Ttypinbg with nmy gfloves pon 6/17/2010

Last night it was -1 degrees. My little cottage is made of brick with no insulation and does not have a heating system so it was very cold. But I have a portable heater to sit in front of, ugg boots and layers of fleece, a microwave to heat a hot water bottle for my feet, and an electric blanket when I go to bed. But as I shiver and think how cold I am, I remember the miles and miles of tin shacks. How cold must those people be? No electricity, no shoes, no warm clothes, maybe a thin blanket. A thin piece of metal for walls that don’t seal out the cold wind. If I am this cold, I can’t imagine how painful negative one must feel to them. I have to stop thinking about it. I can’t think of how the children must feel, I can’t. If I think about it for one second longer, my heart will explode.

I try to change the subject in my mind, but each time I nuke my hot water bottle or grab my mug of hot tea to warm my hands, I am reminded. I can’t shake the image. My heart screams, “What can I do?” There are hundreds of thousands of people living like this in the townships. I cry out in prayer for them, but I don’t even know what to ask for. Do I pray that someone builds 500,000 houses? Do I pray for blankets? Do I pray that the temperature never goes below 50? What can I realistically request?
I fail even in praying for them.

When I got to work this morning, I asked my coworkers, what can we do? Chris said we have about 30 blankets in the storeroom that we can deliver. I said Great, can we go today? Chris knew of a pastor in a very poor part of the township of Shoshanguve who would know which homes in the community needed the blankets the most. AFnetAid has two orphan day care centers and an orphanage in Shoshanguve, but they recently had 210 blankets donated to them by a Christian radio station, so we knew our centers didn’t need them as much as Pastor Gert. Chris, Banie, and I hopped in the Landrover and headed out to Shoshanguve.

Pastor Gert and his wife Lienkie are both graduates of the AFnet Pastor Training Program. Their church takes care of orphans, runs a day care, and has a literacy program for the elderly. Since their congregation cannot pay them to do all this, he builds bricks to make money and she has a nightshift at a factory in a different town sewing car seat covers. They took the time to walk around the neighborhood with us introducing us to the people who could really use some blankets right now. We delivered to a granny who was caring for two orphans.In a makeshift room attached to her home was a man dying of AIDS. They did not call it this. They said that he was being cursed because of his infidelity. He was married but began an affair with a woman who was said to be full of demons. When she died, she passed all her demons on to him and now he was very sick. This is Chris going into the cold shack to pray for him and leave a blanket.We met a blind mom and her children who lived in this weird dome thing. These were left behind from the time when the railroads were built. Here’s Banie handing over extra warmth to a little one.We met this family that had been thrown together by fate. The little baby became an orphan when her mother died in childbirth. The two women took in her orphans. All lived in this little shack.I was happy to do the little bit that I could do. Until I got home. I watched the news and the weather report says a cold front is moving through tonight. You gotta be kidding me. It is going to get colder?!! I must not think of all the children that will freeze tonight. I must think of the 30 that maybe have a bit more comfort tonight. I cannot help them all, but I did what I could do for today. But have I done all that I can? I am going to contact the big rich white churches in Pretoria – they need to do a coat drive. Wish me luck!

Anybody out there have ideas on how to help? You engineer types, can you think of a way to make the shacks warmer? That doesn’t cost money? You creative types, can you think of ways to keep the children warmer? I have so many brilliant friends, time to tap into that brainpower! Let’s get this virtual reality brainstorming session underway…