Our 1st (official) Volunteer!

We have welcomed another new volunteer who will be with us until early December. Lauren has put life on hold back in the US to come and help at our economic empowerment division (Living Way). We’re so grateful for her step of faith in sacrifice to add to what the Lord is doing here.

Living Hope Volunteers

One of the perks of our new position is that we get to work alongside some of the most amazing people - and in full-time ministry. Living Hope gets a variety of volunteers that come out to work with them from all over the world, but mostly the US. People come on teams and as individuals for varieties of time periods. Currently Living Hope has 4 full-time long-term missionaries that work in different capacities. This week we’ve been spending some time with them all just getting to know them!

Outreach in Mountain View

Tonight we had the privilege of being a part of a community outreach with one of our International Teams from Tennessee, US. The team partnered with one of our local church partners to reach out to the community of Mountain View. All week they’ve been doing door-to-door and children’s ministry which all culminated into a Testing day and what was the Outreach tonight. At the testing day people could get free HIV, TB, Blood Pressure and Blood Sugar tests. Then at the Outreach, people within the community were invited to the event that started off with some worship, the children performing to their parents the songs and Bible verses they learned this past week and then a message from the Pastor. Everyone had a great time and just seeing how people were moved was extremely powerful! This is why we are here and so cool to start of our time with Living Hope this way!

Friendly Welcome

We were welcomed this morning by a sweet retired couple from the UK who arrived a few days ago and will be staying here to volunteer full-time for the next two months. Mike will be assisting the chaplain’s office and June will be ministering to patients in the health care center on campus. We can tell they will be a breath of fresh air not only for our clients, but also our staff. We thank God for their commitment to come and serve with us!

Hitting the ground running..

We shouldn’t have, but our flight arrived in Cape Town at mid-day today – and we still went into the office for our “first day”. Happy to see us, our manager still told us to go home and come back fresh tomorrow, but we were too excited to miss it, even if we came in for a few hours. There are lots of volunteer inquiry emails received since the beginning of the month and are awaiting response – here we go! We kept on working and working – till it felt so late even though the clock only said 3:45 pm. Little did we know that it was already 6:15pm and that the clock decided to stop working today! Go figure!

Returning "Home"

The bride and groom with our deck-out Landy!

The groom and his best men!

What a whirlwind past couple of weeks! We are going back to South Africa after a quality (albeit short) visit with friends and family in the US & UK. My brother Jim’s wedding, was nothing short of perfect: flip flops and khakis, and the entire family together for the first time since 2008. It was so special to be there and see everyone even though we had long ago written off the idea that we would be able to do so this year. We also had the chance to share with friends in Pennsylvania, Connecticut, and London how God was calling us to serve in full-time missions – and how we drove through Africa to get there! We would have loved to stay longer and see more people, but not so this time. We are determined, though, to stay in better contact with everyone abroad, since we know that we can’t do this without the prayerful support of friends and family.

"Unexpected" Travels

We board an airplane to the US today. I’m very excited to see my family. It wasn’t part of the “plan” to do this before starting work at Living Hope, but about two months ago I got word that my twin brother Jim was getting married – in early September! We didn’t want to miss it, and prayed that we could afford the time and money to make it happen. To our amazement, both areas were taken care of! Our reporting manager allowed us to delay our start date from 1 Sept to 8 Sept, and my parents covered a large portion of flight costs so that the entire family could be there. What a gift! So we’re flying in early to 1) catch up with friends and church in London on a 3-day layover there, and 2) spend some time with our dear friends and church community in Fairfield, Connecticut. We will spend the final week with my family in Pennsylvania in the run up to Jim and Molly’s wedding. We know the time will go quickly, but we know it’s worth it!