The
Lord’s ways are ever amazing and confusing. He prepares paths for us that we
didn’t expect, but are excited to see and then diverts those paths again. His paths have been both stirring and
challenging to travel the last few months. Let me share a bit about what the
Lord has been doing.
Shortly
after I arrived in South Africa, mutual friends introduced me to Wes and Beth
Gestring, IMB (Southern Baptist International Mission Board) missionaries also
serving at North-West University (NWU).
Wes teaches in the agriculture department, which is located in the same
area of campus as the small animal clinic. They were heading off to a two-week IMB
training conference where they learned about a church planting movement called
T4T (training for trainers) championed by Steve Smith and David Garrison and originally
developed by Ying Kai in China. They
returned very excited about what they had learned and eager to implement it
with the student groups they led.
In
God’s own mysterious way, I had also been exposed briefly to T4T (1 day) and
other church planting movement ideas while at the Center for Intercultural
Training last May (in North Carolina). CIT
offered an extra week of training in Church Facilitation & Multiplication
after finishing with the 4-week missions preparation course. I had decided to
attend since I was there already and it seemed interesting. However, I thought the week might not be very
applicable for me since I wasn’t going to be involved in church planting. I’m
so glad God convinced me to stay that extra week! It was exciting and eye-opening to see how
God was moving around the world and realize what was possible. After that week, I knew God had me there for
a reason, but I couldn’t imagine trying to implement these ideas on my own in a
new country.
The
Gestrings invited me over for dinner after their training excited to share with
me about T4T and see if I would be willing to join them in working to implement
it at NWU. It was wonderful confirmation
for all of us to realize how God had prepared us separately with the same
vision for starting a church planting movement.
Even more amazing, the IMB was doing a second two-week training in South
Africa in September and they were willing to let me attend at no charge!
The
next week, I attended the woman’s Monday Bible study Beth led on campus for
students as well as the student evangelism training Wes led on Wednesdays. Just one week later everything changed when
Beth found out she was going to need to return to the United States immediately
for several months of medical care. I
agreed to continue the woman’s Bible study and for now I am also continuing the
evangelism training although I feel woefully unprepared for that topic. Although it is a relief to the Gestrings that
the students they care so much about have not been left without guidance, it
thrust me into a significantly greater ministry role than I had expected at
this stage.
Please
pray for wisdom as I lead both student groups as well as try to find my way
around my role at the small animal clinic.
Please also pray for the Gestrings, that Beth’s medical treatment would
be successful and they will be able to return to South Africa this year. Finally, please pray for me while I attend
the T4T training in Johannesburg the first two weeks of September. There will be much to learn and to
implement that is out of my comfort zone.
On
a side note, my work at the clinic is going well and I’m starting to develop a
rhythm with all the different medications and diseases seen here. Parvo virus is rife with multiple cases each
week and tick borne diseases, such as Ehrlichia and Babesia, are very common as
well. Diagnostic options are extremely
limited because, although the university has excellent blood chemistry and
blood cell count machines, they are currently broken and are unlikely to be
repaired. I’m essentially limited to
urine dip sticks (when we have them), HCT/TP, a few snap tests (parvo,
Felv/FIV), and whatever I can do in the exam room with a microscope (blood
smears, fecal exams, FNAs, etc).
Thankfully,
I’ve had several good outcomes with patients to start out my time here and we
see lots of cute puppies throughout the day.
For more stories of my patients, please check out my project Facebook
page at www.facebook.com/GoSpeakLiveBoldly.
