Our Story

What a rush!

2006-04-06T13:48:00.000+02:00

On Sunday 26 March, after church, we finally did our bottled water outreach. It was a blazing hot day so we decided to hit Nahoon Beach.

Feeling a little bit nervous, and not knowing what to expect, we headed to the beach, cars loaded with iced water. When we arrived we realised that the beach was really packed.

At first a few people refused our offer, but it often turned out that they thought we were selling water. Once convinced that it was FREE, everyone was enthusiastic. There is a thin crust of reserve that most people project, but once you break through this, people open up. We didn't do any heavy explaining, but when asked, all we said was that we were doing it show God's love.

I haven't had so much fun in a long time! It was amazing to see people's reactions. The kids had a ball running ahead and up and down the dunes, trying to get to people first. Almost everyone was really grateful, especially on such a hot day, and we got lots of smiles and thankyou's on our way back down the beach. It felt wonderful to be able to give something away.

There is really a strong flavour of God's love in all this: freely-given, refreshing, fun and for free! In forty five minutes it was over and we had given over two hundred people a drink. Everyone who helped to hand out water headed home with huge grins on their faces. I cant wait for our next outing.

Wayne's Story

2006-03-28T11:07:00.000+02:00

Hello, I’m writing my testimony to share the Good news of God’s patience and love.

I belong to a family of believers that are real people like you and me. They have their good times and bad; they laugh and cry; they have their short falls and their strengths, shapes and sizes. They are all different yet have one thing in common, their love for God and their hunger to know him.

When I joined the Vineyard church I knew God had led me to my spiritual home, I had never met a group of believers that were so down to earth and so real. Finding a new place to fellowship can be daunting, especially for someone like me who had emotional baggage, yet they took us in and made us feel part of the family. The Vineyard has been known as the church for “people who don’t like church”, and this is so true. When Kim and I decided to go to church, she had a list of things that she did not like about going to church. The first time we left after church, Kim looked at me and said” this is not like any of the churches I’ve been to before, I like this church.”

Don’t let the laid back ” Baggies, slops and T-shirt” approach fool you. God has moved in our meetings. He told other members to pray specific things into my life that I had not told anyone else but God.

My name is Wayne and this is my testimony.

This is a tale of sorrow, love, happiness, loss, sorrow, love, repentance and happiness.

Sorrow
My parents had always fought. My brother Brendan and I had always been subjected to it, until one evening we were called to the main bedroom and told that they were getting a divorce. I remember thinking that I would be a little sad, but at least the fighting would stop. To cut a long story short, both my parents have been in abusive, broken relationships since. Not knowing what a stable loving relationship was, I wasn’t ready for what lay ahead.

Love
My relationship with the living God started a very long time ago, in fact it started before the foundations of the earth where laid. I only came to the realization of this relationship at the thirteen, when God showed me his love one afternoon at my uncle and aunt’s house, watching TBN. I can’t remember what the content of the sermon was, I just remember feeling so overwhelmed by God’s love. I remember knowing that God wanted to heal my hurts and show me what a real relationship would be like. I remember sitting on a chair in the lounge praying the sinner’s prayer, crying uncontrollably. I felt safe for the first time in a long time. A few days later my uncle and aunt gave me my first bible (the good news) and my relationship with God started to grow.

Happiness
I will never forget lying in bed, heart racing and feeling safe, happy, protected, nurtured. My heavenly dad loved me and sent his son Jesus (my brother, savior, redeemer, king) to die on the cross for me. Who would ever want to leave this behind?

Loss
How can it be? I have given up my rightful place with God who loves me for what the world has to offer, sorrow, lies, false security and pain. At eighteen I began to take my eyes off Jesus and started to drown. A girl who was always out of my league starts to take interest in me and I fall from grace straight into the arms of a girl not deserving. Know my innocence is gone, so is she, and I experience separation from God. I am filled with the guilt of my sin but numbed by its pleasures. One thing leads to another, from numerous godless relationships with woman that believe in anything but God, to alcohol abuse, marijuana, ecstasy, cocaine and clubbing.

Sorrow
I will never forget the times lying in bed with cold sweats, gnashing my teeth, and shaking uncontrollably because of the chemicals I have put into my body the night before. Feeling sad, lonely, broken and living in fear. Trying to ignore the voice in head saying, “You are my child, I freed you from slavery for more than this. Instead of sharing in my kingdom you have given up your inheritance to tend to pigs.”

Love
Filled with guilt, fear loneliness and surrounded by wolves, I am taken by surprise. Is this real? Two women inter my life, first my wife to be Kim and then my daughter Jemma.

Little did I realize at the time but God was starting a process of restoration in my life.

I quit the drugs when Kim and I started living together, quit drinking when my daughter was born. Still living in sin… a family without the blessing of marriage and without a relationship with God or other believer’s. I think I have everything under control.

