Normality (February Update)

I had a rather interesting moment a couple weeks ago. Every week on friday we do an outreach with the DTS. The point of the outreach is to expose students to serving the community and to build relationships with people we’re serving. Well we started working with a day care center in one of the townships. The center has around a hundred kids there, all of them come from underprivileged families, at least twenty of the kids come from parents who are infected with HIV/AIDS. The center does not charge, they just round the kids up in the morning and bring them home in the afternoon. Their goal is to teach the kids basic social skills and educational skills enough to integrate them into primary school when they are old enough. They provide food and a safe environment for the kids as well.
Aside from playing with and getting to know these kids, we helped clear land and plant a garden in the back of the property. It has been a true blessing to work with these kids, I think I fell in love the minute I stepped foot on that place. I think kids have an ability to love unconditionally that we as adults need to learn from.
While we were working on the garden the kids were all getting assembled to head into the main building for nap time. While watching them all walk away I looked around and took in the view. This place is rugged and beautiful. Two small wooden sheds set as the classrooms and a cement house as the main building, the kids all gathering at the door to head inside. It looked like something off of a Worldvision booklet or an NGO website.
What got me the most about this was not the beauty, or the kids, what shook me was how normal this had become to me. I have been working with YWAM now for about seven months, film, sound, mercy ministry, whatever needed to be done that day I did. It doesn’t really occur to me that often that I am doing things that the world sees as uncommon. I don’t consider myself crazy involved with human rights or after some big important cause. All I am doing is what God is leading me to do, and right now that has me in South Africa.
This got me thinking; you do not have to be a missionary, or be working with a ministry to be doing things for God. You just have to follow God. You have just as much potential to reach people in the life you are living now. And here is the better news: You are better equipped to reach people in your area of influence than most “Missionaries”. Why is this, because you are where they are at. Students are very good at relating and communicating with students. A social worker is equipped to reach their fellow workers and the families and people they work for.
The world would be a very different place is people focused on living their faith and loving people right where they are at. In Acts 1:8 Jesus talks about us being witness in “Jerusalem, Samaria, and all the Earth.” He was speaking to the disciples, while they were in Jerusalem. Reaching to world for God starts here, starts where you are at, and then goes out farther and farther.

Life with the DTS has been going well. Its been very stretching organizing the outreaches and running the small group but it has definitely been going well. A new project we have started working with MV Productions is something called “Unashamedly Ethical” which will hopefully start pushing and encouraging businesses to be acting with full integrity. It is a project I am happy to have worked on, especially in the midst of a world recession where much of the catalyst was brought on by corruption and corporate kickbacks.
The team is beginning to gear up for the trip to Uganda. As of now I am unsure as to wether I will be able to go. I have also been given the option to help with the radio school starting as soon as the DTS leaves for Uganda, So I have been praying about what I should be doing next
Thank you all so much for your prayers and support, God Bless.

~Jeff


Prayer Requests

-Direction on wether or not to go on the Uganda outreach with the DTS team. Also for the finances for the trip if I do decide to go.

-The direction of the school, we have been learning and experiencing a lot. It is my prayer that things keep going well both relationally and spiritually even during the latter part of the lecture phase where things start getting a little more tiring.

-That I can continue to stretch and grow into the person that God is leading me to be.

-Finances in general, with the economic crunch support has gone down and I need to start raising more support. If anyone is interested please let me know.

- I’ve started talking to Graham and Di about coming out here for a second year and have been praying about that a lot lately.