HOUSE OF LIFE UPDATE

In the House of LIFE June was the month of breakthrough and growth. I am so grateful to Jesus for bringing me into the kingdom of God. What a blessed life it is. The life of faith is rewarding, challenging, and stimulating. But we are also mere servants to the King of Kings. It is not our burden, it is His. It is not our plans, it is His. It is not our power, it is His. It is not our wisdom, it is His.

THE THREE GIRLS UPDATE
The girls who featured on our first Blog are as follows.
P. is at the House of LIFE rehab center. More about her further down. …. N. has been thoroughly saved, reconciled with her mother and has returned home to the Cape. She is living there and is attending church there. B. has returned home to the Gauteng area after having been saved. She is also back with her parents.


PHOTO: P in March




PHOTO: P in June



JUNE UPDATE
In mid June we accepted four girls to the House of LIFE Rehabilitation Center. J, P, M, and Pa. There are at least 20 girls who wish to come, but we made a decision to vet them first so as to start off well, and continue well. We also decided to not fill up the center before we had the entire bedding, lounge chairs, plates etc. Please see the Blog for the things still needed for the house.

• We have decided to preach the Word of God unadorned in all its power and simplicity. We have not bought in secular techniques, fads or fashionable philosophies. Where sin abounds, grace abounds even more [Rom 5:20].
  
  Our method is by passionate and loving evangelism, and solid, pointed, no-holds-barred-biblical teaching. After all, Paul said that he preaches nothing other than Jesus Christ and him crucified.
  
  Our aim is to look for Jesus Christ to be formed in the lives of the disciples.[gal 4:19]. Despite the fact that Paul was a formidable intellectual, he looked to the simplicity of Jesus Christ 2 Cor 11:3. That is our aim. We have found this to be astonishingly powerful.
  
  P …………….
  P was photographed before. She is on the blog titled three women. Her face was puffy and swollen with drug addiction and a commercial sex lifestyle. After the previous report, she became very sick, nearly dying. One day she asked for a hug. I gave her one, but the smell of rotten flesh was overpowering. She lost huge amounts of weight in two or three weeks. She requested and received prayer and became healthy again.
  
  Her face has been radically changed into a young woman of poise and beauty. She has an angelic voice qualified to glorify Jesus in Gospel songs. However, first she must get her foundations or roots right. These are spiritual roots, moral roots and community harmony roots. She has woken up to the fact that Jesus is here, he is alive, well and loves her.
  
  She is also undergoing social transformation as she realises that she has been put in a family, the family of God. Previously she would be hostile and antisocial with people in the Durban shelter. They would shout at her and sometimes punch her and kick her till she became quiet. This has traumatised her, but she is rapidly healing as she realises that she should love her Jesus family and be loved by them. She now abounds with love and affection, and joyfully receives love from Christian women visitors.
  
  She ran away from home. Her mother advertised on TV and the newspaper that if anyone knew where she was, they were to contact her. P phoned home from the rehab center and there was rejoicing that she had been found, was well and was being discipled in Jesus. She is very keen to learn the computer, and she has received a couple of small lessons on my own computer.
  
  Pa ……………….
  Pa is in her late 20’s. She was a commercial sex worker, standing on the streets. She was driven to this because she has two children who are not with her but are being looked after by their father. She was not being supported financially by the father of her children, so she was forced to seek money on the streets for rent and food. Sex work was so abusive that she began drinking heavily to dull the inner pain she was feeling. She responded to the preaching of the Word of God by Petra, and came to Christ. She also is responding to the teaching given by Pastor Steve Blomefield.
  PHOTO: Pa .............

She was not addicted to rocks [crack cocaine] or other drugs.
She is a good cook and often cooks for the people in House of life. Her whole countenance has become radiant because of the inner spiritual change. She has rapidly grown in Jesus and her whole manner is changing as she becomes more and more like Jesus. She has realised that her previous lifestyle was sheer madness. It was not at all sensible.

J ………………
J is an orphan. She fell in love with a fellow schoolboy, got pregnant and was thrown out of her family home. She moved to Durban and found a new boyfriend from Burundi. She believed strongly in the power of Sangoma’s [witchdoctors], and magic and muti [magic medicine].

Unfortunately J’s boyfriend was abusive and violent. He abused her by slapping, punching and kicking her often. Her response was to learn the same style of violence. Petra has encountered J fighting with claws bared and seeking eyes to puncture and make blind, and fists lashing out, uncaring of punches received. Several times Petra has had to pay for a shelter so that J could find temporary refuge and a place to stay.

PHOTO:J ........................

She responded to Petra's preaching of scripture and her love. She has renounced this way of life of violence, magic and muti. She has fallen in love with Jesus. She formerly was an orphan, but now she has a spiritual mother [Petra], a spiritual father [Steve] and a family – Christians.

She says that Jesus has changed her life from the former life to a new life. Jesus has a plan for her life. he has helped her resist temptation of the devil and she has no desire to return to her former way of life. She is filled with joy, and fun, and bubbly happiness now that she knows Jesus loves her, forgives her and has placed her in a loving family.