Sorrow
God turns any situation into a time of restitution, even the bad times.

I’m at work and the mother of my child is working at the Harbor festival so Jemma is being baby-sat with family. I have just finished with clients and answer the phone, as I am busy answering the phone I see my next client being seated, its our baby sitter, she‘s crying as she asks me to get down to the hospital. Jemma was found floating in a swimming pool and is in ICU.

Jemma spend three days in hospital. I had mixed emotions over that period, but one message came through very strongly: God was telling me that it was time to get my life and family in order, that know was the time for me to make right with him, and that life was too short to play with his gift of salvation. Kim didn’t know what was going on in my heart at that time, but the voice was getting stronger.

Repentance
A few nights later Kim went to bed and I took Jemma and put her in her cot. I stood there looking at my little baby girl and started to cry. I don’t think I have ever had such an honest time with Jemma and my creator.

I said, “father thank you for giving Jemma back to me, I give her to you, I will bring her up to know you as Lord and savoir”. I said that even if it was too late for me that I wanted Jemma to go to heaven.

The next day God told me three things that I needed to focus on, I was to make Kim my wife, find a church to fellowship at and to get my house in order.

Happiness
I went to a few churches in the area, but didn’t feel as if God wanted me there. My one aunt, who I rent from, told me that she had spoken to a lady on a bus and had been invited to the East London Vineyard Christian Fellowship.

We thought that we would go and check it out. Half way through the service I had an overwhelming sense of joy. I thanked God for leading me to our new place of fellowship.

Kim and I got married about three months later on the 13 August 2005.

Kim and I come from broken dysfunctional homes so, when God said Get your home in order I knew that what he was saying was to break any of the strongholds in our family lines.

Praise God!

I have left out intricate details, not to hide anything but to save space, time and my eyesight. If there is a message that you receive out of these words I hope it is this:

That Jesus came to this earth not to condemn it but to save it. For a very long time satan had been speaking words of condemnation into my mind, I had been listening to a false gospel, no matter what you have done in your life; the blood of Jesus covers it all. Jesus came to this earth to save his people from their sins, of which I am the biggest sinner of all. With all my backsliding, weaknesses, addictions and faults God took the time to restore my life. He has given me a lovely wife, a beautiful daughter and a great place to fellowship at.

I dedicate this testimony to the living triune God, to my wife Kim, my daughter Jemma and my family at Vineyard East London Christian Fellowship; you are all the ingredients to my life.

If you have been moved by this testimony please take the time to think about the fact that God has taken the time out to be reunited to you, he longs to have a real love relationship with you. Whether you have drifted away from God or have never known God’s love before, please pray this prayer with me now:

Father God, I am alone and need you to make my life complete. I thank you for sending your one and only son Jesus to die for my sins, and that he rose from the dead making a way for me to have a relationship with you. Jesus, I confess my sin to you and submit to your rule over my life.
Amen

Giving away a taste of God's love

2006-03-05T16:31:00.000+02:00

During the last quarter of last year we had a vision breakfast. Part of what I discussed was an honest evaluation of how we are living up to our vision. Although obviously all areas can be developed further, the area which we need to focus on the most, is "being an arrow aimed at the heart of our culture."

When Alan and I met to chart the way ahead for the year, we resolved that this year we will get the arrow out of the quiver and heading toward the target. We are live in a city that so desperately needs God's love. We cannot afford to be passive.

Our approach will be twofold - mercy [1] and evangelism [2]. To make this a reality we need your help.

Evangelism is such an intimidating word! Both for the evangelised and the evangeliser. Instead of launching a huge confrontational program, we are going to do a whole lot of small, simple things to touch people with God's love. To start with we are going to give away bottled water on the beach. Anyone can do that! On our first outing we should give about 250 people a small taste of God's love.

"Small things done with great love will change the world."

More on the mercy aspect later...

Two cool stories of what God is up to

2005-05-20T13:38:00.000+02:00

For a couple of months, Alfred, one of the young men who make a living from tips that they get for looking after people’s cars in Devereux Avenue, just outside the where we meet, has been attending our Sunday gatherings. About four weeks ago he prayed to give his life to Jesus. Since then we have noticed a tangible change in him. Despite his difficult circumstances, he seems to be full of joy and is quite zealous for God. Two weeks ago Phillip and I were practicing guitar just before the meeting and Alfred arrived early for the service. He was singing along and clapping. So I asked him to play the djembe drum we have in the church. Despite having never before played a drum, he was a natural. Able to play the drum and an egg shaker perfectly in time. So we have a new worship team member. He is really excited about playing.

Also about a month ago, we prayed for various people for healing. Gloria has been plagued with an intestinal problem, which would require surgery at some time in the future. The condition is agonizing when she has an attack, and she has to be on an extremely restricted diet. When we gathered around to pray for her, I could see that the Lord was touching her. She was trembling and her breathing intensified.

