This morning we woke up to a much chillier temperature of 59 with a chance of much needed rain. Our guide told us they have not had any significant rain here since April. The flowers and planting areas look lush, green and colorful but the open fields are nothing but brown.
We met our friends from West View Methodist Church at Ditshego for a work day. There were many tasks assigned to the volunteers including building an echo friendly wall to extend the chicken coop to a free range area. There were others that painted the children’s play equipment with brightly colored paints. And there were quite a number of bird boxes (bird houses) that were painted by the younger volunteers. I spent the morning working with three young ladies from West View painting the children’s prayer room. First we had to remove all of the books off the shelves and the carpet squares off the floor and then thoroughly dust, sweep and wipe down everything with a damp cloth to prepare for painting. We used bright white paint to lighten up the small, dark room. Unfortunately the orange and turquoise colors that it had been previously painted were difficult to cover and we ran out of paint before we could totally finish the room. The lady that runs the prayer room asked that an eagle be painted on the wall along with a Bible verse. Luckily, one of the young ladies from West View has artistic ability and readily agreed to do so. The four of us formed a wonderful friendship over those 3 hours.
After a lunch of bbq sausages, vegetables & fruit, we viewed the other projects around the plot. The team made good progress on the Ecco wall, but it will take many more days to complete it enough to keep the chickens enclosed.
Then we listened to the story of a woman who had suffered damage to her spinal cord and was confined to a wheelchair for 28 years. She said God spoke to her and told her that he would heal her in his own time. She was patient and did God’s work to the best of her abilities and waited for the healing day to come. She prayed for God to give her a sign. Finally a message was sent to her through a scripture reference from a friend that told her it was time. She got out of her wheelchair and began to walk. Her neurosurgeon was amazed and could not believe it until she demonstrated for him. He ran tests & scans of her spinal cord and found all damage was gone. God’s promise to heal her had been fulfilled and the doctor proclaimed it a miracle.
As we waited for our ride to arrive, some of the female staff members from the day before asked for another hand massage. I pulled a small bottle of lotion from my backpack and went to work. It was such a pleasure to put a smile on their faces, as we rubbed the lotion into their hands.