Margaret …………………….
Margaret, formerly the Queen of Durban, [see the Blog on the Queen of Durban] has also come to the center. Petra met Margaret many years ago. Petra met up with her on her return to South Africa from the USA. Margaret was so happy and desired to hear her at the Tuesday and Thursday meetings when Jesus was preached. The more meetings she attended, the more she lost the desire to do practice prostitution.

PHOTO: Margaret reading the Word of God

She came to House of LIFE in mid June. She has been completely delivered from the desire to drink, to smoke cigarettes and to engage in prostitution. She has well and truly given her life to Jesus, seeing his love, mercy, grace and forgiveness. She reads scripture most of the day and gets revelation from the Word of God. Instead of turmoil and stress, peace and quiet joy have taken over.


Margaret can also crochet and is making a blanket for someone.

Steve Blomefield
Pastor
HOUSE OF LIFE

A SORRY GAY NIGHT

It was a Friday. A dark Friday. Very dark. …. but warm and the hookers were out to make money. It was going to be a busy night preaching Jesus to them. On this night I was to meet T. a professional gay [but broken] homosexual prostitute.

I am Steve Blomefield. I am part of House of LIFE ministry team, headed by Petra Mercedes Luna. I am a Pastor to commercial sex workers. Drug addicts, alcoholics and the abused of Durban inner city and red light districts. Petra does the evangelism and the deeply personal counselling and I do the most of the teaching. Rachel Thomson teaches the girls about life skills and some vocational skills. Christian women teach life skills and pastors come in and teach the topics they love.


Photo: Steve Blomefield Pastor to Durban inner city

Normally I am the driver. I am not an evangelist so I do not work outside my ministry area. Usually I wait in the hotel for the evangelistic team, led by Petra. Then I drive them home. But tonight it was going to be different. I was going to cruise with them in a combination of red light districts in Durban. We would spot a girl standing on a corner, Petra would get out and I would wait in the car. When she got back in the car, I would cruise to the next girl, or group of girls.

The first area we focussed on was the Point Road area. Suddenly Petra saw a male homosexual prostitute, T. He called himself a woman and spoke and acted like a woman. While having a gay manner, and clutching a fistful of money, T was clearly broken and distressed.


Photo: Petra Luna and T


T said ‘I don’t want to talk to you Petra, I want to speak to this one [me]!” I said to him “ T., out there no one wants to talk to you. No one is interested in you. They only speak to you to abuse your body. They pay. They go. No one cares for you, but I am different. I want to listen to you. I want to hear your heart…..” T. immediately broke down in tears and jumped out the car, running along the sidewalk. We followed him. Finally we stopped the car and Petra jumped out and hugged him, saying “Jesus loves you and so do we.”

T started crying again, and then sat on the sidewalk. After some time he got into the car. “I earn a lot of cash and then I spend it on rocks” [crack cocaine].” That is normal. Commercial sex work is abusive, whether it is consensual or not, paid or not.

God’s plan is for sex to be between two people who have a lifelong covenant of love and special loyalty to eat other; between two people, who support one another, build one another and who laugh, cry and struggle together. It is built on deep intimacy and companionship.


Commercial sex is soul destroying. The one who pays [the client] is driven by jungle instincts, satanic lust and often utter cruelty. The sex worker is not a warm, loving human being. They are seen as people who are so vulnerable that the payment of money will entitle the paymaster to do or be whatever he desires. If any sex worker will not submit to his demands, there are plenty of other sex workers who will, because of poverty.

The sex worker also does not see the client as one made in the image of Jesus, often lonely, but instead as one in bondage to lust, therefore can be manipulated, drugged and plundered from. Many times the sex worker has been abused at home, so stealing from the client is payback. The client is a piggy bank, a stupid victim. ……. Which is why so many sex workers just disappear never to be seen again. Revenge is sweet to a client who has lost his credit cards, money, cell phone, and dignity.

Photo: T and Petra Luna

For these reasons- the abuse suffered by sex workers, the fear of revenge, fear of pimps, fear of police, the memory of soulless, mindless, loveless repeated, weird sex; the memory of slaps, punches and kicks suffered. The memory of people shouting abuse, cursing them. The memory of unfulfilled love and the many rejections, nearly all sex workers become obsessed by alcohol or drugs or both. The inner pain and torment is far too great, chemical friends have to be invited in to help the searing inner agony.

We dropped off T at his flat. Other residents looked at him. Their stares spoke volumes. He was not gay, he was pathetic. He was not gay but tormented. He was not gay but a victim. Despised. Yet Jesus sees him with such enormous love that if T was the only sinner in the world, Jesus would have died for him. Jesus sees him as made in his image, then marred through sin. Jesus sees him as a person broken but the potential of total healing….. For eternity.


Steve Blomefield
Durban Inner city pastor
HOUSE OF LIFE

THE THINGS WE NEED FOR THE HOUSE

Many people have asked us to provide for them a list of things we need.

People have started to give things to the rehab center and so in order that donations are not duplicated, we are posting a needs list on the blog site.

