evangelical 360°

Ep. 32 / From Orphaned to Ordained: A Story of Evangelicalism in Africa ► Goodwill Shana

• Host Brian Stiller • Season 1 • Episode 32

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Against all predictions, Africa has become the world's fastest-growing center of Christianity. Rev. Dr. Goodwill Shana, Executive Chair of the World Evangelical Alliance and prominent Zimbabwean pastor, brings us inside this remarkable transformation while sharing his own unlikely journey from orphaned boy to global church leader.

Growing up fatherless during Zimbabwe's colonial period, Dr. Shana initially pursued law driven by a passion for justice. Despite the injustices around him, a white Baptist missionary became his spiritual father—teaching him early to separate systemic problems from individuals. This perspective would prove invaluable as he reluctantly transitioned from legal practice to church leadership during Zimbabwe's turbulent political history.

Pastor Goodwill offers fresh insights on several critical issues facing global Christianity. He challenges misconceptions about evangelicalism, arguing that its political associations in Western contexts shouldn't define the movement worldwide. "Evangelicalism is not the same as being politically right-wing," he explains. "Evangelicalism really is about Judeo-Christian values that are enunciated in the New Testament." The term itself, he believes, remains valuable: "Evangelical is in the Bible. Evangelical is good news."

As Executive Chair of an organization representing over 600 million Christians through approximately 140 national alliances, Pastor Goodwill sees the WEA providing crucial stability in what military strategists call a "VUCA world"—volatile, uncertain, complex, and ambiguous. While many institutions and relationships fragment, the evangelical movement offers certainty, dependability, and global community.

Perhaps most powerfully, Dr. Shana's personal testimony embodies hope for anyone feeling insignificant or overlooked. "God is a God of grace and He's a God of the improbable," he shares. "Our God can touch and use and transform anyone from anywhere to be anything in the world, because people's value is not defined by where they come from, or what they weigh or which family they belong to, but which God they belong to."

You can learn more about Rev. Dr. Goodwill Shana and the World Evangelical Alliance through their website and Facebook.

And you can share this episode using hashtag #Evangelical360 and join the conversation online! 

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Brian Stiller:

Hello and welcome to Evangelical 360. I'm your host, Brian Stiller, and I'm pleased to share with you another conversation with leaders, changemakers and influencers those impacting Christian life around the world. We'd love for you to be a part of the podcast by sharing this episode using hashtag Evangelical360 and by joining the conversation on YouTube in the comments below. My guest today is the Reverend Dr Goodwill Shana, a pastor and former lawyer from Zimbabwe. Over the last 35 years, pastor Goodwill has led and founded national and international ministries, from starting a church with four people that has grown to over 15,000 members to serving as president of the Association of Evangelicals in Africa and chair of the World Evangelical Alliance. In the 20th century, missiologists were sure that Africa would be dominated by the Islamic faith. How wrong they were. The Reverend Dr Goodwill Shana knows a lot about this incredible development and his personal testimony emerges from its context. I'm grateful that we have the opportunity to learn from and be challenged by Pastor Goodwill today. Goodwill Shana, thank you for joining us on Evangelical 360 today.

Goodwill Shana:

Thank you, Brian, for having me. It's wonderful to be on this podcast.

Brian Stiller:

There are a lot of things that I want to go over with you today and I want to get to the issue of your life and where you began and your involvement in leadership globally. And where you began and your involvement in leadership globally. But I think it'd be interesting to look at Africa as what is becoming the largest Christian continent in the world. I remember back in 1910, the first missionary conference in Edinburgh, and they concluded that by the end of the 20th century, most of Africa sub-Sahara Africa would be Islamic. But the fact that it went from about five and a half million Christians at that point to, 100 years later, over 560 million Christians in Africa what is there about Africa that draws that seems to align itself with the Christian gospel?

Goodwill Shana:

Well, I think we could say some of its cultural values. I think there's an innate value, that in African culture that draws itself to God. I think that cultural value was easy to tap into from an evangelical, Christian point of view. From evangelization, the missionaries were not coming into an atheistic society, they were coming into a society that believed in God and believed in the supernatural. So it was easy, I suppose, to make inroads in that regard. And of course Africa is a very intertwined community, so if you touch one strand of that community it is bound to affect many, many other strands. So I would say in a sense that was the beginning or the foundation of the catalytic effects that the gospel had in Africa.

