Fast forward one year and we are so grateful to be back in South Africa and have had no immigration issues through all of 2016. God is faithful.
It has also made me have a renewed enthusiasm to this calling. Every day I look at it as a complete blessing to be able to be serving alongside dedicated men and women from all over the globe all striving for one goal. To reach the most vulnerable children in Africa.
You will have heard about the drought crisis sweeping across Southern and Eastern Africa. Many of our communities have been hit by this crisis. We are constantly hearing of story after story of families who have been affected by this drought. Yet, God is continuing to provide his faithfulness. Morgan and I have the privilege of supporting those on the ground who are pushing so hard to get water and food to these most vulnerable families. Morgan is helping to gather these stories of affected families and letting people know all over the world of what is happening in so many children’s lives. For myself, I am working with those on the ground to budget what is needed in terms of finances.
To learn more about our drought relief efforts visit our website.
It is amazing to see a group of people who have no experience or necessary skills but just a heart to reach those who need help the most. We do not do it by our own strength but through God’s strength.
Recently, a group of us had the opportunity to join in with Community Prayer. This is a morning a month we set aside to take time out of our daily tasks to spend time in one of our communities encouraging Care Workers and fellowship with them. On this particular Friday, we visited a community called Sommerset. We spent time worshiping altogether and then heard from 1 Corinthians about how our actions can draw us closer to God.
In the afternoon, we broke into groups and went on Holy Home Visits with some of the Care Workers from Sommerset. I was in a group with a Care Worker named Joanna. As we were walking from home to home, she was sharing some of her story with me. Joanna has no husband and has never had children. But one thing she did share to me is that even though I don’t have children, many of the children in this community call me their mother. I am constantly amazed by our Care Workers and their dedication and heart for the most vulnerable children in their communities.
On one of our Holy Home Visits, Joanna took us to visit the home of three kids. They never knew their father and their mother works 80% of the time on farms about three hours away to make a small amount of money for the family. During this time the eldest daughter, who is 8, looks after herself and her younger brothers. Luckily all three of them are in school. Their only meal a day comes from the life centre at Sommerset where Care Workers, like Joanna, care for them like their own children. As we were visiting during the day, we didn’t get to meet the kids but we were able to pray around their house and cover it in God’s protection. The most worrying thing about this visit was knowing that the vulnerability comes from their house not being safe. The house is split into two rooms, one had a lock, the store room, and the other did not. This was the bedroom where all three kids sleep. Any one off from the community could wander in at night and take advantage of these kids. We spoke to the Care Workers about this afterwards and a plan is now being made to get a lock for these kids. But this is just one of many stories where vulnerability can sometimes be a little bit harder to see but it definitely present.
We have many partners as Hands at Work and increasingly we are seeing African partners come on board to care for communities in their own countries. This year we have seen a new South African partner agree to partner with one of our South African communities. We have also seen a growing partnership between a Nigerian partner and one of our communities in Nigeria. It is very encouraging to see people’s eyes opening in their own nations to the vulnerability around them. One such partner we have been working with for the past few years are a group of chefs. They have been providing a portion of food to some our South African communities. This food gets delivered to us at the Hub and we then take it turns as volunteers to join our Service Centre team (in our local office) to deliver the food to the various communities. This past month, Morgan and I got the opportunity to help with this process. We joined Thulane (our bookkeeper in our Hazyview Service Centre) and visited three communities to deliver food. One of the communities we visited is Zwelisha. As we pulled up in our truck, we saw some younger kids playing. In Zwelisha, the Care Workers help operate a crèche during the day to care for those young kids who are not old enough to be in school. Often these are kids of our Care Workers or of our older kids who are still in school. Young mothers are very common in South Africa. The fathers are very rarely around. This leaves many young children often left in the care of relatives during the day who often don’t have the resources to be able to care for an extra child or children.
We are doing some traveling in the next couple of weeks, and then looking forward to a bit of a break in August.
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| We had some little helpers in Zwelisha Community |
