Fan Park

I am in South Africa during the 2010 World Cup, and as such, I have to experience what a south african world cup should feel like, so for the opening ceremonies, we went to Mbali, one of the townships, for what is called a “Fan Park” They set up a Big Screen and a stage in a soccer field at the local college, and have live music and stuff when the game isn't being shown, everyone dresses up in the south african colours and wears flags and stuff and playing their vuvuzelas (the plastic horns that annoy you when you watch the soccer game).
The whole game was one big party, everyone was hanging out having fun, then Bafana Bafana (the name of the african team) scored a goal, and everyone went crazy! Everyone was jumping up and down screaming, blowing their vuvuzelas, and hugging for like 5 minutes.
It was a good game, and even though we didn`t win, we still tied, which is a moral victory when bafana is playing mexico.

Connie's Kitchen

My one of my favourite Zulu foods are fat cakes, which is a deep fried ball of dough that you eat with processed cheese and polony. The best place to get them in maritzburg is a small whole in the wall restaurant called Connie's Kitchen. It is a popular hang out place in maritzburg with pool and a tv to watch the soccer games, and is always noisy.

After hearing about this place for months, I wanted to check it out, so when a friend of mine was going there, I tagged along. I should say point out here that everyone at Connie's Kitchen is black, and a big white guy walking into the restaurant with a small black girl is awfully peculiar. We got there, and as we entered the restaurant everyone suddenly went silent. We walked up to the counter and ordered 2 combos, the girl behind the counter asked me if I was having one of them, when my friend said yes, the last table still making noise, suddenly went silent. We paid for our food then left, as we exited the door, the buzz of activity suddenly returned.

This experience taught me what it is like being the minority in a situation, which is something that I have never truly understood before (I'm male, white, north american, etc). It felt really weird and awkward, strange, but it was still kind of funny.

Oh, a week or two later a friend of mine told me that when he went in there a couple days after my visit, they told him about the white guy that had been there earlier. It's nice to know that I am known.

1 more round

There are exactly 2 months left in my time here, and more and more there are references to me coming home, whether it's me and Ruth booking tickets, or it's an e-mail from Darrel about saying goodbye, and reorientation expectations (which even though I am team communicator, I had to get through kyle), and more and more I don't know what to think about going home. On one hand I miss my family and friends, and I can't wait to go to Tyndale next year, but on the other hand, I have made so many good friends since coming here, that I don't want to leave behind.

sometimes I'm just ready to go home, it's so close to the end, and I'm tired, and I'm just ready to quit. During morning prayer this morning, I was really tired, and couldn't concentrate on what we were praying about, and all I could think about was going home. I know this is bad, I still have 2 months here, and I can't afford to check out yet, and then my brain started to sing a Barlowgirl Song (called one more round)

So take me one more round
I'll just keep fighting
One more round
You're messing me up but I'm still here

So I'm here, and I'm not checking out yet even though it would be so easy to. I'll be home soon, and then I'm sure I'm going to miss it here, so here's to pushing through the next two months.

One more round
I'll come out swinging one more round
I'm telling you now I'm not gonna lose it here

Cape Town

So from the 15th to today I was on vacation. From the very first week we gothere everyone told us that we had to go to Cape Town, so after 7 and a half months of people telling us this, we've finally broken down and taken the 15 or so hour drive to Cape Town.

We tried to leave at 10 am in the morning, but the Shop took too long for our Car to be repaired, so we weren't sure when we were going to leave. At three o'clock, the car was ready and we drove to bloemfontein, where we stayed the night with Pastor Irvin, who is really Cool. He basically ran our convention (which you can read about in anna's blog).

The next morning we drove the remaining 12 hours to Cape Town, we got to Pastor Hilton's house with Just enough time to grab a bite to eat before going to Youth. At youth they had a World Cup Tournament on Bible Trivia focusing on the book of Matthew. They had us join the teams. I was assigned to one of the teams that lost the week before. we ended up winning that night.

The next day some of the youth took us around town, took us to the ocean, out for ice cream, and out for supper for fish and Chips.

