Here in the Southern Hemisphere the sunny side of a building is the north side, and in an unheated, brick building this is greatly significant, temperature-wise. Our study, where I am writing this, is on the south (cold) side. Since winter decided to actually show up this year, bringing with it most of the cold that we missed last year, this is actually significant. Today is not too bad, though, since I can get away with wearing only shoes, socks, blue jeans, a T-shirt, sweater and a scarf - but not my winter coat. A few days ago I had to wear all of that plus long underwear plus the coat - and keep my hands in my pockets as much as possible. It gets warmer most afternoons, though, so we open some windows and try to let the cold air out. The best way to get motivated to get out of the warm bed in the morning is to get into a HOT bath.
Well, enough about that. Life and ministry here are getting increasingly exciting, and also phenomenally busy. Our congregation (Philadelphia Fellowship) has taken responsibility to provide food for the feeding scheme for the homeless of downtown Pretoria that operates out of St. Andrew’s Presbyterian Church. They have had facilities but lacked food since they began, but now the people who come get a healthy and filling meal. St. Andrew’s is part of a consortium of churches, and Louise and I have been invited to their next Board meeting to “give advice”. This could be very interesting, since just yesterday Louise had a very exciting conversation with the head of social services of the Pretoria police. This lady can do a great deal to facilitate various programs, possibly including the establishment of a shelter for the homeless. [If I think it is cold, what must it be like for someone who is homeless??] We have a meeting with her next week to talk about all this. Louise has done a lot of work of this kind in Johannesburg in the past, and in this business EXPERIENCE is of enormous value. “Good ideas” are very easy to find, but most of them have fatal flaws. Louise actually had a building in Pretoria promised to her by the police for the purpose of providing shelter for the homeless four years ago when she was part of a congregation located downtown. But, the congregation refused to take any action, so the project died. As a result, one of the fatal flaws that we know to guard against is starting something without the dedicated people and resources to follow through. This is what is so exciting to us about Philadelphia Fellowship. We have had a number of very strong leaders join us recently, some of whom have what it takes to support such projects. This is evidenced by our support of the feeding scheme, and we believe we can do a lot more.
One very interesting part of the feeding-scheme project is the ‘photography project‘. Probably the deepest need of the homeless is for IDENTITY. Without a home, or family, or a job, or any real possessions, people lose their sense of who they are. Without that, there is no foundation for building a better life, even if the resources to do so are available. How does one help someone find their identity? We ask permission to take the picture of all those who come for food . Interestingly, quite a few didn’t want that - at least until they saw other people getting their pictures taken. We use a digital camera, so everyone can see their picture immediately. After a while almost everyone wants their picture taken. We are compiling a sort of scrapbook of the photos, each one clearly labeled with the person’s NAME. We also plan to produce a sort of photo-ID for those who come regularly. The man in our congregation who is doing this work, Peter Herbst (see photo) not only brings the food and takes the photos, but also speaks life into them. We hope, through all this, to restore PEOPLE, not just their bodies - most of which have AIDS. We are attaching some of these photos so you can see what we hope are the “before” pictures - pictures of people without much hope. As time goes on we will send along some of the “after” pictures.
[The heat from this morning’s bath has gone, so the winter coat has come back on. Brrrr!]
-------------------------
Well, life being what it is, it is now evening and I got interrupted before I could finish the email. Rather than try to communicate a lot more now, WISDOM cries out that the better approach is to send this off and then put the other stuff in the next (or subsequent) emails. So, I will limit myself to just one more. Louise for some time has used a “life-management” (at a higher level than just “time-management”) system called MAP-4-LIFE. The creator of the system is a South African named Glen McQuirk, who now lives in Pretoria. A couple weeks ago we HAPPENED to check an old email account of Louise’s - that often goes for months without being looked at - and found a message announcing the opportunity to have a free, personal “coaching session” with Glen. Well, we went, and were very blessed. Not only did we hear a lot of very practical, applicable wisdom, but we had the opportunity to meet an EXTREMELY humble and gentle man who has accomplished a great deal. What has gone before, in my estimation, is very small compared to what is to come, and the vision of that kind of life of victory is very inspiring.
On a final note, today is the 13th month anniversary of our marriage. We actually met on a 13th of the month as well. Now, traditionally in the US the number “13” is thought of as a “bad luck” number. Louise was born on the 13th of January, so logically enough did some investigation on alternate meanings of the number “13”. She found that another meaning of it is “VICTORY”. This is, oddly enough, exactly appropriate for today in our lives, because our loving Father has brought both of us through “the valley of the shadow of death” into abundant life. And you know what the logical name for such a transition is? VICTORY!!
May all of you be blessed with abundant life, a life of victory!
Love from Africa,
Lary and Louise
