amazing Opportunities
We have been blessed with a lot of amazing opportunities in our new season in the Freestate Province and we have been prayerfully and carefully saying “yes” and “no”.
Align
One of the new ministries that we are most excited about it is the freedom and victory course Dan is beginning. He is calling it Align (aligning your mind and heart with what God says about you and causing your behavior to come into alignment with your new identity in Christ) and it begins on Monday July 25. We are going to use a workbook written by David Hain called Ashes to Destiny and it utilizes an amazing Christian approach to take people through really difficult soul searching to help them move into victory. It is specifically for the areas of sexual brokenness and substance/alcohol abuse, but the tools learned will help all addictions. Dan met David Hain while they were both ministering in the prison system a couple of years ago and thinks his material is the best he has discovered so far. Already Dan has networked with the alcohol addiction support group in town and they have asked to be folded into the new program. He is running an advertisement in the newspapers and also on the local multi-media billboard at a busy intersection in town. In our connect group, a man named Tian has put up his hand to help and is moving quickly with assisting with all the admin. Another man named Willem is willing to help with facilitating the different group breakout sessions. They are planning to run in person groups in Bethlehem and also facilitate an online “zoom group” for those who live further in Southern Africa. Dan is thrilled to have a team of people to run this together! I think this course is one of the biggest reasons God transitioned us to Bethlehem and we look forward to what God will do in the weeks to come. The course is intended to run for 30 weeks, but Dan is planning to do the first week as an informational meeting, show the movie “The Heart of Man” for the 2nd week and then launch into the lessons with the usual holiday breaks, so it will probably run around a year. Please contact Dan at: Dan@magezi.org or 0832939531 for more information if you are interested in joining. It is going to be brilliant and we are praying that many people will walk into true freedom in the months to come!
Student Ministry
We continue to be involved at New Horizon College next door and have a meeting planned next week with Nathaniel, one of the hostel/dormitory “fathers” to plan some events where we can serve the school and introduce the kids living in the dorms to Jesus. Game nights, youth events, hiking, camps, movie nights…. We are excited to see what will open up during the 2nd half of the school year. Lots of students and a few staff members continue to come to us for counsel and mentoring and it is a delight to speak into their lives.
Dan and Etienne have been running the evening church service for young professionals aged 18-30 for a month plus now and it is steadily growing.
Practically Helping
Today is demolition day! The church ordered a new stage to be built for the sound desk to transition to and it was delivered not nearly strong enough so Dan spent a day reinforcing the whole thing. Today, Dan, the worship pastor Shane, and a team of helpful youth (who are on school break) are using sledge hammers to bash down the old sound desk area and the new one will be installed tomorrow. Dan said it took like 100 wheel barrow trips to move all the rubble out of the sanctuary! It is an exciting, loud, and dusty day at church!
Orphan Care
We also continue to serve at the local orphanage. Dan spent 3 Saturdays with different teams painting one of the homes for the children. It looks so much better! We invited the head of the orphanage over for dinner, but it seems like that will happen after I get back.
We are organizing a weekend teaching/conference for the social workers and house mamas to give them tools and training to help them deal with the trauma and abuse in the kid’s lives in their homes. We won’t be the speakers, but will use our connections to invite professionals to come and minister. We think that the best way to help all the kids is to empower and train the staff to help and love more. Our senior pastors do devotions every week with the house mamas also to disciple and grow them in their faith.
We also will do another weekend with the kids at the orphanage to bring in people we know who grow up in a similar situation who are now following the Lord who can inspire them with their testimonies. In staff meeting recently, we have also decided that once a month, a connect group from our church will go to the orphanage and facilitate children’s church and have lunch together. We think that is a super practical way to show Christ’s love and to meet them where they are at.
Preaching
Dan preached last Sunday on forgiveness and then they asked us to do a follow up message this coming Sunday. There was a really good time of ministry and we believe some big shifts and changes are coming.
A quick update on my Mom
In the last month she has improved a little bit, thank you so much for all your prayers. She has gone through a very difficult time with her health in the last several months and has good days and bad days. We decided to book tickets for me to go home for a visit so I can spend some time with her. I have been able to video chat with them multiple times a week this month which has been so good. We are so thankful for my three sisters who can live close and rotate through coming by to help and I am happy to be there as well for a month. I’ll be in the states for the end of July and most of August. I plan on primarily being with family, but will visit some supporting churches and would love to see some friends as I can. I have been blessed with so much peace during this season and feel it is mostly because of all the prayers for us. Thank you again! Please keep them coming.
In summary –
We are happily doing some practical things to serve the church here like making meals and having lots of people over for counseling, discipleship, and mentoring, including having our connect group (20 people!) over for dinner every Thursday. Dan is helping with fixing the tractor, painting the orphanage, and doing the sound desk remodel. We also help with preaching and organizing these sessions for the orphanage, loving and listening to students at New Horizon College, and are thrilled to launch the new Align ministry. The soccer grannies we are partnering with are taking a break in winter for their training, so we will resume visiting them in a month or so when it warms up a bit.
It may seem like a lot, but we are still having quality family time and I think the atmosphere here in the country is more peaceful than Johannesburg. We all are really doing well. Miesha could still use a really good friend, but is enjoying the youth group and we are having a lot of potential friends come over. Titus seems to be doing awesome and has one really good friend that he spends a lot of time with. Both are doing well in their 9th year of homeschooling with me. We are so thankful we are here.
If you would like to give to Magezi Ministries or to help with covering the cost of my plane ticket, please donate using the blue “DONATE” link below. Thank you so much!
Serving with joy,
Janell and Dan
Thanks for supporting us!
