Joy: Week 2



One of my favorite students, Precious



Amanda and me :)

The second week of tutoring was even better than the first because I felt closer to my kids. We understood each other on a deeper level than merely comprehending what was said. I also found that my mindset had changed. I went into the tutoring program with what you might call a “savior” mentality. By the second week, my kids were the ones saving me. It sounds cliché, but I learned far more from my kids than they did from me. We poured love and trust into each other and their ever-present joy and kindness was so refreshing. At the end of week 2, we gave all of the students their own Bibles. My kids’ faces lit up and they smiled. I could see that they were truly touched and surprised, even. “For most of them, these Bibles are the first ones that they have ever been able to call their own. On Friday, I talked to my kids about how our relationship with God cannot be broken, but our fellowship can. This was a slightly confusing concept, but I think they grasped it pretty well. It was especially cool to see them flip through their Bibles to verses that I directed them to.”

The lion cub I tried to pack in my suitcase. So cute!

On Saturday, we all went to Kruegerpark, which is a wildlife reserve and was similar to Pilanesburg, except there were a ton of animals! It was almost like a zoo in the wilderness. We saw water buffalo, jackals, rhinos, lions, cheetahs, ostriches, and zebra. We even got to see a pride of lions completely devour a cow, which was incredible.  Lions are so beautiful, and seeing them up close and personal (and eating) was quite the experience. The game park had an animal nursery and I got to play with a lion and tiger cub! It was so unreal. They were so cute and soft—I just wanted to take them home with me! I now have a pretty cool scar on my hand from the lion cub that will forevermore remind me of South Africa. The next day I got to go to a tent church in Mamelodi and I saw what it really means to worship God. It was so interesting to hear Pastor Ezekiel talk about how the really really poor areas of Mamelodi (squatter camps) are not an issue of laziness or poverty, but of spiritual weakness. He told us not to pray that people will find jobs or be able to provide for their families, but that they will find strength and hope in the Lord. Wow. Now that changed my perspective. After church, Pastor Ezekiel led us on a tour around the squatter camps. “I didn’t have my camera to capture the complete destitution of this place, but I’m glad I experienced it without looking behind the lens. As we walked through the village, shack after shack stared me in the face. I felt guilty and depressed that there was nothing I could do to help. Trash, broken beer bottles, and scrap metal littered the roads. A woman bends over a bucket of soapy water and roughly scrubs the dirt out of a worn sweatshirt. She looks up at us and smiles as she greets us, “Dumela, le kai.” This is when I realized the difference between poverty in America and poverty here. There is an overwhelming sense of community and love here. I feel so blessed that I got to spend 2 or 3 hours in that community, because it truly showed me God’s presence there-- despite what appears to be “dire circumstances”.

 



Temiso and Gateng; I'm so glad other people had cameras.