The next day we went to church at the NZMI Church that Pastor Hilton started in cape town. we listened to Mother Rhoda preach, which was really cool.

we then spent the next two days driving around cape town, hanging out. it was really cool, we saw the penquins, the spot where the two oceans meet, as well as an awesome sun set.

we drove to Jeffery's Bay, spent a night in a Back Packers (basically a motel, or B&B)

We then drove to Mthata where we stayed at the sawatsky family's house. unfortunately our plans crashed with plan they forgot they made, so we stayed at their house while they were at a meeting with the Sudermans (colleagues of ours here in PMB). We watched an entire season of Friends, made popcorn and went for a picnic of a course of 2 days

Then we drove the rest of the way home today, overall it was great.

and yes it is only 2 1/2 months left in my time here.

Sisyphus and prayer

In Greek mythology there is a story of Sisyphus. Sisyphus dies, and goes to Hades where he has to push a boulder up a hill before he can go to the land of bliss, but just as the Sisyphus reaches the top of the hill, the boulder slips and rolls back to the bottom, so he has to do it over and over again.
This story came to mind yesterday as I was carting bricks around church property for the third time, and it would be easy to feel like we are being treated like sisyphus. We are constantly being asked to do the same job multiple times either because they need something moved, or we weren't told about a step part way through the job. so the job get's done over and over and over again.
But as I thought about the repetitiveness of the tasks that we are given, I realised that it wasn't pointless doing the same job over and over again. Doing the same job over and over again creates repetition the same way monks recite scriptures in latin over and over again. IT allows allows my mind to wander and for me to contemplate and work out with God my theology, my insterests, my beliefs, my feelings, my calling and my very existence.
Currently God's working out my calling. Yesterday during brick moving, God reminded me of a promise that I had forgotten from years ago that he had made me. He reminded me that my education will be in pastoral ministry because it's going to prepare me for what he has planned for me, but that full time pastoral ministry as I see it, preaching in a church every sunday, isn't what he's calling me to. I had forgotten this, but he reminded me. I still don't know what the call is for me, so I guess I'll have to dig some holes or something.
I'm still not sure what he's going to with my life, I guess I'll just dig some more holes

who am I?

Last night I had a question pop into my head that I didn't know the answer to. Who am I?

you see, all through high school, I was one of few evangelical christians at my school. So it was easy for me to know who I was, and what my purpose was, to get people to be more than just social activists, and to be more passionate about loving God.

Then I joined this program, and spent a month at Jesus People, where we all were all trying to be open, and honest, and just trying to follow Jesus every way we knew how. and I was on Cloud Nine, possibly even ten.

Once we got here to PMB, our church's youth are passionately on fire for christ, and trying to spread the word every way they know how. Evangelizing is done by others who know how to evangelize, and have an opportunity to evangelize (I don't know anyone here who is not christian). But now I'm one of a few socially conscious christians in a sea of evangelicals. Everyone here is really excited about following christ, but don't seem to know that this has social consequences (read irrestible revolution, or Jesus for President both by Shane Claiborne). And I try to be christ's love, to others through my daily walk.

But that isn't defining me like the opposite did back in high school. And I now that I'm conscious of it, I don't know how to define myself, I'm me. I'm a six on the anneagram (see blog from september), but that doesn't really explain much more than tgat I try to be as dependible for others as possible. I don't know what my gifts are, because the thing that I was once so focused my energies on no longer defines me. I no longer know what makes me, me.

any thoughts?

Mthata

This past weekend we went down to Mthata for a visit with the Sawatsky Family.

Mthata (pronounced UmThata) is located in the eastern cape, it's the birth place of nelson Mandela, and is where the Sawatsky Family is.

The Sawatsky Family comprise of Joe and Anna, and their sons Isaac, Moses, Levi, Jesse. Joe and Anna work with Bethany Bible College, a school that works with African Instituted Churches (churches founded in Africa, not connected to a western denomination). This past weekend they had a conference about Farming Gods Way (no tilling, no burning, crop rotation) with James and Joan Alty (the MCCers, I talked about them in an earlier blog entry).

So We drove in on Friday, And slept at a back packers (kind of like a bed and breakfast, but no breakfast). The next day we had a walking tour of Mthata, and then went to the conference for a little while.

