Birthday Weekend

Joel had a lot of fun over the weekend celebrating his Birthday. The party on Saturday was great and all the kids had a lot of fun, even the parents seem to enjoy it and they all commented very positively on how we had structured and organised the event. Joel's friends were incredibly generous with the presents they gave him, we were quite stunned at some of the stuff and Joel was delighted with his new favourite toys.

On Sunday we celebrated his Birthday proper and opened a few presents before church, followed by lunch out and more presents on our return. The definite favourite is the Duplo dragon from Eli, Joel hates to put it down.

Enjoy the photos below:

Michael's House

We wrote recently about Michael & Joyce being evicted from the home they share with Michael's father. The eviction date is March 31st which is looming very closely now.

In our last post about this situation we mentioned the possibility of you helping us to provide Michael & Joyce with somewhere to live. We are currently looking at 'Wendy Houses' which are basically large garden sheds with 2 or 3 rooms in them. These 'houses' sell for around R4500 (£450). We currently have approximately £200 and need to raise the balance as soon as possible.

If you would like to help (no amount is too small!) please email us or leave a comment on this post and we'll get back to you as soon as we can.

Thanks in anticipation of your help!

Fighting

Paula went in to Chris Nissen tonight to meet with Dina and some new women for tea and fellowship. She had also been invited to look in on the building of the new netball court and to meet the new team of girls and pray for them. Just as they were walking down to the site Dina disappeared like a shot and Paula realised that Sandra, the community leader was heading straight for her full of aggression. She immediately started her accusations about Dina and the fact that she didn't know about the project etc.etc. Thankfully, Shirley, the new leader of the netball team was with Paula and Paula managed to get Sandra to direct all her accusations at her.

Family Update

Where to begin since we last posted? So much seems to get crammed into a week leaving little time to worry about Blogging, so we're sorry if you're feeling out of touch. As well as this post, we've also just posted some photos on our photoblog: Finnie's in Focus.

Family wise we're generally OK although Joel has a really bad cold right now and Eli is showing signs of picking it up. Joel had to miss church yesterday which wasn't much fun, but he's managed to go to nursery this morning.

Eye Of God?

This picture has recently been posted on the web with the title "Eye of God". I was stunned by the photo from the Hubble telescope, especially when such pictures are viewed from the context of God's word...

Genesis 1:16-18 ...He also made the stars. God set them in the expanse of the sky to give light on the earth, to govern the day and the night, and to separate light from darkness. And God saw that it was good

Psalm 8:3 When I consider your heavens,
the work of your fingers,
the moon and the stars,
which you have set in place

Psalm 147:4 He determines the number of the stars and calls them each by name.

A Meaningful Update - At Last!

We apologise that it has been an age since our last blog update but life has been hectic, hectic!! We eventually moved house on Monday 21 February - typically it was the day of the first torrential rain of the year and we all sorts of furniture to move! Thankfully we managed to dodge the downpours and everything is now in situ. We have also had nearly 3 weeks of huge power cuts right across the Western Cape which has impacted everything from not being able to sterilise bottles, make a cup of tea, sew up curtains, cook dinner, wash clothes.

Family Photo

Steve & Anne Murphy from St. Christopher's in Pott Shrigley were on holiday in Cape Town recently and we caught up after church. We had an excellent time together and whilst they were with us they took the family photo below which we just received in our email.

Thanks Guys!

Adoption Update

The 60 day consent period has now ended which means that the birth mother can no longer change her mind and request her child back. This is great for us but must be awful for her. Please pray for her as she seeks to rebuild her life, also, give thanks as she is a Christian and knows Jesus as her saviour!.

The social worker was in court this morning and we're waiting to hear what the next step is. As you could imagine we're really excited to know that Eli is now ours pending the technical formalities of the legal process.

Please keep praying that all would go smoothly and quickly!

We're Back Online!

We've had an eventful few days moving house, as ever with such ventures, whatever can go wrong does go wrong, so our washing machine decided that it didn't like the new house and gave up on us, but not before it flooded the kitchen! Dean fell through the stairs on his way down, one step completely collapsed, but thankfully gravity was stronger than velocity so other than a gashed leg there was no real damage. In the midst of packing and moving we enjoyed a series of prolonged power cuts, generally losing the electricity for 7+ hours at a time which had a really negative impact on the jobs we needed to get done before and during the move. The cuts have finished for now but are due again in the next few months as the nuclear generators are repaired. Our phone eventually started working today only 10 days after it was supposed to!

