Our day begins at 6.30 am where singing starts in the lounge. Once everyone has got up and joined the worshippers, we start praying.
We always pray God's blessing on those who have given to the ministry in cash or kind. We pray for those in the USA and all over the world who keep in contact with us and encourage us. We pray for the leaders of the ministry. We pray for the local pastors. We pray for our national leaders. We pray for financial provision and for the provision of food. We pray for the girls who are out on the beachfront.
At 7 pm each person will read, meditate and pray over scripture. They will ask the Holy Spirit to reveal the Word to them.
At 7.30 we will share what we have received. This causes us all to focus on the word and ask the Lord to teach us the Word so we all have something to share. Those who have nothing to share are often needing counseling.
Then comes the excellence program. This is a very important part of the rehabilitation program.
1. The girl will be given work to do. She will them assess how well she will do the work. She will give herself a mark as to what she believes she achieve.
2. After the work is done she will mark herself.
3. the supervisor will then mark the work. Encouragement will be given, or guidance as to more excellence.
as time goes on the girls will achieve higher and higher marks. This will give them a sense of self discipline, self achievement and higher morale and self esteem.
Breakfast follows at 9.30 then at 10 teaching is given, usually by the house manager, Patricia.
Lunch and then in the afternoon, skills program between 2-5.30 Local people will come and teach cooking, sewing, crochet, computer or basic work skills.
Supper and then teaching by Petra, myself or an African pastor, Pastor Julius.
In the mornings Pastor Steve will be writing, but in the afternoon there will be staff meetings, administrative work, meeting community pastors or counselling girls.
Finally half an hour of prayer and then bed at 10 pm.
Sunday, September 6, 2009
PETRA AND STEVE MOVE
Petra LUNA and Pastor Steve BLOMEFIELD were living in Umhlanga in Durban. Umhlanga is 12 kilometers from the beachfront where we do outreach to commercial sex workers. It is also 35 kilometers to the suburb where the rehab center is.
They have now moved into the house and Petra is a mother to the girls, and Steve a father to the girls. There is a resident married couple. Patricia is the house manager, and Peter, her husband is a co-pastor of a church.
Some of the girls are orphans, and others come from homes where they suffered violence and rape. The vast majority of the girls involved in commercial sex work have suffered rape, often repeatedly, and this usually this was first experienced in the home. So home life was one of fear and abuse. Thus at the HOUSE OF LIFE we have to create a family atmosphere of love, acceptance, teaching, discipline, harmony and personal growth. We have to inspire the girls to have vision and to teach them how to grow so as to achieve that vision.
When the girls leave home they come to the city to find work. They often move into a shelter and pay 3 US Dollars per night. There may be 50 people in the shelter, both men and women in bunks in one warehouse style room. They quickly run out of cash and are encouraged by other commercial sex workers in the shelter to learn the trade. Out of desperation they agree. They then seek the protection of a pimp who manipulates them using tools of sex, pseudo love and drugs to enslave them into a new life where they serve him and work only for his prosperity.
At the shelter they have no discipline whatsoever. Because they work late at night they wake up late in the day. If they find food, they guzzzle it down on the spot. Food is obtained by Take-Away Restaurants. Rarely do they cook a meal with proper vegetables and rarely do they buy fruit.
They soon learn that life in the shelter is all about survival, and if this means deceiving, lying, arguing, fighting, dominating others, manipulating others and violence, then this is what they will do. It is all about survival. This lifestyle becomes a habit, a culture.
When they come to Jesus, they have to learn a whole new life. They learn love, forgiveness, kindness, honesty, discipline, order, walking in the light, excellence of work, and most importantly, the Word of God and who Jesus really is. They learn that while man is sinful, Jesus can give him His righteousness by faith.
This is why Petra and Steve have to be in the center. All day there is a continual stream of encouragement, counselling, discipline, teaching, prayer and preaching. By continually focusing the girls on Jesus as they Way, the Truth and the Life, they are continually changed into his likeness.