The next day we went to Church in Mandela Park. Mandela Park is an old farm, that Nelson Mandela made availible to the poor to build on. We went to church in a small one roomed building, sitting on plastic chairs, singing a capella in Xhosa. It was really cool. Joe preached about Abraham's Journey, and how he prepared the way for his children (he traveled from Babylon to Canaan to Egypt, opposite of his descendants that traveled from Egypt to Canaan to Babylon). And he spoke about how we are called to prepare the way of the Lord.

On monday, we went to see the Nelson Mandela Museum, which apperently used to just be a collection of Gifts that he's recieved from different people, but about a year ago got revamped, and now tells his lives story. I found it interesting and kind of sad, that the Man the world looks to as a symbol of Reconciliation is the one who decided to arm the ANC. As well, when he was in prison he had the opportunity to be released if he would disarm them, but he refused, continuing to use violence as a means to an end.

We then went home and made donuts/ the girls made skirts, and watched a dvd of Michael Jordan's final Basketball game with the Bulls, which was awesome.

Breaking point?

So a couple of days ago, we had just finished supper, and were getting ready to do dishes when my cell phone rings, I answer it and it is MY MOM CALLING ME FROM CANADA!!!! So I conveniently left the house and walked over to beside the church where there are some tables and benches, and talked with my mom.

Nothing overly profound was said, we just caught up with what's happening in each other's lives. But when she hung up I literally had tears rolling down my face, and I had to wait a couple minutes before coming home in order to compose myself.

As I think about it, I realize that this was the first time that I've actually missed home since coming to South Africa. the only other time since starting radical journey that I've felt this way was when I had to say goodbye to my parent's back in chicago.

While some of my other team mates have had struggles with being here, most of the time I've enjoyed it here, and the things I haven't liked I'd just let slide. And I actually haven't missed home, so I was starting to think that there was something wrong with me, because I haven't had the same struggles up to this point, and not missing home made me wonder how deep my relationships were with everyone back home. But now missing home has shown me that I do have attachments to people, I do have feelings and that I am Human.


I'm just sorry that it's taken me this long to realize it.

Christmas in January

so on monday I finally got my christmas packages, one from my dear friends from my home church of River of Life In kitchener, and one from my family.


(important note, when mailing stuff to africa, use airmail, shipping it by boat takes 3 months or more to get there).

some of the contents from the packages:
(note: just because I didn't mention your item, doesn't mean I don't love it, It's just late, and I can only make so many jokes/insights after a certain time)

-Bubble Wrap!
this was especially good Bubble Wrap, it was the large kind that pops easily, and makes loud noise, it was crazy fun to scare both cats, and small humans with.

-Shane Claiborne Promise Keeper CDs
yes CDs, as in multiple copies of the same disk, it's great, I get one to share, and one to pass around. I love Claiborne's work, so it's all good

-KD
I am super excited to eat the three packs of mac and cheese I got, nobody here knows what it is, so I'll probably have to share with people.

-Timmy's Coffee
yes even in africa I can have coffee

-Archie Comics
I now have the first three issues of the Archie marries veronica story line, which I have been dieing to get my hands on.

-Jesus is the Light t-shirt,
It looks like Twilight, but it has a godly message to it- I guess this make me team jesus!

-Lots and lots of Cards
which I have read all of them, thank you

-Tiger puppet
wrong Continent, Tigers are from asia, not africa. Which is too bad, because lions and tigers will never meet, and we can't get Ligers outside of the Zoo

-Duct Tape
BEST. INVENTION. EVER!!!!

-Dove Necklace made from Bombshell
this is totally going all Isaiah 2:4 on me, soo cool

-Canadiana (Flag, and football)
these are fun because the americans complain about how if they got this kind of stuff, everyone would hate them, and accuse them of being pridefull, that and I can Chuck the football at people.

thank you very much for the mail, I greatly enjoyed everything, though I wonder how much of the food I'll actually get to eat :D

updates

So I need to blog again, here are things that you might like

1. Monday and Tuesday of this week we went to a game reserve, where we slept the night, and did a night drive. Unfortunately my camera is busted so you'll have to check out the other blogs from my team in order to see pictures, but it was really cool, the only things that could have made it better, is if we had seen cats.

2. This week is a church wide fast, so we are all really hungry. I am doing a liquids only fast. We mostly just complain about being hungry, but we are really doing quite good.

