It’s unfortunate that we were only able to spend two weeks in Cape Town, South Africa. This month has by far been one of my favorite months. Cape Town reminds me so much of home in Southern California. The weather is great, and the people are beyond sweet. This month we have received blessing after blessing from the Lord. When you depend on the Lord more, its ridiculous how much more he provides. I wish we had more ATL months on this trip.
View when driving through to Cape Town
For our month of ATL each person on a team had $340 dollars to live off. That means with the six of us we collectively had $2,040. Mind you we also had to get from Malawi to South Africa, and pay for all our visas. So upon arrival in Cape Town, we needed to figure out our remaining balance. Once we figured out the total, there wasn’t much left to pay for our trip back to Johannesburg, food, and lodging. So when one doesn’t have much money, the food category suffers. Typically on a regular month we get $4 a day for food per person. To make ends meet on ATL we went down to $2.50 a day. I was the main food/cook on our team, so the idea of trying to prepare 3 meals a day for 6 people on $15 a day worried me. But when you don’t have much, that’s when the Lord really shows up and provides.
Our ministry for the month was an organization called MES. It’s a place that helps homeless and prostitutes. They graciously offered to provide us lunch for our services, which was something that we never expected to receive. Great, that means I only have to worry about two meals a day! Well, another blessing that came our way was a lovely couple called Duffy and Jostine. Our first night in Cape Town, they made a huge feast for us. Throughout our two-week stay they would invite us over for a meal or show up at our house bearing gifts. Whenever our team ate at their house, there was so much food available that we usually felt like stuffed Thanksgiving turkeys when we were done eating. Some days they would stop by say hello, and hand us a bag of some goodies inside. They provided for us, when we didn’t have the money. Thanks again Lord.
Me climbing some rocks to get a better view of the sunset
Another blessing that came our way was money. While on our road trip we met a family that let us stay at their home for the night. They fed us an amazing game meat meal, had a wonderful time of fellowship, and at the end blessed all on our team with a monetary gift. As for me, I was the only one on my team not fully funded. We were supposed to be fully funded by the beginning of the New Year, and I was still $2000 shy from that goal. I started getting the phone calls from AIM saying that if I didn’t have the money in by Jan. 15th, that I would then be sent home. I didn’t know what more to do other than pray. On the 14th I looked at my account in the morning and saw that it hadn’t change. I went about my day and at night on the same day I looked at my account again and saw an anonymous donation of $1,000 dollars. Thanks again Father for blessing me yet again. More money began to flow in after that day, to the point of me now being nearly fully funded.
WaterFront in Cape Town
So yes this month consisted of blessing after blessing. When we thought something would be difficult or practically impossible, life just seemed to work. Before this month, I had never eaten nor lived in such great living conditions on the race. The Lord is good, and when you depend on His provision He provides, sometimes even better than expected.
