The past Easter weekend was particularly blessed by the Lord’s grace. We were especially excited about the involvement of the children. It was a school holiday and many children were at home for the weekend.
Friday evening we had a worship service that focused on the suffering of our Lord Jesus. Despite the rain, the people gradually became more. After the worship service, we showed them the video “Walking with Jesus”. These are five videos that connect to the crucifixion events. In my previous report I mentioned the videos. All the characters in the film are African people and their mutual intrigues when they accepted the Lord Jesus as Savior. The moving part of the film is how the Lord Jesus changes people’s lives. On the right is a clip from the video of the chief who before his conversion was at first a grumpy buffalo and hurt many people, but after time became a humble Christian, who like Zacchaeus went to compensate for all the harm caused he did to the people of his village.
The word for believe in the Tswana language is “dumela” which at best means agreeing with someone. They also have two words for trust, “ikanya” and “tshepa” which in my opinion are closer to believing than simply agreeing. Why they didn’t use one of these words when translating the Bible, I don’t know, because “dumela” means to agree with someone. Either way, if you agree with what the Lord Jesus did for you on the cross on Calvary, you will be saved. Not only that, your whole life is going to change, and that’s exactly what happened to the characters in the video. They embraced the Lord Jesus as their Savior in their lives and this brought about a drastic turnaround in their lives. It reminds one of the famous saying: “Nature forms; sin deforms; school informs, but only Christ transforms.”
Saturday evening we held another service. Afterwards we showed the last three of the videos. Between the videos, my colleague and I explained how it all fits together. Everybody sat mesmerized and watched the videos because they could relate to a lot of the stuff that was happening.
Sunday morning it was the normal worship service during which we could commemorate the resurrection of our Lord Jesus. Afterwards, I visited one of our church members and his words to me were: “Reverend, I could feel the presence of the Holy Spirit in the church this morning. The proclamation of the Word spoke deeply to me.”
During the week, one of the farmers in the area donated a cow and the local art project P1000. Thanks to these donations we could eat for two days. There was enough food for Saturday and Sunday. If we look back at everything, we can see how the Lord blessed us this weekend, our fellowship, the preaching of the Word so that the focus could fall on what our Lord Jesus came to do for us as worthless sinners. To You, O Triune God, all the glory.
Your brother in Christ,
Hendrik du Plessis