3. Life here has become crazy busy, Monday nights we have worship/prayer services which are usually good. Tuesday to thursday mornings are prayer times, where everyone just prays in the spirit for various things. I don't get much out of these meetings, but I still go because it makes me more disciplined in my faith, but the really hectic time is the weekends, fridays we start work at ten like every other day, but at three o'clock we have kids klub, which is a drop in time for kids, then afterwards we get like an hour or two before going off to Youth Celebration at 7. which are really awesome. After Youth Celebration, there is an hour or so before HALF NIGHT OF PRAYER, which starts at 10, and goes untill 1 in the morning.

Shelly Beach

So as stated in my past entry, this past week we were in Port Shepstone at Skogheim Christian Conference Center with other Mennonites doing a week long Retreat. It was good times, and we did a bunch of cool stuff.

Note:if you don't understand a term see my previous entry, it should be in there.

We sang hymns from the Hymnal: a Worship Book, which was cool, I haven't done that in a while. I was however, disappointed we didn't sing the good Doxology the entire week, yet did the slightly less awesome one like 3 times.

We did sharing and praying time, when the various families/ groups would share what their job discription is, what they do, what they struggle with and what various prayer requests, then we laid hands on them and prayed for them.

We swam in a pool and played a form of water polo where you had to get a ball under a chair. This game was complicated by the fact that their were little kids playing with us, and we didn't want to hurt them.

We built relationships.

I met a Rockway Alumni who graduated the year I started, and learned that things don't change.

We went to a used book store, where we got a bunch of books, then went and got Frozen Yogurt which was good.

We had good discussion times about how we experience God in a new culture, talking about both what we have to gain, and what we have to learn from the new culture.

We had chocolate fondue which was good,

We did communion, which was even better. It was cool sharing Christ's Body, with Christ's Body

We also went to the beach where I learned a few things
1.just because you haven't sunburned somewhere before, doesn't mean you can't (my legs hurt for three days).
2.Wind picks up sand blows it around. That's how a sand blaster works, and theres a reason you wear thick clothes for that.
3.Wind Barriers don't work if they are made out of sand. It just provides more ammunition for the wind to shoot at your body.
4.Sand can get into everything including your ears, and into your glasses (which turned out to be problematic, sand kept getting into my eyes, and it sucked trying to get it out).

Mennonites in South Africa

This past week we went to a retreat, all of the Mennonite workers in Southern Africa were there. Everyone from SALTers to MC Canada Witness workers, to MCC Country Reps, IVEPers to us RJers to MMN workers. Now I know what youare thinking, none of these terms make sense, that's because we mennonites like Acronyms, so this entry will be about acquainting you with relevant Mennonite Groups, programs, people, and organizations that I like/ think are important.


ANISA- Anabaptist Network in South Africa, a network of Anabaptist minded groups in the beginning stages, currently a website getting 75-100 hits a day, with news, editorials, and a growing library of print and electronic resources. See: MC Canada

IVEP- International Visitors Exchange Program, a MCC program that allows people to come to Canada and the States and volunteer at various Mennonite organizations such as MCC thrift Stores, or Mennonite Schools (we once had an IVEPer at rockway). Think SALT, but reverse it. See: MCC, SALT

MCC- Mennonite Central Commitee, the development organization affiliated with the Mennonite Church. Founded after World War Two to help Russian Mennonite Refugees, and has since expanded all over the world doing various work such as helping Co-ops get started, and other cool stuff. The best thing about MCC is that they do not force themselves on people, they wait for other organizations to ask for help before entering an area. The family we know are the Altys, who like everyone else on this list are cool.

MC Canada- Mennonite Church Canada, their name speaks for themselves, it's basically all of the Mennonite Churches in Canada (hence the name) coming together and working alongside each other. I love going to their annual conferences, but have missed the last two.