Now we live in the HOUSE OF LIFE, we can join the pastoral community here. Church women from the community here can teach the girls cooking, sewing, knitting, crochet work, gardening, and other home skills. Supermarkets can provide food. Pastors can come in and teach the girls.
We are beginning to meet local pastors, attend their churches and are inviting them to come and teach in the HOUSE.
I thank God for the way that the ministry is growing. From midnight outreaches to feeding programs and then finally to the establishment of the house, then us moving into the house and establishing links with the local Christian community, we are growing, growing, growing.
They have now moved into the house and Petra is a mother to the girls, and Steve a father to the girls. There is a resident married couple. Patricia is the house manager, and Peter, her husband is a co-pastor of a church.
Some of the girls are orphans, and others come from homes where they suffered violence and rape. The vast majority of the girls involved in commercial sex work have suffered rape, often repeatedly, and this usually this was first experienced in the home. So home life was one of fear and abuse. Thus at the HOUSE OF LIFE we have to create a family atmosphere of love, acceptance, teaching, discipline, harmony and personal growth. We have to inspire the girls to have vision and to teach them how to grow so as to achieve that vision.
When the girls leave home they come to the city to find work. They often move into a shelter and pay 3 US Dollars per night. There may be 50 people in the shelter, both men and women in bunks in one warehouse style room. They quickly run out of cash and are encouraged by other commercial sex workers in the shelter to learn the trade. Out of desperation they agree. They then seek the protection of a pimp who manipulates them using tools of sex, pseudo love and drugs to enslave them into a new life where they serve him and work only for his prosperity.
At the shelter they have no discipline whatsoever. Because they work late at night they wake up late in the day. If they find food, they guzzzle it down on the spot. Food is obtained by Take-Away Restaurants. Rarely do they cook a meal with proper vegetables and rarely do they buy fruit.
They soon learn that life in the shelter is all about survival, and if this means deceiving, lying, arguing, fighting, dominating others, manipulating others and violence, then this is what they will do. It is all about survival. This lifestyle becomes a habit, a culture.
When they come to Jesus, they have to learn a whole new life. They learn love, forgiveness, kindness, honesty, discipline, order, walking in the light, excellence of work, and most importantly, the Word of God and who Jesus really is. They learn that while man is sinful, Jesus can give him His righteousness by faith.
This is why Petra and Steve have to be in the center. All day there is a continual stream of encouragement, counselling, discipline, teaching, prayer and preaching. By continually focusing the girls on Jesus as they Way, the Truth and the Life, they are continually changed into his likeness.
Now we live in the HOUSE OF LIFE, we can join the pastoral community here. Church women from the community here can teach the girls cooking, sewing, knitting, crochet work, gardening, and other home skills. Supermarkets can provide food. Pastors can come in and teach the girls.
We are beginning to meet local pastors, attend their churches and are inviting them to come and teach in the HOUSE.
I thank God for the way that the ministry is growing. From midnight outreaches to feeding programs and then finally to the establishment of the house, then us moving into the house and establishing links with the local Christian community, we are growing, growing, growing.
OUR MINISTRY MODEL
The HOUSE OF LIFE has a model which is a guide to all the counselling, teaching, preaching, discipline, encouragement, discipline and skills training.
We cannot go into rehab work willy-nilly. There has to be a clearly defined approach to all we who minister, say and do. While our goal is to evangelize and disciple the commercial sex work community, we must have a strategy by which we achieve these goals. That strategy must be biblical, because the Word of God has a clear understanding of what drives women into prostitution, theft, addiction, conning and broken relationships. The Word of God not only can define the problems, but has simple but profound answers to these problems.
Every problem in the HOUSE OF LIFE family can be traced to SPIRITUAL PROBLEMS [not knowing, loving and obeying Jesus]; MORAL PROBLEMS [integrity, righteousness]; COMMUNITY PROBLEMS [being unable to get on with others, unforgiveness, pride, jealousy,anger etc] and EXCELENCE PROBLEMS [being unable to do work with excellence].
