Update – March 17th

It’s the start of a new week, and we are excited about
what God has in store. From the kids we tutor to the
babies we rock to sleep each night, we see the face of
our Creator and how He desires all to be found in Him.

There are many struggles foreign missionaries face as
they seek to share the truth of God’s love with
different cultures. Although we have both had
experience ministering among different peoples and
cultures, each new expereince gives rise to its own
questions.

We keep coming back to Bryan’s words from a past
sermon about our identites. Before we are anything
else, we are Christians. In this situation, before we
are relevant to the culture of South Africa, we are
followers of God. The reason we have been meditating
on this is that we have faced a few situations with
the teenage girls where we were put in a position to
respond to the culture. We want these girls to know,
as they watch us and talk with us, that they are
precious in the eyes of the Lord and that they can
make choices different from the ones the world and
their classmates encourge them to make. In one
conversation, this meant being honest about our belief
in abstinence until marriage (something the government
does not actively promote). Our struggle to be a
faithful witness without being culturally insensitive
is tiring and sometimes we doubt our testimony, but we
trust in the Lord and His power to work through us.

Our friends at 3-D Outreach were so sweet to us this
weekend and provided us a 24-hour getaway. Our friend
“Erica-from-America” picked us up and took us to the
campground where we spent our first days in Jo-burg.
Amid the solace of this peaceful place, we were able
to commune with the Lord and gain strength for the
week ahead. We also had the chance to talk at length
with 3-D’s interns who are preparing to set out for 6
months of missions. Our faithful guide Lennit and his
encouraging wife Janine took us to church on Sunday
morning. The campground’s director, Dawn, let us
crash at her house and watch movies on Sunday
afternoon when it became terribly cold and rainy.

We cannot express the depth of our thankfulness to our
church leadership and to those who are praying for and
are encouraging us. We feel the warmth of your care,
even as we are thousands of kilometers away. Please
continue to pray for our relationships with the
teenage girls and with the other volunteers. Pray for
Rachelle as she begins helping in the local school and
for Kate as she helps another volunteer revise the
volunteer application process.

~ Kate & Rachelle