Prayer changes things!

Please would you pray with us for Dustin and Ann who are in Canada trying to get their monthly support up to 100% so that they can come out and join the Mossurize Ndau discipleship team. They are already learning Portuguese in Canada. Good work guys! stick at it. But lets PRAY this young couple over to Mozambique.

The next few days

Oh!, wouldn't it be fun to be riding through the snow in a one horse open slay instead of driving to hot and humid Beira on rough and bumpy roads.
 
As we are packing for a 4 day trip to Beira and Chimoio I'm reminded of the time a few years back when we were very blessed to visit with Walter & Rosie in Northern Ireland and it snowed and was cold and it rained. Boy did we we ever feel out of place. Because for us December is a hot and humid time of the year. It would be great to have a LITTLE of that cooler weather right about now.
 
We leave for Beira at 7.30am tomorrow and head almost right into meetings for 2 days. Most of which will be with our AIM country leader who has just returned from her home assignment. Please pray with us that all these meetings go well and that we are able to lighten her load in some way. She has just too much on her plate.

But please pray very especially for a meeting at 5pm tomorrow. It is with the president of the denomination we work alongside. We are needing to focus on what our role is in Mozambique alongside the local Church. We feel that there might have in the past few months been some miss communication /information / expectation and understanding of our role here. And most of all we want to avoid a dependency situation some time in the future. But want to focus our energies on training leaders of the local Churches to become empowered leaders. And that when we on day leave there is a vibrant missions minded Church which is sustainable. We want God's plan and His glory to receive all the praise. In what He is doing in Mossurize district.

Bush Telegraph

December 2012

Jinx & Dawn Reyneke

Serving with AIM

Among the Ndau

 

Thanks be to God for his indescribable gift!

2 Cor 9:15

 

Silly season….

The ‘silly season’ is upon us where people miss the true meaning of Christmas ...      however, we thank the Lord for the privilege of being able to celebrate Christmas once again and for everything it means to us-Jesus came into the world. We pray that we will commemorate His birthday in a way that is pleasing to Him, not only at Christmas but everyday of the year and for all eternity. We also pray that you are able to share this festive season with family, friends and fellow believers– may it be a time of great spiritual rejoicing!

My father (Dawn’s), Toni and nephew Josh are here for the holiday and this time we will be having Christmas dinner at Cecilia’s house together with Jen, our friends from Zimbabwe, the Catholic priests and nuns. Quite a full house. We alternate each year and everyone contributes to the meal. So we have Brazilian, Italian, American, Zimbabwean and South African food...a variety. Sadly, the McCorkells won’t be joining us as they are away on Home Assignment in the UK but we will be thinking of them having a ‘white Christmas’ while we will be sweating....

Pastor Domingo & Laurinda

Pastor Domingo has been transferred to Tete and we have yet to hear who will be  replacing him. We are not clear on when they will be going but some say it is as    early as the 1st of December. Please keep them in your prayers that the transition will go smoothly and until the new pastor arrives, we will be able to fill Ps.Domingo’s shoes..

Many of you have met them and I am sure that they are sad that they did not get to say goodbye personally and also to thank you once again for your support -prayers,  financial and material gifts over the years.

Jinx is planning to pay the President of the American Board Church , Ps Madeira a visit in December to discuss what has been done so far and for future plans. Please pray for the traveling and the meeting.

Wonderful news!

We are now back online again.. It has been a frustrating time with having to use the 3G stick which kept on dropping every few minutes. We believe that the stick works well in Chimoio but I think we too far away and the signal is not strong enough. We have found a provider for $150 per month which is just a $4 more than the last one. We thank you all for praying with us to resolve the issue and to the Lord for His provision and answer to prayer. It also seems as if the old provider will be returning the monies paid in advance… God is good.

Deaths

Over the past two months there have been quite a few deaths—family  members of members within the Church and in the community. As we are entering into the rainy and mosquito season the deaths will be on the increase. Last weekend we had a massive storm which left us with no electricity for 3 days but it also killed two people in Espungabera with lightning strikes. (Many houses fell down as well.)  Please pray that we can continue to spread the Good News and that we reflect Christ in us.

Ministries

Over December there will be no official ministries taking place but we will continue to minister wherever possible. This is also a time for us to catch up on much needed maintenance of our house and paper work. Jinx will also be working on the Roloff’s house. Please pray that we can buy the necessary materials needed before the factories shut down for Christmas. The Roloffs will be arriving toward the end of Feb next year and much still needs to be done.

