After the first full week of ministry, I can say that I have been challenged by the Lord in so many different ways. We have done ministry in several settings including children’s ministry, community outreach, and student ministry. Most of our ministry has been community outreach which has consisted of door to door evangelism and spreading the love of Christ to all we come in contact with. We’ve prayed for and witnessed many healings and salvations among people here in South Africa. It’s only been one week of full ministry and God has already blown me away in the mighty ways He has moved. There was one day a teammate (Amanda) and I met a man named Evidence in a community that we were evangelizing in. We helped him take down and fold his laundry and then began a conversation about the Gospel. He knew who Jesus was and he knew some of the stories of the Bible, but he had a hard time trusting in the Lord because he had been praying for healing for a stomach virus he had for over a year. He had on and off pain from this virus and he was frustrated with God because the doctors couldn’t diagnose his illness and God wasn’t doing anything to heal him. We continued to talk about how we need to have a child like faith and completely trust in the Lord. When we fully surrender our will to His and put all of our trust in Him, we give a lot more room for God to come and move within us. After some time, we prayed for Evidence to have child like faith and put complete trust in the Lord. We then prayed for healing in his stomach and commanded that all pain he was feeling would immediately leave his body and that the enemy would flee so that Evidence would have no doubt in the Lord. After we finished praying, Evidence told us that his stomach started to get warm, and that he felt so much better. He told us that he knew that today was the day he would begin to feel better and would finally be able to go search for a job again since he felt so much better. This was truly the work of the Lord. Evidence had been jobless and with stomach pain for over a year. All it took was true faith in the Lord to cast out the pain so that he could feel well enough to hopefully find a job. For me, this was absolutely incredible because I had never felt the presence of the Lord so strongly and been so confident in the ways that He can use me when I have child like faith too. I realized that in some ways, I am like Evidence. I get frustrated with the Lord when he doesn’t answer my prayers right away or when he gives me the answer of no. I lose faith and trust in the Lord. I believe that part of the reason I came in contact with Evidence was not only to heal him through Christ, but so God could teach me how powerful the He can be when I give up my will and lose all doubt I have in His omnipotence. To be honest, I was (and still am) terrified of talking to strangers about the gospel, but this interaction gave me more confidence. I am already dead to sin and I am made alive in Christ, my life doesn’t belong to me but it belongs to Him so there is no reason to fear. The enemy has loved being in my ear, telling me that I’m not a good enough Christian and that I’m not bold enough to share the story of Christ with others. It has been a battle that I have been going through, neglecting the help of Christ for several years. The last week has truly opened my eyes to the fact that I need to continue to let Christ work within me and receive his work generously because I am nothing without Him. Below is a picture of Amanda and I with Evidence after we had prayed for him and given him a copy of the gospel of John.
The ministry that has put me more in my element is our children’s ministry and student ministries, as you would expect from a youth ministries major who works at an elementary camp in the summer. During our lunch break while doing community outreach, we get spend time at the preschool that is run by Impact Africa (the ministry we are paired with this month) and play with and show love to the preschool students. We also get to do children’s ministry on Friday afternoons. On Friday afternoons we do what are called JK’s, which stands for Jabulani Kids. Jabulani is Zulu, a native language of South Africa, for “happy.” During this time we dance, play a game, share a bible story, learn a memory verse, play a game, and hand out candy (which they call sweeties). JK’s are held in different parts of the communities. We drive the van to the soccer pitch (soccer field) in an area of the community and host a JK outside and most of the kids will come right after school is over. After we finish one JK, we move to another soccer pitch in the community so we can reach more kids. It’s important for us to reach all the kids at a young age before they get involved in any gangs or substances. It’s very common for the children to get themselves involved in this styles of things by the age of 10 in the slum communities of South Africa. Below are some pictures of children’s ministry.
Another way that our entire time has been challenged is by being completely transparent and vulnerable with each other during our team times. The last week, we have spent most of our team time sharing our testimonies. Our team has been honest with each other about so many struggles we have gone through and are also currently going through. This has created such a deep bond between all of our team and I truly believe that sharing how God has worked in our lives and through our lives will make our team even stronger over the next three months as we continue to share the love of Christ to the nations. It helps us to know how to pray for and encourage each other. We can grow stronger together in each other and in Christ now that we can see how the Lord has worked and how the Lord is currently working in us. My team is incredible and I cannot wait to continue to do the work of the Lord alongside my teammates for the next three months.
