Pastor Arnold Venter
Pastor
Arnold Venter is the national director of AMF-SA since 2001, He was born in
1973 and grew up in South Africa during the Apartheids Era, within a strict traditional
Dutch Reformed church, His father served in the 1970’s as member of Parliament
for the then National Party.
At
age five Pastor Venter realized God’s calling on his life and so he started to
put his focus on God’s word, to the dismay of his family and friends. He no
longer would believe what he has been taught, instead he started to pull at the
strings of their doctrine, he started to question the doctrine of the church,
and specifically the issue of racial segregation and infant baptism, he was
ridiculed at school because of his staunched believes in God’s word, and the
apostles doctrine. The persecution became so severe especially from his own
family that he turned his back on the church.
After
his graduation from high school Pastor Venter joined the department of
correctional Services and became a prison Warden it was during this time that
he again felt God’s call on his life, and received Christ as his Savior, he
joined a multi racial charismatic church, and was nearly ex-communicated by his
parents, because he joined a church where no racial segregation exist, soon
after this he was baptized in the name of Jesus Christ, which caused an even
greater separation between himself and his parents, and the Dutch Reformed
Church.
During
1995 Pastor Venter started to study for his degree in theology, with the aim of
becoming a Pastor, in 1996 he started writing his first book called PITS
(Prophets In Training) where he tried to bring the churches focus back to the
reality of the gifts of the Holy Spirit, and Prophecies right full place in the
church, as well as the function of Speaking in tongues, he completed his book
in 2002, during the same time he started to write his second book, on the book
of Revelations, called Revealing Revelations.
In
1998 Pastor Venter married a young Charismatic woman named Janette Barratt and
in 2001 he became the father of a baby girl named Sarah-Lee.
In
November 2001 Pastor Venter resigned from the Department of Corrections and
moved to Polokwane, with a vision to do mission work across Africa. He became
involved with various ministers in and around the area, and introduced them to
the doctrine of the Apostles.