We didn’t see her at church the following week, but the next week she grabbed me at the beginning of the service. She said that for two weeks she felt that something unusual was happening inside her stomach. During this time she had no pain whatsoever. The previous evening she was craving a cheese and tomato snackwich, which she was not allowed to eat. Usually eating something like this would provoke an attack, but despite having one, she was perfectly fine! This is a clear demonstration of God’s power at work among us. The cool thing is that it was just a group of ordinary people praying for her.

At the Global day of prayer

2005-05-20T13:31:00.000+02:00

On Sunday Derek and I attended the Global Day of Prayer that was held at River Park, and lasted around two and a half hours. Despite the poor acoustics and rough and ready feel of River Park, there were some incredibly anointed and powerful moments and I believe that the event was really successful. The sound of thousands of people praying in unison was incredible. I can’t help thinking of the old Delirious? song:

Do you feel the darkness tremble,
When all the saints join in one song?
And all the streams flow as one river,
To wash away our brokenness.

And we can see that God You’re moving.
A mighty river through the nations.
And young and old will turn to Jesus.
Fling wide you heavenly gates,
Prepare the way of the risen Lord.

Something that was announced by Gareth Syncock from Victoria Methodist, as he prepared us to pray for all the churches and pastors in the city, was that almost all the Pastors in the city are going to go away for a night to pray for the city and seek God’s face. This week I received an invitation to this event, and have managed to take some leave to attend.

I am really excited about this because we have been praying for unity among the churches in East London for years. Due to the history of East London and because of a dream that Glenda had, I believe unity will release God’s blessing on the city. The invitation to the event puts it this way:

“Opportunities for the Church and the Kingdom of God have not been so favourable in the Eastern Cape Province since our new democracy. Unless we come together and work together we will miss this great opportunity. It will be recorded as one of the greatest tragedies in the history of the region we live in. On the other hand, the Church could usher in one of the greatest moves of God that will affect our whole Nation.”

I believe that all churches and denominations should work together to promote the Kingdom of God. To me this unity means co-operation and support, not uniformity. This means a celebration and respect for our diversity, because each part of the body has a specific role to play in God’s purposes. For this to happen we have to agree to disagree on non-essentials, because we are bound together by the gospel and sacrifice of Jesus, and we need to repent of the grudges, hurts and envy that we hold towards one another.

Citywide prayer

2005-05-03T10:14:00.000+02:00

On Wednesday we will be going along to a monthly prayer meeting where various churches from diverse denominational backgrounds gather to worship and pray together. This gathering happens at 19h00 on the first Wednesday of every month, and meets at a different church each time. This time around the meeting will be at Coastlands Christian Fellowship on the East Coast Resorts Road. I encourage everyone who is part of our community to attend. Contact me if you need a lift.

I am really excited about this meeting, as I believe this is part of God’s plan to bring a fresh move of God to our city. Whenever God has been moving in East London, where things broke down was in the area of church unity. Notably in 1968, East London was on the brink of outright revival, but due to a lack of unity (and a fear of the things of the Spirit) the move of God was stamped out. I believe that unity has to be the key to the next move of God in East London.

I also encourage you to attend the global day of prayer that is happening on Sunday 15 May between 14h00 and 16h30 at River Park. An estimated 200 million Christians, worldwide, will be attending similar meetings.

A dream about John Wimber

2005-03-10T15:58:00.000+02:00

On Wednesday 20th October I had a rather interesting dream. This is rather unusual because I rarely dream (at least dreams that I can remember the next morning!). The whole dream had rather a "Lord of the Rings" feel to it.

The dream began with John Wimber in a forest at night, sitting next to a clear pool of water. He was praying and appeared to have been crying. Under the water in the pool was the dead body of a very young women with dark hair. She had a pale skin, but the body was clearly blue and lifeless.

Suddenly her eyes opened and she rose up out of the water. John was extremely surprised that his prayer for her resurrection had been answered.

Next they were walking out of the forest through long grass, hand in hand. The sun was breaking through the remaining treetops and as they walked John Wimber rather sheepishly asked her, "At the moment you came back, I could see inside your mind and understand your thoughts. Was it the same for you?" She smiled and replied and said, "At that moment I could understand exactly what was in your mind."

God reminded of this me of this dream last night, and I realised that I had not posted it on our blog. At the time of the dream I did forward it to Costa Mitchell, who is the National Director of the Vineyard in South Africa. I believe that it may have some application for our church, but probably also for the wider Vineyard movement.

Derek Morphew on the resurrection

2005-03-09T15:54:00.000+02:00

I have discovered a really excellent teaching series by Derek Morphew on the resurrection, for download on the Kenilworth Vineyard website. This has to be the best intellectual presentation of the gospel that I have ever heard. For those of you who have never heard him preach, he is really brilliant. Derek heads up the Vineyard Bible Institute and is an internationally recognised teacher and theologian, and has been around since the early days of the Vineyard.

