Margate Outreach

Two weeks ago I, Piet was in the city of Durban (in another province/state) for an outreach with the church young adult’s band. We drove down on the Monday (about a 7 hour drive) and started ministering Tuesday morning. The objective of the outreach was to reach the young people in schools in a way that is relative.

We arrived at the schools at 8am and played praise and worship songs at their morning assembly gatherings. We then invited them to a “praise party” on Friday night at the youth group of the church we were partnering with, Margate Baptist.

One of the school assemblies

We worked with both a public/government school as well as a private school. We were so impressed how the students were going crazy for God! They loved the music and we felt we connected well on their level. We ministered to about 300 students the first day and 400 the second day. 

On Friday night it was time for the praise party. There were many different ministries and churches represented in that church hall. There were probably about 800 people in that church. Many of the young people gave their lives to the Lord and there were a lot of volunteers to pray with them.

School #2

On Saturday, we ran music/worship workshops at the church. We invited other churches worship leaders and band members from the area. One of the things we taught was how to take a popular gospel song from a CD and make it relevant for a church service.

At the end of the outreach the team was exhausted, but it was such a nice time. We really enjoyed working with the church in Margate and reaching out to the young people. God moved in Margate! Overall, I really want to thank everyone for your prayers. I know many of you were following the outreach on facebook. I have personally been inspired and reminded by the Lord to continue to use my musical gifting so that many could know Him.

While I was in Durban, the Lord reminded me of the story in the Bible about the people with different talents. The one who didn’t use his got it taken away. The point of a gift is to use it. Edwin McManus asks the question “is an instrument really an instrument if it isn’t played?” During that week I learned, I served and I grew. One can never stop growing in God.

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In other news concerning the life of Piet and Leah, we are just one day away from a personal discovery and outreach to Lesotho. We have been praying about moving out of South Africa and into another African country for a while now. We feel that God has opened the door for a ministry in Lesotho called LXP Lesotho. If you remember, we took our team on an outreach trip to Lesotho in October.

We are joining good friends of ours, Godfrey and Elizabeth, who lead the organization. On Monday, we are going to the town of Butha Buthe for a month to have deeper exposure to the culture, language, and ministry opportunities. We are confident that God has called us long-term, but we are using wisdom to “test the waters” before uprooting our whole life in Johannesburg.

Please pray with us at this time as we are handing over Year of Your Life/S2S and trusting God for new opportunities in Lesotho. We feel this month will be a refreshing time as we listen to God’s voice and serve the people of Lesotho. We are so excited!!

We are still available via email for this month, so feel free to send messages our way!

Truly Loving Africa,

The Bakers

S2S 2013!

Hello family and friends! 

Last week was the official launch of our gap year program 2013! As you can see by the title, we are in the process of changing our name. There is another church in our area who runs a gap year program called "Year of Your Life" and they have kindly asked us to change our name. Our slogan for the last year's team was "Sold out to Serve", so we decided to adapt this as the new name for our program (S2S for short). 

The structure of our team is slightly different this year. At this point we officially have three students (all guys!). We also have the leaders: Piet, Cindy, and myself; as well as two girls, Cassandra and Maxine, who work full-time in children's ministry at our church. These two ladies help out quite a lot in our school ministry and other aspects of children's outreach with the team.

We took our team to a Christian campsite in Hartebeespoort for an orientation week last week. We did lots of team building games and sessions regarding attitude, values, leadership, diversity, trust, and conflict management. This was a great time to connect with the team and hear everyone's stories. 

This week we have started up working at the primary school, high school, youth group, and kid's club. We will also be working again with the retirement home, a baby shelter, after school playtime, and we also hope to start up an initiative in the informal settlement (township).

We are excited about this year and anxious to see what the Lord will do. 

We are still praying about our future and feel that the picture is slowly coming into focus. We will be thrilled to update everyone when the time is right.

Thank you for all of your support over the years. The other day I realized I have been in South Africa for 4 1/2 years! I can't believe how the time has flown.

God bless, dear friends

Love,

The Bakers

A White Christmas

Hello Everyone!

We trust that you had a very lovely Christmas holiday and that it was spent with family, friends, and loved ones. Wherever you were, we pray that you felt the love and presence of the Lord.

We ended the YOYL 2012 year with our graduation ceremony where each of our 7 students were presented with certificates of completion for their year of service. The very next day we boarded the plane bound for San Francisco.

Piet and I were very spoiled in our 5 weeks in the US! We had such a great time and we were sad when it finally came time to leave.

Most of our time was spent being wined and dined by old friends for me, and new ones for Piet. We eventually got to the point where we were no longer hungry and simply ate because it was that time! We were treated so well and loved by everyone that we were able to see though we were saddened that time simply did not allow us to see everyone we would have liked to!

