I wanted to post this because I want you to know the realness of the situation. My team is very safe! We are having a great time. Do not worry. But I just wanted to keep you all up to date.
The first day we arrived to Port St. John, our host informed us of the safety of the little town. It’s so small, everyone knows each other here and, we were informed, it’s safe enough that if we so wished, we could walk somewhere by ourselves (don’t worry mom and dad, we didn’t do that). That afternoon, a teammate and I went on a run around town. The town of Port St. John is beautiful and because of this, the run was so enjoyable we began to loose track of time. Dusk approached faster than we expected as the sun here sets around 5:30pm. Our run began to pick up pace as we realized we needed to return home soon. Being new to the town, we turned early and ended up running down one street over from where we were staying. As we ran we noticed a man walking in the shadows of the street. Instead of continuing his walk, he stopped and walked directly in the middle of the path of where we were running (in the middle of the street). Spreading his arms wide, bending his knees and swaying back and forth as if he were playing defense on a basketball court, 15 feet from us, he waited for us to attempt to pass him. As we went to run around him, he lunged for me, missed, and then lunged for my teammate. “No” I screamed at him loud enough for the entire neighborhood, other afternoon walkers and everyone at the near by soccer field to hear. Startled by my scream, he jumped back. Hearts beating fast our pace increased again and we made it home within a few short minutes.
The next day our host took us to the market to buy fresh food for our upcoming meals. As my teammates and I waited for our host to go through the checkout line, I saw the man from the street heading to exit the store in the corner of my eye. I quickly turned around and discretely pointed to my teammates the man I had told them about the night before. As I was whispering to them, he turned around. It was if I had yelled at him, “Hey! Here I am!” He had spotted me. Without taking his eyes off of me, he circled back into the store away from the entrance he was just about to exit. I couldn’t believe it. He had entered back into the store, walked through an empty checkout line and was now walking straight to me. It was if he just wanted to walk past me, just to breath on me. And he did. As he passed my group he whispered to me, “Hi”, and kept on walking. When he began to reach the exit once again, he stopped at a small counter on the side where customers could buy a loaf of bread. There, he planted himself and there he watched me. Never had I seen a black man with such green eyes. The outer coat of his eyes, which, in any normal person would be white, were bloodshot and stained yellow. There was no discreetness about him watching me. When he knew my teammates and some of the boys (we were staying with) were watching him, he did not turn his head. Instead he stood there, watching. I clung to the boys as we left and for a short time he followed us until one of the boys approached him and told him to leave.
That afternoon myself, three of my teammates and a local boy named Josh (connected to our ministry) went on a run. Towards the end of our run we went to cross over a bridge. On the other side of the road we saw the man with the green eyes. He rushed over to the side of the street that we were on and immediately singled out one of my teammates from the group and tried to grab her. Josh got in the middle and pushed him away. “He’s crazy”, he later told us. He used to be a smart university student and good-looking guy but he got involved with a witch doctor, dropped out of school and started taking drugs. The more we found out about this guy the more of a threat he became to us. His name is Sam and he is about 28 years old. Apparently, his mother has 3 boys, all mentally unstable and/or on drugs. She locks them up in the house in order to keep them out of trouble, but they often lash out against her. He was arrested a few months ago for sexual assault and was recently released from jail. He has a reputation at the local high school of showing up and threatening both the students and the teachers. I didn’t like hearing any of this and, as we were taught in our training, I reported all of it.
That same afternoon, it happened again. Sam tried to grab same teammate while she was walking into the market with other teammates. He had his target and he was persistent with her.
When we told the locals what was happening, no one seemed to take it seriously. “He’s just messing with you, he won’t actually harm you. He just wants to scare you,” they said. But that wasn’t going to do it for us.
That night none of my team members slept. At 4am we were all wide-awake feeling frightened and alone without knowing that anyone else was as well. Soon enough one spoke up and whispered, “Is anyone awake?” her question was quickly answered by everyone. That morning we prayed for hours.
When the sun arose and our host had awakened, I informed him that none of us could sleep. I told him we couldn’t stay if we were going to be living in fear. He kindly walked us to the police station where we informed the police. The police responded by letting us ride in their car around town to point out the man who had tried to grab our teammate. When we found him, the police threatened him and he became angry. He yelled at my teammate and then sprinted away.
A few days later an older member of our ministry later saw him again passing by our house, ran after him and threatened him.
That was the end of it. Or so we thought. We left town with our ministry that weekend for a campout retreat, to return for a few days and then leave town again for 5 days to another town to help with a ministry there. We returned the 19th and began working again with our ministry in Port St. Johns. My team was at peace. We still saw Sam around town, but when we did he would ignore us or occasionally yell out something that made little to no sense. He started to seem harmless… Until Friday hit.
Friday we were working with our students in the school courtyard. A few minutes before the bell rang for them to go back to class, in bolts Sam heading straight for us. The older gentleman, Charles, who had threatened him before, grabbed a sharp, large rock, and threatened to bash it into his head if he didn’t leave immediately.
