The Finnie family in Blighty, December 2021
Dean and Paula pastor The Gathering together
The Gathering
Baptisms at The Gathering
Preparing to serve at The Gathering's Soup Kitchen
Soup Kitchen Welcome To 2022 lunch
Serving hands - the heart of The Gatheirng
Thankful Thursdays
HOPE Home Based Care Team
Gathering Ground
Staying fit as a family
The Helderberg - The prettiest of the mountains we face
Eli is now walking to school on his own and really enjoying the space and freedom of it (though Paula is missing her time with him chatting in the car). Some days he also skateboards to school just because he can. He's also enjoying the freedom of hanging out with school mates or messing about on the beach on his way home, just because he can.
Just two weeks after his first attempt, and at a different testing station, Joel passed his driving test and can be unleashed on the world.
This is another step in our change of lifestyle as not only do we no longer need to do any school runs, but now Joel can sort himself out for lifts to and from work, church etc.
Thank you LORD!
This move should lead us into a positive change in lifestyle which is exciting us. We'll be just a five minute walk from the beach which will make a big difference to our mental well being, and having a sun room that spills out into the north facing garden is also a big change for us. We'll also be a bit closer to church and won't have to drive through the town centre to get there!
I always knew that the garage and my workshop would be the single biggest job in terms of packing, so I was chuffed to get it all done today.
I'm feeling quite sore all over, but it's worth it for the progress and the sense of achievement.
In our seemingly never ending quest to defeat the inconvenience of loadshedding we are always looking for ways to keep the power on so as not to interrupt our Homework Club and other church activities that are reliant upon a decent internet connection.
So it's great to have a mini UPS which can power the modem and router for our fibre connection meaning we can stay connected in spite of Eskom's dastardly tricks in trying to defeat us.
Today was an exciting day for The Gathering as we were blessed with 23 boxes of peanut pastes from our dear friends at My Father's House in Simon's Town.
This means we can once again be generous with the pastes which have become incredibly popular amongst our Soup Kitchen regulars.
Last night we had the joy of BMW Man as some of the others called him, and he was very proud of his converted shopping trolley, though he was a bit fed up at having lost his wing mirror in a recent crash.
Sadly only three of the kids got the message for this week, but word is out and so the next time loadshedding is scheduled for when a Homework Club is happening the kids know that we'll be ready and waiting to serve them.
So yesterday for the first time we were able to crack on with The Gathering's Homework Club through the scheduled two hour blackout thanks to our mini inverter which not only charged the tablets but then kept the router and wifi running for the 2½ hours for which the electricity was off.
Loadshedding celebrates its 15th birthday this October.
Yes, this country has been rolling out planned energy blackouts for fifteen years because Eskom the state owned utility is too incompetent and the ruling ANC are too corrupt to get their act together and actually resolve the issues. The main issue being the $24bn+ that have been stolen by those in power!
This is a time of tremendous blessing for us, never mind for those that come to partake of the soup, though we know they are truly blessed too.
However, lately it's been quite sobering seeing the Soup Kitchen growing and seeing how the demographic of those coming for soup is expanding.
As ever our regulars were queueing well before we started serving, though the crowd was smaller than normal due to it being payments weeks for the various social grants such as pensions.
Despite the lower number we still served 140 litres of delicious homemade soup which was well received. It also meant we were able to be very generous in filling pots and giving seconds to those that wanted.
Early in the morning we had a desperate call from one of our church members in the community telling us that there had been a small explosion and it had wiped out the local electricity supply.
Sadly the recent growth of the Soup Kitchen means that those days are long gone and now as we use our biggest pans to make 140 litres of yummy soup, there's only enough for one cup each and a pot to take home.
Anyone who knows me knows that one of my great joys and pleasures in life is unicycling.
I regularly ride for at least an hour twice a week and often more if I can squeeze it into my week, and if the weather allows.
So it was a real joy when Carla said she would like to learn to ride the unicycle. She took to it quite quickly and wasted no time in applying some of her ballet techniques to help conquer the balancing side of unicycling. With just a little more practice she'll be riding with no problems.
This morning after picking up a trailer I had the joy of driving through to Simon's Town to My Father's House where my dear brother Shaddie loaded my car and trailer with loads of food for The Gathering.
There have been so many blessings to talk about recently, but I'll stick with my favourite which is seeing another young Christian being given the opportunity to serve and minister in the church.
This morning Kuda, a young Zimbabwean with a fantastic testimony of how God dramatically broke in to his life and saved him from drugs, opened our worship at The Gathering and exhorted us to put God and the needs of others above our own interests. Great stuff!
