We finished up in Mozambique on the 7th and headed together back across the border into South Africa (with the slight hick up of our chappas – minibuses – finally turning up seven hours after they were supposed to…) for our month 4 debrief (we have a debrief at months 4, 8 and 11).
It was a great three full days together to relax and get refreshed, both physically and spiritually, before heading on to our next location. We were blessed to stay in a four star backpackers lodge with a bed each, hot water, even a small pool to cool off in, and then spend our mornings and evenings being fed in to with teachings that encouraged us to continue to seek out God with all we have, to address the baggage that each of us carries individually and to speak life into one and other and those we serve.
[Before I left Machava I had managed to read another few books that I had mentioned before, and those also gave me more challenges and growth. ‘Pray with Fire’ by Guy Chevreau was about the spiritual manifestations that can be found when waiting on the Holy Spirit (based on the Toronto Blessing); then ‘Shaping History through Prayer and Fasting’ by Derek Prince and ‘The Hidden Power of Prayer and Fasting’ by Mahesh Chavda got me thinking more about these spiritual disciplines, as well as introducing me to the discipline of ‘watching’ – intentionally staying up through the night to spend time in prayer; finally, I got half way through ‘Spiritual Warfare for every Christian’ by Dean Sherman before we left, which reminded me and gave me more detail about the spiritual battle we are all a part of].
In my next blog I’m going to try and detail for you about what God has been speaking to me personally about and challenging me in, so watch this space.
Then yesterday we headed out for our travel to Swaziland, and I can tell you that it was the shortest travel day we have had so far, by a long shot. We left our base in Nelspruit at about 1pm and arrived on to our ministry base about tyree and a half hours later, including our jump across the border and a stop at a supermarket on the way. Compared to the 30+ hours getting from SA to Mozambique was, or the 50+ hours between Beijing and Cape Town and you can appreciate how OK with us this was. In fact, following the race I think a journey the length of England would be something I wouldn’t bat an eyelid at any longer.
We’re based at an orphanage this month – El Shaddai ministries – and we’re with 2 other (different) teams again, and so the twenty of us will be playing with kids, caring for infants, painting some buildings/rooms, engaging with the community and more. We have a beautiful location at 4000 feet and some amazing views, and so the guys I am based with all went out on a hike today across some of the landscape nearby. I’ll close with an inspiring photo of the four of us.