Brian Stiller:

To what degree did the colonial enterprises of the 18th and 19th, and even the early part of the 20th century contribute? Did it contribute, Did it distort the gospel?

Goodwill Shana:

In some ways it contributed to the gospel. There is no doubt that African Christianity today wouldn't be what it is without missionary intervention, and for that we are grateful. But of course we know that every missionary brings with them their own social values and cultures, and those social values and cultures sometimes did not translate very well in an African context and to that extent it sort of distorted what the gospel is. In some cases the gospel was identifiable or identical with white colonial rule or European culture, and yet we know that the gospel is the culture that God wants for every human being in the world. So I think there are pros and cons. There are some great stuff that missionaries brought, but they brought with them also certain things that distorted and contorted the gospel.

Brian Stiller:

The post-colonial era and the rise of indigenous leadership. Was that a remarked difference to how the church operated and grew?

Goodwill Shana:

Again, in some ways it was the same, because the gospel is the gospel, regardless of where you plant it. But I think it was the socialization of it, making it contextual, that made the difference. It was Africans preaching to other Africans, and so it was that much easier to connect and to identify. It was no longer a foreign gospel, it was now a local, contextual, social gospel, from one person that lived in the same community to another person in the same community. So there's a lot of barriers that came down because people know one another and so when people are transformed by the gospel, the community can see that. But if it is imported or parachuted from outside, it's a little more difficult to actually believe its authenticity.

Brian Stiller:

You live in Zimbabwe. Your life began in that country, to the south of South Africa, in a time when it was very much ruled by the British. In a time when it was very much ruled by the British, how did your life emerge as a young boy, and how did you move from becoming a lawyer to being a church leader?

Goodwill Shana:

The Zimbabwean context for me has played a significant role in shaping who I am, and I suppose God allows people to be extracted from their backgrounds for a particular reason, but for me, having grown up in very challenging circumstances and in a culture that was generally unjust and pivoted for one section of society, there was a motivation, a desire in me to work for justice, to work for equality, to work for the value of all humanity, and so that was my early motivations as a young person and now, thank God, I got born again when I was young.

Goodwill Shana:

So there was this sense that life could be different, that all human beings were equal and that justice could only be received or acquired from a biblical perspective, from a love perspective, from an inclusive perspective, because God loved all of the world. So those were some of my earliest thoughts, if I can remember a drive for justice, a drive for equality, a drive to speak on behalf of the voiceless and the poor, and so that, I think, attracted me to be a lawyer, although it was not very attractive. At that time. The church, and especially the Pentecostal churches, preached very much against lawyers, preached very much against lawyers. They thought lawyers were defenders of criminals and murderers and all things that were immoral in a society. They could find the escape through the sweet tongue of lawyers. So it was not an easy decision to make at that time.

Brian Stiller:

You were dominated by the white community. Were you a bit of an angry young man?

Goodwill Shana:

community. Were you a bit of an angry young man? Interestingly, I was not angry. I knew there was injustice, I knew things were not wrong, but I think God helped me not to be angry because my mentor, the person that led me to Christ, was a white Baptist missionary. His name was Robert E Beatty. He was like a father to me, because I grew up without a dad was Robert E Beatty. It was like a father to me because I grew up without a dad.

Goodwill Shana:

So it was very difficult to categorize all people as being oppressive or white people as being evil, because I had one special person in my life who was very, very sweet and very dear to me, who mentored me or who came after me in the township, and so no, I was able to differentiate between injustice and people or races or people who could perpetrate injustice, and I think that that distinction has helped me to maintain my position, even post-colonial, post-independence, because I discovered that injustice could also come from black people, and so I learned very early not to be angry at color or at race or at origins of people. It's the heart that really makes a difference, and that was what I wanted to change.

Brian Stiller:

Now, were you a lawyer during the time of Mugabe his rule, or were you in church leadership by then?