Our time in Livermore was spent with my parents, Grandparents and a few dear friends. We took a week to explore parts of Southern California making sure not to miss Disneyland! On the way, we spent a few nights in Yosemite where Piet saw snow for the first time. He will definitely say that this was a big highlight for him! We were also in Redding for a week visiting the Stirring and a few of my old college friends. Piet felt right at home and fit in so well with the Stirring culture. We can truly say that our time away was precious and we have come back refreshed and ready for this new year.

Today is our second day back to work. We are working out the kinks of the YOYL program and preparing for the students to arrive on the 5^th of February. We will have our Orientation week from 5-8 February and hopefully will start off the year with a bang!

Please do join in praying with us and for us. Not only for this year but for us personally. There are a lot of things on our hearts at the moment, though not much we can share at this point. We are still praying about our future in ministry and open to whatever (and wherever) the Lord has in store for us.

To those in the US, thank you to each one who gave us a meal or even a cup of coffee. Our time with you was truly valuable and will not be quickly forgotten. To those in South Africa, thank you for receiving us back with open arms. We look forward to 2013 with you!

All our love,

The Bakers

Two Weeks Till Home Time!

We are literally counting the days until we board that plane bound for San Francisco. 12 days from today and then we travel for approximately 25 hours. Things haven't been easy in the last few months, but we are pushing forward and trusting God for the best.

You may have heard or seen on facebook that Piet has gotten in two car accidents in two months. The first one wasn't so bad and our car isn't too badly damaged, however, Piet cannot continue to run the business because the chassis on our car is bent and we cannot risk towing the trailer while it is not fixed. The second accident, however, was in our friend's vehicle. The damage to the vehicle itself wasn't terrible, but the angle of the impact could have caused serious damage to Piet. He could have either lost his legs or snapped his neck. We are so thankful that God was watching over him because he walked away with only a small scratch on his foot.

We only have the rest of this week and next week of YOYL. The year has really been winding down nicely. We haven't been as involved in the schools as of late because of exams. We have been focusing on community outreach and recruiting for next year. Our YOYL graduation ceremony is on the 1st of December and Piet and I fly out on the evening of the 2nd. We will be in California for 5 weeks. We will be sharing about our ministry on 9 December in Livermore, CA and we will be in Redding the week after Christmas.

We pray that you have a lovely Christmas season celebrating the birth of Christ, wherever it is you will be spending it!

With Love

The Bakers

Lesotho Mission Trip

October 15 - 21

 

We arrived on Monday afternoon in the town of Butha Buthe minutes outside of the South African border. Godfrey and Elizabeth introduced us to the culture of Lesotho and the organization here, LXP Lesotho.

 

While serving with LXP, we were involved in a few different projects. Each morning, we drove to the new site of LXP Lesotho to help them clear and fix the land. We dug a trench to channel the rain around the property as to not flood to property. After we finished with the digging of the trench, we poured the first layer of cement. We also did smaller projects such as painting the poles of the fence, pulling weeds, and  prepared the dirt for a retaining wall.  The house (which will be the first addition to the base) should be finished in June 2013.
 

On Thursday morning, we visited  a school for disabled children. The children are of all ages and have variation of disabilities. The school is called  “Thuso e tla tsoa kae” which means “Where does our help come from?”  We performed two dances and our “Set Me Free” drama. We felt this was the best audience that we had ever had! After this, we split up into teams to help in the garden or help with the washing. Visiting the school was a very humbling experience, however we wished that we had a bit more time to interact with the children.

 

In ministry groups of three, we went out into the community of Butha-Buthe to build relationships with the locals. We each had a translator in our team since many of the elderly people do not speak English. We were impressed that the team picked up quite a bit of Sesotho! They really made an effort to be able to greet the locals in their language. When we went into the people’s homes, we asked about their culture, connected with them relationally and spoke to them about the message of Christ. We found that many of them knew who Jesus was and is, but didn’t really KNOW him on a personal level at all. We took these opportunities to bring a deeper understanding of Christ. Before we arrived in Lesotho, the message of healing and bringing healing was spoken over our team. We prayed for many people and saw many healed!

 

Every Saturday, Godfrey, Elizabeth and their team of leaders run a youth program for the children and youth of their village. The children range from age 2—20. The week that we were in Lesotho, the discussion topic was being set free from oppression or anything that can hold a person back. The team did our two dances and the “set me free” drama. The youth responded well to this serious drama and found that they could relate. We also discussed in groups Isaiah 61 and that role that Jesus played on earth and the role we now play as followers of Christ.

We were very impressed with the youth and their understanding of the youth Word and their ability to apply it in daily life.