The audio files are in DSS format, which means you have to download the DSS player, but this format seems to really compress the size of the files. Along with the audio files are PowerPoint presentations.

It is really worthwhile. Check it our here.

Our first Sunday morning meeting

2005-03-07T12:09:00.000+02:00

Our first Sunday morning meeting went well. I must admit that feels very different from meeting on Saturday night. I still enjoy the energy of Saturday nights, but I enjoyed seeing all the children there more. That is a huge leap forward.

During last week we had the partition moved back a couple of metres to give us some more space. This gives us more room for new people. We just have to get the floor in that area sorted out now.

Sunday morning meetings

2005-03-04T15:10:00.000+02:00

After a great year of meeting on Saturday evenings we have decided to move our meetings to Sunday mornings.

One of the main reasons for this is the changing make up of our community. Once Joshua arrived we realised the difficulties involved in including small children in an evening meeting. Since then Andrew and Jacquie have had a son, Brogan. Other couples in the church are also looking at having children. This is a good thing, but we have to make room for children in our program.

Another reason is that we constantly have to overcome the mental block potential visitors have against Saturday nights. Some people think it is very cool, but most people think we are a bit odd. It has also not born the fruit that we thought that it would in terms of reaching the unchurched. As a growing church we believe we will have more impact on a Sunday morning

One of the things I really appreciated is having a full day’s rest on a Sunday. I think it is one of the reasons I stayed sane last year. I still love the idea of Saturday night meetings and I think that if we grow to the point where we have two services, the second will be on a Saturday night.

See you at 09h30 on Sunday morning!

C3 Communities

2005-03-04T15:06:00.000+02:00

We have relaunched our small groups with this new title. The new name is indicative of a new approach, which ties in strongly with the vision God has given us as a church.

Essentially the meetings consist of three elements:

» Communion Meals
» Conversation and Sharing
» Care through Prayer

The idea of sharing communion over meals is a very biblical one:

“They worshiped together at the Temple each day, met in homes for the Lord's supper, and shared their meals with great joy and generosity...” Acts 2v46

The aim of this approach is to provide a place where people can be cared for, and minister to one another. This approach is not about learning more theory or theology; rather it is about putting the theology of love into practice. On his last night with his disciples before he was crucified, Jesus washed his disciples feet and shared communion with them (John 13). Afterwards he said, “You know these things - now do them! This is the path of blessing.” (v17)

This is all about loving one another and caring for one another in real and practical way and hopefully having a lot of fun along the way.

Catching up

2005-03-04T15:02:00.000+02:00

It has been a while since I last blogged and there are a lot of things to catch up on.

We had a good festive season, and a great end of year party. We chose a really cheesy theme – Hawaiian Luau, which was a whole lot of fun! A lot of people put hard work into making it really special. Thanks to everyone who contributed especially Sam and Glenda. Check out the photo’s here.

The Christmas service went well. We had a candlelit service with carols the Saturday before Christmas, and then had a two-week break over Christmas and New Year.

On a sad note we bade farewell to Richard who left for Cape Town to pursue his architectural career. We are already missing his energy and contribution, especially musically.

More recently Alan, Ros and Gloria took on the challenge of Valentines Day. They transformed the room with hearts and candles and set up a really funny version of the old Springbok Radio show “Check your mate”. The contestant couples were Piet and Arlene and Glenda and I. The van Rensburg’s pipped us by the narrowest of margins, but we still won some chocolate, which is ok with us. We all had a lot of fun.

Being a dad is wonderful and lots of hard work at the same time. The disturbed sleep has been taking its toll, particularly on Glenda, but the smiles and fun definitely outweigh this by far. The challenge facing us now is teaching Joshua to sleep through the night.

God really blessed our family with a new place to stay. We were given notice on the garden cottage that we had occupied for 10 years in Gonubie. With the property market booming we found it very difficult to find a suitable place. One of our prayers was to be close to the church. After months of searching and lots of false starts we found a beautiful two bedroomed cottage no more than 300m from where we meet. It has everything we need and is only a year old and has been finished really well. I know that stacks of people saw it before us, but the owners decided that we were the people for the place! God exceeded our expectations by far and answered our prayers, and we are really happy living where we are. Now we can walk to church. He is Good!

NEWSFLASH: doing reconciliation interview on 702 talk radio

2004-11-02T13:46:00.000+02:00

From Anri at the Association of Vineyard Churches offices:

“Please note Tim Modise will be interviewing Trevor Ntlhola and Alexander Venter on radio 702 and ‘Cape Talk’ on Wed 10 Nov from 1000 to 1100 on Racism and Reconciliation. Let's pray for them!”