MC Canada Witness- The missions arm of MC Canada, their work here in South Africa is in developing ANISA. The couple here doing this work is Karen and Andrew Suderman, a couple from my home town (kind of, they are also connected to Winkler). My team mates and I really like them because they are really cool and fun, and have had us over a couple times have an x-box, and teach the girls to knit/ crochet (we'd like them even if they didn't have an x-box, and couldn't knit)

MMN- Mennonite Missions Network, like MC Canada Witness, but American. Their mandate here in South Africa is to help their three church partners here develop Social Ministries. This is the organization that runs RJ. There are two families here with MMN, the Lindel-Detweilers (aka Phil and Christine) who live here in Pietermaritzburg, and are completely awesome people who invite us to their house, and help us wrestle with the things we are experiencing here. The Sawatzkys (I'm sorry if I'm spelling your name wrong) are the other couple, they live/ work in Mthatha, with Bethany Bible School, helping African Churches build a firm theological foundation, they've got 4 crazy boys who love sports.

RJ- Radical Journey, if you don't know what that is, start at the first entry of this blog, and you'll figure it out. See: MMN

SALT- Serving And Learning Together, a one year program By MCC, participants aged 18-30 (I think) work for a year internationally with various MCC Partners. A program close to my heart because both of my parents did it when they were close to my age. See: MCC, IVEP

I'll write about the Actual Retreat in my next couple entries.

If he is with me...

So immediately after explaining to you that I don't write because there is nothing to write about, I immediately have two entries that I want to write. How's that for irony?

I realised a couple of months ago (I think it was October), that I didn't feel called to go to the school that I had planned on attending next year (the University of Waterloo for Social Development Studies), and that I should go straight into a pastoral ministry program instead. This was partially because I was reading one of the books that we have to read for Radical Journey called Dangerous Wonder by Michael Yaconelli, which talks about childlike faith, but it's also been something that I've been struggling with for a while, I just don't see putting off studying about God, to be worth the effort. So I applied to Emmanuel Bible College, and Tyndale University College, and left it at that.
This past week I got accepted to EBC, and after several days of basking in my happiness of being able to go to College, and doing what I feel God's Calling me to do, I went back into my usual “6” state (see my entry about the Enneagram), and began worrying about anything and everything that could go wrong with this such as how I was going to pay for college, how I'd pay off the debt I've taken to go on Radical Journey, and how I'd overcome my speech impediment when I preach (I have a really heavy speech impediment which makes it hard to understand what I say some times, my brother has literally translated what I've said for his friends before). And everything seemed to be impossible
But then yesterday at the Picnic, there was a time of worship, and we sang Hossana by Hillsong, which is about God's great providence, and seeing his Glory revealed on this earth, then Pastor Russel told us a story about a young man who wanted to be a missionary in Mongolia, despite his parent's wish for him to take on the family dairy business, and how he went to Yale, Seminary, and went off to Egypt for a missionary training program before getting sick and dying, and how he was totally committed to his cause.
Because of these things, I feel that God reminded me of the very strange events that led me to even to get to Africa, how I applied 2 months late, how I was supposed to be going to sweden, and how I didn't get my passport/visa back untill the day before I was supposed to go to Chicago, and how God's hand was in me getting this far. Now I know that God is with me, and if he is for me, then how can anyone stand against me?


And if anyone is interested, I am still waiting on Tyndale, so any prayers in that regard would be greatly appreciated.

Albert falls times two and fun times

So on friday, we went to a retreat center in a place called Albert Falls in order to have a forcasting (read: planning) session for next year.

We got their friday night, and ate the best T-bone steaks I have ever eaten (maybe that's because I don't eat very many t-bone steaks). Then we played games that night. First I played thirty seconds (kind of like South African Taboo) and failed miserably at it. Then we played spoons, during one round, the last spoon flew off the table, and there were two of us still fighting for it, so I pushed the table towards the other guy, and then dived for the spoon on the ground (which was quite fun).

Then on Saturday (It was a sleepover), we had times of worship and planning for the next year, there they talked about the evangelism goals they have (5 new members/person), effective strategies for reaching those goals, and how the structure for the youth would change. One of my friends here, Wayne, (the guy I pushed the table at), was going to become a senior leader, my Mentor Hein, the guy in charge of the youth, will be taking a more supervisory role, and a bunch of the other leaders were moved between different parts of the town, to make up for one of them leaving for a YWAM Discipleship training school.