As the soon as the needs are filled, we will delete them from the blog so we don't get two of the same thing. If we were disorganized and allowed two or three of the same thing to be given to us, it would not be good stewardship on our behalf, and would be a disappointment to our donors.

KITCHEN
4 PLATE STOVE WITH OVEN ........................... PROVIDED
FRIDGE ,.................................................................PROVIDED
DEEPFREEZE ........................................................ PROVIDED
MICROWAVE ........................................................ PROVIDED
FRYING PAN ...................................................... 1 PROVIDED
SET OF COOKING POTS ................................. 2 PROVIDED
SERVING DISHES ......................................SOME PROVIDED
BLENDER
FOOD MIXER
WHISK
COOKIE BAKING TRAYS
BREAD BAKING TRAY
BASTING BRUSH
SCISSORS
BREAD KNIFE
CUTTING KNIVES
CAN OPENER ......................... PROVIDED
SPATULAR
POTATO MASHER
POTATO PEELER .................. PROVIDED
EGG LIFTER
DRAINING SPOON
WOODEN SPONS
GRATER
OVEN GLOVES ..................... PROVIDED
APRONS .................................. PROVIDED
DISH CLOTHS ........................PROVIDED
OTHER COOKING EQUIPMENT ..PROVIDED


DINING ROOM
1 DINING TABLE .................................. PROVIDED
10 CHAIRS ............................................. PROVIDED
15 KNIVES .............................................. 6 PROVIDED
15 FORKS ................................................ 6 PROVIDED
15 TEASPOONS ............................................. PROVIDED
15 PUDDING SPOONS ....................................... 6 PROVIDED
15 PLATES ................................................ PROVIDED
20 COFFEE MUGS ......................................... 10 PROVIDED
20 COOL DRINK GLASSES ................................. 10 PROVIDED
8 PLACE MATS
2 TABLE CLOTHS ............................................ PROVIDED
1 DINING SIDEBOARD

TRAINING AND TEACHING
DVD PLAYER ............................................. PROVIDED
TELEVISION ............................................... PROVIDED
VCR PLAYER .............................................. PROVIDED
DVD TEACHING BY SOLID BIBLE TEACHERS
VIDEO TEACHING BY SOLID BIBLE TEACHERS
STUDY AND WORKING TABLE ........ PROVIDED

SCULLERY
2 WASHING UP SPONGES ................. PROVIDED
2 WIRE WASHING SPONGES .............................. PROVIDED
1 DRAINING RACK ...................................... PROVIDED

LOUNGE
2 SEATER COUCH ................................ PROVIDED
4 SEATER COUCH .............................................. PROVIDED
5 OR 6 SEATER COUCH ......................................... PROVIDED
10 LOUNGE CHAIRS ............................................ PROVIDED
7 BAR STOOLS ................................................ PROVIDED
1 COFFEE TABLE .............................................. PROVIDED

BEDROOMS

5 STEEL BUNK BEDS [SINGLE WIDTH] ............................ 3 DOUBLE BUNKS
10 COILED SPRING MATTRESSES TO FIT ........................... 6 PROVIDED
3 DOUBLE BED 70MM MATTRESSES ................................. PROVIDED
5 70 MM BY THICK, SINGLE FOAM MATTRES........................ 1 PROVIDED
5 BY 70 MM CM THICK SINGLE FOAM MATTRESSES............2 PROVIDED
2 DOUBLE BEDS WITH BASES

15 BED COVERS [SINGLE] ........................................ 5 PROVIDED
3 BED COVERS [DOUBLE] ....................................... 2 PROVIDED

15 DUVET SINGLE ................................................. 3 PROVIDED
15 BLANKETS [SINGLE] ...................................... 5 PROVIDED
2 DUVET [DOUBLE] ................................................. 2 PROVIDED
3 BLANKETS [DOUBLE] ............................................ 3 PROVIDED

BLANKETS SINGLE .................................... 10 PROVIDED

30 SHEETS [SINGLE] .................................................. 10 PROVIDED
6 SHEETS [DOUBLE] ................................................... 4 PROVIDED

30 PILLOWS ............................................................... 4 PROVIDED
30 PILLOW SLIPS ...................................................... 4 PROVIDED
100 HANGERS
3 WARDROBES
8 BED SIDE TABLES
8 SIDE LAMPS

OFFICE
3 COMPUTERS [to teach computers]
1 PRINTER
COMPUTER DESKS 3 .......... PROVIDED

LAUNDRY
1 WASHING MACHINE .............................. PROVIDED
2 BROOMS ...................................... 1 PROVIDED
2 IRONING BOARDS .............................. 1 PROVIDED

BATHROOM
15 TOWELS .................................. 6 PROVIDED
2 BATH MATS .............................. 1 PROVIDED
2 TOILET BRUSH ...................... 1 PROVIDED
NEW TOOTHBRUSHES ...................... MANY PROVIDED
TOOTHPASTE ............................. MANY PROVIDED

EXCERCISE EQUIPMENT
1 EXCERCISE BIKE

To all thosewho intend to bless this ministry with material donations, may the Lord Bless you abundantly. Those who give to the poor lend to the Lord.

Love in Jesus

Petra Mercedes Luna