And so as we come to another end of year– we would like to thank each one of you for your partnership with us– we would not be here if it weren’t for you and your love for the Lord and His people. Thank you!

Take care and God Bless,

Jinx ,Dawn and Toni

 

 

So Happy

Finally, our Internet is up and working again. Boy what a lot of work we have just discovered that needs to be done. Backlog, WOW!

Thanks for all your prayers.

Our new team member is soon to arrive

Jennifer Jacobs will soon be in Mozambique. She arrives in Beira on 5th July and will go directly to Chimoio to get her documentation done for work & residence permits. Please for the transition from Brazil to Mozambique. She is from the USA and has been in Brazil since the beginning of the year to learn Portuguese.

Calander for the next few months

Just an idea of what we will be doing up until the end of August.

30th June to 7th July we have the outreach team from South Africa.
We will be visiting 2 bush Churches. Sambanje and will show the Jesus film 2 nights. Then from there on the way back to Espungabera a Church at Muchiyoyo which no outreach have visited yet. Here we will hopefully be helping to put up a Church framework made of poles cut from the bush. As well as showing the Jesus film two nights. We are going to be doing children, ladies and mens ministries at both places.

8th July Cecilia is getting a outreach group from Brazil of 11 people. FANTASTIC! The main focus is on training Sunday school leaders/teachers and also youth leaders. The Jesus film will be shown 2-3 nights there as well. This is an area where there are a lot of children and young people. They young "men" 18-25 years old are quite keen on carrying forward the idea of having multiple wives. Please pray for this time that we can get through to them. There will be quite a big focus on ladies ministries during this week as well. We are hoping to get some men as well so that we can have the opportunity to teach them as well.

20th July to 4th August Walter and Rosie get an outreach team from Northern Ireland from their home Church. EXCELLENT! They are coming to help build a 3 room dormitory which will be used by future outreach teams and also the Bible school students. While they are here they will be part a new Church plant at a place called Bundwa (not Bunga) and will be putting up a Church framework. And there will be the showing of the Jesus film over 2 days.

Dawn and I ave tried to make plans to go down to South Africa a few times but too much to do and Can't seem to fit a quick trip in. But we are thinking that we will have a gap to do that from 5th August to about 12th August. We have to replace Dawns Laptop which went KAPUT about a month ago. But even more fun than that is. We will have to get a new scanner as well to suite. Ours we have now was bought before we went to Namibia and has served us well since 1997. But we have no drivers for it to work on anything since Windows ME/2000. We will need to visit dentist as well. And possibly have eyes checked

13th August to 25th August we get a construction team from the USA. They are coming to help with the completion of Russell and Nicole's house. Russell is a medical doctor and will be working in the Espungabera hospital along side the Mozambican doctors and nurses. They arrive in February with 3 small children.

Please pray we have a lot on the go.

Bible School

Tomorrow we have Bible school again for the week. And then we have our AIM Mozambique conference after that so we are going to get very busy again. We would appreciate your prayers as Dawn stays at home this next week alone. And then as we go to the conference.

A short break

It has been a great few days time off. We have been in Chipinge with Hendrik and Meryl. It was a much need time off.

How do you eat an elephant?

How do you eat an elephant?

So how do you eat an elephant?  Easy, “Invite the family”. Together you can get through the elephant, one mouthful at a time.

It’s 2002, and AIM has placed two people in Espungabera, a town in rural Mozambique. Their mandate is to work with the local church, tiny at the time, to develop and mentor leadership & to plant Churches. The elephant on their plate was enormous, more like a prehistoric mammoth, but for two South Africans, Jinx and Dawn Reyneke, flinching wasn’t an option. They knew the Lord had called them to the work. After prayerfully settling four growing-up daughters and two sets of parents they ‘put foot’ which is Jinx’s description for getting on with it, quickly.

Anyone who knows Jinx and Dawn will tell you that these two don’t sit around watching flies land on cows and within a few years the gospel was preached mightily, the Church had grown and there were many baptisms. But a handful of people can only eat so much elephant before their tummies start to get sore.