On sunday we returned to Albert Falls, but instead of being at a retreat center, we went to a park for an all Church Picnic, which was really fun. The youth set it up so that those senior leaders that could afford it would pay more, and those of us that couldn't could bring less expensive stuff, and everyone was really cool with it, and very gracious. I took a couple of pictures before my camera died again (don't worry, I'll steal pictures off other people's facebook accounts once they get posted), then I played Cheat, and then President before spending 2 hours Braai-ing.

Now this is probably the most important role that one can do at a south african gathering. Braai would be our Barbecue, but they don't have hamburgers and hotdogs, they have real meat- steaks and porck chops and chicken wings, etc, and they eat it in quantities far greater than what we do (in fact, literally one of the first things we were told when we got here was that South Africa is one of the few places that consider Meat to be a staple). So for me to Braai, made me feel deeply connected with south african culture. (The other great thing about being the braiier is that it is our right to sample the meat as we cook it).

Then when we got home I got an SMS (read:text) from a friend from youth inviting us to go to Fantasia, a carnival, with his friends, Connie and I were the only two up for it, but the two of us went anyways, going on incredibly sketchy rides (on the swinging ship, our side gate was kept attached using wire), then we drove to a restaurant to get take out, and went up to World's view.

Pietermaritzburg is literally in the middle of a bowl of mountains, which makes for lot's of pollution and popped ears and other such problems, but it also means that if you get to the top of the Bowl (at a place called World's view), you have an epic view of Pietermaritzburg, especially at 10 o'clock at night with all of the light's shining).

We spent the night talking, and bonding, sharing stories and telling jokes, and growing our relationships with the people of Pietermaritzburg.

Sorry

Yeah, sorry I don't blog more often, but I really don't have much to say because:

1. We don't do much, after work we sit around and watch a tv show on our laptops, and I don't think you want to read about what Jim and Pam are doing on the office in season 4 (btw, we finally got season 4, so that prolongs our watching of the office, yay!)

2. I don't hate everything about africa, while there would be plenty of things to complain about, I've decided to not let them bother me, so I won't say anything about it.

3. I'm not good about talking about my feelings (hey I'm a guy, what do you expect), so That throws that option out to

So here is my blog

Hard work, and a new friend.

A church with a property the size as Breakthru has a lot of garden refuse (lawn clippings, tree trimmings etc), and Breakthru hadn't done anything with theirs for two years, so there is this massive pile of compost, just sitting in the corner of their property, and at one area about one story tall, so what did Breakthru do?

if you guessed have the RJ team clean it up, then you win a million dollars*. So for tuesday and wednesday there was always a couple of us either loading it up onto the trailer, or ripping branches out of the pile and stacking them to go into the trailer (it's a lot easier that way). So after 2 days of work in hot weather, we had managed to make a dent in the pile, we would have made a bigger dent, but we were waiting for fuel money to come back to the church, anyways, during our wait for fuel, we started prepping for the next load, and I heard what I thought was a cat, but I couldn't see anything, so I went back to work, 5 minutes later, Kyle finds this half starved kitten under one of the branches.

Now remember, we'd been working on this pile for almost two days and and had moved 4 trailers worth of refuse by this point. so how this kitten got there, we don't know (we think a momma cat abandoned it while we were eating lunch).

so Meet Dwight, our new kitten, who will be staying with us for the next few months, and hopefully helps our mouse problem.

*payable in Tim Dollars

"You didn't tell him about the missing jedi" ~Neimodian

"No need to report that to him untill there is something to report" ~Nute Gunray

Star Wars the Phantom Menace

some of you may be wondering why I haven't posted anything in 2 weeks, well that's because there isn't anything really interesting to report in terms of what we've been doing.

However, last week kyle got a package from home, with a lot of cool stuff in it, there was gum, and tea, and books, and best of all Mice Traps! Now, we have mice traps here, but the bait platform on them is made of metal, and not that sensitive, so they don't catch anything. Kyle got traps with plastic bait platforms, that are really sensitive, so we set them up, and then had team time, and then started watching the office (the other really awesome thing that Kyle got), when I go into the kitchen to grab something, I decide to check the trap and there are TWO mice trapped in it facing each other. I yelled, others came over, and we took pictures, and laughed, etc (these mice have been bugging us since we got here, our bottom cupboards smell like mouse poop, they deserve to die), eventually the festivities die down, I reset the trap, and we continue watching The Office, when we hear a snap, and we run to the kitchen, and another mouse is dead, by the next morning we had caught 7 mice!

