Participant Blogs

Written by Paul du Plessis, compiled by the whole team.
9:30pm .... Masaiti..... FCE
WE are here!!!!!
The challenge was awesome, but now we have to wait for our other team-mates. God was with us all the way!!!!
Last night we were on a bus from Livingston to Lusaka. That was pure luxury. 122pm we received cool drinks and snacks!!!, better service than in SA. This morning at 4am we arrived at Lusaka, where it was still dark. We unloaded, and we searched for Marks Travel bus. We found another bus, but to our dismay we didn’t depart as we would have liked to.

Slices of life - by Dini Esterhuizen

The Van Gas family living in our valley had six beautiful daughters,  when they probably called a halt to the dream of a son. Van then focused on his film career as producer of his first and only movie. A South African cowboy production. Oom van Niekerk of the farm shop was the villain and he and Tannie Dot, our Sunday school teacher, got shot in the story. Our dad took us to watch the shooting on the set one afternoon, and I remember  Oom van Niekerk and Tannie Dot lying on the floor covered in tomato juice from the shop.

                                                                      What is true & relevant? A lot of movies has the punch line "true stories" but are actually false! Because true is revised from the word Truth and Truth is the Word of God, Personified in Jesus Christ and revealed through the Holy Spirit. Their stories are only real (it happened) but not True!   Truth is to be Authentic and with Substance. Ex of un-authentism is "don't worry be happy" song and the guy committed suicide just after that! There was no substance in his words.   Phi 3:10  [For my determined purpose is] that I may...

The Africa challenge really was something to write home about.  Who would have thought it possible to go through Botswana, Zimbabwe and Zambia in two days (and still find time to have a picnic at Vic Falls! Which was awesome I might add!). We were so blessed in that we raised the money we had to raise for the challenge before 10:00 the first morning!

During our visit to the Holy land we had the opportunity to serve the people of the land on both sides of the wall. If you have never been to Israel you might not know what I am talking about, but there is a thick concrete wall seperating Israel from Palestine. I am not going to pretend that I understand why it is there neither will I condone nor condemn its existance, but I would like to share the spiritual truth God revealed to me about a different type of wall. The wall around my heart... During the year we...

People of nowhere   Macedonia. I'd heard about it before but only because it was one of the flags I drew in one of the few educational activities I got pulled into when working with "the kids." Before then, I didn't  know where it is, or that it was even a country. Macedonia has since become more than just a flag I recently drew. Can't help but to see that such a minor activity could add a glimpse into what my future then, did hold.    Refugees  As volunteers it would seem pretty obvious that we follow the needs of...

 Since Kosovo, our team has stepped into a musical. The absence of wifi and the presence of lovely hosts made the difference. We had a lot of freedom to spend time with Christ and grow in unity. It was a healing and strengthening time there and not at all a disappointment. The fact that we could not go to China is long forgotten, because we truly believe God wanted us in Kosovo. Our hosts admitted to wishing for help and knowing God used us to show them He hears their prayers even before they pray them, means the world. We...

“You give and take away, You give and take away…
My heart will choose to say Lord, Eu te bendirei” 

Gods plan… it´s perfect.
His will… it´s perfect.
His timing, it´s… perfect?

You could almost call Panama America with the countless similarities between the two. The closest to western culture we have seen thus far, the culture shock was more apparent then is has been in previous countries. During our time here we came into contact with more Americans then Panamanians, and the pace of our work also changed from day work to minute work.  In previous countries we had become accustomed to a certain style of living- a pace at which it seemed everyone lived by. Our schedule became a day to day thing, where we may have things to do,...