That's A Good One!

Eskom (South Africa's monopoly electricity provider) has just blamed a massive 12 hour blackout across the Western Cape on the recent fires and the mist which covered Cape Town this morning! Incredible!

We always thought that British Rail was pushing it when they blamed delays on 'leaves' or the 'wrong kind of snow' but Eskom really has BR licked when it comes to pathetic excuses!

Yes we're cross that we couldn't have a cup of tea when we got up this morning! At least church was interesting and our guest preacher (Adrian Holloway) coped admirably and lead 6 people Christ. Praise God!!!!!!

Another Taster

Here's a couple more photos to give you another taster of the photos we've just posted at Finnie's in Focus.

We hope you enjoy them

A Passage I Love

JN 16:33 "I have told you these things, so that in me you may have peace. In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world."

I love this passage simply because Jesus let's his followers know that troubles are guaranteed (not promised) for no particular reason (not for character building or testing etc) other than we are of this world and have to live in it. So being robbed or living through Hurricane Katrina are not judgement by some vindictive deity but rather just part and parcel of life on this planet.

Photo Update

Here are a few 'taster' photographs, you can see more on our Photoblog 'Finnie's in Focus'.

We'll post some more over the next few days too.

Catch Up

We've finally managed to get back onto Blogger after 3 days, apparently our monopoly phone company messed up and barred access to the service which is about what you'd expect from a monolithic uncompetitive monopoly. Gripe over and on with the posting...

Quite a lot has happened and we'll try and give a brief update on each thing...

Can't Access Blogger

We're emailing this post through in the hope that it will be posted automatically.

We haven't been able to log onto Blogger for over 24 hours despite trying several different computers.

Hopefully all will be back to normal soon, but if you happen to know why Blogger is down, please email us.

Action in CNP

Dean has just been to an excellent meeting at the municipality with Dina & Mama Jane regarding the vegetable garden in CNP and the proposed netball court for the community. Amazingly, the parks dept have agreed to give the community R1000 towards the vegetable garden for seeds, fertiliser etc so after almost 2 years the garden will now be utilised properly. The parks department have also agreed to fund the construction of the netball court and to supply the basic equipment such as hoops and balls. Needless to say Dina & Mama Jane were delighted and the community will be thrilled when they hear about this.

The Law Is An Ass

Dean accompanied Michael & Joyce to court this morning for the final eviction hearing. You may recall that Michael & Joyce are living with Michael's father (Douglas) who wants them to leave the house, primarily because he's an alcoholic and they've been trying to address this issue with him. As expected, the court made it's decision based purely on the law thus ignoring the moral arguments for Michael & Joyce remaining in the house.

Dean was quite angry afterwards as he feels that Michael & Joyce were steamrollered by Douglas's lawyer as they had no legal representation themselves (legal aid was refused and they can't afford legal fees) into signing a settlement document. This then allowed the lawyer to make direct representations to the chief magistrate in his chamber rather than having to go into court.

Emyezweni Pre School

Debs has just updated her Blog with some cute photos of one or two of the kids at the pre-school. Take a look at Deb's SA News

Here's one to whet your appetite

CNP Men's Bible Study

Dean had a great bible study on Thursday morning with a possible record attendance of 11, which is really encouraging, especially as most of the guys are now coming along regularly. We're continuing our series of Character Studies and this week looked at Paul and his life.

Left to Right: Cyril (in blue shirt),Danny, Michael, Basil, Peter, Trevor, Vicky, Alfred, Ernest & James.

Depictions Of Mohammed

Controversy over the publication of images depicting Mohammed in the Danish newspaper Jyllands-Posten has erupted into an international furor. While Muslim nations are calling for a boycott of Denmark, Europeans are divided as to whether they should stand up for Western principles of freedom of speech, or cave in to to self-censorship in the name of multiculturalism and fear.

Wed Afternoon In CNP

Dean had an interesting afternoon in CNP on Wed. He started by visiting Peter (one of the men in Dean’s bible study), whilst there a fight erupted in the street outside a shebeen and Dean noticed that a young man named Colby was one of those fighting. Later he bumped into Colby and whilst they were talking it became clear that Colby was drunk. This is articularly sad as Colby is a young man who has just joined the police force and he has a bright future.