Day of Service
We had a wonderful day of service here in South Africa. We started with scraping paint of the protective bars at the school so they can be repainted. This was a process and more tiring than one may think. We then had a nice lesson by Jonathon for the chapel time at SABC.
After lunch we went to the Zenzela church of Christ located in the squatter camp of Zenzela, now known as Mayfield extension 6. Shelby, a recent graduate of SABC is preaching here and they have erected a church building. This building is twenty feet by forty feet and is what we would call a storage unit. It has two even sides, one is for a kitchen where they distribute a meal every day for the school kids of the camp. For some of these kids it is the meal of the day. On the other side is where church services are held and where Shelby teaches the kids before and during their meals. When we arrived the younger children were being taught and then fed. Jonathon made and instant impact with his ukulele. They were soon laughing and playing with Jonathon as they ate their meal. I spoke to a couple of the church members and found out that they have seventy people who meet at this building every Sunday for worship. Shelby was very gracious and let me teach the older children when they came after school. It started out as a Bible study of creation and the flood, and then went to getting to know each others names and ages and sharing pictures of my family. These kids thought for sure I should know the singers and actors from America. I think I disappointed them when I said I lived a long way from all of these folks. It was a wonderful experience.
One of the current students, Martin, recently built a bathroom out of brick and mortar behind this building. They are wanting to make an additional building out of brick and turn it into a library for the children so they can do their studies here as well. I also know that this type of building would be multi use as is seen in the pictures above. Martin said they would need about 25,000 rand to make this happen and I asked him if he is truly willing to build it. He said yes if these funds were made available. So friends, want to build a library for over a hundred children for only $1900? If this is something you would be interested in helping in, please let me know.
This squatter camp is on the upswing compared to most of the camps in the area. The government is making low cost housing and helping these families to overcome poverty. This camp is one of many that I have seen in the area. I have been told that many immigrants come from Zimbabwe and Namibia and the true unemployment rate is 40-50%, with many of them living in squatter camps. This church receives no funds from the people it serves and is reliant completely upon outside help. It is a wonderful ministry and a testament to the graduates coming out of the Southern Africa Bible College.
The next two days we get to go out and see some of the beauty of South Africa. We are heading to a lion park and doing a driving tour. This will be an overnight event and I will probably not have any internet service for this time. I look forward to sharing with you next time some of the beauty of South Africa. God Bless!