Last month, ministry looked a little different due to some changes in our route. We spent all month at Manna Church in White River, South Africa. Two months in South Africa and I am not complaining – it's my favorite country 🙂 We lived as a whole squad in our tents and helped the church with random tasks throughout the day – cleaning, gardening, cooking, cleaning and gardening some more. I've never seen a more immaculate onion garden in my life.
All of the staff at Manna cared for us so well and when we had a bout of the flu/random African bug come through the squad, they let whoever was sick sleep inside the church youth room, which was so great. Except when you get sick in the middle of the night and the doors are locked and it's storming outside so they can't hear you knocking and the electricity goes out and the other bathroom is dark, scary, and far away from everyone else.
And boy did they have thunderstorms/windstorms like nobody's business in that town. But through the sickness, and the thunderstorms, and tents that tried to blow away while you were still in them – we survived.
And we thrived. It was a month of great community, tea times, many ministry projects, and it ended with a wonderful Thanksgiving dinner.
Now we are in Swaziland for month six! Due to political unrest, Mozambique is too dangerous to enter so we won't be going there anymore. However, we got all of our India Visas and will be leaving for India at the end of December!
~*~
Here in Swaziland we are living the type of African lifestyle I expected when I signed up for the race. Friendly smiles greet us as we walk down a dirt road, men hold hands with their friends and soccer is the community sport.
Our living situation is vastly different in comparison to the cities we've lived in the first half of the race and mud huts and open fields surround the small building my team and two other teams call home.
Sometimes we have running water that runs at the pace of a slow trickle and makes showering tricky – sometimes we don't have any water to shower – and sometimes we choose not to shower because of the bats.
Our worship sessions are interrupted with bugs and reptiles larger than they should be. There are strange ones that resemble monstrous centipedes/small snakes and there are frogs that seem to appear out of thin air every night.
There is an eclectic chorus of roosters, goats, cows, turkeys, chickens and dogs all who show up with the children for the day and go home with them at night.
~*~
The main point of our ministry this month is visiting care points around Nsoko. There are ten different locations we visit where kids come to play and receive lunch.
We spend our time there playing with the children, scouting out the happiest babies willing to be held, and teaching a short Bible lesson. A lot of the kids here are sponsored and so my team has been working on taking pictures of the kids for their profiles to send to their sponsors.
If we're not visiting care points, we are gardening in the community garden, trying to tell the difference between snake eggs and chicken eggs and digging up trees with thorns the size of my pinky.
We also have random maintenance tasks around the AIM base, and make home visits to the gogos (grandmothers) and other families in the area.
The other day we visited a little boy, 3 years old, who had tuberculosis for 10 days. We gave him the food he needed for his medicine to work. When he got the food he held our hands and jumped up and down with the biggest smile on his face.
~*~
Something you can pray for during our month here would be for renewed energy – we're halfway through the race and starting to get a little tired. Also, some of us have had bad dreams while we're here so please pray for restful and comfortable sleep during the nights.
I'm thankful to have people like you who read my novel of blogs – are praying for me and my team – and support me in ways you don't even realize.
Thanks for loving me and being a part of this journey – God is showing up – kids are being loved – grandmothers are being told they are appreciated and they're lives are special – and he has his hand in every ounce of hope being poured out in this place.
All my love,
Em
