“We didn't know any South African Christmas traditions so instead we hastily cut the shape of a baobab tree out of two pieces of cardboard and slotted the pieces to make a tree. We wrote the first name of all the children in Zwelisha on pieces of card, tied them with a ribbon and hung them on the tree….”
Over this past week many areas in Southern Africa have experienced high winds and heavy rainfall particularly Zambia in the Kabwe and Chisamba regions have been hit very hard.
There has been significant damage caused to a number of homes within the communities we serve. In some cases, homes collapsed in the night, leaving families with nowhere to go.
The Watchword brings a sense of unity, knowing that the verse being shared is being shared across Africa and around the world. We know that whilst we are here in South Africa, other people are sharing the same Watchword in other countries. There is power in being a part of something way bigger than just where we are.
We faced many challenges along the way because people thought that if you were doing something like this, you should get money. They would also point to the work and say that it was for women and that men are supposed to be working for their families. But the relationships that I had built with the children made me unable to say no.
“They both thought of God as a distant figure, someone not to be approached, someone whose love had to be earned. They came to Africa with thoughts of “fixing problems,” especially practical problems. However, through their first couple of trips, they began to see their own brokenness and the brokenness of the world around them, and, more importantly, they began to see God’s desire to bring healing and restoration”
The two of us who had previously gone to Africa through Hands at Work shared stories of what we might have experienced while there — stories of Holy Home Visits, attending local churches, and building relationships with long-term volunteers. At the end of the two weeks, the team realised that we would have arrived home. We agreed that we did not want to stop meeting.
One of our first tasks was bridging the gap between the government health authorities – who were making the decisions about which essential services could stay open and what people could or couldn’t do – and the communities that are off the map, where the needs amongst the poorest people are the highest.
