It is truly amazing as we stand back and look at God’s handiwork. Take for instance our flight from Chitown to London. Our group is actually two teams that joined together for the purposes of getting a group airfare. When we were boarding the plane in Chicago, we met up with three other missions groups that were also heading to South Africa. One was a group that was led by a guy who was on my last trip here in October. All five groups were staying on the same flights through to Nairobi, Kenya. The back third of the plane was all full of high school and college students going to share the Gospel. Now, we all wont see each other the rest of the trip, but it was a blessing knowing that we will all be praying for each other.
This morning, we had our team orientation at the Gestring Home. We spent some time discussing the Lord’s agenda for our trip, a lot of time praying, and being blessed by some beautiful African voices singing worship. There are so many students that we are staying in three different places. Some are staying in the Gestring home, some are staying at the church’s parsonage, and I am staying at the Janz (IMB missionary family) home. I am blessed as the Janz family home feels almost like I am in my own home. Mr Janz’s name is Dennis. He has 5 children, two of which are girls and are my girls’ ages.
Anyway, after we had our morning orientation, prayer, and tea we joined the whole nation of South Africa in celebrating the World Cup. Today was the last day of school as the entire country is re-arranging all the breaks to coincide with the WC. Today at noon, the entire country was to sing the South African National Anthem and then blow vuvuzelas (plastic 3 foot horn) for five minutes. Our group of 20 joined in the festivities.
We then ate lunch and headed out to the village where we will be spending the next several days. We will be doing soccer clinics in the mornings, prayer walking in the afternoon, and then we will be showing the Jesus Film one night and three nights of WC matches. At half-time each night, two of the Tswana students will be sharing their testimonies.
We started going from house to house inviting people to come and asking them if we could pray for them. (The houses are mostly just tin lean-to shanties with tin roofs, most of them no more than 10-20 feet in length and about 10 feet in width.) I am asking all to pray specifically for one lady. As my two teammates and I walked up to house, I saw some drums. From my time living in Haiti, I knew those to be witch doctor drums. When the lady came out of the shack, she was draped in animal skins and had gourd hanging around her neck. I knew that look even that she had on her face and I could hear in her voice as she was talking with our interpreter that she was not happy to see us. A man and several other people immediately approached us in a hostile attitude. There was another lady on the side of the house that was mashing up different things in a large wooden pestle. While our interpreter was talking, I felt led by the Lord to put my hand on the house and start praying against the demonic forces. When we left, our interpreter confirmed that the lady was the village witch doctor, and that the other lady on the side of the house was grinding up the ingredients for curses and such things. Please pray for this lady’s salvation and that God would break the fear that she holds over the rest of the village. Pray that they would come and “check out” the Jesus film or the soccer matches and testimonies. Pray that God would use us as a tool to bring this woman and her family into a relationship with Jesus.
Well, that is all for tonight. We will be starting our first day of clinics tomorrow. Pray that God will be glorified and that His kingdom will by multiplied. Pray that none of us get hurt, and pray for no technical glitches.
