Sweet Home Update

This was an update from Bridges Of Hope.

Please pray for Sisanda as she recruits and trains more Community Health Evangelists (CHE's) this year.

Please pray for Khuselwa, a 13 year old girl who is facing a personal crisis.

Pray for this weeks CHE Training Lessons: Worms and Praying for others.

Below is a picture of some of the Orphans and Vulnerable Children in Sweet Home:

Sewing Business Underway in Sweet Home!!

This was in an update from Bridges Of Hope.

Please pray the women of Sweet Home who purchased their own sewing machine and have launched their Micro-Business! The second picture is Noluthando holding up the receipt. Please pray for Noluthando, Nowethu, Nozuko and Thobeka who are all employed now and are putting their business plan into action. Please pray for success and for God's protection on their new asset and business.

Please pray for Nosizile, one of the Sweet Home Committee Members who has been sick and for Chumani, who has a problem with alcohol abuse.

Please pray for this family as they are grieving and in a very though spot. Pray that the Community Health Evangelists in Philippi will know how to best assist this family.

About Our Partnership with Bridges Of Hope

Our partnership with Bridges Of Hope started in 2007 when a 9 member core team was created and went on a scouting trip to South Africa and Namibia. We landed with Bridges Of Hope and adopted the township of Sweet Home. In 2008 we had two teams visit in July and December.

The Bridges Of Hope ministry is built around a CHE (Community Health Evangelist) program developed by LifeWind. When adopting a community, Bridges searches for leaders to become CHEs. After training, these CHEs go on home visits and give spiritual and physical lessons. They also create a list of "felt needs" for the community which is the list that Bridges Of Hope and ROCKHarbor work on when coming alongside the leaders in the community. Bridges Of Hope has a strong desire to work on development as a long term goal and relief only to support short term needs. Here is an official description of Philippe from the Bridges Of Hope website.

The original community which was adopted by Bridges Of Hope in Cape Flats is called Phillipe. The church of St. Paul, once a small metal building is now a beautiful brick structure and a center piece of the community.

In 2009 we are again planning on sending two separate teams, one in July/August and one in December.

Summer Team Selection

We've spent the last few weeks interviewing candidates for the Summer trip and after many meetings we have selected and called the final team. If you didn't find out by today (positive or negative) then something went wrong.

If you were not selected, please don't be disappointed. There are a lot of variables that go into creating a team and it may be that you have a skill that we may need on a future team. We are working with ROCKHarbor on a program that should launch soon that will give everyone an opportunity to serve. There are a lot of events and ways to help before and after a trip and we will be announcing ways to get involved. This will also give the leaders a better opportunity to get to know potential team members well before the interview process and will help us make a more informed decision. A 30-45 minute interview is short and may not show your true heart for South Africa.

Interviews

The core team will be interviewing applicants every evening for the next two weeks. We plan on having the team chosen by the middle of February. We will call everyone we interview to tell them if they have or have not been selected for the team. This is a very difficult process as we typically receive three or four times the number of applicants as we have slots available. There are always difficult decisions at the end and we have turned away many amazing people for no other reason than there are just not enough slots. We pray a lot about our choices and try as best we can to lot God choose His team and simply work through us. If you pray, please pray that we put Him first and allow Him to guide our every move in the selection, training and during the trip.