happenings

HIV Positive

Although at least one in four, sometimes as many as one in three people have been diagnosed positive for HIV in South Africa, it’s still a pretty big deal when someone opens up to you enough to admit it.  Yet as we offer to pray for people here in Masi, they are sharing their needs for healing from this ravaging disease.

Nightmares No More

Wednesday a few members of the Norman team prayed for a young woman who had been having scary dreams.  When we stopped in to check on her Thursday, she said she didn’t have any bad dreams last night!  

Sunday Best

Many churches in this area require their attendees to wear a super fancy outfit to services.  Thus, most of the poor in Masi cannot attend church.  Which is probably fine, since most of the churches are not preaching the true gospel anyways!  Our heart is for the people of Masi to see that God doesn’t just live in a fancy church building that they’re not allowed into, but that He actually lives in people - who live in shacks in Masi!  Our goal is to disciple them in such a way that church begins to happen in homes and meeting places all over Masi, where every child of God is participating in communion with the family of Jesus, regardless of how they’re dressed.

No Jobs

The unemployment rate in Masi is unbelievably high.  Everywhere we walk we see men and women and teenagers just sitting around because they cannot find any work.  Subsequently, alcoholism wreaks havoc on the community.  Many of the times we stop to pray for someone, we’re praying that God would provide work for them.

Children

Wednesday we hosted a party for the Vulnerable Children - which are children who are either orphaned or have sick parents and are being sponsored by the Vulnerable Children Ministry.  We made cards with them, fed them sandwhiches and lemonade, and sang songs.  Jen and Amanda got to share the gospel with two little girls and led them in a prayer to receive salvation.

Thursday was a holiday - Ascension Day.  How appropriate!  The kids were free from school for the day, so we managed to have a pack of them following us pretty much at all times.  After a few failed attempts to meet with people we had met on Wednesday, we decided to just go with what we had at the moment - a half a dozen runny-nosed kids.  We found a modest wooden platform to sit on, and gathered the little guys all around.  Amanda began to tell them stories via a translator named Vovo.  She animatedly told the story of Creation and a little about Jesus while Sean and I each held a snuggling child.  Every few minutes another child or two would join in as word got out that the strange white people were telling stories in the alleyway.  We taught them a song or two and they sang their own songs for us as well. 

We returned to the same part of Masi on Friday to tell more stories and sing more songs.  We were warmly received by a young woman with two children and her house promptly filled with over twenty kids listenting to the stories of Jesus!