with Christ. That change provoked me to think deeply about my relationship with God. He invited his fellow teenage boys who had committed their lives to Christ one afternoon to our church where they preached in a youth gathering and I was the first one to answer the altar call of salvation. I felt I needed to Know their Jesus who had given them such joy, hope and confidence.
I became very aggressive in knowing Christ whereby I bought a new testament bible at six Kenyan shillings. That small bible became my companion, I carried it in my school bag, whenever I went visiting other boys in the village and when I went out to graze cattle. That small bible was my companion. I read it until it got worn out. Thank God as it got worn out my faith and life were getting renewed.
In primary school and high school I was a Christian leader, read the bible and conducted prayers in the assembly. In high school, I joined the CU where I became a treasurer all my high school life. It was in college that I became the Christian Union Chairman. I can say with confidence that my turning point in life was that afternoon when I committed my life to Christ through the ministry of young teenage boys..
You do not have to be an English major to write a book. Writing takes a resolve that once I start, I will finish. The most important thing is jotting down your ideas. With the help of English major teachers and editors they can help you fix the grammar. The truth is, the ideas you have nobody else has and that what a story is. I can say without blinking that everybody has a story to tell.
The book Rebranding to Win is a collection of my experiences, thoughts and ideas that I have across through my personal and corporate leadership. It is so amazing that when you hold a pen and focus on writing, once you scribble the first sentence, the second sentence comes, the third, then a paragraph, a page and on and on.
It has taken me three years to write this book. My first book took me five years so at least there is progress. It might mean that the next book will take a shorter time. I had crossed to a year of communication back and forth from my editors. The communication were in form of virtual meetings, emails, texts, calls or physically meeting to discuss what was needed in the book. At times they marked red some paragraphs which sometimes meant that I had to discard it or write afresh. Any way it was so fun.
Tell us a bit more about your other book
It took me five years to write and publish my other book titled The Journey Against All Odds. What provoked me to write this book was my absence from family for five years. The book covers my experiences in the United States that time. I left the country by faith in pursuit of education and empowerment for ministry. I had a visa that would not allow me to come back incase I left the States. That is why I ended up staying there so that I could finish my mission.
By God’s divine intervention, I realized the purpose that had led me to the States. While I was there, I felt a call to do ministry among the destitute and orphaned children, the sick and the lowly in society. I returned in 2006 and close to fifteen years that is what I have been doing with my life. We have established four children’s homes, touched lives of thousands of children, and we have sponsored over 250 children and youth in primary schools, high schools, colleges and universities in Kenya producing teachers, engineers, technicians who are now living as comfortably as other normal Kenyans. All these were from a pack of kids who were either orphaned or destitute. The book is about that journey, from 2001 to date and about how God lined up people to that cause in Kenya, America, Britain, Australia for that mission.
As I write this, that book is selling in the states and yesterday I was informed they are printing some more 200 copies for the American market due to demand and that the book would be discussed in a church bible study lesson group.
What does literary success look like to you?
Success is being able to look deeply into your life and be proud and happy of who you are. When you can confidently say that I had my life and have given it all the opportunities that came or comes my way; then you have experienced a good measure of success. Success is also setting goals to achieve them. To a student passing an examination is success and is worthy celebrating, to a pastor, establishing a spiritual program that meets spiritual needs of the people that is success, to a teacher, it may mean impacting knowledge and skills to the
students to pass their exams and a live a better life, to a business man, it may mean acquiring lots of money in terms of millions, billions you name it, to a drug addict it may mean discovering their predicament and accepting to go to a rehabilitation, to an athlete it may mean winning a
race.
In submission I would say that success is best measured with the parameters or the benchmarks of personal purpose and mission in this life. Human beings are endowed with gifts and talents which are meant to benefit not only themselves but also humanity. Any success that does not
positively affects other people’s lives is wanting and is not fulfilled.
All we have, the knowledge, the wealth, the gifts, the talents were given to us by God so that we can be good stewards. That means being good managers of our success. Andrew Carnergie, an American industrialist and a business strategist acquired a lot of wealth through his businesses and at one point he decided to come up with a plan to distribute it all for the benefit of man kind, supporting education by building libraries and campuses and giving to social actions and churches for he did not want to die with it. He said it is even a disgrace.
What advice would you give to upcoming writers?
In Kenya and the rest of Africa, there has been a culture, a narrative that Kenyans and Africans don’t read and write. Time has come to debunk that myth. It is time to change the narrative.
When you engage in reading you interact with ideas, the thinking of great men and women who walked on the face of the earth. It is through such exposure that you grow mentally and especially in your thinking capacity and hence removing the cob webs that tangles our minds. Writing engages you and refreshes you and gives you opportunity to contemplate, to imagine to meditate, hence grows you mentally. The process of writing helps you to solidify the vague thoughts and brings clarity. Someone said that this world will be ruled by thinkers. All those people who have made a tangible achievement and have made a difference in the world, interacted with ideas that challenged them to do things differently.
To the young writers, my message is that you can write. Everybody has a story to tell but it is only those who will be brave enough to pick a piece of paper and a pen and scribble down their thoughts who will leave a manuscript or a book in this world.
I am proud to belong to a group of writers from Kenya who are changing the culture and the narrative that Kenyans don’t read and Kenyans don’t write.
What was your experience publishing with CLC Kenya?
I came across CLC Kenyan publishers when I attended a book launch entitled Conceive Achieve by an author called Julius Mwebia. I realized they are very professional and that they work with their heart on what they do and that they walk with young writers hand by hand for I heard testimonies from other people who had published with them. I have some books they have published and even by the look, the books look good with covers well designed. Inside the books that I have read, they are very meticulous in their editorial work for you cannot find a comma, an exclamation mark, an apostrophe, a question mark that is left out or misplaced. And my perception is formed, these are the people I would want to publish books with.
The cost of publishing is also very friendly in comparison to other publishers in Kenya and abroad. I have published a book abroad and I can say CLC they keep and go beyond international standards.
Book 1: Rebranding To Win
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Book 2: The Journey Against All Odds
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