Participant Blogs

 All the teams have been finalised for GCEX 2009. South Bound has been divided into four groups - Red, Pink, Yellow and Orange. They will be led by Megan, PJ, Paul and myself, under the overall leadership of expedition leaders Hattingh and Sally. The official ORANGE TEAM for GCEX 2009 is (drum roll please)... Yvonne Lombard, Johann Baasden, Henri Labuschagne and Liesl Roos.   I am very excited for what the Lord is planning for our team this year, and we invite you to follow our journey around the world by reading our testimonies and praying for us.  

  It has been a while since my last blog entry because we have been in Israel for the last couple of days! We left Dahab to go and climb Mt Sinai, which has a lot of steps to get to the top!!! Getting to the top, we had the extreme realization that it was freezing up there! We even found some remaining snow on our way to the summit! There was a small church on the summit of the mountain and we where just in time to see the most amazing sunset! We left the mountain and headed straight for the...

  In the silence, in a quiet place, In the stillness you are there... Our stay in Jerusalem surprised me on a personal level. I had so many expectations to visit all the religious places of Jesus' life,  and of his crucifixion. I had an expectancy to have  wonderful feelings of joy overwhelm me when in the supposed resting place of Jesus' body, or the Mount of Olives. The real eye opener was when I visited Bethlehem to see where Jesus was born. The exact spot is marked with immense fanfare and pomp, and a continous flood of tourists ensure that the space...

One of my diary entries at the beginning of the year makes a statement concerning an event I expect to happen in the year ahead.   Hebrew 6: 1-2 speaks about leaving the elementary doctrine of Christ behind and going on to maturity.   Let's proceed with the above in mind...   One of my biggest struggles is that of the mind. Far too often I allow the Accuser to play havoc with my mind. Thoughts and emotions enter, are projected into the future and I end up being the one finishing last in all of these "man made fairy...

The beauty of Zanzibar is absolutely breath taking.  We will forever be thankful that God brought us to this unique little island to witness the great things He's doing all over the world. Our first ministry point was Chuini just north of the island's capital, Stone Town.  The pastor we stayed at has a spice farm and we helped out on the farm for a day.  Unfortunately it started to rain (like it does almost every day on Zanzibar).  While we were waiting for the rain to clear up one of the workers quickly made each one of us an...

Dear All The last 6 weeks in Zambia was wonderful and life changing.The Lord was so good for us and challenged us in many ways. Please see below a few pictures of our time at Kotini Eden in Masaiti  We are currently in Hong Kong and will depart for Mainland China on Monday for the next month. Please pray for us!!!  All my love Marizy Our group that was Baptised!!!!                    n    Chimbola village where we stayed for 2 days                      ...

Although our jumping is not as coordinated as that of our fellow GCEX teams, we do not lack in enthusiasm or serving the community. After the opening of a sports stadion at Ndumo in KZN in South Africa, the URCSA church in the community decided to clean up the mess left behind. This decision was made during our morning service under the trees (because of the heat and humid conditions). D-day was decided on - Monday 16:00. At the estimated time, two Sani loads of kids and a few adults were picked up and transported to the rendevouz point where...

Everything in and about India is incredible.  The splendour of the landscape, the majesty of historic and modern buildings, the culture, the buzz of tuc-tucs and rickshaws, and everything in between.  Incredible are the people, the sights, the smells and tastes.  But just as everything is incredibly good and magnificent, so are those same things and experiences incredibly bad.  India is a mixing pot of every imaginable sense – sight, taste, smell, feeling - a rollercoaster of emotions and experiences!

"M-slapped" writing in honour of all the M’s I have met this year, you never asked for this, but you are worthy of this, and so much more...thank you for showing me a glimpse of your life During our travels this year, I have met many missionaries (let’s call them M ’s), some inspiring, some grey with age, speaking words of wisdom, some frustrated, some rejected, some exhausted.  My heart goes out to each and every one of these, who have left their kids, their family, their grandchildren, and their culture behind for one purpose only...to proclaim the gospel that...

So the last day or two we have been running around Jbay and PE and doing the MOST MOST bizzare stuff EVER!!! We have had to catch a chicken (twice) make footprints in cow dung, build a human statue, play official official at a local school's  (read GLA) athletics day, played for a hour on a super tube, took a swim in the indian ocean, took a Ihashe for a ride on the beach ( for some of us the horse took us for a run...:P ), visited a few historic places in PE, sang gummy bears song about 100...