Do As I Do

Well, I learned today that Jocelyn is friends with Beyonce and Obama walked all the way from Africa to the United States. Did you know that? :) 

Today we went to Kabokweni to assist with the feeding program.When we got there, only a few children were at Elizabeth’s house and out of school. So we played with the children and washed a few of the school uniforms for the orphans. We taught them the Jesus Hokey Pokey and played “Do as I do” with the kids. The children were so lovable as they had a look of longing in their eyes. I noticed on one boy today that his one eye did not open. I couldn’t tell if it was swollen or just always that way. Another girl had a large scar on one of her legs and many of the children just had a thirst for attention that no one could miss. I loved so much being able to just grab each one of them and hug them.

After we played a few games, the children began to sing a prayer that no one prompted them to sing. It was so beautiful. Something about the way African’s sing is so moving and touching. Jocelyn and I think maybe it is the way they speak, that their languages use more of their voices or throats or something, but not a single one lacks a gorgeous voice. When you put it all together, it sounds like the professional singers in Broadway’s Lion King except with much more heart behind the voices. We all joined in on helping to serve the kids. I would say that at least 60-70 children were served a meal of pop, chicken stew, and beets and I am a terrible estimate of numbers, so I think there were probably more!

 

He is our King

Saturday night, we got the opportunity to get off the base and enjoy ourselves a bit! We went to the movie theater to see Bride Wars and have a nice cool treat of ice cream. The movie theater was a lot like ours at home, except it only cost 33R which is about $3 compared to the $9 movies at home. I really enjoyed the movie and it even got a few tears out of me!?! I was so caught up in the movie though, that when it finished I was confused!  I thought I was back home in the states for a minute until we were back out in the parking lot in warm weather, in the middle of January, driving on the left side of the road. 

Sunday morning we woke up and went to Elizabeth’s (Eunice’s mother) church in Kabokweni. The church was SO alive! They had one drummer and a person playing a keyboard, yet it felt like they had a whole band up there. The church was in a large one-room garage essentially. When we walked in, I was surprised to see how many children there were compared to adults. I know that there are so many orphans here, and I know those are whom we are ministering too, but it’s so easy for me to just imagine there parents are just at home working. I can’t wrap my head around how these children live. For instance, the Orlando team is building a home for orphans. Do these children live in a house with no parents? How do they get food then? The whole situation is so immense that I’m barely beginning to understand it, but seeing so many children in church without parents, was a bit surreal. Anyways, when we walked in, everyone was up and dancing. They were singing in an African language, so sadly I couldn’t understand them. But they would sing songs, then someone would begin to speak and everyone would quickly sit down. They a lady in the choir would get up and start to sing and everyone would join in singing and dancing again. Then someone would begin to speak, and everyone would sit down right away again. The sitting and standing was almost a dance routine in itself. At one point, everyone in the church formed a conga-line and danced and sang around in a circle! They had so much joy and happiness. It was contagious. I kept thinking though, how beautiful their expression of love was to God. And in that thought, I begin to just marvel at all the different ways people praise Him. My church in Milwaukee is mostly hymnals, North Way Oakland is very modern music and people freely raise their hands in praise, and then here is an African church full out dancing as they worship God. How people express their love for God can vary so much, but it’s so neat to think that God loves everyone of them. Finally, after much dancing and singing, a Pastor gave a message on God’s grace. I do not have a watch yet, so I am not sure exactly how long the service was, but it was at least 2 hours long. It got a bit hot when the pastor turned all the fans of for his sermon, but besides that it wasn’t too bad.

To finish off the weekend, Sunday night was community night! Other community nights have been mostly worship and prayer, but this night, we split the group into two and played a game of capture the flag. It was a bit of a different version than I am used to playing and we played on a very small area, almost like the size of our gym. My team lost, but it’s all good. We gave it our best try! After a bit of playing, the staff member brought us ice cream as a nice cool treat. Sunday was very hot, so it was nice to have a refreshing dessert. 

rain down mighty God

After having no water from Thursday morning till Monday night, I have a new appreciation for something that is so simple yet so important! For a while, we were able to get some clean water from a tap, but that ran out quickly. Then there was no water for the showers, washing dishes, cooking, washing our hands, flushing the toilets, or drinking. Thank God for hand sanitizer, baby wipes, and that we have a pool on the base that became our sole source of water. We filled up bottles to flush the toilets and to wash the dishes. Not the most sanitary way of washing dishes, but I think enough of us were praying over it that we all made it through without any harm. On Thursday, we lost power for the whole day and so we didn’t have water than either. However, what I never would have thought about through this whole time, was water for baby formula! Luckily, we were able to make it to Eunice’s house in the morning to get clean water for Sentila’s formula.