Listen on streaming audio here.

Vineyard national conference reportback

2004-10-13T13:19:00.000+02:00

Several of us made the trip to the annual South African Vineyard conference held at the Gariep Dam. My feeling is that the week was definitely an intense one. The keynote speaker was Alexander Venter, and he spoke on Reconciliation.

He has just launched his latest book called “Doing Reconciliation”, subtitled “racism, reconciliation and transformation.” The subject of racism is really a deep and difficult one, but it is something that the church needs to tackle head on.

A really moving part of the week was a time of confession, where representatives of the various racial groups confessed the sins of our nation. This flowed into a more freeform time where individuals where able to confess their own sins. Both Phillip and Glenda had painful memories that needed to brought into the light. This process is definitely healing. For Phillip it was the first time that he was able to freely talk about some of the experiences he had as a medic in the Army. It was incredible to see God touching and healing so many people.

As usual the times of worship were wonderful, and it was great to catch up with old friends again. There seemed to be a real atmosphere of relational openness and the structured sharing of meals meant everyone got to meet some new people.

Our nation is a deeply wounded one, in need of the healing touch of Jesus and the church has a divine responsibility to be the healing agent. The feeling that I left the conference with, was that we can choose to be reactive and live in the past, or we can live into the future by chosing to be prophetic of the way things should be in the kingdom of God.

Hallmark of real community

2004-08-04T08:51:00.000+02:00

Glenda and I want to thank everyone in our community for the way they have looked after us. We have really been blessed! Thanks for all the loving care, the gifts and especially for more than a weeks worth of delicious suppers that turned up at our home every night. You guys are amazing! Thanks to Melinda who took it on herself to organise meals for us. This really eased the transition of having a new member of the family at home.

This is what being part of a true Christian community is like, and there is nothing like it!

Josh has arrived!

2004-08-04T08:44:00.000+02:00

To most you this is old news.. this has taken a while to get to the blog… Glenda and I are excited to announce the birth of our son Joshua Keanan. He arrived at 13h30 on the 14nth of July by caesarean, and weighed in at 3.83kg.

Call to prayer

2004-06-22T12:28:00.000+02:00

For a number of weeks I have been feeling an increased prompting from God with regard to prayer. I feel very strongly that God is calling us a community to pray more individually, and more corporately.

Last Thursday was the last session of the "Natural Evangelism" course we have been going through. A large part of the final chapter was on praying for evangelism. I took the opportunity to share how I have been feeling about prayer, and there seemed to be an overwhelming sense of agreement from everyone present.

As we spent some time in prayer at the end of the evening, Glenda had a picture of threads being woven to form a cloth. The cloth was white, but the thread that was being woven as she looked on, was red.

This red thread symbolised prayer becoming an integral part of the fabric of our church. At the same time two others saw the same picture. How is that for confirmation! We need to be praying more.

To this end, the Vincent Home Group will be put on hold for a period of time. The members of this group will instead form the core of a new prayer meeting at V-Cafe on Tuesday nights, beginning at 7pm and running for an hour. There will also be prayer in the mothers room on Saturday evenings immediately before church at 6pm.

Prayer Meetings are great, but there does need to be a groundswell of personal prayer. We are all responsible for praying. The focus of the teaching I will be giving over the next couple of weeks will be prayer, and we will be covering the topic exhaustively, from the basic principles, to the more subtle details.

Lets get praying!

Authentic Community

2004-06-03T14:15:00.000+02:00

One of the core elements of the vision of our church is authentic community. Three Sundays ago my message was on this. This week I discovered an article called Searching For Community written by Mark Sampson on Relevant Magazine's website. It is definitely worth a read.

Natural Evangelism

2004-05-20T17:27:00.000+02:00

For the next 5 weeks we are running a Vineyard Bible Institute course called .Natural Evangelism, written by J. John from the UK. The aim is to learn to be able to share your faith in a way that almost anyone can do.

The course takes the place of home groups for it's duration and is on Thursday nights at 19h30 at v-cafe. It would be great to see you there.

The Passion

2004-03-25T11:49:00.000+02:00

On Tuesday night Glenda and I saw the Passion. We were invited by LinkFM to attend one of the Premier shows that they organised in conjunction with the River.

The movie was an incredible experience! It is a very intense movie, very moving and definitely a must see. The reality of what Jesus suffered has never been so graphically and artfully portrayed on the big screen. The fact that it was Jesus suffering, made it painful to watch at times.

This is one of those rare films that have the potential to transform your thinking, and I believe that it is one of the most significant cultural events of our time.

On Sunday night we are going to watch it as a church, and have free tickets for anyone who is not currently attending a church. We would love to see you there.

Saturday Night Church!!?

2004-03-16T14:35:00.000+02:00

Together with the eldership team we have decided to move our main service to a Saturday night.