If you can imagine a tree which has three roots which are invisible to the secular world [but of course are visible to Jesus]- these are spirituality, morality, community harmony. If you pass someone on the street, you cannot see by mere looking if the person is moral, spiritual, and lives with others harmoniously. But the tree [branches and fruit] itself is visible. The visible tree is the product of work in the real world, and this work has to be done with wisdom, knowledge and excellence. Unbelievers can have wisdom, knowledge and excellence of work, which is why we will send girls to secular training programs, colleges and universities. But without the roots of spirituality, morality and community, they will be unable to build a proper career or business.
Of course Jesus himself is the whole tree, because he draws us to salvation, calls us to our calling, enables us to live in righteousness, gives us the model of the Godhead and the church as a community and gives us the example of himself as a model of excellence.- We live for the glory of God in all work we do here on earth.
Now that we [Petra and Steve] have moved into the house, we can observe all the people here. We can quickly identify which of the four areas a person is struggling in, and we can then provide biblical answers to sin in any of these areas. We have found that the Word of God truly identified the roots of the evils that drive people to addictions, commercial sex work, an inability to form friendships and live in community with others, as well as an inability to work properly.
By preaching, teaching, counselling, casual exhortation at tea and meals, and by training in skills, we are providing a proper foundation at HOUSE OF LIFE that will enable a girls who has gone through the rehab center to build a proper life for all her future. When she leaves the house of life, she also can identify to herself where she is failing or succeeding and can go to the Word of God and to Jesus and receive Christ's righteousness and grow into maturity.
We cannot go into rehab work willy-nilly. There has to be a clearly defined approach to all we who minister, say and do. While our goal is to evangelize and disciple the commercial sex work community, we must have a strategy by which we achieve these goals. That strategy must be biblical, because the Word of God has a clear understanding of what drives women into prostitution, theft, addiction, conning and broken relationships. The Word of God not only can define the problems, but has simple but profound answers to these problems.
Every problem in the HOUSE OF LIFE family can be traced to SPIRITUAL PROBLEMS [not knowing, loving and obeying Jesus]; MORAL PROBLEMS [integrity, righteousness]; COMMUNITY PROBLEMS [being unable to get on with others, unforgiveness, pride, jealousy,anger etc] and EXCELENCE PROBLEMS [being unable to do work with excellence].
If you can imagine a tree which has three roots which are invisible to the secular world [but of course are visible to Jesus]- these are spirituality, morality, community harmony. If you pass someone on the street, you cannot see by mere looking if the person is moral, spiritual, and lives with others harmoniously. But the tree [branches and fruit] itself is visible. The visible tree is the product of work in the real world, and this work has to be done with wisdom, knowledge and excellence. Unbelievers can have wisdom, knowledge and excellence of work, which is why we will send girls to secular training programs, colleges and universities. But without the roots of spirituality, morality and community, they will be unable to build a proper career or business.
Of course Jesus himself is the whole tree, because he draws us to salvation, calls us to our calling, enables us to live in righteousness, gives us the model of the Godhead and the church as a community and gives us the example of himself as a model of excellence.- We live for the glory of God in all work we do here on earth.
Now that we [Petra and Steve] have moved into the house, we can observe all the people here. We can quickly identify which of the four areas a person is struggling in, and we can then provide biblical answers to sin in any of these areas. We have found that the Word of God truly identified the roots of the evils that drive people to addictions, commercial sex work, an inability to form friendships and live in community with others, as well as an inability to work properly.
By preaching, teaching, counselling, casual exhortation at tea and meals, and by training in skills, we are providing a proper foundation at HOUSE OF LIFE that will enable a girls who has gone through the rehab center to build a proper life for all her future. When she leaves the house of life, she also can identify to herself where she is failing or succeeding and can go to the Word of God and to Jesus and receive Christ's righteousness and grow into maturity.
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