So that's really the only interesting thing that I want to blog about.

And now it's time for Gabby's Grammar:

"He probably just puts cookie drops in it to make it black"

This means food colouring, and was referring to Christian's Recipe that he claims he can make called "Black Sauce Chicken Geoorge" but we don't know what it is, or what makes the sauce black.

Hectic Weekends, and Relaxing mondays

Hectic Weekends, and relaxed Mondays!


Kyle and I have come up with a new rule, whenever we are asked to do something, we will wait 10 to 20 minutes before starting, that way we only have to redo everything twice and not three times. Because enevitably someone else will show up with another vision of the way things should be done, and we will have to redo it.
Friday morning, Kyle and I got to work early to help set up the tent for the events. They had set the tent up the day before, and had left a bunch of table that needed to be set up. We started to set them up staggered so that everyone could have a view of the front (The way I was taught to do it in school when I set up for countless events), but when the decorators came, they told us that they wanted the tables set up in rows. Being the servant hearted workers that we are (and humble to boot!), we moved the tables we had started to set up, into rows, the decorators then realized that there wasn't enough room for everyone, so they want us to move the tables, take a guess what pattern they wanted. If you guessed staggered, you are right! So we had to reorganize the tables again, the way I had wanted to in the first place! Once the tables were set up, we spent the rest of the morning and into the afternoon hauling chairs from the sanctuary, the children's church, and the Balcony to the tent, and by the time we were done we were exhausted.
We wanted to take a rest, but then we had Kid's Klub in the afternoon, and Nathan, my group leader was sick so I had to lead his group, which is okay, except that they were 12 boys aged 10 to 12, all highly excited (having just played soccer), and not really interested in hearing about how God wants us to take care of the environment. So they were loud and squirmy throughout the lesson.
The next morning I got up early and went to the men's breakfast at the time it was supposed to start, which was a mistake because, everyone here runs on African time (if it happens today, great, if it happens tomorrow, even better), so we spent the next hour sitting around waiting for the food to cook, after we ate, we had some worship and speakers talk to us, and it was really good. Kyle and I then took home a whole lot of leftovers.
The girls went to a High Tea in the afternoon, when it was finished, Kyle and I started stacking chairs, and bringing them back to the sanctuary, after we had gotten most of the chairs returned and set up we were told that we had the chairs set up in the wrong order (we had realized that there were different chairs, and had put them in like groups, but didn't realize it matters where you put the different types of chairs. So kyle and I left, Lwandile (sound guy extraordinaire) behind to figure it out (because he knew what he was doing), and were finishing up moving the final chairs when we realized the tables were still set up in the tent and that there wouldn't be any parking on Sunday if we didn't take them down. So we worked until 8 at night stacking tables. After ward we bought pizza, which we had to pick up, because the Pizza Place wouldn't deliver to our street after dark, and watched a movie.
The next day we had to go to all three services to present a skit we had learned. Which went really well, and fit right in with Pastor Russel's Sermon (even though we hadn't planned on it). However, this meant being at church for 6 hours of service. That night we had to go to a leader's meeting, which consisted of watching a video and reading through some notes Pastor Russel had written. We could have saved about an hour by watching the video, and taking the notes home with us to read.
After a busy weekend, we were looking forward to a nice relaxing Monday Morning (our time that is specifically set aside as our sabbath), and having a debrief with Phil and Christine over coffee, when we found out that morning, that it was going to take up some time we were quite enthusiastic about it. We ended up spending the entire day there, and eating lunch and supper with them. I found out Nathan is “technologically informed” which is his way of calling himself a geek, and we had a long discussion of everything from hardware and software to Lord of the Rings. Before we left they let us ransack their movie and book collections, and we came home with over 20 books, and 7 movies which we are borrowing. Over all it was quite a nice day, and a really good sabbath.


And now time for Gabby Grammer

“You are fasting us up”
this sentence was uttered during the first week of orientation back in chicago, telling Kyle to slow down because he was walking to fast.

