Evangelist Wandaro Dabaro of Ethiopia

The simple youth from the hills may have seemed most unlikely material for an evangelist, but he probably won more people to Christ than anyone else in southern Ethiopia - during the time of tremendous persecution.
The missionaries who had been forced out of the country in 1937 were allowed back into Ethiopia in 1942and feared what they would find. They had left a small 'community' of just 48 Christians. They were amazed to find it had multiplied to 10,000. Among them they found Wandaro - his body covered with scars but his face wreathed in a smile.

Wandaro, the evangelist, whose father had been a witch doctor, had been made an 'example of' by the authorities .He had been flogged, in public, by 5 men continuously for 3 hours with a hippo hide whip. For several days they feared he would die but thanks to the prayer of family and friends he eventually recovered. He was imprisoned for a year. He was such a model prisoner that the guards left him in charge when they went off duty.

For 55 years Wandaro preached the Christian message. 8,000 people, each carrying a flower in appreciation, attended his funeral in 1991.