BMW Man

One of the joys of The Gathering's weekly Soup Kitchen is the variety of our regulars from all different walks in life. This diversity lends a calm and light environment in which folk are chilled and happy to laugh at themselves and others.

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.

Desperate For Power

Our power situation doesn't improve. 

We had loadshedding until 4am this morning followed by scheduled maintenance from 6am until 4pm which stretched out 'til 5.30pm. The only bright spot in this was that our scheduled loadshedding from 6pm was skipped this evening.

Not Defeated

It was great to see The Gathering's Homework Club continue through loadshedding on Thursday for the first time ever, and it's a blessing knowing that we no longer have to turn the kids away just because the electricity is off.

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.

Cracking On

With loadshedding now in its 16th year and showing no signs of going anywhere anytime soon, it was time to make a plan to ensure life can go on (see Take That Loadshedding!).

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.

Take That Loadshedding!

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!

The Longest Queue

I may have mentioned once or twice how Thursdays are my favourite day of the week because we get to serve the community through The Gathering's weekly Soup Kitchen.

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.

Soup Kitchen

Last night's Soup Kitchen was another blessed evening with The Gathering.

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.

In God's Power We Trust

Yesterday's Women's Day Outreach at The Gathering was spectacular and we're thankful to God for making it the day that it was. One salvation, a healing and a deliverance made it an awesome time in God's presence, and we're also thankful for His amazing answer to our prayer for electricity for the event.

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. 

Soup Kitchen Quandry

Not so long ago at The Gathering's weekly Soup Kitchen our regulars were able to hang around and enjoy several cups of soup before collecting their takeaway pot for home.

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.

Fantastic Family Friday

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.

Gymnogene

Over the years we've had some special visitors to our garden, and this afternoon it continued as we had the  pleasure of seeing a Gymnogene or African Harrier Hawk flying over before settling in to the neighbours oak tree. The hawk sat there for quite a while, even ignoring the protestations of many songbirds which tried to get it to move on, before taking off to join another hawk in flight.