The township we’ve been sweating and bleeding and praying in. To imagine life without it is impossible.
Red Hill has become us and we have become Red Hill.
To take her from us would be like ripping a child from a mother, a loved one from a loved one.
Yet the day has come where we need to step away. Our time has passed. And perhaps better so, for in order the eagle to fly it needs to fall from the nest.
And in this moment of anguish we discover a bit of her stuck in the earth of our very hearts. Something like a seed, sown from her. Already it has begun to grow and a root has lodged itself in deep.
We will remember her. We have no choice but to remember her. She has inexplicably changed us and left us different.
When we saw Maggie miserably crying, felt the warmth of Ouma Nokoteni’s hug, saw the garden Elliot planted, thankfully took the Grenadella plants David gave us, heard the words of Rogers saying goodbye, shook the mass of hands around us and pulled up the children that hugged us, we knew.
We knew that not only did Red Hill change us but somehow, through God’s love, we changed Red Hill.
Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant or rude.
It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth.
Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.
Love never fails.
(1 Corinthians 13:4-8)
Than you to everybody that supported and prayed for us and Red Hill. Please continue doing so as the work is not finished. The harvest still needs to come in.
Willem Taute