2010 Trailer Ministry

Jean at Spitzpunt reports on what God is doing:  Our holiday club ministry has seen kids saved and exposed to the gospel daily.  Our big screen events have been amazing.  We’re basically having church services every night.  God is totally blowing our minds!  We’re seeing people saved and exposed to the gospel.  We’re tired, but so excited!

The team from Marapyane Baptist Church writes:  we feel so blessed in this community.  The church has supplied volunteers that are excited for the vision and have already run with the programme.  It has been so encouraging seeing God’s hand at work.  We have a solid 60-70 kids a day and are learning many African phrases, as well as interesting meals (chicken feet and cabbage!)

Ephraim reports from Elim Stinkwater that they had 30 kids Wednesday and they are enjoying the holiday club program.  All the leaders are very active.  There are few local leaders but that has not been a barrier because the kids understand English.  They are planning a big soccer tournament today.  He requests prayer for relationship tensions between pastors in the area.

23 June 2010

Eastside Community Church

Dear Riaan,

Thank you for partnering with us again this year. We found your manual extremely helpful and really appreciate the time, effort and talent that went into it. Thank you, also for sending us Easter eggs, soccer balls, clothes and blankets. They were much needed and really appreciated by the 500 children that attended.

Your kindness and willingness to be involved is much appreciated.

God Bless,
Lots of love
Craig and Gina
Community Ministries
Muldersdrift

Uitenhage Baptist Church is a church with whom we have a partnership.  They are situated in the Eastern Cape near Port Elizabeth (see map below).

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We have assisted them with the running of their annua Holiday Club since 2008 and this year they ran with our material on their own

Attendance:
To our knowledge we registered 150 children who attended the Holiday Club. This is incredible for us as we see God’s hand in it all. We did our first holiday club in 2006 with 50 children and we see how God is working in our community of Uitenhage. The English community is relatively small so we were really blessed this week seeing so many children attending!

Reaching kids for His Kingdom:
To our knowledge between 20-30 kids were “saved” during the course of the week. Many of our Grade 8 leaders led children to Christ for the first time which was really exciting!

Leaders:
This year we had a team of 20, including myself and the sound guy. So basically 18 leaders/directors for the club. I was relatively happy with the amount as once again we look back and see God’s provision. However, we wouldn’t have been stretched so much if there were more leaders! Although it is always good to be challenged. We had quite a few “new” leaders i.e. Grade 8’s who, were leading for the first time. This is really encouraging for next year as, we can build on it.

Music:
The music was really well received, the kids responded well to the music. By Friday they knew all the actions and the words to the songs! Once again it was wonderful to reinforce the bible stories by the music that we were singing.

Parents Evening:
This was really, really, well attended. As you are aware, Bruce, the mindset in Uitenhage is drop off the kids and fetch them in an hour! We have worked really hard with the help of Eastside to get away from this mindset, and once more we saw God’s hand in this. Most of the parents that attended do not worship at our church, so once more was a wonderful testimony to God’s goodness. Jacques led us just before the message in the song “God of the City” we lit candles the idea being that of evangelizing and holding a light to God’s word as well as spreading God’s word. It was incredible, as one felt the Holy Spirit moving amongst us.

Overall:
For myself, I feel really grateful to have been able to be involved with Eastside’s vision and to be able to bring the vision across to our own church. My prayer being that the WHOLE CHURCH would be able to catch the vision. Once more God answered this prayer and I really don’t think there was anybody in the church that wasn’t involved, from the décor, to the food, to the crafts, to the marketing, to the prayer to EVERYTHING! This to me was the biggest blessing! The church feel for 2011 we should once again have the Holiday Club in June/July Holidays! We would like to continue to partner up with Eastside, and it would be wonderful if your program is made available once more to us in March 2011! Not sure if you guys have thought that far yet!!

Jacques was a wonderful blessing to us and I am missing him so much! He paid for his flight and took unpaid leave and I trust that God will bless him abundantly! I will be sending a parcel up later this week to him and will include a DVD of photo’s should you need it.

We wish you and Eastside go with God’s grace for the rest of the holidays and that you will see great things happening for His Kingdom in the seeds that you have sown.

All the glory to God in the Highest,

Yours in Christ,

Tracey McEwan
Youth Ministries Director
Uitenhage Baptist Church

The program in Pampierstad is going very well.  The local volunteers are great and are integrating into the program well.  They are having 150-180 kids each day for the Holiday Club and 70-90 for the soccer.  They said the trailer ministry programs are working well and the program is impacting the community.  They have asked for prayer for low energy because they are so busy and not having enough time to sleep.  Also for sickness as Richard is getting over an illness and Hank is sick today.

Pampierstad is in the Northern Cape region of South Africa see map below:

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Below, a picture of some of the 3000 blankets we have been able to distribute thanks to donors.

KC, Joanne, Taryn, Gray & Thembani

While we’re not into the numbers game, it is exciting to take not of how many people have indicated that they would like to follow Jesus as a result of our ministry efforts.  It is exciting to see how the Holy Spirit has been at work.  We were praying that at least 1000 people would respond to the gospel and it looks like we are well on the way to seeing that realised! Praise God!

Commitments leading up to the Trailer Ministry: 250
Commitments during the trailer ministry (Week 0 – Week 2): 547

TOTAL COMMITMENTS: 797