Siboniso, aka, Punu, aka Chad is 23 years old, parent-less, and lives with his gogo (grandmother). We met him at our care-point we stayed at in Fontotje, Swaziland.
He is apart of the Hope Rises team that we worked with for the entire month. Our team worked with them in plastering the preschool built at the care-point and a kitchen at another care-point.
In my first interaction with him I found out he was having nose bleeds. When I found this out our team laid hands on him and prayed for him.
He later told him he had been having them at least once a week which I really didn’t think was normal. So I automatically thought it could be a sign of HIV.
About a week later he said he hadn’t had anymore nosebleeds.
I still was worried about him though.
So as I began forming this friendship with Punu, I found out how amazing he is.
I began seeing several things: his gentle spirit, how sweet he is, his kindness, respect, good heart, love for the Lord, his awesome dance moves!, how he radiates the Lord, humbleness, and crazy potential. He just isn’t like the other Swazi men.
As the month went on, the Lord was working on my heart for Punu. So I prayed for a few conversations to happen with him, mainly a conversation to ask him if he’d ever been tested for HIV.
One night some of the team went to some Pakistani’s house for dinner (yeah, weird they are in Swaziland, I know). But that night I had an awesome conversation with Punu.
I asked him more about his dreams and what he wants to do in his life which was really cool to hear. I fought with God the whole time though trying to decide when he wanted me to ask Punu about the HIV. So I just asked him when I thought it was right. He said people in his family had died from it and told me he’d been tested before but he needed to be tested again…
So I offered to take him and get him tested. He agreed to go.
The next day I wasn’t sure if he was going to come with me to the clinic.
I ended up having a break down moment where I just started to bawl my eyes out. My heart was so heavy and burdened for Punu. The Lord laid him on my heart so hard and my heart broke for him. So I stayed back and didn’t go to the clinic with the girls to pray for people there. Instead I went with Steve and Kelly to the market for Steve to get minutes for his phone because my heart definitely wasn’t in the right place to go to the clinic without Punu. On the way there, I talked a lot out with them and they were so awesome in speaking life into me and encouraging me. When we made it to the market we saw one of the ladies that cooks for us and after a couple of minutes Punu showed up out of nowhere! It was totally God. He asked if we were still going to the clinic and he said he would meet me. It didn’t end up working out that day but the next day it did.
Punu, Corine-our ministry contact, April and I went to the clinic that next day. We waited a long time while he was getting tested and the whole while I was praying for him I was thinking: what in the heck am I supposed to say to a guy who is HIV positive.
But boy did the Lord have my back. Punu came out that day and said both tests were invalid, neither positive or negative. He actually had 2 tests done but neither of them would work.
So they told us to come back the day we were leaving Fontotje to get a different test done.
So the last day in Fontotje, we took Punu to the clinic one last time while everyone else left to go to the squad debrief site. Me, April, John, and Vinny all went which was such a huge thing to me to have their support and prayers for Punu. It was such a perfect day and I definitely had a peace about going that day to the clinic and leaving Fontotje too. It was so the Lord’s timing for the test. So we prayed for Punu before he went in to be tested and were in prayer all day long.
The main guy in charge at the clinic told us Punu would have to come back either way either to get his CD4 count after a week or to get a second test in 3 months to make sure the virus wasn’t hiding.
So Punu came out of the testing room not sad not extremely happy but still had a small smile on his face like usual.
Once we got outside, I slowly asked him what the results were. He told me he would have to come back in 3 months and showed me the sheet with his results…which meant HE IS NEGATIVE!!!!
That day God totally showed me how amazingly sovereign and mighty he was in that situation. It still blows my mind the results were what they were. 50-90% of the people in Swaziland have HIV, how could Punu not. I believe it was the Lord.
I have such a hope and love for Punu and I don’t want anything holding him back from living a full life that he desires and deserves. I prayed for a miracle in his life this month and God showed up. It’s awesome how much the Lord was apart of the situation. I prayed for the conversations to happen with him and they happened. It’s cool too how I usually don’t have a lot of grace on people but with Punu it’s so different. Even if he is still stuck in sin I have the mind set of saying AMEN to where he’s at.
It was so freaking hard to leave Punu and Fontotje though. My heart was definitely left there with all the people that we met. I pray that my heart for them and Swaziland doesn’t leave me, and that I’ll have the same heart for it even after the race.
My prayer for Punu: Lord, help him make smart decisions in the future, to save himself, make him pure again, let tradition and culture not reign in his life, Lord be in control, help him live up to the potential and plan you have for him, reign in Punu’s life and in all the Hope Rise’s people and everyone dear to my heart from Swaziland.
This blog doesn’t even do the experience or the month any justice but I hope this video will show you a little more of my good, DEAR friend Punu and his amazing heart.
