One 15 hour layover in Boston, a twelve hour flight to Qatar, a nine hour flight to Johannesburg, a few passport stamps and an accumulative 45 hours of travel later, our squad officially made it to the first country of our Race, South Africa, on Wednesday!
This month, four of the teams from our squad (22 of us total) are partnering with an amazing ministry in Johannesburg called Impact Africa. Although we’ve only been here for about four days, it’s already been amazing to see how the Lord is moving in Johannesburg through Impact Africa.
Our teams spent most of Wednesday recovering from jet lag, getting settled in, and learning about Impact Africa. Thursday, we spent the morning in the Apartheid Museum. Learning about apartheid, the impact it has on South African culture today, and Nelson Mandela was incredibly eye opening and humbling.
Yesterday our teams had our first day of ministry with Impact Africa. Every Friday, the staff at Impact Africa put together four mobile children’s programs in one of Johannesburg’s squatter camps, Diepsloot.
Diepsloot is a community about two miles in radius in which over 300,000 people live. Johannesburg is known for having a high population of people coming into the city for work from rural areas of South Africa as well as from bordering countries. These people typically set up temporary housing in areas like Diepsloot. Some may stay for a few months, others a few years.
When we arrived in Diepsloot, our teams split up and walked through the streets to tell the kids in the area that the program, Jabulani Kids, would be starting soon. The amount of excitement the kids in this community showed when they realized Impact Africa was there for their weekly program was astounding. These weekly programs are truly creating space for Impact Africa’s staff to build beautiful relationships with these kids every week that make them feel seen, known, and loved.
As the kids gathered, we set up for the program and got to exchange as many South African handshakes and learn as many names as possible. That’s when I met my friends Faith and T. The two sisters came over to the group and shyly stood off to the side for a minute, but it didn’t take them long to start dancing around with wide smiles along with the rest of the group.
For the next hour we got to dance and worship with our new friends, review the memory verse that they’ve been working on for the last two months, and share a Bible story of one of Jesus’ parables.
It was so special to hear the kids recite the memory verse, 1 John 5:20, with so much excitement. Standing there with them, I could tell that the kids who come to Jabulani Kids often definitely have that verse memorized and are learning so much about Jesus every week.
When they were done, we loaded up in the van and drove to another part of Diepsloot to do it all over again.
During our time in South Africa, it seems like we’ll be getting to spend some more time in Diepsloot and other squatter camps doing more children’s ministry as well as community outreach. I’m so excited to get to spend more time with the people in these areas for a couple of reasons, but one in particular.
Like I said before, the people living in these communities are coming into the city from other parts of the country and from neighboring countries. Sharing the Gospel and love of Christ with them has the potential to spread the Gospel much further geographically.
If a family from Zimbabwe moves into Johannesburg for work, learns about Jesus, and then moves back to Zimbabwe, the news of Jesus goes with them.
HOW COOL IS THAT?!
I’m so excited to see the Lord move in huge ways this month and am looking forward to sharing His stories with you.
I’m fasting from social media this month, so you won’t be seeing anything from me outside of blogs. So if you’d like to stay up to date with what our teams will be doing during our time at Impact Africa, make sure you subscribe for blog updates at the top of this page. 🙂
I love you. Thanks for sharing in this journey with me.