I am really excited about this and I believe that it will have the following significant benefits:

» It is more relevant for un-churched people.
» In the language of our culture, Saturday night is prime time. Having church on Saturday night indicates that this is the highlight of our week.
» It allows Sunday to be a full day of rest – keeping the Sabbath. In our “busy” culture this is valuable.
» We can socialise till much later on a Saturday night, and will be able to facilitate our original vision for V-Café, having bands/musicians performing afterwards.

We are launching into this from Saturday 3 April with a Passover Meal. See you there at 6.30!

Leadership Team

2004-03-16T14:32:00.000+02:00

As a church we have recognised Alan van Dyl and Piet van Rensburg as elders. It is great to have such mature, sensitive people to lean on, and to help me lead the church. We are blessed!

Our wider leadership team also includes Richard Stratford (Worship) and Phillip Hartwig (Finance).

I believe that having good leaders in place will keep us grounded and will enable us to grow.

Our Travels

2004-03-16T14:05:00.000+02:00

During the last month we did some ministry related travelling.

Our first trip was to Knysna for a gathering of Leaders from the Eastern Cape Vineyard churches. It was good to catch up with the other guys and to meet a couple of new people. It was also great to have Costa (National Director of Vineyard SA), who was at Knysna Vineyard for the weekend, at the meeting. He gave some excellent multimedia teaching on strategic issues and contextualising Vineyard values. Because of the distance, Glenda and I ended up staying for two nights. We decided to make use of the opportunity to have some time together before the little one arrives. As a result we also got to attend one of the Costa’s sessions at Knysna VCF. His teaching was on spiritual gifts, and was inspiringly practical and it had me itching to get involved in ministry time.

Our next trip was to Chatsworth, Durban for a worship conference at which Andy Park was teaching and leading worship. The conference was excellent, but Durban in February is a sauna and Glenda took serious strain in the heat. The breyani on Saturday night was also good. Richard accompanied us and was enjoying Durban so much that he was tempted to move there. It was good to catch up with family (Glenda’s parents and my sister and brother in law), and to see good friends (especially the Morningside crew and Cora).

This weekend we are off to Port Elizabeth for Andrew and Jacquies wedding. It is the first wedding in our church, and the first one I am officiating at. Pray for me.

Long time, no blog

2004-03-16T13:47:00.000+02:00

My apologies for not updating this page for a couple of weeks. It has been a busy time filled with travel, computer problems and lots of other important stuff ; ). I will try my best to post at least once a week from now on.

Brunch at Gonubie River

2004-01-28T16:14:00.000+02:00

On Sunday morning we had a great time at the Gonubie River doing brunch. We did Bacon, eggs, steak, mushroom and someone even cooked a stir fry, on the skottel braais. For once the weather played ball and everyone seemed to have a lot of fun.

I managed to get in some quality frisbee time with Alan and Wade, using Alan's "holy" Delerious? frisbee.

2004

2004-01-09T10:39:00.000+02:00

It has been a really quiet holiday season with a number of people away, and others spending much needed time with family and friends. Now things seem to be kicking back into action for the new year.

One of the priorities for the year will be a focus on connecting and building community. While this has always been a priority, both Glenda and I have felt that we were lagging behind on this for the second part of the year, and that somehow seeds of disunity have been scattered among us.

Glenda had two dreams last night that I believe were a word to the church. In her one dream she saw an old fashioned corset. The type that gets laced up. The strings needed to be tightened. I believe this represents the bonds formed by the Lord between us. Whatever your opinion on the use of corsets, their purpose was for beauty and support. I believe these things will be present as we tighten the bonds between us. I wont share the details of the other dream as some were personal. The meaning of the dream was that there will be growth, but that people need to be released in their callings and ministries.

One of the ways we want to build connection is to spend more time having combined social activities. We should be doing this at least on a monthly basis (did someone mention the word camp?). We are planning something toward the end of January, as some are feeling "peopled out" after the intensive socialising over the holiday period. So we are allowing a few weeks to recover.

We are trusting that the coming year will be one of growth. Growing closer together. Growing in size. And growing in our giftings.

Richard's gig in Cape Town

2003-12-18T12:00:00.000+02:00

I received an email from Richard about Runner's gig in Cape in Cape Town: "Clear evidence that I really did go ministering over the weekend, and nothing asunder!" Check out the photos here.

He has also given me a CD of a live recording done at a party. He has nicknamed this recording "Pete's rough cuts" because he had flu on the day. Nevertheless it has become a firm favourite on our CD play list in the car. Wait till these guys get into the studio and do a serious recording!

Also on the CD are two solo worship tracks by Richard. These are songs written by him, that we sing in church. I will post some clips very soon.

Return of the King

2003-12-18T11:23:00.000+02:00

I had an afternoon off yesterday and went to see the Return of the King all by myself. Brilliant! Although I must say I am still trying to digest it all. A number of us are going to see it again tonight. I can’t wait.