Now, Mozambique seems to have a simple 3-rule road infrastructure; ‘this way’ and ‘that way’ and ‘mind the potholes’. With new Church plants stretching up to one hundred & thirty five kilometres from one end to the other, the work quickly became a mobile ministry. Thousands of hours were spent driving and Jinx was spending hundreds of hours under the hoods of hapless vehicles that the Moz bush roads chewed into pieces, with Dawn patiently serving coffee by starlight. Lots of coffee. South African friends who made short term visits annually didn’t know whether to laugh or cry when the stories came out via newsletter.

Jinx once blogged… “It has got to the stage where the repairs and maintenance are keeping me out of what the Lord has called us to do. Namely planting Churches and training Church leaders as well as heading up the "new" team of missionaries which are coming to enable the work to go forward through discipleship in all the local Churches.

In the early days they only dreamed of heading up a full team of missionaries and for many years they were alone. The work had been growing and the local men whom the Lord had called as village Church leaders needed help. One village pastor walked to Espungabera through the night with his sick child in his arms, only to have the child die a few metres in front of Jinx and Dawn’s home.  The Reyneke’s work under a fabulous leadership team who are always willing to pray, assist and mentor, but the team is based in Beira, hours and hours away on the death chilling roads, each member also in fulltime ministry.

It became clear that help was needed to eat this elephant. What to do?

“But God…”  (Don’t you love these words?) But God had a plan.

As well as providing reliable transport, the Lord had been preparing the hearts of Walter and Rosie McCorkell from Northern Ireland and Cecilia from Brazil to join the Reyneke’s.  Prayer, time and, yes, some tears, brought these three workers to Espungabera. They needed accommodation so basic house building started,  Jinx even falling from the roof one day onto a pile of bricks but the Lord spared him from serious injury.  Many friends from Pretoria drove the 2-day journey to help with the work together with friends from the Church in Ireland

The ‘family’ had been summoned to help eat the elephant.

Thousands of miles away, while this was happening, the Lord was preparing even more family to come to Mozambique, five in all.  The Roloff’s and Jen Jacobs are from USA and the Dyck’s are from Canada. These folks are in Missions preparation and will need housing when they arrive.

AIM International has opened a building project to provide simple, basic housing for the new Missionaries arriving in Espungabera in 2012/13. Will you help Jinx, Dawn and the Moz team eat the elephant?  If you’re hungry and part of the family you’ll be welcome.

For more thrilling instalments on the Moz family go to www.JinxDawn.blogspot.com

Funds may be sent to your nearest AIM office. Please quote the project name and number Mossurize Construction Project; SR-MOZ-152-U

Zimowane, burning of the witchcraft trinkets

The latest

In the last 2 weeks we have negotiated to buy a house from a man in Espungabera. It has the roof on and is plastered inside. But all the rest needs to be done. Namely the floor, ceiling, electrics, plumbing plaster of outside. Window frames need to be put in and glazed. This house is in preparation for the Roloff family coming in February next year. It sounds like it is a long time away but is just around the corner. We have an outreach team coming from the USA to help with the build for about 2 weeks in mid August.
The situation is that we got a loan for the buying of the house but have no finances to finish it at this stage. So please will you pray that the funds will come in. There is a project registered for this with AIM (Africa Inland Mission). Its Mossurize construction project SR-MOZ-152-U Please quote the project number if you feel led to help in this way.

Gospel to the unreached

Holy Trinity Church Pmb Outreach 2012

A bit of the forest cleared out for the new Church

LIFT team 2012

Preperation visit

Dawn and I have just had Pam & Geoff visit with us for a few days. They help co-ordinate and get prepared for new medical missionary doctors coming out to the field. We were able to go and visit 3 rural clinics and as well had a grand tour of them all. Then lastly we were able to visit the main district hospital in Espungabera. And the leadership of the hospital are all very eager to get the new doctor. So Pam & Geoff helped me a lot in thinking through what needs to be done in preperation of Russell, Nicole and family. We are not wanting to have them overloaded/committed and they get discouraged. Please pray for the wisdom in dealing with govenment officials so we don't creaate expectations which can't be met.

Middle of April

Again we have been overwhealmed by God's goodness to us. As we recieved a team from Northern Ireland, LIFT (labour in faith and trust) they came to help us get Walter & Rosie's house completed. What a blessing as they brought fellowship, friendship and a hole bunch of fun with them. Thanks you so much. We all enjoyed being with you and the way you guys got stuck in. It is a massive step for us to get all done what you did in a few days.

