Hope Christian Church

I am sorry that I have not been better this past month about keeping up with the blog.  We have been much busier now that the church has started!

Hope Christian Church held its first worship service as a congregation on March 9, 2014.  The church building is a small country school about 3 miles down the road from where we live.  The first week we had an attendance of 56.  The second was 76!  The last two weeks we have been around 60 because of a holiday weekend and last weekend being "month's end."

It's blurry because people are... dancing in church!  This picture is from March 9th, 2014, the first Sunday of worship at Hope Christian Church.  

"Month's end" is a South African phenomena because of the vast amount of poverty in this country.  South Africa is very wealthy with vast amounts of agricultural and natural resources.  However, that wealth lies in the hands of a relatively small number of people.  Add to that the 30+ percent unemployment rate and you have many people left with almost nothing.  But because of the nation's resources they have the ability to provide some financial assistance to those in need.  "Month's end" is when the government support checks are given out so people must go into town to cash their checks and buy groceries and other needed supplies. Since Hope Christian Church is in the country (aka, "the bush") many people are gone for the weekend around the end of the month.

But despite some people being gone for the week not only was worship this past Sunday fun, energetic, and strong, but we also had congregational participation in a "work day" to clean up the inside and outside of the church a bit.  The school/church-yard had been overgrown with grass and the trees were quite shaggy.  The headmaster at the school had asked us to cut the grass for the safety of the children because he had seen snakes around the yard.  So, a member of our Blessman Ministries team in South Africa, Talent, and Matt went over Saturday morning to mow and trim around the yard (Talent and his family have also been attending church there every week).  Later that day Rene and Beth Blessman along with Jacinda, Matt and several members of the congregation came to rake grass, trim trees, pick up trash, and clean the classroom floors, windows and chalkboards.  It was a wonderful effort and such a tremendous blessing that we could give back to the school for the use of their facilities.

Kaalleegte School before...

... and after with all the grass piled high and some volunteers washing windows.

 

 

Lemon and Guava trees.  Rene and Beth helped remove much of the brush you can see underneath them in this picture.

A "mama" helping out!  (The trees are much cleaner in this pic).

Cleaning the floors where we hold our "fellowship time" with coffee, tea, and cookies, which are called biscuits in    South Africa.

Jacinda making sandwiches for the work crew.

Everybody loves Stella!

On Saturday nights we have been hosting a community movie night.  Doc Blessman had thought it would be a good idea to help get the church going and an easy way to invite people to come.  We have been watching "The Bible" mini-series and typically have about 30 people who come.  We just finished the third episode about Joshua and Samson.  We are only three episodes in though we have been doing it for four weeks because one night the power was out at the school.  It was a bit frustrating but the group simply told a little about their own testimonies and sang praise songs.  

Rati, Talent's daughter, with Jacinda and Stella at Hope Christian Church movie night.

This last weekend I continued the sermon series on the book of Romans.  In Romans the Apostle Paul lays out the basics of Christian faith for people he had never met.  Although many of the members of Hope are already Christians (previously without a church within 30+ miles), starting a new church with mostly people I had never met it seemed that Romans would be a great place to begin learning about the Christian faith.

One of Blessman Ministries strongest projects is the sewing center.  It employs several women who make products that are sold mainly in the Blessman Ministries office in Iowa, at ministry events in the U.S. and to the American teams that come over for short-term trips.  The manager of the sewing center is Hilda Chongani who also happens to be one of the leaders of our worship team at church!  Her team at the sewing center recently put together a beautiful curtain that we hang at the front of the "sanctuary" to cover the school chalkboards.  It was such a beautifying piece this past weekend and really makes the space feel more like a place of worship rather than a classroom.    

The worship team (Hilda is in the grey) with the curtain in the back.  See the first picture above for what it looked like before the curtain went up.

Thank you so much for your support and prayers.  We are so blessed to be a part of Blessman Ministries and we are excited to see what God has in store for the future.  Please feel free to contact us.  If we are slow to respond we apologize.  We will respond and we want to!

May God bless you and may you continue to be a blessing to everyone you meet in the name of Jesus Christ!

Yours in Christ,
Matt