Dear Pastor and Friends,

Another year is come and gone. It’s now that C.T. Studd’s words ring loudest in my ears; “Only one life, “twill soon be past, Only what’s done for Christ will last.”

We are still attending and serving at Madiba Bay Baptist Church. It is awesome to see all that the Lord is doing there through Kevin and his guys. Last month we celebrated family day which was a big success; 177 in attendance. Two adults trusted Christ that day; just last week there were another two. The Lord has been using the preaching every week to see someone come to Christ!

It’s summer here now and holiday has begun which normally affects attendances tremendously. We have several evangelist outreaches planned to counter the affect of holiday. One that you can be praying with us about is a Saturday youth soccer league. We are turning the church parking lot at Madiba into a fulbito (soccer on concrete, something we played in Peru a lot) court. We plan to play soccer, preach, and hopefully build some relationships with new people and get them in church.

Last week we met with a contractor to get a quote on the building in Kwadwesi. Kwadwesi is a more developed part of town and a simple shack will not be permitted in the area. It will require a building much like one in the states. We are still awaiting his services, but hopefully in the next few weeks we will break ground and begin the foundation for New Life Baptist Church. We have had several individuals and churches give to this project already and we are extremely grateful! Because of those donations, the land and building plans are in order. A specific, urgent need I would like to ask you to pray with us about is the water and sewer hookup ($600+/-). We will keep you updated on the progress.

Come January 15th Rebekah and I will have been in language school one year. We are hoping to be finished with our classes in another 6 months. My personal prayer and desire is to be able to start a church in September. We have come a long way, now able to have short conversations, but we still have a long way to go. Please continue to pray with us that this language foundation is laid firm and well. We are convinced that this time will pay dividends for years to come.

I say this every letter and honestly do not know how to express it adequately except for to say it again, thank you! God is using you guys to help us accomplish what we believe He wants done here in South Africa. The gospel is being preached and souls are being saved. Please know, as you think about this year coming to an end, that you are storing up small treasures in Heaven here in South Africa. THANK YOU!

More Prayer Requests:

• The Our Generation Summit will be next week in Gatlinburg, TN. Pray the Lord will use this event to raise up new laborers
• The King and Underwood families as they are on deputation to come as church planters here to South Africa
• Our Pastor and wife, Wayne and Connie Cofield, as they come for a visit next month

Love in Christ,

Jeremy and Rebekah Hall

Beth Staley’s personal testimony about her internship here in South Africa.

Life as an Intern

The thought of internships don’t usually bring about happy thoughts. No one gets overly excited about being an intern. It usually has a negative connotation to it that means you will be a slave to basically everyone for this period of your life, or at least until the new guy shows up. If you watch TV shows, you know that the interns are the ones who really don’t do anything besides get coffee and get yelled at while they mess everything up.Thankfully,  I can say that my internship  to South Africa wasn’t like that at all, although I did  have to use my new ability to drive a stick shift to chauffeur MK’s around. You’d be surprised at how many ways there are to get lost in a city like PE.

Life as an intern in South Africa is great. And by great, I mean it will be the most productive, challenging, growing, and fun period of your life if you have the right attitude. I personally loved every second of it, and it wasn’t even the exciting things that I loved the most. Sure, jumping (or being thrown) off the highest bungy bridge in the world is one of the coolest experiences ever, although it’s is close tie with shark diving and seeing great whites right in front of you. Yes, the sound of my voice was incredibly similar to that of a two year old when I rode the ostrich, and having the background of your phone be a selfie with a rhinoceros is pretty cool. Add in all the beautiful scenery, the gorgeous beach and stunning mountains, minus the ever-constant wind, and you have a pretty exciting place to visit. However, more than all of the excitement and adventure that went on while I was down here, if you asked me what my favorite part of South Africa was, I would not say any of those.

First, I would say that spending time with the missionary families was one of my favorite parts. I learned so much from them all, both by what they said and by their example. If you are considering going on a missions trip, South Africa has some of the best missionaries in the world. You will fall in love with the families there, and even with the chaos that ensues of having twelve kids running around everywhere. If you’re a girl, Amy, Bekah, and Corli are some of the sweetest, wisest missionary wives that I know, and going to South Africa is like getting three blessings in one, because you can learn different things from all three of them. I went to South Africa as an intern and gained life-long friends in the process.

