Adventures WorldRace SethBarnes Sponsorship Giving

| by archiveworldraceblogs

This week was our first week of ministry at Pop Up and for the most part I’ve been on the computer all week. Originally I didn’t see myself doing computer jobs for mission work, but now I have realized it is one of the most helpful things I can do. A lot of joy has come with that change in perspective, and I want to serve however I can and love the jobs I’m given.
 
Here is what I did during most of the week:
 

Computer Class: I helped students in the computer class as they learned how to use Microsoft Word. This sounds easy, but it is a challenge teaching computer skills to adults who grew up without one in their home. Ironically, they are still figuring out how to comfortably use a keyboard and mouse while learning functions on Word that most people in the US don’t even know about. Their assignments are to create documents that look exactly like handouts they are given, but it becomes a struggle to explain basic changes when their documents are formatted in incredibly funky ways from trial and error. This was fun though and the students are learning great skills that will help them get jobs in a globalized world.

 

Data Capturing: There is an online database of info for students at Pop Up, and a group of us helped enter this data from handwritten forms. This was interesting because most of the original writing was hard to read. Also, the spellings of African names and locations are way different than anything we were used to. (Just to give you an idea: a few street names were “Nammanskraal, Mmakaunyuna, and Kaalfontein.”) Even the formats of address and education were something we had to figure out, but this was great for problem solving skills.

 

Excel Formatting: This was my favorite job because I love having the chance to do really specific tasks that I can feel successful at. For this job, I helped the finance person program the Microsoft Excel framework on the confidential donation reports that get sent to the South African government. This was extra challenging because the documents were in a different language (Afrikaans), a different currency (rand), and the formatting had to be completely different as well. For example, the number 1,000.00 is written here as “1 000,00” and negative numbers are in parenthesis, so I had to change my computer to recognize this as a number on Excel to do all the math functions correctly.

 

Today (Saturday) our group went downtown to create our own ministry with Russell and another local. We found a nearby park where we could play worship music and find people to talk to. It was crazy to see all of the God encounters that happened and people who asked for prayer.
 
We met a lot of people from other countries, including a bunch from the DRC (Congo) who spoke French and very little English. At the right time, God sent two Christian teenage boys who spoke French and could help us out.
 
We played with a lot of children, including a young boy who has no father and gets dropped off unsupervised at the park everyday by his working mother. We were able to have fun with them and let them know they were loved, by us ridiculous looking Americans but even more by Jesus.
 
We prayed for a lot of people who wanted to be prayed for. One man asked for cigarette money but left with joy instead. Two police officers came to see what we were doing then wanted prayer for their families. Many others had conversations with us as well. So many people are religious down here and claim to be Christians, but don’t personally know Jesus or live in freedom and joy. That’s what we are seeking to give them with the help of the spirit.
 
After that a few of us went to a youth soccer game. There are a few boys that always stop by Pop Up to hang out and they invited us to their game, which happened to be on a field at the correctional facility. Both kids and adults were so encouraged to see us there cheering and we were also able to visit and pray for more people, including the coaches who are serving the kids who need something to do.
 
I used to be intimidated about doing stuff like this, but my perspective is changing. It’s easier to live without reservation when love overflows for both God and others. Now I’m less concerned about unimportant things like self-image and more concerned with what I’m called to do for the kingdom.
 
God is using our group for great things and I love being part of it. I am very blessed and excited to do stuff like this for the rest of the year.