Yesterday morning, I had the opportunity to go with Eunice and Brittany to a clinic in Kabokweni. We were going so that Sentila could have her immunization, but it was also a neat experience for me to see a clinic. It was rather small and by the time we got there at 7 in the morning, all the benches were full of people waiting to be seated and a line formed of women with their children, waiting for shots to be given. We waited for about an hour in line, which seemed so long!  Yet, everyone was just patiently waiting. At one point, a nurse came up to ask Brittany and me if she could help us. It was a strange experience being picked out of the crowd because I was a white in the clinic. The towns we are working in are mainly black Africans, but a lot of the other towns are mixed a lot more than it is in the states. I suppose because I had seen so much of the main cities being mixed, that the amount of racial difference that still exists here just hadn’t hit me yet. During the week, I had a chance to watch Catch a Fire with Eunice and Stanley. It is a story about South African’s freedom and if you ever have a chance, I suggest watching it. It was very good. But, that also gave me an opportunity to talk with them about South Africa’s freedom. Eunice told me, that had it been 10 years ago, there is no way she would be in the class now with all of us. In a way, it makes our ministry here just that much more neat. I hope we can show love to the communities to help mend the face of whites in this country.

This week, we had a South African man, named Ronas lead our class through a discussion about culture in ministry and also leadership. The culture part was very interesting! We talked about differences in culture. For example, men will eat first in the African culture, and then the women and children will eat afterwards. Also, they refer to their father’s sister’s children as their brothers and sisters along with their mother’s father’s children as brothers and sisters. But their mother’s sister’s kids and their father’s brother’s kids are their cousins. Uh? Way to make it complicated. J I also learned that it is common for African men to just stop on the side of the rode to go to the bathroom. Since then, I have witnessed this cultural tendency at least 5 times.  One big thing we also talked about was presenting the gospel without the culture. It’s such a simple statement, but something I had never really considered. Ronas was telling us that when missionaries came here, they all wore suits and ties. Now, pastors here are looked down upon greatly if they don’t wear a suit and tie, even though it is really unrealistic expectation with the extreme heat here. Hm, just a little something that I’ve thought a lot about this week! Next week, one of the staff members will be leading us in a class titled The Fatherheart of God.

Everything else is going well here. We now have the internet available at the base so hopefully I will have the opportunity to provide ya’ll with more updates. Thank you for the continued prayers! And I’ll leave you with the words from one of the songs we sing with the kids here. I wish I could record it and put it up here for you to hear, because it’s adorable, but the words will have to do for now.

“He’s a good God, He’s a mighty God, He’s so lovely” And then there is some African language thrown in there too, but that’s still a bit too advanced for me. But amen to it anyways.

Also, if you would like to read more about our time here you can read Jocelyn’s blog at alwaysspreadlove.blogspot.com and Monique’s at moniqueslaughter.blogspot.com

Sawubona!

Sawubona! I believe that means hello, how are you! in Siswati or possibly just a big happy greeting.  Either way, I have made it safely to the YWAM base in South Africa and have been here since Sunday. The trip was a long plane ride and then a nice 4 hours bus ride next to a man from Capetown who enjoyed singing along to Abba’s Super Trooper—entertaining to say the least.

 

When we arrived at the base, there were already about 60 different people here. There is a small group from a church in New York that is here working in the community for two weeks and then there are two Discipleship Training School programs that were on their outreach here, one from Orlando, Florida and the other from Worchester, South Africa (near capetown). The team from Worchester left today and now it is feels so empty! The New York team leaves Saturday and the Orlando team will be here at least another week, possibly two. It is going to be very quite when they are all gone. As for the people who are in my class though, there are currently 5 of us and then a couple will be joining us in about a week. They are moving here with their family and will be joining the staff after they finish the DTS! Here now, in my class, are Monique, Jocelyn, Eunice, Stanley, and I. Stanley and Eunice are both from the surrounding communities. Stanley is an orphan. He is now 22 and a youth leader in the community. Eunice is a single mom. Her little girl, Sentila, is 5 months old and so precious! Most of our breaks revolve around playing with her. Jocelyn is from Maryland and is also taking her spring semester of sophomore year off from IUP! And Monique, is from Minneapolis, Minnesota. Overall, our team is getting along great. It is fun having two Africans with us. They explain the strange food that we are eating and are trying to teach us Siswati!

 

This first week has been nice and slow to get us eased into a routine here. We have had class everyday, but by class, I more or less mean discussions about our faith and how God is working here in Africa. A lot of it has been explaining the mission of 10, 000 Homes, getting to know each other, and learning what our role will be here! Right now, the Orlando team is running programs in the two villages we will be working in and we had a chance during the week to go and visit. We saw the feeding program where 160 children came and a playground that the New York team just built for the children.  It didn’t even take a minute of us arriving and all the children ran up to give us hugs.

 

Okay, now we’ll do a quick few highlights of life here so far:

 

1. Pride rock—it reminds me of “the point” that our team in St. Lucia found. It is basically a huge rock that has a beautiful outlook at mountains and one of the communities we are working in during the week. It is so peaceful and I have found it to be a perfect place for quiet time to pray and reflect.

 

2. Work-out videos. Lets be honest, did anyone really think I would lose my crazy desire to run a million miles while I was in Africa? I haven’t lost it but I realize it probably isn’t safe for me to go by myself for a long run. So instead, every night, Monique, Eunice, Jocelyn, and I have been doing a work-out video. It is essentially a really cheesy jazzercise video and I love it. Stanley laughs at us, but I know he secretly wants to join in.