Goodwill Shana:

No, I started off a lawyer. I was trained as a lawyer. I only became a church leader later, reluctantly. I was dragged into pastoral ministry, screaming and howling and complaining, but my initial desire was really not to be a pastor. In my eyes, pastors were very sweet but ineffective people. The ones that I saw around my community were old people. There were not many young pastors there. They were old, very sweet, very ineffective and completely irrelevant sort of people. They always wore these hang-me-down clothes from missionaries. They didn't look very attractive to me, so I didn't start off wanting to be a pastor. I started off wanting to be a lawyer, and then God called me out of that trajectory.

Brian Stiller:

How did you manage your time during the Mugabe leadership of Zimbabwe?

Goodwill Shana:

For a long time I wrestled between being a lawyer and being a pastor, because in the eyes of the society those were two completely different things.

Goodwill Shana:

But as we began to engage the regime of Robert Mugabe, it became very clear that we needed value-led leadership. We needed leadership that would stand on two components. First of all, it was a leadership that had to have people at heart, that was loving of people, that was principled, because much of the leadership that we have experienced in Zimbabwe suffers from serious principled deficits. So we needed principledness, if I can put it that way, and I found that in being a pastor and I found that in being a lawyer. But secondly, in engaging the dynamics of politics, it needed a certain mindset, and being a lawyer helped me to engage with people at a certain intellectual level and be able to engage with the structures and the dynamics of our politics without fear. So it was this very interesting combination of legal thought, mindset, rationality and the heart and the passion of a pastor combined that helped me to engage Robert Mugabe without compromising principle and without being reduced to the usual label of pastors not being able to be relevant to their societies.

Brian Stiller:

In the last few years, though, you've emerged as the executive chair of the World Evangelical Alliance, which is this global body that is representative, is voice for over 600 million evangelical Christians. First of all, just for our listeners, give us your overall definition to help understand the World Evangelical Alliance.

Goodwill Shana:

The World Evangelical Alliance is basically a unity in diversity of a range of evangelicals. I mean, it's not one set of traditions, but it's traditions across the globe that believe on certain basic things. I think sometimes they're called the Beaverton Principles, sometimes they're called the Five Solas, but those are some of the basic principles that bring us together. And so for me, the World Evangelical Alliance is this global, in a sense, church of evangelicals coming together, pursuing a unity in faith, a unity in doctrine, in touching the world, in transforming the world. So for me that resonated very, very much with where I came from, in Zimbabwe.

Brian Stiller:

And what is its prime objective and how does that operate?

Goodwill Shana:

Its prime objective is to unite evangelicals for gospel transformation. In other words, there is a drive to ensure that this diversity, this wonderful tapestry of churches, denominations and faiths across the world, actually working together to impact the world. I think it very much resonates with John 3, verse 16, for God so loved the world, this collective of ethnicities and languages and cultures and diversities. It is from these same ethnicities, diversities and cultures that we draw ministry out of and ministry back into the world. So for me, that is what the World Evangelical Alliance is about. It's about bringing this diversity into unity so that it can be projected back into the world where it came from, for gospel transformation.

Brian Stiller:

As you know, in certain parts of the world the word evangelical seemingly has been compromised by political liaison. Is there something about evangelicalism that aligns itself with the political nationalism, or is this an aberration?

Goodwill Shana:

I think it would be different in different sections of the world, but generally, because we are heavily influenced by Western and Northern Hemisphere definitions of evangelicalism in the church, I think there are two things that show up in evangelicalism that often project it into the political arena. I think the one is that evangelicalism desires certain principles and certain accountability, and so when those principles and accountability whether it's moral or spiritual are missing, there is an attempt to inject that into society, and then there's a coincidence with politics that may have those same values. But evangelicalism is not the same as being politically right-wing or being politically conservative. Evangelicalism really is about Judeo-Christian values that are enunciated in the New Testament, and so somehow, as people attempt to shape their communities, they often rely on those values that they treasure the most.

Goodwill Shana:

And the early history of evangelicalism saw some stalwarts of evangelicalism influencing the world of politics and economics, like William Wilberforce, for instance, or Martin Luther King Jr. Those were people who were motivated by their Christian faith, and yet they were projected into the political arena. Faith, and yet they were projected into a political arena. And so, as the value, the potency, the appeal of evangelicalism became evident out there, it was often confused or amalgamated with politics, as we see, for instance, in North America right now. But evangelicalism and as we believe it and political evangelicalism are two different things. Sometimes they may have the same demographic, but they're two different things and it would be fantastic if that was cleared. In my world, where I come from, oftentimes the word evangelicalism is identified with American evangelicalism, that kind of Christianity that tends to be politically active, potent and aggressive and does not think twice about injecting itself in the political arena, and that can be detrimental sometimes.