Camp

Breakthru runs these events called Encounter Camps, when people stay in the building next to us, for the weekend, and have praise and worship, and teaching sessions etc. This past weekend was Kids Kamp (yes that is the correct spelling), with what was supposed to be 30 kids, but ballooned to a total of 65 kids running around the church property.

I personally enjoyed the camp and found it a spiritually uplifting experience as a whole for both the campers and myself.

Interesting points of the weekend:

-Worship times-one of the coolest things I've ever experienced- 70 kids jumping around, praising God, defintiely a powerful experience.

-The Session about the Importance of the Cross- They showed 70 kids aged 10-14 years the crucifixion scene from The Passion of The Christ, which while it definitely helped the kids understand what Jesus Went through, probably traumatized at least a few of them. As well, there was a lot of focus on the Death of Jesus, without much focus on Jesus' Resurrection. If Jesus hadn't been resurrected, then his death would have been meaningless.

-One night, we had an alter call, then asked everyone who wanted to be closer to God could come up to the front, and we would pray for them, while I was praying that the one boy would be guided by the Holy Spirit, he fell over slain, It was amazing to be a part of what God was doing in his life.

-Kyle put the container of juice on one of the food tables (the one with all of the dishes, but none of the food), we didn't have any dishes after that

-I decided to bring out my harmonicas and the kids just couldn't get enough of them. I collected all of them after one of the breaks, but thought I was missing one. When kyle went to the pool after camp was over, he met one of the Kids, and the kid gave him back my harmonica.

And now for a new Feature: Gabby Grammer Where I'll share something that gabby has said-

today Gabby was talking about going to go to the Game Park tomorrow, and the animals that she'd see there, the animal she is most excited to see- Rhinosaurs

Holy Spirit Weekend

October 12, 2009.


This past weekend has been really important for my spiritual walk. For the last while I haven't really been able to connect with worship. I've been trying to figure out what I've been doing that's wrong, but I couldn't, then during Friday night Youth Celebration (once a month all of the youth cells come together for a joint worship service). They played the song Heart of Worship,

“I'm coming back to the heart of worship, It's all about you Jesus”

and that's when it clicked. It doesn't matter what I do, or how silly I look, it's not about me. The only thing that really matters is God. If I just focus on God then everything else just falls into place.
Later that evening, we split into areas, and we prated for the cell leaders, then Hein and his wife, prayed for all of the youth in our areas, and prophesied into our lives. When Hein prayed for me, he told me that God is saying “no excuses,” which really hit me, because I like to make excuses about why something goes wrong, I don't like to be accountable for my actions.
Hein also spoke into my life about my being here, and assured me that I am where God wants me to be, which was really reassuring because that is something that I have struggled with, I mean, I only have a highschool diploma, what good does that mean?
The Final thing Hein told me was that God is going to release into me a passion for the lost, which is good because I used to have a passion for that, but after six years in a school where everyone is either saved (the small minority), or are sick of religion (the vast majority) passion can die out.
The next night we went to prayer, and during it, they played a song which lyrics say

“The more I seek you, the more I find you,
The more I find you, the more I love you”

And that is so true, the more we seek God, the more we love him, and the more he works in our lives.
Then Sunday during Youth Service (there are three service at Breakthru: English, Zulu/English, and Youth), Pastor Russel (the head pastor) spoke about being on fire for christ, and afterwards asked people that haven't spoken in tongues before to come up to the front if they want to. I went up, and he prayed over us, and a lot of us started speaking in tongues which was really amazing. It's amazing because it's our spirits communicating directly with God, without our minds censuring what the spirit says. Then someone laid hands on me (I don't know who, my eyes were closed), and I instantly hit the ground, now I come from a charismatic church and I've felt the holy spirit before, but usually when I end up on the ground, I feel it coming, and I crumple to the ground , after trying to stay standing, this time I didn't have any warning, I was down on my back without warning!
During prayer that night, Pastor Russel again had people come up to the frond to be filled with the holy spirit, before going out this week to do evangelism, and again I went straight back again. But that wasn't the best part of of the prayer meeting, during the worship part, I felt a freedom to move like I've never felt before, and I just jumped, it was one of the most exhilirating feelings I've ever felt. I guess it's true what scripture says “Those who are free, are free indeed”.

Note to any current or former members of River of Life's Youth Ministry: Yes the title of this post was intentional