Happy Thanksgiving 2008

Goeie more (Good Morning), dear friends!

Thanksgiving is just around the corner and I've already got my turkey in the freezer. Like last year, celebrating the special day with some of the other Canadians living in Jbay (this year that's Becky Vaughn and Adam & Ariel Driedger). My kids have already requested home-made pumpkin pie, which means making everything from scratch - including boiling the pumpkin filling and everything! (Have I mentioned lately how much I miss Costco? sigh...)

Anyway, here's what's been happening in the lives of the "Blaakies" (as Gil Dimas still calls us)...

September 22^nd – Raelynne turned 12! Wow! What a beautiful young lady! And how funny that, now that they're getting close to being "mature" teenagers, she would choose to have a "baby" party! Yup! It's true! All of the party-ers came dressed up like babies! We served "baby" food, apple juice in baby bottles, played "baby" games, and watched "Kindergarten Cop". It was hilarious! What a fun bunch of girls!
September 4^th – Rachel turned 6! Can you believe it? After spending the entire year planning and re-planning her party, she finally decided on doing a Barbie party with her friends. Mommy and Daddy helped her choose that theme because we had secretly planned to buy her a real Dream House for her Barbies! What an exciting day! And since that time, on any given day, you can always find at least 1 of the kids in the room playing dolls together. Precious memories!

July 22-23 - Erwin and some of our Worship Team leaders from Victory Church had an amazing opportunity to host a Worship Workshop in a city called George (about 4 hours down the coast). The workshop was held in the old town theatre and its purpose was to train and empower worshippers, both spiritually and practically, and to impart a mature understanding of what true worship is... to break the "worship of worship".

The organizers only expected about 20 people to attend the 2-day event, but 210 people showed up! No kidding! This was particularly awesome because there was such unity between many different church groups, as well as representation from radio stations, high schools, etc. In fact, the hunger in these people was so intense that they refused to even take a coffee break on the first night! They were like thirsty sponges, soaking up every word!

Concerning Erwin's involvement in the workshop, Adele Visser, one of the team members, wrote "We were SOOO blessed by Erwin. You know how funny he is. People were laughing even before he would crack a joke... Just the fact that he is Canadian already brought us a greater favour for ministry. Funny how people are more receptive when they hear the Gospel in another accent? But this really opened their hearts to receive from the Lord. Erwin really brought a wealth and depth in the outline of the teachings, especially about the real heart-facts about worship. God does not look at what we do - how well and how poorly - but at the heart. And yet, this truth does not give license to neglecting the growth of our gift." Well done, Erwin!

July 2008 - School holidays and our 2nd (and hopefully last) snake adventure. Some friends of ours, Rob and Laura Birch, have a house on the Kromme River, and they blessed us with the opportunity to get out of town for a few days during the school holidays in July. We thoroughly enjoyed our time there! There were no TVs, no phones, no people... unfortunately, there were snakes!
On Wednesday, after enjoying a long afternoon of playing outside and braaiing (BBQing) with friends, Erwin went to pull the garage door closed and a large, black Boomslang (a very poisonous tree snake) slid off the door and slithered into the garage! It had been hiding in the tree just outside our bedroom window, and over top of where we were playing. Aaaagh! Thankfully, Hennie and Adele Visser were there, and together the 2 men managed to smoke that thing out of its hiding spot, and as Hennie pinned it against the wall with a garden tool, Erwin cut off its head with some pruning shears. Yuck! Thank you to all of you who have been praying for our personal safety! Thank you, Father, for Your constant protection!

To add to the adventure, the very next morning the house was assaulted by a troop of Vervet monkeys! Seriously! They desperately wanted to get inside the house and eat all of the food we had sitting on the counter. We couldn't even step outside or open the window for fresh air all day until they left the area! TIA... this is Africa!

Shauna - I continue to be involved with the Reading Program at the kids' school, which has now expanded into helping to develop a new library. Have I told you yet that the school is moving into a new facility this coming January? With that move comes the development of their first library! Hooray! Our goal is to have a multi-generational library that can serve the families in the school, sell memberships to the community, and also be accessible to the various under-privileged schools in the "community" that we sponsor. Building a library is a huge job and, despite having some very knowledgeable people on the team, I often feel "in over my head." But it's also very exciting! Remember... living the "Kingdom of God" doesn't mean that you give your own children the best future possible (that's easy). Living the Kingdom means that you do it for other people's children who don't have a hope and a future! That's Kingdom thinking. That's what we're doing.

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Coming home for Christmas! Well, it's official... we're coming home for Christmas this year! Hooray! We feel very strongly that it's time to come home - to rest and re-connect with friends and family! We'll be flying out of Port Elizabeth on December 3rd, and arriving in Edmonton on December 4th at 3:22pm. Our return flight isn't until January 25th, which means that we'll be able to enjoy a White Christmas with all of you! (here's a pic of our last Christmas in Edmonton in 2006)

Thank you so much to all of our precious friends and family who have blessed us with finances toward our plane tickets! To date, we've saved/collected approximately $6000! That's wonderful! Thank you! The tickets are costing $12, 481.80 so we have a little way yet to go. I'm confident that it's going to happen, and I can't wait to see you all on the "homeland"!

We really hope to be able to visit all of our friends and family during our time in Canada. If you would like to book a specific time for us to visit you (or your church) during December and January, please let us know quickly so we can accommodate everyone.

Love you guys! See you soon!