Sam toyed with him for a little bit running away and calling Charles to come and get him. One of the strangest things to me was that Sam didn’t care who saw. Clearly he was out of his mind. Eventually Charles chased him away. Sam ran off to the nearby elementary school, where he tried to grabbed a little girl who was outside playing. The little boys in the school defended her as best they could, until Charles arrived to pick up his own son. When Sam saw Charles he picked up a shovel and started smashing it into the ground, screaming and threatening Charles. After this event Charles went straight to the police.
That was the final straw for us. We could no longer do efficient ministry when we knew that we could be in danger. The police could not arrest him because, they informed us that they don’t have any room in the jail. All the cells were taken up with “stabbers”. We were not willing to wait around to leave until it was too late, allowing any of Sam’s threats become realities. Once it reached that point, our staff at Adventures helped us arrange to leave and serve in a different location for the remainder of the month.
The Adventures In Missions staff was very helpful. They were ready to relocate us if and when we said that we were ready. This experience made me trust in the leadership we have even more. Zach, our squad leader is with us now and has helped walk us through leaving. I and my team are very thankful he is here with us.
I tell you this story because I want you to know what is honestly going on here and why we are leaving our ministry early. Please know that Port St. Johns is, besides Sam, a welcoming, safe place. We have LOVED our time here. The town is very accepting and loving. The reason we didn’t leave right away is because 98% of the time we felt totally safe. There is a lot of need here. There are a lot of people who go hungry at night. Even our ministry host will often go to bed hungry because he gave his meal away to someone else. Our host is a 6’1” man who is probably 120 pounds, because he literally gives away everything. He once told me as we were cooking together, “Lyndi, I could go hungry, I could go naked, but as long as I know the name of the Lord is being praised, I will rejoice”. For some of us, this is a cute quote, and we figuratively live this out. But to watch some one live that out the way Solomon does… It has changed my life.
Telling our ministry that we had to leave early was one of the hardest things I’ve had to do in my life. Our host is an amazing man of God. He does not have much, but what he does have he is quick to give up to further the work of God and to help someone else. Honestly, I feel like we are leaving at a terrible time. One of the boys in the home, who had just lost his father, found out he might have cancer and will be getting the test results back from the doctor on the 29th. His mother came to the ministry house and cried heart-breaking tears as we prayed over her. Another boy who struggles with seizures, among other medical issues, was pushed at school and his once perfect smile hit the concrete, breaking out his two front teeth. He came home shaken and bruised. Two other boys left the home without telling our host and went missing for 3 days making our host so upset he couldn’t eat.
Knowing all of those things and then telling him now we too have to leave broke me. Outside help is what keeps this ministry running. Our host is one man who works a job as a receptionist at a guesthouse so that he can feed, house and provide for the 15 boys that live under his care. His life is so unbelievably hard, yet he seeks the Lord’s will in all he does. He teaches these boys how to love the Lord, helping many of them who were once addicted to drugs and or alcohol become clean and live in freedom. He holds them to a higher standard then they might even hold themselves and walks along side them encouraging them to study hard so that one day they can go to a university like some of his past students.
There is so much good that has been done here and I don’t want to let the enemy win and I don’t believe he has. If you are reading this and think to yourself, I would love to help that man and his ministry in some way, here is what they need:
- Bunk beds– The boys share 2 rooms which consist of 4 beds. They often sleep on the floor when they don’t have a bed.
- A refrigerator– Everyday Solomon has to go to the store to buy food to make that night because nothing that buys the day before can be refrigerated.
- Shelves for food– All the food they have that doesn’t rot right away are in boxes on the floor
- Paint– Their house is in dyer need of a new paint job
- Rain gutters– all are broken around the house
- Money for food and electricity
- Plants for their garden
- Towels– all the boys in the house use one of two towels
- Shelves to put the towels and other bathroom things on
- Money for fixing up the shower– Everyone in the house takes bucket showers, meaning everyone dumps a bucket on their head and that is how they shower.
- Money for University- (Scholarships for the boys) Many of them have a parent that died and were raised by just their mother or their extended family. They don’t have jobs because they are full time students (meaning they even have school on Saturday and Sunday). They have no way to make money but have a large desire to go to a University.
- Money for Solomon to get married- Solomon has been dating a very sweet woman and one day he would love to marry her, but marriage is very expensive and all the money he has goes towards his ministry.
- Help Songs get his teeth fixed- He has a lot of medical issues and now is struggling to eat because his nerves in his teeth have been damaged. He is still joyful though and even told me how excited he was to go to church a few days later.
- Prayers for this amazing ministry we are leaving
If you would like to donate to this ministry, click on a link below.
http://www.backabuddy.co.za/student-hostel
Visit to make a donation www.payfast.co.za/donate/go/portstjohnsyouthministry
Port St Johns Youth Ministry
Thank you for reading. Thank you for caring. Our team is now headed to Port Elizabeth for a few days before we go to Nelspruit where we will meet up with the rest of our squad and prepare to go to Swaziland. Please pray for safe travels.
