Hope your trip was an enjoyable one! We had a few inches of snow yesterday and it feels more like winter here. I am getting very excited now and also maybe a bit fearful, but i realize that this is an opportunity that I will always cherish. May God’s Grace be with you always and enjoy the moment of today.
My name is Mark Hoeft of Madelia, MN. I will be leaving on the 14th of January for the mission trip to South Africa. What an opportunity to be a part of this group. It’s amazing how God works in our lives every day and has made this opportunity come together. I hope that by being a part of the trip, we begin a lifelong relationship with the South African people and can help them improve their farming operation. I know that this will only be a small step in the long road, but I do think that we will make a difference.
Many of you have asked, “What is your schedule?” There are many things I know, many I don’t know, so I’ll try to tell you a bit more about the trip.
We will be going in 2 groups. I will be going with the 1st group. We leave from Minneapolis Today, January 8th at 3:10 on Flight NWA 42. It is an 8 and a half hour flight to Amsterdam. We have 3 and a half hours in Amsterdam, and then take KLM Flight 591, a 10 and a half hour flight, to Johannesburg. We will arrive at 9:30 in the evening, South African time. We will be met by Pastor Bheki Mathe, who visited us in the spring, and who is now the General Secretary for all of the Evangelical Lutheran Church of Southern Africa (ELCSA). We will stay overnight at the conference centre in Johannesburg that is owned by ELCSA, Kempton Park Conference Centre (http://www.kpcc.co.za/about.htm). The next day we will visit Soweto, one of the focal points of Apartheid and its ending. (http://www.soweto.co.za/html/t_soweto.htm). That evening we will be met by Skhumbuzo Mntambo, who is the treasurer for the partnership committee of Shiyane Circuit. The following day (Friday) we will rent a sedan, and the two vehicles will travel together to the Shiyane Circuit, and specifically, to Newcastle () and to Rorke’s Drift (about an hours drive south of Dundee, or about 60 miles south of Newcastle).
Now, in this first group there are three people going to Rorke’s Drift, where there is an Arts and Crafts Centre (http://www.centre-rorkesdrift.com) that is run by the church. Lois Peterson is a ceramics professor from Gustavus. Her purpose will be to both teach and help with marketing. With her at Rorke’s Drift for the month will be David Goldstein, one of her senior students, who also has marketing skills, and Gary Grunig, from Our Saviors in Butternut, who will be repairing equipment, as well as mentoring a person in repairs. There are two others with the early group… Juanita Harberts, a senior seminarian, and Don Swanjord. They will both be connecting with other of the circuits in the Diocese, as well as participating in the ongoing ministry that we will be doing.
I will spend the 1st week visiting in various parishes in Watonwan Conference’s partnership circuit… Shiyane. I know that this coming Sunday I will be preaching about baptism somewhere around the town of Newcastle in the Mountain View Parish. Then it will be on to Dundee and the congregations around that town. Then I will return to Johannesburg with Skumbuzo to claim the rest of the group who will arrive on the 15th of January.
I began this email 3 days ago… life has been too hectic to finish it. Now I must leave for the airport in 5 minutes.
This morning I began my day by reading a bit from Isaiah 43… Fear Not, for I have redeemed you. I have called you by name. You are mine… As I fly I will be taking quiet time to ponder what I will preach this coming Sunday. What is so very cool is that the God who calls us each by name calls each in South Africa as well. And the God who is with everyone in Southwestern Minnesota is also with our brothers and sisters in South Africa. To put it another way, in God we know the reality that we aren’t really that different… created, called, and sent out into our world, wherever that sending might be.
And so, now, the adventure continues.
God bless each and every one of you. Thanks for your prayers!!! Revkah (Hebrew for Rebecca)
I am about to join with a group of 27 people who will be leaving for South Africa during the next 2 weeks. If i really get this blog to work, there will be others beside myself that will be adding pieces. We’ll see… I’m new at this, and am of the “slightly older” generation.
I am a Lutheran pastor serving at Bethany Lutheran in Judson, Minnesota. 3 years ago I went to South Africa on a relationship building trip with the Southwestern Minnesota Synod of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America. (ELCA). As a result of getting know Bheki Mathe, a pastor in KwaZulu Natal, we invited him to visit in April and May. While he was here he invited farmers to come and help with some agricultural pieces in January of 2008… I said no way could we get a group together that quickly. However, one of the people at the table, a farmer, looked at me and said, “tell me when the 1st meeting will be”. That first meeting occured before Pastor Bheki left.
It is now 8 months later. I thought we could get together a small group. We have 27 people. As I go along I will describe some of them to you, and invite some of them to share as well. Meanwhile, I’m beginning my time change early (you need to add 8 hours to know what time mine is), and so I’m going to crash. The plane leaves tomorrow at 3, flies 8.5 hours to Amsterdam, we have a 3.5 hour layover, and then it is 10 hours to Johannesburg…
Perhaps there will be a couple of minutes left in the morning between last minute packing to add a bit.
God’s peace is in the midst of the pieces!!!
Thanks for your prayers!
Rebecca