Although the story is by no means overtly biblical, the symbolism and imagery always impact me in a powerfully spiritual way. Here is a quote from Thunderstruck's review of the movie:

Although his work does not preach a theological dogmatic, Tolkien did believe The Lord of the Rings to be a "fundamentally religious and Catholic work…The religious element is absorbed into the story and the symbolism." It extols the virtues of love, compassion, and longsuffering, while painting a very Christian-inspired vision of good and evil, as well as treachery, addiction, and greed.

C.S. Lewis, the author of The Chronicles of Narnia and Mere Christianity, credits Tolkien with helping him move from atheism to Christianity. In their literary group "The Inklings," Lewis and Tolkien met weekly to discuss myth, stories, and theology. "He was for long my only audience," Tolkien said of Lewis. "Only from him did I ever get the idea that my 'stuff' could be more than a private hobby."

I read another very interesting article on Thunderstruck about John Rhys-Davies, the actor who portrays Gimli the dwarf, and what he believes is the challenge for our generation in history.

Compromise and Sabbath rest

2003-12-04T11:06:00.000+02:00

Last night was our last meeting for the Vincent homegroup for the year. For a while we have been studying the book of Nehemiah. We looked at chapter 9 and 10 yesterday.

One of the points of discussion centered around how Israel had compromised and sinned by ignoring the law and allowing the practices of the surrounding nations to become the norm. One of the interesting things for me was that Israel had slipped up in keeping the Sabbath. How should we respond today? I personally believe in having a Sabbath, but how practically should this work in our lives?

We further promise that if the people of the land should bring any merchandise or grain to be sold on the Sabbath or on any other holy day, we will refuse to buy it... Nehemiah 10v31 NLT

One example of how churches are contextualising this is Highway Community Church in East London who are probably going to be moving their Sunday Service to a Saturday night. This is so that they can a full day of rest on a Sunday. This is not a legalistic move, rather it is a practical one, so that their members can have a full days rest.

Another example comes from Glenda, who used to work with a lady who was a Seventh Day Adventist. They are very strict on their Sabbath observances and keep the Sabbath from sunset on a Friday through Saturday, as the Jews do. On Monday mornings her friend would always be full of energy and joy, while everyone else seemed to be sluggishly dragging themselves into work (I can relate to this). When asked why she was so "chirpy" she responded, "I actually rest over the weekend."

I know there are a lot of issues involved, but how, practically, should a Sabbath that is pleasing to God, look in our day and age?

Congratulations to Richard

2003-12-04T11:01:00.000+02:00

Congratulations to Richard Stratford who this week heard that he passed his professional practice exam to be a registered Architect. Well done!! We celebrate with you.

He is off to Cape Town this weekend with his band, "Runner" for a Gig. It is good to see them getting more exposure. Pray for them.

Growing the church

2003-12-04T10:47:00.000+02:00

On a personal note: Glenda is eight and a half weeks pregnant! I am really excited about the news, but also nervous. This will be our first child, so there are major adjustments on the way for us. I know it will be an immense blessing though. God is again stretching my faith, as we will have to trust God for provision.

During the AVC conference, which ran from 15 - 19 September this year, I had a word from God that we would soon have a child. I wasn't quite sure what to do with the word, so I kept it to myself, not even telling Glenda! So when asked if "it was planned", I say "not by us".

AVC SA website updates

2003-11-28T10:20:00.000+02:00

For those of you who like to stay in touch with what is happening in the broader Vineyard movement, the South African Vineyard website has been updated.

One of the best parts of the update is Costa's pastoral reflections and projections. The pastoral projection contains an interesting article on the prophetic.

Photos of the conference have also been added. This years conference was an African Community of Nations conference and one of the highlights of the conference was the celebrate Africa session, where we experienced worship from all over Africa. For me a highlight was seeing a Masai warrior, from Kenya, in full (tartan!) regalia on stage! Also in the photos section is a photo of Nelson Mandela visiting Sparrow Schools.

Tangible presence of God

2003-11-28T10:12:00.000+02:00

Sunday night's worship was just awesome! There was a very real presence of God with us during worship. I saw what I can only describe as a smoky haze. Although no-one else I have spoken to, saw what I saw, most people really connected with God. Someone else did not notice a really fresh aroma.

It is awesome when God turns up in such a tangible way, but we need to continue to worship passionately no matter what our experience is.

Come now is the time...

2003-11-11T14:28:00.000+02:00

As we were singing "Come now is the time" [written by Brian Doerksen] during worship Sunday night, I had very strong impression that God was calling us to sing this song in a prophetic sense as a call to the lost. I realise that the song was originally written as a call to worship, but the way most people perceive it , is as a call to one another - fellow Christians. It must also rate as one of the most popular worship songs of all time, and because of its popularity we take its message for granted.