Brian Stiller:

There's been talk about whether the word evangelical needs to. We need to find a new name for the word evangelical, and I recall Tim Keller, who passed away, was pastor of a church in New York City was asked the question and his response was why should the rest of the world allow 10% of the world to self-define? And so, I guess, the word evangelical. As you lead the world body, it's a word that I suppose, in your view, is worth saving, is it not?

Goodwill Shana:

I think it is worth saving. I can't imagine an alternative. I think an alternative will probably catapult us into some long-winded discussion or controversy. Evangelical is in the Bible. Evangelical is good news. Evangelical has a whole history of goodness behind it. We have built that identity. Our identity is the world evangelicalized based on that word, which is good news, which talks about evangelization, which talks about projecting the good news of Jesus Christ into the world. I cannot, as this is an individual opinion, I cannot imagine another word that best captures who we are from a biblical perspective. That would be very difficult for me.

Brian Stiller:

Now the Evangelical Protestant Church is something of the last few hundred years. How did the World Evangelical Alliance form? What were its roots?

Goodwill Shana:

I think it's well, when we go back to the history of the Evangelical Alliance in 1846 to 1848, it really was driven by individuals and this is some of the conversations that we've been having recently that it was not driven by institutional motivation. It was really driven by individuals who were looking for an identity, an identity that was separate from Catholicism or Reformed Protestant church movement, and for me, it is one of the things that I think we need to recapture this injection of individual conviction into the institutionalism called evangelicalism.

Goodwill Shana:

And so people begin to grow that go back to their churches, motivate the churches into denominations, into nations, and so the world evangelical fellowship, as it eventually got to be known, took form and shape around individuals who were driven to see the unity of the body come together.

Brian Stiller:

Now, today is composed of what about 140-some national alliances, countries that have their own indigenous national alliance. How does that body, those many parts? How does that work together?

Goodwill Shana:

Yeah, I think one of the beautiful things about the World Evangelical Alliance is that it is a grassroots organization that has got structures that lead all the way up to a global level. So without the National Evangelical Alliances, the World Evangelical Alliance would be a head without a body without feet, and so I think it is this connection to the local, it is connection to communities at a grassroots level that actually gives the World Evangelical Alliance one of its greatest value proposition. It's not just theological persons and big spiritual think tanks at the top. There is a structure that connects national alliances through regional alliances into the World Evangelical Alliance that serve both regional and national alliance. It is this connection to grassroots and to the international or global stream of families that makes WA quite unique, I think.

Brian Stiller:

Now, as executive chair, you're looking to have your general assembly in the fall of 2025. What is the purpose of that and what do you hope to achieve?

Goodwill Shana:

Well, the General Assembly really is not just the purpose of the executive chair, it is a constitutional imperative.

Goodwill Shana:

The Constitution behoves us to hold a General Assembly every six years and the reason for that is that, as the Executive Council or as any office bearer, we do this in stewardship to millions of people around the world and ever so often we need to go and give account of our stewardship, how we have led the WEA, how we have acted on behalf of their good faith and their intentions and their purpose. So the General Assembly really is primarily for the leadership to give account to its membership, those that have bestowed them the privilege of leading. Secondly, the General Assembly is for the evangelicals around the world to come together, to confer together, to rethink, reimagine and maybe craft a new journey forward together. And thirdly, I think that the General Assembly is also an opportunity to grapple with developments, global developments or theological developments, so that all together, the AA family sitting together, is talking together about what to do with the world that they are faced around the globe. For me, those would be the three primary reasons why we would gather as the General Assembly.

Brian Stiller:

Goodwill. I think we've all been surprised over the last period of time, the last few years and even months. Surprised over the last period of time, the last few years and even months the widespread persecution of evangelicals and of Christians globally. This is a bit of a shock. What is the role of WEA as it relates to the persecuted Christian?

