Dr David Owuor at home in Nairobi’s Westlands suburb. Picture: Anthony Omuya
He started off as a medical doctor; today, he is a preacher, famous for “leading” Kenya’s Prime Minister Raila Odinga to Christ.
Dr David Owuor once led a group of surgeons in pursuit of a better understanding of the process through which cancers grow in the human body, a study that was critical in saving human lives.
Today, many call him a prophet and his preaching is all about obeying God and being saved.
In academic circles, Dr Owuor is no lightweight. He holds a PhD in medical research, specifically searching for a cure for cancer in all its sub-categories. He has worked in several laboratories before he quit the profession.
Now, he says, “You cannot reconcile science and religion. I had to quit because God revealed himself to me in a vision and directed me to go and pray for His people, as the existing churches were plagued with sexual immorality and the love of money.”
“It was difficult for me to convince a panel of scientists that tumours are disappearing in the name of God. You cannot prove it scientifically; otherwise they will take you to hospital and chained you up there for a couple of days,” he quipped.
The man who is reputed to have foretold the earth tremors that shook parts of East Africa in February 2005, now predicts a mass rally in Nairobi, where millions of people will gather and embrace one another in a tribal reconciliation.
“I have a vision of a big gathering in Nairobi, where about 6 million people will converge and tribes ask for forgiveness from God and each other as the nation is healed by the Lord.
“It is critical that the King (the president) announce the meeting for national repentance, which will include three days of fasting and prayer, culminating in a day he will lead the nation to the Lord.”
Dr Owuor says he has seen Kenya’s President Mwai Kibaki do this in his dreams.
“The president of Kenya, like the biblical King Josiah, must lead the people to repentance and forgiveness in order to heal the pain that came with the post-election violence”.
After meeting the prime minister, Dr Owuor told him, “Your life is going to change. Are you willing to transform your life — to be buried and resurrect with Christ Jesus in baptism?” The PM answered in the affirmative.
The medic-turned-preacher is also on record as having foretold the earthquake that swept through Iran in March 2006.
He now plans to take his message of salvation to Uganda, Tanzania, Rwanda and Burundi, after touring Zambia recently.
Dr Owuor, whose dreadlocked beard makes him unique among evangelists, is also different for his rejection of church offerings, saying that the Lord is able to provide for him and accusing other church leaders of being insincere for asking gifts from their followers while promising that they will receive abundantly from God.
“Why can’t the preachers get what they want directly from God? Do they doubt their creator?” he asks.
Enrolled at Uganda’s Makerere University, Dr Owuor returned to Kenya after war broke out in Uganda in 1981 and registered for a Bachelor of Science degree at the University of Nairobi.
He graduated with first class honours, scoring distinctions in every subject, and was awarded two scholarships, one to Israel and another to Germany for further studies.
He settled on the former, where he did his masters and PhD degrees.
He then went to the US where he worked at the Centre for Pharmaceutical Biotechnology in the University of Illinois, Chicago Medical Centre.
While there, Dr Owuor performed research on signal transformation by cancer chemotherapeutic drugs, and lectured graduate students of the pharmaceuticals and drug metabolism programme of the University of Illinois.
Talking about his research into how tumours and various cancers grow in the human body, he suddenly changes tack and describes how the devil was taking all his time, plunging him into the complex subject to prevent his being used by God.
After a successful career at the University of Illinois at Chicago Medical Centre, he moved to the Cancer Institute of New Jersey.
He became a research-teaching specialist in the Division of Surgical Oncology, in the Department Of Surgery. He also worked as a consultant specialist at the world renowned Civil Aerospace Medical Institute at the Mike Monroney Aeronautical Centre.
And then everything changed.
“At this point, I felt I had outgrown my creator. I cried out and the Lord heard me,” he says. He returned to Kenya in 2004 following this visitation, to bring a message of “repentance and holy salvation.”
