June 20, 2005 - Cleaning, Cards, Celebration (and Other Tomfoolery)

Captain's log, stardate 349239.4.
(Also known as June 20th, which, since it is the day after Father's Day, and is also not Mother's Day, can only be Children's Day, since every day is Children's Day.)

This is Matt, this time, giving you my perspective on the day.

For the first day in a long time, the team was able to sleep in, and there was much rejoicing. While everyone was in various stages of rousing from their slumber and having their devotions, I drove out to the building site to look around and prep the bricklayers.

A brick, by South African standards, is 70 x 10 x 170mm. To make a stack of any reasonable size takes thousands of them. And as I walked around the structure that is now finally starting to look like the Pastor's Home on the blueprints, I marveled. There are a lot of stacks of reasonable size. I was somewhat aware of various team members moving wheelbarrow after wheelbarrow of them into the house so that the bricklayers had something to work with, but only now did I realize how much work they had done. People who are willing to do anything are a brilliant testimony of Christ's example of humble service. The people on this team have been those kinds of people. As I survey the site in the smoky morning air (since the air here is always smoky in the winter), I thank God for each person on this team and all the sacrifices they made to come work here.

Meanwhile, on the other side of town --beyond the smoky communities of the Germiston Extensions, past the mom-and-pop shops of central Primrose, and through the fence-walled yet tree-lined streets of Petunia Rd.-- the rest of the team was getting busy.

Who knows how many people have lived in the house at 12 Petunia since it was finished in the 1950's, but until tomorrow, the Grace House is home to the team from Grace Bible Church of Battlement Mesa. And today, they're making it sparkle! Cleaning floors, washing windows, scrubbing floors, and so much more. Attention parents, if anyone from this team tells you they don't know how to clean, they're making it up. This place looks great. Kudos.

And that was just the beginning. Later in the day two elite (read: "healthy") groups went to a Lambano home to say either hi or bye to the toddlers (depending on whether or not it was their first time there). Jeff and Kwacha ripped all the baseboards off the walls at the newest Lambano house (on purpose), getting the hardwood floors ready for sanding tomorrow. Sand the deck, sand the deck. Lunch, more cleaning, a break to play cards. Pack for the game park, sort all the tools, break to play cards. And that's about the rhythm for the rest of the day, until evening, when the tempo got faster and the volume went up (it always gets louder at night with this crowd).

There were two reasons for the switch to double-time in the evening. First, dinner. Thanks to people from the church here, who have graciously volunteered to bring dinners for the team, everyone has eaten well. Tonight we brought out our best kept culinary secret: Celeste Stewart. South Africans love to show off their cooking ability, and Mrs. Stewart should be their queen. Shepherd's Pie (which they call Sheepherders Pie), Greek salad (which they call Greek salad), and various other foods that don't get much time to decorate the table before they're devoured.

Reason two: Kwacha's birthday. Actually it's not really until tomorrow, but he didn't realize that until this morning, and by then we had already made plans to celebrate tonight. And Celeste (showing off), made a few different desserts to help us observe it. And it was when we had lit all 30 candles that we realized why there are no smoke alarms in this country. Find Jeff's picture to see what I mean.

And this brings us to the weird part of any narrative where you're at the present, and you're not sure if you should speculate about what will happen next, or just stop without a climax. (I think that's why most historians write massive volumes... they just can't find a good place to stop.) I'll go with just stopping here.

In all seriousness, it has been an immense joy and pleasure to have these 10 people here for the last two weeks. Come what may, the common theme I've seen throughout their days here has been a willingness to follow the Lord's will for them, no matter how unexpected. They have been a great encouragement to me. Thanks to everyone back in Colorado for sending them to South Africa, for your faithful prayers. Thanks especially for everyone who wrote me an email, they have been a great joy. :)

                                                                   By grace,

                                                       Matt Floreen

Also view Jeff's June 20 Pastor's Journal