Day 7 - Mafambisa Community

Today the team were feeling a mixture of excitement and sadness.  We were due to visit Mafambisa today and had planned additional craft activities for the Children.  However, it was due to be our last visit to Mafambisa for this year.

The day started early with breakfast on the terrace at 7am so that we were ready to meet with the Hands Family and the other visitors at 8am for “Word and Worship” - something they do on the first Friday of event month. 

The service contained the now familiar mix of worship songs and prayers.  It was also a chance for the Sanctuary Team - who had spent this week in Oshoek - to provide some feedback about their 2 weeks before they leave to return home to Australia this weekend.  It sounded like they had a great time, but also had faced some challenging journeys in faith and were very sorry to be leaving.   We all gathered around the Sanctuary Team and prayed for them.  The Word for this service was a video from Jeff Brooke - a paster in San Francisco, USA who is part of the Hands team in America and has visited South Africa and Zambia a number of times.  He challenged us to recognize that we live in abundance and should be grateful for all that we have and not covet what others have.  He reminded us about the game Musical Chairs - when there is always one less chair than there are people and you always need to be thinking about how you are going to get one of the chairs and not just enjoy the music and dance. 

We set off for Mafambisa slightly later than usual at 10am and were accompanied by Prudence, Virgina and Eunice.  When we arrived we helped the care workers finish preparing lunch and played with the under 5’s who were already there.  Then we did relationship group and DuDu shared words of encouragement based on Jeremiah 17:7-8 and John 3:16.  We finished by Mark leading a prayer for the Care Workers. 

When the Children started to arrive we had 3 activities for them to do - Origami Boats, Colouring sheets and God’s Eyes made from lolly sticks and wool.  The children really enjoyed all three activities and we saw some wonderful colouring, origami and God’s eyes.  We also had a number of children who found other interesting ways to amuse themselves with lengths of wool and lolly sticks.

After  lunch - today it was rice with beetroot (Alice’s favourite) and potatoes in broth - we had a chance to share some words of encouragement with the children - Ben led this based on ‭‭Deuteronomy‬ ‭31‬:‭6‬ - “Be strong and be brave! Do not be afraid of those people, because the Lord your God goes with you. He will always be there to help you. He will never leave you.”. Ben reminded the children that as they grow up, the lord will continue to walk with them, in struggling situations they should be brave because Jesus will be beside them. 

Then the speaker came out and everyone joined in Help me be your eyes Lord Jesus, Be Happy, Great Great Brill Brill, Be Bold be strong and Shine.  We had brought with us Friendship Bracelets made by the children at Edward Peake Middle School in Biggleswade.  We presented these to all the children to remember us by.  

We were subdued on the journey back to the hub - knowing that we had left Mafambisa for the last time but looking forward to the weekend in Kruger Park and visiting further care points next week.

Blogged by Chris W