I believe that God is telling us as a church to call in the lost. That now is the time.

Under the boardwalk

2003-11-11T14:15:00.000+02:00

On Saturday a couple of us had a great time at Gonubie beach. We managed to get a prime spot in the shade under the boardwalk. We shared some lunch, threw frisbee and swam in the rather cold waves. It was great to just hangout together and relax. We haven't been doing enough of that lately.

It was also interesting to see that some connections were forming with others around us on the beach. I will put some photos in the gallery section as soon as we get them developed.

The Spiritual heritage and destiny of of our country

2003-11-06T10:23:00.000+02:00

In our continuing teaching series on the book of Acts, on Sunday night I shared on Acts 6v1-7. What happened was that a ethnic tension threatened to derail the expansion of the early church. Once the problem was dealt with vs 7 says "God's message was preached in ever-widening circles. The number of believers greatly increased in Jerusalem, and many of the Jewish priests were converted, too."

I believe the problem of racism has prevented the church from fulfilling its destiny in South Africa, but as we deal with it, we will be able to move forward in God's authority and blessing. One of the points I mentioned was that our country has a rich spiritual heritage, particularly from the Hugenots who were spiritual refugees. Here is some more information on the Hugenots which I found on Joel News:

The Lord is currently leading intercessors from different countries to pray for the restoration of the Hugenot inheritance in France. In the 17th and 18th century, under Louis XIV, the Hugenot protestants in France experienced a strong revival, but faced severe persecution from the Catholic church. Many of them fled to neighbouring countries like Holland and Germany. Many were killed and the French soil was stained with innocent blood. Some say this caused a spiritual bondage in France that paved the way for the French Revolution, freemasonry, existentialism, humanism, rationalism and other anti-Christian movements. It is a fact that since the persecution of the Hugenots French protestant churches have been struggling. Only 1 percent of the French population is Christian. France has never seen a major move of God since the Hugenot revival. It is interesting to observe that God is leading intercessors back to the roots: the roots of sin in France, but also Gods original purpose with the nation. Intercessor Henning Schikora wrote a booklet on the Hugenots called 'The anointing of the Holy Spirit on France. Reflections on the prophetic movement in the Cevennes in the 17th and 18th centuries.' This revival in the South of France became known because the Lord anointed young children to prophesy over the cities and villages of France.

Generosity and Recording

2003-10-29T12:52:00.000+02:00

Sunday's Generosity event was great! It was wonderful to see so many going home with things that they really needed. Among the items that changed hands were a cellphone and a CD player. There are a few things left which will still be available this Sunday for those who missed out. After this we will be selling what is left and giving away the proceeds.

So far Richard has recorded his two songs and we are waiting in anticipation of the CD with them on. Piet has decided to delay recording his songs for now, so we will have to wait a while longer for his. We will have some clips of Richard's songs up on the website as soon as we have them.

Please note the worship event scheduled for this weekend has been postponed. I will post the new date as soon as it is confirmed. We will have church as usual on Sunday.

Demo recording tonight

2003-10-22T10:38:00.000+02:00

Piet and Richard are beginning the process of recording some of their own songs tonight. The idea is to produce a demo quality recording for submission to Vineyard Music. We have sung Richard's songs in church, and Piet has some good Afrikaans worship songs. Richard has co-writing credits with Stewart West on one of the songs, "This is Your Song", on Vineyard Music's CD, "Wonderful Mercy". Piet has also been involved in producing an instrumental piano recording, which has been quite successful.

They will using Richard's 4 track tape recorder. Please be praying for them as they record.

Giving it away

2003-10-21T10:09:00.000+02:00

When Dave Pederson was here some time back, he shared about how at Fountain Vineyard they schedule times where they just give stuff away to one another. He recounted a specific incident where someone who was really in need went home with a car! This is taking community to a whole new level!

Ros was really inspired, and thought that we should do the same thing. So she is co-ordinating what we are doing this Sunday. Bring anything that you don't want or need or feel led by God to give away. Anyone in the church can then take it home if they want to. Obviously it is "first come first serve". Anything left over at the end will be given to a worthy charity/ministry. The only stipulation that I have is don't bring broken junk- make it worthwhile. Our hope is that this will be a start of a greater level of sharing and giving to one another.

The whole congregation of believers was united as one - one heart, one mind! They didn't even claim ownership of their own possessions. No one said, "That's mine; you can't have it." They shared everything. [ Acts 4:32 The Message ]

This is our story...

2003-09-26T15:21:00.000+02:00

I have set this blog up to record the unfolding story of the Vineyard Christian Fellowship in East London, South Africa. I will give my perspective on what God is doing with us and keep everyone updated on the latest happenings. I might not be able to update everyday, but I hope to do so at least once a week. I would really appreciate your comments.