& so it begins..

Today was my first real day doing what I've been assigned. I worked with Michele, the most tenderehearted, meek, sweet lady I've ever met. As soon as I met her I basically jumped right into the Social Work life at Living Hope. I sat in on a meeting with Kevin, one of the volunteers from the UK who is coordinating a bid "Celebration Day" at the end of the Holidays in July. The day is designed for about 1,000 kids to come and hear the Gospel. The setting will be divided with a soccer/netball tournament going on, and a rotation of games and events for those not so sportsy kids, aka the other 750. I was really encouraged when he took one of my ideas in mind and completely rearranged the schedule.. I felt semi-useful ;)


After our meeting we went into Oceanview for a home visit, only the lady we were visiting wasn't ready to be visited so our "visit" was about 3 minutes. We then spent a few hours in the Oceanview offices. She put me right to work--I made calls to find pregnancy mentoring for a 14 year old girl who is pregnant. She is a rape victim, but her and her family have decided to keep the baby and need somewhere to help her through the last four months. I typed up the notes from our meeting, and helped Michele brainstorm some ideas for the Celebration Day. It was so encouraging to see how I could already contribute to Living Hope. 


Afterwards Allysha, our wonderful driver who has more spunk than anyone I know, drove Ethan and me to the mall to exchange some of our cash for rand. It was exciting to get back an amount in the thousands when I had less than $200 to exchange :) I also ate my first South African fast food meal at a place called "Wimpys". We had a Wimpy burger and chips (fries) with about two sips of Fanta since the cup is the size of a McDonald's Kids meal toy... Oh Americans, how we value size everything.


We spent the afternoon working in Red Hill again, picking up trash, trying not to be attacked by a mother hen who was protecting her chick, and laying mulch in the meeting area for the kids clubs. Afterwards we got a tour of the area and went into the ACTS Day Care. The most precious children were all around, climbing on backs and wanting to be loved. Even in five minutes I made a friend:

my new friend, whose name I cannot say but starts with an R I know :)

please love her eyes like I do???

Today was so encouraging. I'm anxious to see how my time here is used, and looking forward to what other opportunities I will have to serve. God keeps reminding me that the smallest things can still make a big difference. And He's also in the process of teaching me to rely solely on Him. Ironically (not really) my Bible study this week is on God as El Shaddia, the all sufficient One. Don't you love God's humor?