Holy Spirit move through this place!

Hello family and friends! I hope you are all doing well! I am doing quite wonderfully! Shelby and I have now been here for a little over a week and we are lovin life. Orientation week is now over and now that our brains are maxed out we are ready to be put to work. Today, which is Monday, we started the day with a three hour meeting. I am not entirely sure what I wrote in my last blog and how clear it was but I am just going to explain it again because I have more information now... I think! So, Shelby and I are going to be working in the morning with the program that Living Hope is starting called OVC which stands for Orphans and Vulnerable Children. What will happen is if there is someone that is in the township, which would be me, they will see a child who is in serious need and would report it to someone else that works and is paid by Living Hope to go into the homes and scope out the living conditions of that child. Now, if you all saw the township I am pretty sure that you would say that every single child qualifies as vulnerable but with this kind of place you have to be a little more extreme. So, if we see a child that has been raped or hasn't had food for weeks then we will go in and see what we can do to help. The idea is not to constantly give them relief, the idea is to go in and help these families get on their feet and to the point where they can take care of themselves. In the meeting this morning the team, which only consists of 4 other people, shared the cases they had. I will share one with you that hit me. There is a 4 year old little girl that confessed to someone at Living Hope that she was almost raped in her township. Here's the story that I was told today! This little 4 year old (please pay attention to the 4 year old part) girl was in the front of her house with her 17 year old sister. Her sister went into their home for a few minutes but while she was gone a man came up to the little girl and asked if she wanted to go under a bridge to catch some frogs. Being a sweet little girl she of course said yes and went with him. He then proceeded to take off her clothes while she was begging him to stop! When this man "was about to put her on him" a woman came up and saw him and screamed and ripped the 4 year old little girl from his grip and ran off with her. Praise the Lord for that woman! I believe that it is also important for you to know that her 17 year old sister also was raped and now has a 2 year old child from that rape! (Honestly, this has been one of my greatest fears in life... that I would be raped and become pregnant!) Can we all please take a moment to pray for this family... right now! I don't really know what to say...words can't express how much I hate to hear this. Today I heard this story and my amazing and beautiful 4 year old niece came to mind and I got sick thinking about her living in this place and having rape as an everyday reality! I mean come on! I ask you to please take a moment to pray! As I write this to you this 4 year old little girl is probably in bed tonight and from what I was told is having dreams about her attacker! I don't know what you each believe about the Holy Spirit and HIS power but believe me when I say that the Lord is amazing and alive today and living in that township. I ask you to PLEASE take a moment and invite the Holy Spirit into that little girls home tonight and every night to follow! Rape is something that is very present in these townships but I know that God is bigger and can do miracles! I know that was a downer but I figure I should tell you the other half of my daily life here in South Africa. In the afternoons I will be going into the townships called Capricorn and Overcome Heights. Shelby and I will be going to be a part of the children camp. This consists of tickling children, letting them play with my hair, hugging them, and treating them as precious children of God. It is such a privilege and blessing to be able to be used in these places because these children are often treated like dirt and like they just don't matter to anyone. When you look at the children it is honestly hard not to notice their lack of shoes, dirty clothes, and open wounds from having AIDS but when you look at their amazingly cute faces you are drawn in and then you are hooked! It's love at first sight! I am quickly building a love for this ministry and am so eager to see how God can use me in this place. I promise that pictures from the townships and children will come in the future but right now we are not taking pictures because it makes the children feel like they are on display. They see teams come and go all the time and we want to just spend this first few weeks or months to just be present with them and not put them on display. But... here are some pictures of life here in SA and the fun times we are having with new friends!

A little bit of home!

Living Hope!

Well, today I was oriented into my job and now I finally have some information about what I am doing. Shelby and I will have orientation for the rest of the week and start work next week but here is what I know. We are working with a part of the organization called Living Right. This part of the organization does life coaching and prevention. Prevention means not just aids prevention but it is much more broad. We are going to build relationships with children and teens and try to give them a firm foundation in Christ. The idea behind this is so that they can grow up with a faith and it gives them a chance to not follow in their parents footsteps. We will be working in a township. For those who don't know, a township is pretty much a large neighborhood made up of shacks. We went threw about five today and I will be working in one called Capricorn the whole 8.5 months. Going through these townships was extremely humbling and broke my heart. I have seen poverty all over the world but it just seems that this was far worse. Imagine a room that is maybe ten feet by ten feet with a bed in it and maybe like a small table...that is what these people are living in. Some people do live in a little better conditions but still not anywhere close to what I am used to. The one thing that hit me this morning was when I realized that a whole family is living in this one shack together making it to where children grow up seeing their family and siblings sleeping with others or being abused by others if they aren't themselves. Can you imagine if you had to sleep in the same room as your parents? People get scarred by walking in on their parents but these children have to live in it. It just broke my heart! Anyways, I will be doing two different things on a daily basis. In the mornings I will be helping with aduse and violence cases within the township. This is something Living Right just started and desperately need help in so here Shelby and I are to help in that area. Then, in the afternoons we will do a camp for teens. This will be a lot of building relationships with individual teens and just being present in their lives. I cannot wait to start doing all of this and see what God does with it! I was also very excited because within the township that I am working with their is a population of muslims. Growing up some in Saudi Arabia has put a passion in me to be able to reach Muslims so when I heard this I was very excited for the opportunity to speak truth into them! Who knows what could happen! The possibilities are endless! Well, that is all I know and I will keep you all updated as I know what is going on!