Goodwill Shana:

Well, I think, interestingly enough, as we've been having what we call concentric circles of conversation around WA, one of the things that WA is known for is advocacy for the persecuted, for the marginalized sisters in sections of the world where they are a minority or where they cannot express their faith, where they are actually being killed or persecuted out of engagement, and so, for me, I think that the advocacy on behalf of the persecuted is one of the things that the WF brings on the table.

Goodwill Shana:

I can give you, for instance, our own story in Zimbabwe. There was a time when, with some serious human rights violations in our country and an attempt to stifle the voice of the church, the WEA took up our concerns and were able to express them at the United Nations on our behalf. There are instances where local believers, local churches, don't have the power, the voice or the courage sometimes to speak up on certain things, and you need another voice. You need, if I can say, the big brother voice. So you need a place where you can run for refuge, people that can speak on your behalf or advocate on your behalf, and the WEA, I think, has done a sterling job in doing that.

Brian Stiller:

And how does its particular relationship to the United Nations with this Geneva office? How does that as an instrument? How does it go about affecting the places where Christians are persecuted?

Goodwill Shana:

Well, the fantastic thing about having an office is that you are present, and so if you are present, oftentimes you cannot be ignored. And the second thing is that when people are present, they begin to develop relationships, and it's no longer just institutions or a labeling of institutions. People are able to have coffee together, discuss certain issues heart to heart, human to human, and oftentimes it is in these meetings that people have a certain understanding, from a human point of view, from an empathy point of view, of the need to speak on behalf of the marginalized, the persecuted, you know, or the oppressed, and, of course, the United Nations. We expect it to be a place where justice, equality and liberty are safeguarded, and so I think that the office is there to take advantage of that.

Brian Stiller:

Let's go back to Africa again, this remarkable continent with an explosion of Christian faith like no one ever anticipated. And yet in the middle of your country, there are wars, nation to nation, ethnicity to ethnicity. There are issues of corruption that can be mind-boggling at times. So here you are, a pastor in Zimbabwe, but you also are executive chair of the global evangelical community. What do you see happening within the church in South Africa that speaks into these profound issues of social and moral dislocation?

Goodwill Shana:

I think one of the things that we experienced from where I come from was this question of if the church is effective and in Zimbabwe it is a fairly significant influence why is it that we are producing citizens that tend to go towards corruption or tend to go towards political domineering dynamics?

Goodwill Shana:

And so the church wasn't just addressing the fact of corruption or poor governance, it began to address itself. And so we began to look at perhaps our model of church, perhaps our model of discipleship, perhaps the things we describe as being virtuous and valuable and that people should aim for, perhaps they're the wrong ones. And so there was great introspection that has taken place in the churches as to what kind of people are being produced through the church. Many of the politicians, especially the ones in the earlier days, were products of missionary schools and Christian institutions. So the question was how come that they passed through our hands and they ended up that way? So another element was revisiting the definition of leadership, revisiting the definition of leadership, and many times we have overlooked the Christ-like, christocentric leadership, servant leadership. Leadership just became something that was bureaucratic but never really shaped on the values of the Bible. So the church began to revisit definitions, its own processes, definitions of leadership.

Goodwill Shana:

And then, lastly, the church also began to revisit its community responsibility, salt and light. How can you be in a community or in a nation and that community or nation is degrading, and the church is a significant and powerful force in that. So it was. How do we turn this moral value into transformation? How do we get to be salt and light in a meaningful way? So those are some of the things that the church in Africa is here to grapple with and is still grappling with. By the way, we are not out of the woods yet.

Brian Stiller:

I live in Canada, so that's my context, although it's to the very person that I'm interviewing today. So maybe full disclosure is good. But Goodwill, where I live, there is an assumption that faith is on the demise, that church attendance is diminishing. But worldwide there is this enormous uptick in church attendance in personal faith, given the demise of church attendance in north america and in europe. The assumption is that faith is dropping around the world, when in fact it isn't so, as as executive chair of world evangelical alliance, which is the second largest christian body in the world. As you look to the future, what do you see the church globally achieving or doing?

