The Break-In

About 3 weeks ago we had the opportunity as a family to go down to the upper Drakensburg area in the province of Mpumalanga. It is a stunningly beautiful area, with names such as God's Window and historical areas such as Pilgrim's Rest, which began as a gold miners camp. While we were gone, a young couple in our church agreed to stay in our home and feed the dogs--you really don't want to leave your home empty for any period of time. At 2:30 am I was awakened by my phone ringing; I almost didn't answer it as I didn't recognize the number, but I'm glad that I did. It was the security company informing me that our alarm was going off and should they send a car out. I asked them to send one out, and I called the couple at our home. I could hear our alarm going off in the background and assured them that the security company was on its way. (In South Africa you don't call the police as they won't come out unless something has actually happened, so you call the security company who will send out an armed response.) What I didn't learn until later was that the couple in our home could see that someone was in the house moving from room to room--they could tell by the keypad indicating that different passives were being activated. When the security guard arrived he was startled to find someone in our house and actually pulled his gun on Chad. After getting over the initial shock, together they began to go through the home and discovered where the men got into the house. The picture above shows the actually window where they got in. All our windows have these type of bars on them but as is the mantra here in South Africa, "If they want to get in they will," and they did. The guess is that there were 4 of them and they had cased our home and waited until deep sleep was upon us and then set out to get in. These guys didn't even break the window pane, but somehow silently popped the window open and then took some sort of wrench to twist the bars until they break. Once enough are broken, they simply twist the bars up and they're in. The police reckon they were professionals as they didn't even make enough noise to wake the dogs.

The great part is that everyone was safe and all that was stolen was our computer monitor. Chad shared how he and his wife had prayed that night for safety and God did exactly that for them. We were amazed that they left so quickly and didn't come into the sleeping area. In their haste to get away they even left my cable for me on the wall. What I don't understand is why they ripped the cable out of the monitor and left the back cover. I don't know who would buy a damaged monitor like that, but poverty is so great over here that people will take anything to get some money. So we just praise the Lord for His protection and graciousness.

Before this all happened we had the typical security measures, such as walls and barred gates as you see in the first picture. The second picture shows the interior gate as well as the exterior gate. Nyosi, our lab, is an added security measure. What the police figure is that they jumped the first wall and waited outside the second wall until dark and then jumped the fence where Nyosi is and waited in the shadows until the middle of the night. We found a lot of footprints and cigarette butts in the area. Prior to this, I honestly didn't see how anyone could get in without making a lot of noise cutting bars, but there are ways. In fact as people learn of our break-in the typical comment is "Welcome to Africa."



Due to all of this our homeowner has added an electric fence on the outer wall as well as infrared detectors around the perimeter of the house for which we are very grateful. This incident has opened the door to share the Gospel with some of our homeowner's family members. They were very eager to accommodate our desire for more security, and they think that this will calm our fears. As we've shared with them, our protection comes from the Lord, not from all of these security measures. We were calm before and we're calm now as we rest in our Heavenly Father's will and purpose. He teaches us to use wisdom and so we want to take wise measures of caution. Pray for us as the homeowner will be back soon from Australia and we are looking for more opportunities to speak with them about salvation. Thanks for praying for us! Keep it up!

T-Junction

In August I had the privilege to speak at a large youth rally called T-Junction. Youth from all over the city came to a bowling alley to bowl—as you can guess—as well as play some unique games. As you can tell by the picture it was packed; in fact, we had to bowl in groups. Unique and interesting bowling styles were the norm for the day as we had a race to see who would be the first one to hit a pin while bowling from the seated position on the floor. Another interesting method was to have your entire team line up with their legs spread and someone had to bowl the ball between all their legs and hit a pin to win a prize. Our team, had a few anxious moments as we attempted to break the high scoring mark (we’re still not sure if we did, but it lent some intensity to the game).



Following the bowling we gathered together to play a version of the old TV game Let’s Make a Deal. It was a lot of fun to see young people trade in their box for another one with worthless stuff in it as well as to see someone jump for joy as they won a great prize. I think about everyone won something; Kyle even won a yo-yo. The ultimate prize was in the left corner of the picture--a cd player and at least 6 people had it in their possession but gave it away.



After this we settled down for the challenge where I spoke on John 3:16. We had about 10 young people come forward for salvation. It was thrilling to see this but also to see other young people counseling the ones that came forward. We had a young boy who was considering Buddhism as well, so it was neat to see God challenge his heart to the truth of the Gospel message. Please pray for these young people as well as for the churches as they follow up with them.

After our time with the Lord, we piled in our cars and headed over to the stadium to see a rugby match. Now I’ve seen a few of these during our time in Fiji, but this was much more intense as I was sitting with Garth Lombard, a huge fan of one of the teams that was playing—the Lions. They had won 6 in a row and needed to win again to have any possibility of the playoffs. It was a great game in which the Lions did win and increased their chances of going on. As you can tell Garth was excited.



As you watch a game that is new to you, it is always interesting to see what differences you notice. For me this time it was watching the kicking. When it come time to kick a try (see I've got the terminology down--I think), the kicker waits for this little remote-controlled truck to come out with a plastic bucket of sand in the back. The kicker dumps it on the groung to make a tee and in the case of Pretorius for the Lions, he makes a line on the ground to show him the path in which to kick the ball. Here is a picture of that action.