End March & beginning April

We were blessed, we were blessed, la,la,le,la. Our home Church, Holy Trinity Church Pietermaritzburg sent their first outreach to us. This has been a long time prayer & hope for us that we would get a team come. It was just so great having a really mixed team, some quite young and the older folks. Anotheer blessing on the team was Rob. Although he mentioned that he is older but never the less we appreciated his input. The youngsters, local people are still commenting on how they got involved and for the most part willingly. Thanks guys. Just our daily lives out here is a wonderful testimony.

With the HTC outreach team we were able to plant a new Church at Zimowane. This is a area where Mateus from Makumba has been visiting over the last year from time to time. It is quite a trip to get there and the reception was fantastic. Such friendly people. We were able to show the Jesus film a few times with upto 300 folks at the one showing. And would you know it or we should have expected something, as Satan would not be happy us making in-roads.

The ageing DVD machine let out a bit of a smell and one of the parts which is factory filled with smoke let the smoke out! KAPOT! So what now? It is just amazing how God provides for the Gosple to go out. There was a young man in the crowd who in the middle of the bush had a DVD machine and loaned it to us, So the rest of the film was seen by all.

Another cool thing was seeing Craig get down a boogie with the local folks as they sang choruses and danced. It's true white folks have no rythum. The next morning we had a man and his family come and were converted. They brought along all their trinkets from the witchdoctors to be burnt and destroyed. The Lord is good

Team building time

March we set aside a week as a team to have opportunity to get together, pray, talk and re-connect. We, being Walter & Rosie, Cecilia, Dawn & myself had not realised how tired some of us actually were. When we got to Xai-Xai, to Nascer do Sol. I got Walter's and my fishing rod all sorted out ready to go and get that big one for our supper. Well we didn't starve but we also had no fish. The whole week we were just too tired to muster the energy to go down and enjoy some fishing.

Never the less, we had a good time and came back relaxed and ready to face things again. It was just such a reminder that we are on call 24/7 in our ministry places, Espungabera and Siyabuzana. That to find time off or time to rest is just so very difficult. Not like in the city where you simply close the door of your house and nobody bothers you.

Feedback on Nairobi trip

The week's conference was a great time to meet with other folks who are all passionate about planting Churches. We had a number of presentations on a completely "new" or different approach to Church planting. Starting with a different way of thinking of; what is a Church. In this presentation it is 2 believer's/families who meet regularly. That is very broadly stated. And their whole approach to how and who does the Church planting. This to the western way of thinking is almost unheard of. Where traditionally we get ourselves prepared and then go out. Wow! some challenging ideas for sure.

Up and coming events

In just a few days time I (Jinx/Eugene) am going to a conference in Nairobi Kenya. I have been asked to participate because of the experiance we have out here in our areas. So I will be leaving Dawn in Espungabera between the 7-22 Feburary. But when I return I will be driving our "new" vehicle.

Cecilia gets back towards the end of the month from her home assignment. And we are all looking forward to her telling us about all she did. And seeing her re-unite with the youth and children.

Bible school starts 27th Feb. for a week. and this is the first time in the new year. And we pray that all the local people will have good harvests this year. Please pray for regular rain that is just the right amount.

Middle of March we have a team building time away for 7 days. 13th to 20th pray that this would be a good time to share and bind together and also to be praying and sharing together. Satan is not happy that we are making in-roads. We are all facing opposition in one or another form. But it is to be expected. Please pray with us.

The Lord is Good

We have over the last two months been amazed by our Lord, over and over again.

A number of things that have happened can only be explained in and through Jesus. Toni applied for a change in her course/faculty. After waiting for a long time, the response was, sorry but we have no space. Wow! what now all the applications had closed for the year 2012.

We were advised to contact a university and what do you know, Jesus answers prayer. We sent the email application on the Wednesday and she was accepted the next afternoon. Praise the Lord. But we had to go down to South Africa for the official interview and payments.

The next thing we had heard of a vehicle which seemed was what we were looking for. It was just down the road from where we were with Toni in Pietermaritzburg. And it was in good condition and we took it for a test drive. It seemed just great. But we had only about half the purchase price available. We informed some of our supporting Churches and within a few days we had all we needed to buy the car. Blessed I tell you!

The vehicle is in Pretoria at the moment being made ready for our conditions. Again blessed with men and women who love the Lord and are helping out there. Tyres need to be replaced, the front bumper needs to be exchanged for a metal one to house a winch. And there are a few odd and ends that need to be looked at.

GOD IS GOOD AND ALL HIS PEOPLE SAID AMEN!