Meet Okello Benson, Pastor of Living Stones Community Church

When Okello Benson realized that we are all sinners separated from God, he knew he needed Jesus to save him. As he grew in his faith, he dismissed the encouragement to become a pastor until he realized the danger the whole world faces: without God’s grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus, we are all headed for God’s wrath.

Throughout the difficulties in Benson’s life, God has and continues to shape and mold him for leadership in the church. When Okello Benson was nine years old, his father divorced his mother and married another woman. His mother struggled to provide for him and his two younger siblings, and Benson wrestled with the physical and emotional effects of growing up without a father.  

“I would watch some of my uncles take care of their children and I would yearn to have a person who would care for me like that, provide for me clothes to go to school, pay my school fees, give me food to eat, and correct we when I’m wrong. I didn’t have that,” Benson said.

By the time he was about 14 years old, the war in northern Uganda intensified. Joseph Kony and his rebel army ransacked villages, abducting and killing innocent people. By the grace of God, Benson and his siblings narrowly escaped the rebels when they came to their village. 

Many people had gathered for a family burial. Benson and the other children were tired from helping the visitors and completing the tasks that needed to be done for the burial, so they decided to sleep in one of the huts that night instead of going out into the bush. Around 9:50 p.m., Benson’s mother found them, woke them up, and told them to go hide in the bush for the night, which is what they had to do since the rebels became a threat. 

“We reached where we were sleeping, and after about 15 minutes, we saw back home they were lighting our huts on fire. The LRA had arrived just about 15 to 20 minutes after we left,” Benson said. 

The LRA rebels burned their homes, stole their livestock, and abducted some of the people who had come for the burial, including Benson’s uncle. His uncle was held captive for about one month. He was bruised, beaten, and starved until he became too weak, and the rebels decided to let him go because he had become a burden to them. After being released, it took two weeks for his uncle to find his way home through the bush. Despite the odds, he survived and made it back to his family.

After the night the rebels attacked their home, Benson’s mother realized the only way to protect her children was to flee their home in Koro Lajwatek and seek refuge in the nearby city called Gulu. They stayed there for five years from 2000 to 2005. During those five years, Benson continued to go to school, but it was difficult to receive a good education. Few teachers would attend school because they also risked their lives. While walking to school in the mornings, Benson often passed people lying on the roadside who had been murdered by the rebels. Some of them were his relatives.

It wasn’t until Benson was about 19 years old that the threats from the rebels subsided and the LRA agreed to a temporary ceasefire with the Ugandan government. Kony and his forces left Uganda and migrated to the surrounding countries including South Sudan, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, and the Central African Republic. Then the Ugandan government announced it was safe for families to return to their home villages, so Benson and his family returned to Koro Lajwatek.

Benson remembers giving his life to Jesus on a Sunday morning in 2008 after his pastor preached on Romans 3.

“He started from verse 9 all the way to verse 23, and the moment when he hit 23, ‘for all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God,’ that’s when I realized, ‘What? All people? Even the people that I think are good? Even my uncles that are providing for their children are sinful? Even the pastor is sinful? I am also a sinner,’” Benson said. “I decided that day that Christ should be my Lord and Savior. He went on to read John 3:16, ‘For God loved the world and he gave his only begotten son that whoever believes in him would not perish but have eternal life.’ I thought that is hope there. I decided to get up from my seat, and I went to the front, kneeled down, and said, ‘God I am here.’ It was a wonderful experience for me.” 

Benson attended a vocational school for agriculture and worked on farms to earn money for his school fees and his siblings’ school fees. During school holidays, Benson did work for his local church. One day, Benson received a call from his pastor who proposed a job opportunity with Four Corners Ministries, a new ministry in the village of Kinene. His pastor said a missionary was looking for a farm manager. Benson had never heard of the village of Kinene, but he believed this was an answered prayer.

He still had a few more months until he finished his agriculture certificate program, but when he returned from school during holiday that December, he scheduled to meet with the FCM missionary, Myron West. After the interview, Myron offered the job to Benson, and he accepted. He started working at Abaana’s Hope in January 2014 where he began to grow more mature in Christ.

“It was such a good experience that I got. I was accepted with my young age and my inexperience, and I found godly figures in my life. The other missionaries that were here played a big role in my life and other African pastors that were here, naming one of them is Pastor Sunday. He discipled me and brought me into discipleship,” Benson said.

At the time, Pastor Sunday led Living Stones Community Church at Abaana’s Hope. He met with Benson on Monday evenings to go through Bible studies together while sitting under a tree, and he brought Benson with him when he visited families in the community. Benson was learning more about the Word of God and learning how to put it into practice.

After a year and a half working as the Abaana’s Hope farm manager, Benson shifted to the Child Development Program, which is designed to assist vulnerable children and their families with educational, spiritual, and physical needs through sponsorships. As he continued to grow in God’s Word, others started to recognize the gift God had given him to preach His Word. 

“I was like, 'I don’t want to be a pastor,' but God was doing a different thing. He was shaping my heart slowly. He was teaching me, humbling me, and opening my heart to tell the truth of God’s Word, so in 2016, I was ordained as one of the pastors,” he said. “I think the biggest change came when I realized the danger that the whole world faces, that we are all sinners separated from God and heading for God’s wrath. That’s where my perspective changed because knowing that the people that I meet, if they are not saved then they’re heading to Hell. That changed my perspective of thinking I want to be someone who God can use to shift people from darkness to light through preaching of the Word of God.”

Benson became a student in the first cohort of the Pastor Training Center and was in the first graduating class in 2022. Now he is the director of academics for the PTC where he oversees the students and teachers, grades papers, teaches, and more.

“Personally, the PTC has changed me and given me confidence in teaching the Bible and handling the Bible with care,” Benson said. “The other impact that we see in PTC is the desire that the local churches are having to be taught God’s Word. Right now, even before we graduate this current cohort, we are receiving so many calls from pastors within the local community.”

The PTC has doubled in size from 37 men in the first cohort to over 80 men in the second cohort. These men will be sent out with the truth of God’s Word ready to teach sound doctrine for the glory of God. Benson said it’s a joy to watch the network of gospel-centered, Bible-saturated, African-led churches grow. 

“Seeing those who have passed through from the graduation to teach, it’s a praise to God because we are fulfilling what 2 Timothy 2:2 tells us, ‘What you’ve heard from me in the presence of many entrust to faithful men who will be able to teach others also,’” Benson said. “It’s a beautiful thing to see the gospel reach to the ends of the world as Christ commanded us ‘go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.’ So, when we see brothers coming from Congo, from South Sudan, from far ends of Uganda, we see the great commandment going out by preaching the gospel and making sure that the gospel reaches to the end of the world.”

Benson recently went to Moi’s Bridge, Kenya, with Pastor Sunday to test the Training Leaders International teaching material and see if there was a need and desire for pastor training. The material was received well, and Benson is now waiting to hear if TLI will approve to start pastor training in Kenya. In this small area, Benson saw many local churches that were teaching heresy. 

“Africa needs the truth of God’s Word, and where does it start? It starts from me and you preaching the truth of God’s Word,” he said. “We came back with a big burden in our heart. The PTC is not only going to be for Uganda, but PTC will be for other African countries.”

Please continue to pray for the PTC, specifically for the recruiting process for the next cohort of students. Pray for the PTC, the teachers, and trainers as they go through the accreditation process under the Uganda National Council for Higher Education. Also, pray for Pastor Benson as he preaches God’s Word to the community and as he leads his family. His wife Adokorach Proscovia works in the Child Development Program, and they have two daughters - Angel Grace, 14, and Laloyo Leah, 2.