My next favorite thing was the fact that I had an abundance of opportunities to be actively involved in the ministry in South Africa. Not only did I get to see the beginning stages of a ministry that I believe God is going to do great things with,  but I also had the opportunity to take part in it. There wasn’t a week that went by where I had nothing to do. Whether it was working on formatting the Xhosa Bible for the Logos program, designing postcards, assembling packets of invitations to pass out, going on visitation, teaching at young ladies meetings, singing specials or teaching Sunday School, there was never a lack of things to do. I’m sure if there was, the same missionaries mentioned above would have thought of something to keep me occupied. 🙂

There is also a great opportunity to use the internship to grow personally. I always had a book to read and write a report about, which was not necessarily ministry, but it helped me in my own personal, spiritual growth. I learned the importance of discipline in the little things in life.  Language school helped me to realize the challenges of learning a new language and how to go about it, and  teaching the young ladies helped me to get over speaking to groups. Experiencing a minute form of culture shock helped me to realize what I made fun of people for when they visited Peru is not actually all that fun. Practically, I learned a lot about cooking when I had to cook a meal every week for a family of eight. I learned how to drive a stick shift, and how to get lost while doing so. I learned that beauty without a bathroom is vain, especially when you are driving down a beautiful road that lasts forever. 🙂

Most of all, I learned that sometimes God puts you in a place that was so right that all you can do is thank Him for it. For me, South Africa was that place, and it will always have a special place in my heart, even though I am banned from returning at the moment because of visa issues. I am so thankful to Him for putting me in South Africa, for providing for me, and for surrounding me with just the people I needed to help me grow. Maybe South Africa is that place for you too, and I encourage you to go and see how you can be involved in the ministry there. You never know what God could do!

Superiority Complex

I was talking with a friend the other day and, for the first time, I realized just how crazy life can be here in the townships. Don’t get me wrong, I have heard many stories over the past year while studying in the township, but they really were just that, crazy stories. This person with whom I was speaking really brought those stories home for me for the first time. She had just lost her sister who was only 29 years old to sickness. I spoke with her and found out that she had 14 other siblings, but only 7 were still living. I will save the details of their deaths, except to say this, they happened way too early (all under 30) and in some of the most horrific ways imaginable. When hearing her story, honestly, I listened in disbelief, but then began to recall several other stories that were just as bizarre and terrible.

Hearing stories like that, I begin to think how wicked THEY are; I think how in the world could THEY do such wicked things to one another. If I’m honest, these stories leave me with a superiority complex. I even begin to justify my thoughts with the Bible (some rightfully so, others not so much). I look at their moral standard and my own and begin to think wrong thoughts. Thoughts like: since they do those things, what can they teach me? what will they teach my children? I look and begin to make blanket statements and think all their culture is wrong and should be changed.

Duane Elmer, in his book Cross-Cultural Servanthood: Serving the World in Christlike Humility, said, “Many missionaries are like me: well intentioned, dedicated and wanting to serve, but also naive and in some denial about what it means to serve in another culture.” That would be a fitting description of me. The God I serve is superior. The message I have is superior. It doesn’t take much for me to start thinking since my God’s superior and my message is superior, then I must be superior too. Though, it doesn’t take a expert in culture to know that having these thoughts will produce negative consequences. I am pretty certain that if I allow myself to think that way I will eventually have a bad attitude toward the people. My confidence in them will not grow which will soon affect my wife and children’s attitude toward them. I am also sure that I will not have meaningful friendships with them. In the end, those thoughts could be to blame for a much less impactful, or completely ineffective ministry.

Being a missionary, and wanting to have an effective ministry, I have read several books on cross cultural adaptation and building relationships cross-culturally. Many give great advice on how to identify the superiority complex. They tell you how you get it (mainly because you grew up in the West, but more likely because you’re prideful). But honestly, they give little advice on how to conquer the hidden monster.

I am convinced that the solution is found in God’s word. I believe that Paul, in Philippians 4:8, gives a clear and straightforward solution of how to conquer the superiority complex. I must change my thinking. I must replace my thoughts with things that are true, honest, just, pure, lovely, of a good report, virtuous, or anything of praise. That simple. But not so simple when you hear such terrible stories, and live in the real world. 

Truth is, sin is awful and should be despised. The story I heard made me upset and rightfully so. But I think part of my problem, personally, was looking at their sins, and not separating the people from the sin. Hate the sin, love the sinner; easy to say, hard to live. Honestly, I believe that’s a job only the Gospel can accomplish. Without the Gospel I am forced to look at the circumstances. In doing that I will soon forget that I too was/am just as wicked without Jesus. Meditating on the Gospel will take away my prejudices. But, without the Gospel, I will think that I’m hear to change them. Again, that’s the Gospel’s job. If I’m not super careful, I will begin to sound a lot like that religious man in the parable in Luke 18:9-14. If you remember the story, the Pharisee despised, or looked on the tax collector with disesteem. He began to believe his own religious hype and he actually had the audacity to pray to God thanking him that he was not like the extortioner tax collector. Shamefully, that does sound a lot like me sometimes.

If I could remember that only by God’s grace, I am what I am. If I could think back and remember, it’s only by the power of the Gospel I am not a drunk toady, and that I didn’t kill someone when I used to drink. If I could remember, that only by his grace I am still alive, then the superiority complex would dissolve. 

Superior!?!? My prayer should be as the publican’s; God, forgive me for my exaggerated thoughts of how right I am and how wrong they are. God forgive me for thinking my right living comes from something other than Jesus, the fountain of everything right in my life. My prayer should be as the tax collector’s, please forgive me a sinner!