We have arrived!

Greetings from South Africa! Yay! Getting here was very easy and we didn't have any issues. The only thing terrible was the 17 hour flight from Washington DC to South Africa but the end result was totally worth it. I will be honest with you, when we first arrived and got off the plane I was a little nervous because it was hitting me that we were going to be here for the next 8.5 months and we don't really have any clue what we are going to be doing. I felt that we were taking a very large leap of faith and it made me nervous for the first time. Luckily it only lasted about ten minutes because once we were greeted by Tim and Natasha Hoffman, the volunteer coordinators, we felt welcome and right at home. Even though we arrived at night and couldn't really see the beauty that is surrounding us we were already falling in love with Cape Town. We arrived at our beautiful home in Kommetjie, which is south of Cape Town and it is absolutely stunning! We went to bed last night very eager to wake up and see what was around us. So... this morning we woke up and we were greeted by Katrin, the lady that runs the place we are staying. She fed us breakfast and we got to know her a little. It was really awesome to meet her and get a glimpse into her life here. You can be in prayer about our relationship with her for the next nine months. After breakfast she took us to go get our car where we met the most wonderful couple who does a car rental business out of their home. They were so sweet and wonderful! They even blessed us with an extra phone that they had and told us to take it. So wonderful! I then proceed to get in the vehicle and drive on the left side of the road for the first time in my life. I was a little nervous at first being in a new city and having to drive on the opposite side of the road. Of course the first mistake I did was turn on the windshield wipers and not the blinker...it was comical! But I quickly got the hang of it. :) Shelby and I proceed to try to make it home and we end up taking a wrong turn some where. Now, most people I feel would get a little scared or freaked out about being lost in a new city but not the two of us! We first started to get lost together in Greece and now in South Africa. The amazing thing is that both times we have gotten lost we end up taking a drive that we will remember forever. We missed our turn to our house today and found out that less than ten minutes past our house is the most beautiful drive. We found ourselves driving up a mountain looking out over the most amazing turquoise water! Words cannot express how beautiful this was. It almost brought me to tears! Since this was a surprise to us we did not take pictures but that is the beauty of living here long term! So, pictures will come. After this we find our way home and walk to the beach which is less than a 2 minute walk from us and then walk to dinner. Let's just say that Shelby and I feel a little spoiled right now and we say, "Oh my goodness! This is our home!" about 20 times a day and we probably will for at least a month. We are feeling right at home here and so blessed that the Lord put us, two Texas girls, in such an incredible place! Words cannot express how absolutely overwhelmed I am by being here! After a year and a half I am finally here and ready to do the Lord's work in anyway I can!!! Prayer requests: Besides the crazy driving experiences ahead I ask you to pray for Shelby and I to have our eyes open to every opportunity God puts in front of us. We start our volunteer job on Monday. We are very eager to see what we are doing but still am not too sure what that will look like. But, whatever it does look like I am so confident that the Lord wants to use us in this place. Please pray for His will to be done!

Shelbs and I on the beach by our house!

This is the beach down the street from our house... be jealous!

Meet Freda! Oh and there's Shelby!

Here we go!

Well, the time has FINALLY come! I am getting on a plane in 15 hours and heading to Cape Town, South Africa! Most of the money is in for the whole nine months, I have a car and an apartment and I start my new job on Monday! I have never been more excited about anything in my life as I am about this next stage of my life. I cannot wait to see where the Lord takes me and what he teaches me through this experience. The one thing I am extremely excited about is getting to tell the people I meet about the beauty and freedom that Christ brings. I don't know what this next nine months looks like or what specifically I need prayers for yet but I ask you to simply pray that I hear the Lord clearly and that I am courageous to live out His will with every single person I meet. Pray for the hearts of the people I meet and that they will be open to Christ! please keep Shelby and myself in your thoughts and prayers! I will post on a regular basis so you can all hear what the Lord is doing in Cape Town! Yay! Thank you all for your support!