Finally.....

Family!

Finally, i got me a blog goin on! Forgive me for taking so long to do this, i've had to explore alternate options because the AE one isn't quite ready yet.......... Much thanks actually to an undisclosed friend whose own blog reminded me to do this.

So much has happened in the time i've been here. I think what i'll do is gradually put y'all on. Things are blessed though. It's been madd nice to be back with Carmz and also to be moving into my calling and passions you know? More on all that later.

But an exciting thing that happened yesterday - God is too amazing. Carmz, myself and a fellow Intern by the name of Hloni were on our way to the nearby city of Durban for a UN conference on "Youth and Crime Prevention" - big things right? Well after the 1hr trip there we're signing in and none of our names are on the list, even though we're holding our confirmation printouts in our hands! So they're checking and checking and finally it comes out that you can't get in except by invitation! Why didn't anybody tell us this? They were advertising the event on the radio and the website had no restrictions neither was it mentioned that you had to be invited. So we were feeling kind of bummy about this, but not too bummy because there's a beach in Durban........was raining though.

Next, I decided to introduce Carmz and Hloni to this Rev Berryl who I'd been working with in setting up an AE mission to DUT (a Durban University). She's a very hospitable lady and her church, St. Aidan's, is very socially responsible i.e. they're involved in some amazing community work, etc. So we get there and she immediately offers us lunch (which was well received) and then she mentioned that they are housing 35 refugees in their church hall! These are refugees from the recent xenophobic attacks here in SA (check out this webpage if you aren't familiar with this http://www.thetimes.co.za/specialreports/Xenophobia/Default.aspx?id=380077&gclid=CODjyoOSgJQCFQaYQAodiR-HWw ) All of these refugees were either from the DRC or Burundi. We all sat in a circle and shared for somewhere around 2hrs - it was such a powerful time! Here we were trying to get into some UN conference that didn't want us and instead God sends us right to "ground 0" to deal with the issues firsthand you know? We shared who we were then spent a good amount of time hearing each of their stories - that was really emotional for a lot of them. There has been so much separation of families; none can repatriate their countries because they were fleeing very dangerous situations; the government hasn't produced solutions for them and has discouraged them from hoping to be relocated to a "safer" country; the UN hasn't produced any solutions; most have no work; some can't send their kids to school; the list goes on - all that to say that these are people who are really suffering. We really tried to encourage them by listening and speaking Psalm 91 over them, praying for them and assuring them (without making empty promises) that we'd do what we could to help. I really carry a burden for these people and more so for God's church to be activated into the doing all that we're called to in this situation. Please pray with me and pray for me....I need wisdom, discernment and creativity to know how I as an individual should respond to these deep needs. Please also share with me any input you may have concerning this.

Apart from that, things continue to move on here. The pic above is of me and my Queen from our engagement celebration; the one below is of a few of the youth Carmz and I been working with from a local community called Happy Valley - left to right: Carmz, Chantelle, Pinky, Jason.

Much love and every blessing in Jesus!