From Nairobi’s Slums to Shaping East Africa’s Youth Leaders
John Miere was born in 1984 in a small village in Kenya. His family moved to Nairobi when he was two years old, so his father could pursue work there. When his father's work opportunities changed, the family had to return to the village. Of the six children, John's mother made the decision that would shape the rest of his life: five siblings went back to the village, but John would stay behind, left alone no parents in Nairobi and no one to keep him accountable or give him direction.
As the one sibling chosen to stay back in Nairobi, John had the freedom to do whatever he wanted, and no one steered him toward a better path. He chose the wrong group. That choice led him into Kibera, one of the largest slums in Africa, running with about fifteen friends who were involved in violence, and crime. John became a nightmare to his community. He skipped three years of high school. Of those fifteen friends, only two are still alive today. The rest were killed or are serving life sentences.
When John's father returned to Nairobi, he gave John a choice: go back to the school or go to vocational school. It was a friend, someone John believes God placed in his life, who advised him to go to school instead. So as an older boy, John went back to high school.
Around that time, something shifted in his community. A government minister of health came to officially open the Hospital in the community. He had the opportunity to be taken around, so he came to visit their base. He arrived with an entourage of people in suits at the place where John would hang out and play pool. Most of his friends scattered when they saw the minister coming with men in suits, but John stayed. The minister sat down, played pool with him, and asked him about himself, including the group he was running with. He told John plainly: find a better group, and he would succeed. That conversation changed John's course. He decided to leave the group he was in, and since he was going back to school, he started looking for friends who would push him toward finishing it.
He found them at Youth for Christ (YFC). When YFC came to minister at his school, John was struck by the energy and passion with which they shared the Gospel. He started showing up, first out of curiosity and snacks, then because it started to feel like home. In 2003, John gave his life to Christ, and he has never looked back.
"Where I was and where I am now are totally different," John says. "I never thought I would speak in front of people. I never thought I would travel outside my country."
That transformation set John on a path of ministry that has now spanned 23 years. He rose from volunteer to staff to center coordinator, and today serves as YFC's Nairobi Coordinator, overseeing six program centers and the coordinators who lead them. Under his leadership, YFC Nairobi reaches roughly 46,000 young people across 100 schools every week.
John has already seen that impact multiply firsthand. Clive, a young man John began mentoring back in high school, is now one of his closest ministry partners. A young woman, Ivy, came to YFC as a university volunteer and later became his personal assistant and now serves as a director at a big telecommunications company in Kenya, still rooted in the ministry that shaped her.
It is what John sees missing that drives him now. Time and again, he has watched young people get placed into leadership simply because they show up often, without ever being trained. “So many young people are leading in church, but nobody trained them how to lead,” John explains. “After two or three months, the youth stop coming, because the leader was never given the knowledge to lead them well.”
"I want to see this happen to other people, what happened to me," John says. "Even if I change one person, and they go on to change another, that is what keeps me going."
John Mire
That gap is why, four years ago, John began pursuing something new: equipping the youth workers themselves. He reached out to UYWI CEO, Tommy Nixon, praying for a way to bring this kind of training to his own country. Finances were not there at first. But in 2026, it happened: UYWI launched its first cohort in Nairobi, Kenya, and entrusted John to lead it.
John has already trained roughly 800 youth workers over the years, some using UYWI materials, and now leads 15 of them through UYWI's Certification Program. He is preparing to transition fully out of his role at YFC into leading youth worker training and development across the region, a work he sees as inseparable from his own story.
John's vision does not stop at Nairobi. He hopes to see UYWI firmly established in Kenya and then across East Africa, a region of five countries where UYWI does not yet have a presence. Nairobi, he believes, is the pilot: proof that this training translates, that it takes root, and that it multiplies.
From a boy who never expected to survive his own neighborhood to a leader training the next generation of youth workers across a continent, John Miere's life is a testimony to what happens when someone gives a young person a reason to hope. Please join us in praying for John as he soon transitions fully into this new calling, for wisdom in the transition ahead, and for the young leaders across East Africa who are waiting to be equipped.
To learn more about the UYWI Certification Program or to support the leaders being trained, visit uywi.org/certification.