 Prayer Requests

 

-Pray that the people of Butha-Buthe will come to have a personal relationship with Jesus
-Pray for Godfrey and Elizabeth as they minister daily into the lives of the people
-Pray that the resources come through to develop the LXP base

A big thanks goes to Godfrey, Elizabeth and LXP Lesotho!

Thank you for hosting us and introducing us to new things! We are
grateful to you and your team! May the Lord bless and keep you!

Lots of Love,

The Bakers

 

 

As the year comes to a close

Seeing as 2012 is coming to a close, we can look forward to a couple of things:

1.       Our student graduation is coming up

2.       Fall and Christmas flavours at Starbucks (in some parts of the world…)

3.       Our trip to America is nearly here

4.       We need to find students for next year’s YOYL program (and quick!)

After a meeting with our pastors and the finance team, they have indicated that we need 8 students in order for YOYL to carry on. No eight students? No YOYL.

BUT the good news is that we feel God is doing something good and new with Year of Your Life next year.

A few weeks ago, some of our mentors asked to meet with us because they know of a young person who wants to do YOYL. Out of this meeting, we identified three young men who would be perfect for YOYL. These three guys are from the rural community, but are very involved in their local churches and have a heart for reaching out. Piet and I mentored two of these guys while we were still at Refilwe and we identified them as “junior leaders” in our youth. It is amazing to see how they have picked up where we left off and are now coaching soccer, mentoring other young people, and teaching Sunday School.

About a month ago, we were speaking to a friend of ours and they were commenting that it is too bad that the people who need the training of YOYL the most are the ones that cannot afford it. But after this meeting, we feel that God is drawing people not necessarily always from the “better off” areas and those who can afford the program, but from the communities where they need training and equipping the most.

Two of these young guys will hopefully join us this next year, and the other will join us the following year. The biggest thing we are worried about now is their accommodation. We have to trust God that someone (possibly in our church) will open up their home for them to stay. Ideally we would like to find someone with a cottage in their yard where these guys could stay together. We also need to trust God for finances for their food.

In addition to these guys, we have additional 4 or so students from our church that are thinking about YOYL. So, in total we have about 7 interested. This is good news!

We are trying to make the most of these last 2 months of YOYL...can't believe it's gone so fast! We have been running a new outreach lately that seems to be working. Right across the road from the church is a community center (the one we re-painted a few months ago). So, we decided to do a "play day" every Friday. We invite the kids (and moms!) of the community to join us for games, jumping castle, and lots of sweets!

Please pray with us that God will provide the students that we need for next year! YOYL 2013 here we come!

Year of OUR Lives

Executing a “Unique Taste”!

We are happy to announce that Piet’s new business is almost up and running. By this time next week we will be in full swing! For a few months now, Piet has had the idea to sell food by the side of the road to taxi drivers and people waiting for a taxi. He scouted out a prime spot very close to our house.

Piet's catering trailer

After we returned home from Zambia, we (in faith) bought a catering trailer which was completely by God’s blessing.

Piet belongs to a small business association that helps low income entrepreneurs get on their feet. Recently, the business association (called Seeds of Africa) found a sponsor for Piet’s business: Unique Taste Foods. With the money given, he was able to buy all the necessary items.

Piet’s brother Ernest will run the business Monday-Friday. He will sell freshly braaied (BBQ’d) chicken or steak, pap (a starch), side salad, and fries. “Unique Taste” will give Ernest a job as well as give a bit of a supplement to our income. We are really excited to see how the business grows and flourishes as the months go on.

Year of Your Life

We cannot believe that it was this time last year that we starting planning and dreaming about YOYL. The time has escaped us and the year is coming to an end in 3 short months.

Since our return from Zambia, we have been carrying on with weekly ministry as usual. Piet and myself and a few of our team members have been helping with the church youth group, which the other half of the team is involved in children’s ministry.

We have also completed a renovation project in our local community. Across the road from the church is a community center complete with a playground. The playground was broken in various spots, it had chipped paint, and wasn’t the safest for children to play on. We have added a sand pit, fixed all the broken planks and made a world of difference with colourful paint! A few moms in the community have asked if we can do a once-a-week play group with their children. What a great opportunity this will be to bring good news of a Saviour to these young lives!

Painting at Thembalami Care Center

In addition to all of this, we have had a few other outreach projects as well: painting at an old age home for the disabled, cleaning homes in a retirement village, and leading the CIA group (Christians in Action) at the local high school. Finally, we will again be crossing borders in October as we will be having an outreach to Lesotho!

CIA Club at Rand Park High School

Needs and Prayer Needs:

-A deep fryer for the business
-A small generator

-Protection and blessing over the business
-Protection for our business against corruption from governing officials of this country
-Pray for our team as they start thinking about their plans for next year

And, in other news, in three months from today, we will be arriving in the USA!!!

Thank you for standing beside our family as we get the business going and finish out the year!

Blessings and Love

The Bakers