Goodwill Shana:

I think, from an evangelical perspective, I see the WA getting stronger in a number of ways For me. I think that, without self-indulgent comparison, I think we are pretty clear about who we are and what our values, biblical values, are. And I think, in a world where there's identity, fluidity and the cacophony of voices that are redefining everything, the WA will remain that one solid. The WA will remain that one solid, dependable reference point on issues pertaining to the Bible and to faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. I think we live in a world that is, as the American military calls it, a VUCA world volatile, uncertain, complex, ambiguous. It is in this volatile, uncertain, complex and ambiguous world that the WA brings a high level of certainty, a high level of dependability, a high level of reference, and I think it is this point of referencing that many people will be running towards when there's so much fluidity, so much ambiguity, so much uncertainty. I think the WA, by virtue of being based on the Word of God and on Jesus Christ, brings this clarity of certainty For us. In Africa, we have seen that when there's this plethora and upsurge of all kinds of crazy doctrines, people get tired and weary. They're not clear what is the truth. But I think WEA has built a reservoir, has built a reputation for staying with the truth, for being dependable, for being a reference point in matters biblical and matters of faith and value. I think that will still be a very, very important contribution that we make.

Goodwill Shana:

The second element that I think we will bring is a sense of community, is a sense of cohesion.

Goodwill Shana:

I'm in Zimbabwe, but I feel a great kinship with you from Canada or from anywhere else, and in a world where social cohesion and community is fraying and they're fragmenting, I think the WA brings this sense of unity and cohesion where we can be brothers and sisters across miles or kilometers around the globe, this sense that we belong somewhere. And for us, for instance, in the Zimbabwe Evangelical Fellowship of Zimbabwe, we had grown sufficiently significant in our country but we felt we needed a home. We felt in a sense I hate to use the word tribe because where we come from, tribe has got a bad connotation but we needed to belong somewhere. We needed to belong to a tribe, we needed to belong to something bigger or greater than ourselves, and we found that sense of identity, that sense of belonging, that sense of security in the WA, and I dare say that we're not the only ones, and not just from a national point of view, but from institutional point of view, from an individual point of view. I think WS will still bring that to bear in the world.

Brian Stiller:

Goodwill Shana, you have a remarkable story. You began in Zimbabwe with a young boy without a father. With a young boy without a father, you become a lawyer, pastor, denominational leader and now head of the World Evangelical Alliance. That's a remarkable story. So, as we conclude, today speak to someone out there who is wondering what opportunity. They're caught in some small place and wonder how could God ever use me? What would you say to them?

Goodwill Shana:

I would say I think God is a God of grace and he's a God of the improbable. He picks up people, circumstances, situations we would never pick up for Him to use, and the Bible is full of all those kind of stories. I mean stories like David the shepherd boy that got picked up. For me, it is this inspiration of knowing that this God can use, or can pick and use almost anyone in the world and use almost anyone in the world. You don't have to be born into high status or into royalty, and our Lord Jesus Christ was a perfect example born to a carpenter family, born in a manger, born in a small and unknown village.

Goodwill Shana:

I think that's how God does it, and my story is not just a unique story, it's a Bible story. It's a story of how God can take anyone from anywhere if they are willing to be used, of God to touch anything anywhere in the world and wherever people might be today. I think that's the beauty of knowing our God, beauty of knowing our God. Our God is a God that can touch and use and transform anyone from anywhere to be anything in the world, because people are of value. Their value is not defined by where they come from, or what they weigh or which family they belong to, but which God they belong to. And for me I would pray that there would be many, many other good Roshanahs across the world. By the grace of God not because of my cleverness, but by the grace and the goodness of God God can elevate people to play a significant role in his kingdom.

Brian Stiller:

Goodwill Shana. Thank you for joining us on Evangelical 360 today.

Goodwill Shana:

Thank you, Brian, for having me.

Brian Stiller:

Thank you, pastor Goodwill Shana, for joining us today and for helping us understand the powerful and historic witness of the African Church, and thank you for being a part of the podcast. Be sure to share this episode using hashtag Evangelical360 and join in on the conversation on YouTube. If you'd like to learn more about today's guest, be sure to check the show notes for links and info, and if you haven't already received my free e-book and newsletter, please go to brianstillercom. Thanks again, until next time.

Brian Stiller:

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