Listening

Listening

Dear Friends,

I pray this finds you all well. I am very confident that God continues to give you the energy, zeal and passion to do the work you do. Team Nhaka is inspired by the feedback you send us through emails about our work, blogs and the goings on of the organization and how we are working to fulfil our mandate. On a cold, bleak morning, when all the chips are down and I am wondering what really is going on, the thought of that little child walking 3 kilometres to school or the child who doesn’t know what they are going to eat at home and the expectations laid on each of us to support the less privileged in our midst among other things spurs up renewed hope and confidence in me.

I realise that what I do ceased to be a job a long time ago. It is a passion, driven by the desire to ensure that every child lives a life full of possibilities and opportunities that they can take up to enhance their lives. It makes me realise that by the small difference made by an exchange student coming from abroad for a season, the $1 a day paid towards school fees for one child, the feeding program ensuring that a child has a guaranteed meal each school day and the love exuded by all the people involved in these efforts, changes the lives of thousands of children daily. What future do we want for these children? One with love towards one another? Tolerance? Respect? Recognition? Peace? If this is all in the affirmative what are we doing on a daily basis to ensure that these objectives are met? Are we praying and asking God for wisdom to deal with difficult situations? Are we spending time supporting others? Is our development more important than that of others or at their expense? Friends I feel we need to always look at these aspects and reflect a little bit more and let God speak to us and help us.

A few days ago during morning devotionals with two young men I am mentoring, we were discussing on how we hear God speaking to us… This subject brought a lot of intriguing responses but the bottom line was are we listening when God speaks to us or we are just too busy playing the pipe that we are not bothered at all.

I know for sure for our friends in Zimbabwe and true for other parts of the world, one wakes up and is on the go. The only time they settle down is when they sit to have their dinner and probably halfway through it sleep creeps in and before long it is morning again and the cycle begins. I encourage us all to take time out to meditate on the word of God, just have some quiet time reflecting, taking a long walk or finding something that brings a sense of peace and through all this be able to listen to the still small voice.

I am also on a journey. It took a severe headache and fever to put me in bed at 4pm on Monday 22 April. As I lay there shivering and trying to figure this fever out…the still small voice said listen……listening I am!


Blessings,

Patrick