One of the great things was to go down on the field afterwards and meet the players; Kyle had his picture taken with several—one of which is a believer with a good testimony. Here is a picture with Andres Pretorius—who plays on the national team, the Springboks, and is an excellent player. He infuses a lot of energy when he plays and is a great kicker. Again, Kyle and I were exposed to some new and exciting events and we praise the Lord for the opportunity. Maybe even someday we’ll become diehard rugby fans.

The Rescue

This picture doesn't do it justice but this is a photo of Tugela Falls, which are the second highest falls in the world. The other week I went away with a group of pastors for two days in the Drakensburg mountains where we hiked 11 kilometres (one way) up to the Amphitheatre to get a glimpse of these falls. Now the Amphitheatre is no slouch either as you can tell by the picture, but little did we know what awaited us on this adventure.



I was walking up the trail with one of the pastors who is a medical doctor when another pastor came running back to let us know that a man had slipped on a rock in the gorge and had broken his leg. We hustled ahead and reached the man, and Wayne checked him over and explained that Harry (the injured man) would need to be carried out. Here is a picture of what we had just climbed to get here.


So it wasn't realistic to think that we could carry him 11 kms back down, so Wayne went back to an area where he could get a signal on his cell phone and called to get medical help. When Wayne returned he informed us that a helicopter was on its way to evacuate Harry. Here is a picture of the gorge where the helicopter would have to enter.



Now thankfully we were at the beginning of this and in the interim time and group of rangers came with a stretcher so Harry could be moved from the rock pile to something semi-comfortable.



We waited for about 4 hours for this helicopter to come and when it did it was quite an awesome experience. Here it is coming up the gorge very low to drop off the medical team who would rig Harry up for the lift out.



It took a while to get him prepped for the lift, but they got it done and here is the picture of the airlift to the helicopter.



It was amazing and I have the only copy of it on video. If I can find the right website I'll put the video up on the web to view. How the pilot kept the helicopter still, I cannot fathom, for what the picture doesn't show was that the winds picked up and came howling down the gorge, buffeting the helicopter. There were several times where I thought that if this copter goes down, I'm dead. But they rescued him and flew off to a hospital who could handle his injury. Later we learned that a storm came in and grounded the copter and an ambulance had to meet them to take him to the hospital. He had 9 hours of surgery and is now back in Holland where he lives.

One of the best pieces of news is that one of the men on the retreat does business in Holland and can follow up with them. Please pray for the salvation of Harry and Harriet as Kosi (man from the retreat) follows up with them. They were so grateful for our assistance and help.

People are beginning to say that our life is a daily adventure. I'm beginning to wonder myself.

Let it Snow, Let it Snow!!

I know that most of you reading this note are about to experience at least the possibility of snow soon. Well, back a couple of months ago, we were able to see something that had not happened here in Joburg in about 25 years--it actually snowed. Now I'm not talking about any blizzard but white stuff that was floating down. It didn't accumulate but it was a unique and memorable experience. As you can tell from the kids, they at least had fun trying to catch the flakes with their tongues.

The night before we had a hail storm and I can at least show you the result of that storm.



We also had frost frequently and so we are so ready for this warm weather that is beginning to come regularly. This picture shows the thatched roof home we were staying in for a while and let me tell you, it gets cold in a house with only grass between you and the sky.



So enjoy your winter and we'll let you know later about how hot it gets here.

KwaMhlanga

One of our trips has been to see an AIDS orphanage ministry in a town called KwaMhlanga (pronounced kwam-shlanga). In the picture you see a home where people in this area live. It is extremely sad to see and your heart goes out to these families. In many ways it reminded me of places that we saw in Fiji; the only difference was that everything was green. Anyway AIDS is rampant and funerals are commonplace. The ministry in this area is training men and planting churches to reach these families with the Gospel. I believe that they have something like 40 churches in this immense area. They also are providing homes for orphans who have lost parents to the epidemic, as well as providing schooling. Here is a picture of one of their graduates, Abraham, who wants to go to medical school to train to become a doctor and come back and help the ministry through the medical field.



Pray for Abraham as he seeks God's direction and pray that God would open the doors needed to provide the medical education he desires. Abraham was so grateful to God for his time at the school. Let me give you an idea of how needed doctors are to educate the people. When you enter this area you don't talk about AIDS because they believe that if you name it in the presence of someone, you curse them to get AIDS. They believe that if you are HIV+ and you have intercourse with a virgin, you lose your HIV+ status. Some even believe that it is a white man's ploy to rid the land of the blacks. There are millions of orphans in South Africa due to the AIDS epidemic and this is just one of the ministries who is reaching out with the Good News as well as tangible actions of love. I will share about some of the others as we get the opportunity to visit them. But as you can tell by the picture with Kyle and Skyler, they are adorable and love to have fun, just like all kids do.



As you think of Africa, pray for wisdom for us as we explore about how best to help with AIDS epidemic and many, many orphans. We cannot ignore what James 1:27 says, "Pure and undefiled religion before God and the Father is this: to visit orphans and widows in their trouble, and to keep oneself unspotted from the world." Regrettable we focus on the latter half of the verse and ignore the first.