 

3. Talking with the people from other teams. There are people here from Germany, Norway, Finland, Canada, Nigera, Kenya, England, and the Netherlands to name a few. Not to mention probably someone from almost all 50 states. AND, even one person from Lancaster, PA. (He went to Lancaster Mennonite so I am afraid, Lancaster Catholic friends that it was difficult to find any connections). But it has been really cool hearing so many different languages being spoken and talking with people about music and culture.

 

4. African singing and dancing. First off, on Sunday we had a community night where we all had singing and praising. The leader of the Worchester team led it and he is a South African so the songs were upbeat and had us all dancing on our feet. It was such a joyful way of singing and praising God who has given us all so much! We also had a special treat of Eunice’s dance team coming to show us authentic African dance. The girls dressed in custom and were enjoyable, but my favorite was the boys who did a stomp routine. It was part of our time to learn about the African culture.

 

5. This is maybe not a highlight, but a big part of what I have learned life is here—the water! There has been so much of it, yet so little at the same time. The first few days here, it down poured almost everyday. The power went out one day and whenever the power goes out, the water turns off. It is run by an electric pump so no power=no water! That means no shower, no drinking water, no sink to wash dishes, no toilet, and nothing can be done that needs water! The water has come on and off within the day, but it has been turned off all day today and they think it may be turned off for the next few days. I really hope it isn’t true!

 

6.  The flies here are horrific. They swarm us all during class and while we are preparing the food and while I am just sitting minding my own business the come in my ear and buzz! So, we have decided to fight back. Jocelyn killed 30 yesterday and tomorrow when we go into town—we are getting a fly swatter. If we don’t leave anything behind here, at least we will be helping decrease their annoying fly population. ; )

 

7. Reading. Can you believe it? I am reading books. I have almost finished a book in less than a week. I have just a few pages left in The Shack and it is great! (thanks Jordan for recommending it, even though it took me 5 months to actually get to reading it! )

 

8. Clean-up duty. We have a worker, who cooks and cleans for breakfast and lunch but our team is in charge of dinner preparation and clean up. It is my work detail to clean up the dishes and the tables every night. It is proving to be quite a bit of work with over 60 people here for dinner, but it is definitely teaching me to have a servant’s heart.

 

9. Tea time! Yes, South Africa use to be a British colony so tea time is huge here. Every day, at 10:00, we stop what we are doing for some tea. It also really helps for when I sleep through the 7:00 a.m breakfast and can instead have some pb & j on toast during tea time!

 

10. Classes. Even though our classes have not been too in depth yet, as it is just the first week, I can tell this is going to challenge me to grow and I am excited for it! Yesterday we talked about creativity. The staff here values creativity and is going to work it into our schooling a lot. At first mention of this, I thought, “What! Creativity? I love to color but anything past that and I am challenged.” But we talked about God as the perfect and best creator! Think, he made the stars and flowers and beach and the wind to cool us off (and the sun to warm all of you at home) and how beautiful all of that is for us! Now, if we are all made in the image of God, then aren’t we all creators in some sense? I decided that I am a creator of going into places that are messy and making them neat again. I love when my room is a mess and I can just sit down and make sense of things. As Jeremy pointed out, that means the mess is a necessity in order for me to practice my creativity. Like that one mom? Yea, I thought so! : )

 

Phew! Now I know this is a very scattered update, but it is the best I can do for a short time to write about a whole week! We do not yet have internet at the base like we thought that we would, but hopefully that will change in a while so I can give you all more updates. As for now though, it will only be the few times I can get to an internet café. Overall though, life here is going very well! I still miss you all at home, but I know I have my best friend here with me all the time, no matter where I go. (Deuteronomy 31:6)

take my life.

A little less than 48 hours until I leave! As I am trying to organize and pack all of my things for the next five months into two suit cases, I am so overwhelmed with emotions. One is complete awe for God and His planning. As I was scheduling classes junior year of high school, there is no way I could have told you I would be going to South Africa 3 years later. Yet, had God not opened the paths for me to take AP classes at that moment, this trip may not have occurred. And as upset as I was about not being accepted to Marquette University's physical therapy program, I believe it was yet again God just saying He had a different plan for me to discover at Pitt. Another emotion is excitement to see how the Lord will use these next 5 months! I look back at all I have learned since I started college and I can't believe it. I can't wait to see what these coming months will bring!

As I was packing, the song Take My Life started to play on my itunes. Amongst all the hustle and bustle of packing, I think I have sometimes become caught up on "going on a trip" and forget that I am going to serve. But when this song played, I was reminded of my mission and my prayer that I would give my all to Christ. 

"Take my life and let it be
consecrated, Lord, to Thee.
Take my moments and my days,
let them flow in ceaseless praise.
Take my hands and let them move
at the impulse of Thy love.
Take my feet and let them be
swift and beautiful for Thee.

Take my voice and let me sing
always, only for my King.
Take my lips and let them be
filled with messages from Thee.
Take my silver and my gold
not a mite would I withhold.
Take my intellect and use
every power as You choose."

-- Take My Life by Chris Tomlin