Sunday, December 16, 2007

July 8, 2007 - Part I





Today is the day we started meeting and forming relationships with our Mamelodi partners! Exciting starts to the blessings that we received on this trip.

We woke up to cold (remember it is winter in the lower hemisphere of the Earth), layered for church, and prepped for a long day. The leadership team told us for church was cold and much longer than our normal 65 minutes, more like hours. The Charity and Faith church is a large warehouse with a stage, concrete floor and no heat. We had a 2 hours service there, with singing and dancing like a concert. The time amazingly flew. We sat next to (soon to be dear friend)Eunice and a nephew who explained the songs and danced with us. Next our group of 300 split into smaller groups of 50 and travelled to the extension for another 2 hour service in the heart of Mamelodi reaching out to the folks who can't get to the church.

The extensions are the names for the poor shanties where black people were relocated to during Apartheid and where they still reside in poverty. The beauty of what the Charity and Faith church does shines under a tent with holes, on a floor of mud, and with chairs for half of the people. This was the best service ever and seemed to last only 15 minutes. There was singing, dancing, praising, laughing and loving. Mamelodians are the most joyous of people. Jim and I met Mpumi (pictured with me) and her sister Amanda (pictured with Jim). We continue to write to the today and hope to always be penpals with these 2 angels. We sat next to them, certainly not by accident but fate. They translated the songs, talked with us about their life, and Mpumi even joined the IT team helping us with training the rest of the week on the computers.

That night got to spend the night with Lebo's family, which deserves a separate blog!

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