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