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Hi everyone! I'm really sorry that the last email didnt work, and now someone has deleted it off the computer, so here i go again.
We're are having a really great time here, amazingly i stil havent been ill, i wake up everyday and thank God for all the people back home (and across the world) who must be praying for me not to get ill! Most of the others have had a couple of tummy bugs, but it hasnt stopped anyone doing any work! The team are doing really well, we all get on so well now, its like we all feel valued in the group now, and we understand each others senses of humour and even the little annoying habits people have dont matter so much when you start to love them. In my group of 3 (Me, Becky and Flo) we are the group that are always laughing, which if you know me well..i love to do! But I feel really happy now, especially as i was quite homesick a few weeks ago, but we prayed about it and now i just want to make the most of it because i'll be home sooner than i know it! God's doing really cool
things in the team, its amazing how many prayers he has answered even for the most silly things, like he fixed my camera, i missed Tigga (my cat) and prayed about it and now we keep having cats from other flats wondering into our house! It's so cool, we pray about everything so its easier to see how God is helping us.
The work in the churches is going great, our church Baptista Renovada is really lively and fun, and they have loads of youth and children. So...on mondays we will be doing visits and praying with people (once school for the mozambicans finishes) and a creative workshop, which has so far included, art, dance, sport and sewing and after our holiday we'll be doing singing! </DIV>
Tuesdays is our day off, so we go to the beach and play in the sea or the pool, its really great to just relax with the whole team.
On wednesdays we have training at the oasis office and we pray as a whole organisation and then just the GAT team and then we have a talk from a pastor linked to oasis, so far these have been about the history of the church in mozambique, spiritual warfare, evangelism. Then we have our portuguese lesson, which is very important and our teacher is really good so we learn lots although its difficult to concentrate in the heat!
On Thurdays we have preparation for all the activities we do which usually involves making and photocopying worksheets and thinking of things to do for the workshops. In the afternoons we have kids club, which is run by Oasis but they train people in the church to do it themselves, so we just go to support the leaders and get to know the children! It's very dirty running around in the sand but the kids love it, and so do we!
On Fridays we have team time, which is a bible study and general chat in the morning, and then more portuguese lessons in the afternoon, after our holiday we will be working at an orphanage out in the districts on a friday afternoon, which we visited on my birthday, so thats very exciting!! In the evening we have some English time at Marina's (our overseer) we take it in turn to cook, chat and watch a movie - our little escape from Africa for 3 hours!
On Saturdays we go to worship practise in the morning, where we try to sing in portuguese, its actually really good,because then we can sing the songs at church on sunday! altho they like us to go up, and then we look like lemons, when we dont know the words and we just dont look as good dancing along! In the afternoons there is youthclub, which is sometimes evangelism, which is really fun, its amazing how people here actually stop and listen, although they dont always come along to church, if we start building relationships with them, i think they will see that its because we want them to be saved, I managed to evangelise in portuguese the other week was great! although it was a script, but its a start! We sometimes have conferences on saturdays aswell, they are all in portuguese but i like to sit and listen and try to pick out words and i can kinda get the
gist now. We do have it translated for us, but then i dont listen to the portuguese! Last week we had to run youth club so we did some singing and then a bible study and then played sports on the beach! Everyone just loved it! It was awesome! People aged 6 to probably 26 were all playing, boys against girls, and we drew! amazing, although to be fair we did have about 10 goalies in the girls team! We're really starting to build relationships with the youth now, although communication is difficult, by playing sports and worshipping God together we definitely feel like we fit in now!
And then there is sunday! We go to church at 9 am and have an hour of "sunday school" ive moved into the youth group now because we were in the adult group but i found it really hard to contribute and the translation was hard to understand so now i'm in an all portuguese group, so i have no choice but to learn! The service usually lasts between 2 and 3 hours, but when we're helping lead the singing it breaks it up a bit, last week we had a Zimbabwean woman doing the sermon so we could listen in English and she invited us round for lunch sometime, so that'll be really great! In the afternoons we teach english, i love it! I correct my friends' english at home so getting to teach it here is like a dream come true! hehe, but really its great, our group has grown each week and now we have over 30 people coming! Some who can only say;"fine?" and other who ask questions
like "should i say my favourite food is...or my favourite foods are..." with a perfect accent! So its challenging to feel like everyone is learning but its really fun! And then we meet the rest of the team at the beach (at the end of our road) chat a bit (having not seen each other since friday) and go to english fellowship, where we sing english songs and listen to english sermons! bliss!
So thats our week really, its restricted because we have to always be home by 5.30 and go home for lunch, but I'm really enjoying the work here and building great relationships! Our family are so lovely to us, and understand that we have lots of preparation to do so leave us in peace when we need it, its quite hard sometimes because we can barely speak and i worry that we're annoying them, but then Ana will smile at me and sing along with us playing the guitar and I stop worrying
Please thank God for
the team, that we have bonded so well
Marina our overseer - shes just amazing!... the opportunity to go to the orphanage in Manga
the relationships we have formed already with the people in the church
all the prayers he has answered so far
Please pray for
our continued health and safety whilst travelling in Zimbabwe in the next two weeks
Our relationships with our mozambican families that communication wont be a problem
Sonia, one of our church overseers after the death of her mother
the people we talk to whilst evangelising that God will open their ears to the truth in his word
energy to love people (i know that sounds silly) but when we cant communicate and arent from the same culture its not always easy
Thank you for all your prayers and post!! keep me up to date with what's happening back home
Lots of love Rachel xxxxxxxxxxxx
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