yesterday began with some great devotional time with the team. we talked about what has been hard for us so far on the trip and how God has revealed Himself. a moment we all loved occurred the day before on a train ride. after seeing downtown cape town and eating some traditional south African fair (gatsby sandwiches, samosas, appetizers and stoneys) we took the train back to Gersh's hometown. we entered the station in the "white" area- modern and clean- and then moved to the "colored" section- old and tagged and run down- to catch our train. these sections are no longer segregated but still loudly profess the inequities suffered for so long. on the train we encountered a father and son, disheveled, the child without shoes, jump on the train with their drum. perhaps the dad was a street musician, we speculated. suddenly another man on the train sat down with them and began to play the drum and sing! the bus ride turned into a concert! we all loved the joy and spontaneity of the moment,  God revealing something beautiful that sprung up in an ordinary, dirty train ride.

Mural on the wall inside The Warehouse

we headed out in the rain- a lot of rain- to "the warehouse", a ministry that practices urban gleaning. following the biblical model of leaving part of the harvest to give to the poor, the warehouse collects gently used clothing and new items gleaned from local businesses. we gathered around Barry Lewis, a British man who is a leader at The Warehouse, to tell us about their work in sweet home farm, an informal settlement with 17,000 people living in deplorable conditions. but the first thing he told us, upon discovering we are from Denver, was of the horrific shooting at the batman premiere. we listened in stunned silence as he read from the BBC report of the violence. a world away, our hearts are heavy for our hometown and those suffering there. suddenly the suffering here and at home felt connected. we live in a world broken, by evil and by poverty and we were standing at the intersection in our own hearts. Barry went on to tell us of work they have done in sweet home farm learning the language, living among the people as friends and fellow humans and his vision and hope for the future of the people of sweet home farm. we have been reading when helping hurts by Steve Corbett and Brian Fikkert- a great book about poverty alleviation- and it was if the words came alive as Barry spoke. it was a really inspiring talk. he spoke a phrase Xhosa, that is foundational to their work and philosophy, "the beautiful people will do beautiful things." we are still talking about that today. after eating lunch  we went to work on bags and bags of clothing, sorting by size and gender and folding and folding and folding. these kids can fold some laundry!

after we finished, we went to a coffee shop in the mall to talk about the experience and wander around (still raining) and then back to our new south African families for dinner and then youth group at a local church!

parents, i have to tell you that these are some awesome young adults. they are handling challenges with aplomb, interacting graciously and with so much laughter with each other and the people they are meeting, they are a joy to be with! thank you for your willingness to share them and release them to their callings!

love
kay