Good Friday?

Many people wonder at the name Good Friday celebrated at Easter each year, check here for more info.

But I think this BC comic sums it up well:

May Easter be a reminder of the goodness of God shown to us on a cross 2000 years back...

What is the Care Team?

When I was tasked to head up the PVFC Care team  I was totally unprepared and did not consider it to be my particular gifting. However, after some serious prayer and trying to find reasons for not getting involved in such a difficult ministry, I understood that God was telling me to be obedient, and to trust him. This was almost a year ago and I must confess that although we have gone through some rough patches, it has been a very worthwhile experience and a wonderful blessing; more to us than the people being cared for.

My initial thoughts were that this ministry should belong to the whole church, as Jesus’ clear command was that we love one another (John 13:34-35; Matt 12:48-50) and that we care for our neighbours (Luke 10:25-37; Matt 25: 35-40) and now that the Vision is moving us towards Gospel centred Worship, Discipleship, Community and Mission I’m more convinced that it should be so. After all, we are part of God’s family here on earth and are meant to live in community with one another, caring for and looking out for each other.

One of the families who has been prayed, counselled and cared for wrote:

We want to thank the PVFC Care team for their ongoing love and care, for opening up their hearts to us as they have done in our time of desperate need. As we have been fed spiritually, the Care team has  also fed us physically by providing for our basic needs like food. May God bless this ministry as it goes from strength to strength, as you do the work of the Ministry of the Kingdom of God faithfully according to God’s call, by being His hand extended here on earth. We pray that God will use you more and more as you show yourself faithful to him and his calling as you work among those in need - spiritually, emotionally and physically. Most of all, thank you Father God, Lord Jesus Christ and and Holy Spirit for being faithful to your promises of never leaving us, nor forsaking us and for being with us always. May your name be Glorified! 

We as a family have experienced first hand , the love, caring and practical Christianity from the Care team at PVFC. After assessing our needs in relation to the challenging financial situation we as a family are presently in, the Care team stepped up and have helped us with groceries and other items. that in the true sense of the word have kept us alive, sane and helped us maintain our dignity. It is so overwhelming to experience such love and practical Christian faith in our lives at this time, we feel so blessed. Just saying thank you seems so inadequate. The Sunday notices read 'Care Ministry - call our help line and someone will come to your aid'. What a fantastic statement that we have experienced  first hand. Thank you Care Team.

We realised from the outset that, with limited knowledge and experience in counselling, it was going to be a low key affair and that it would consist mostly of being a good listener, holding someone’s hand through a difficult time, helping with practical needs, where needed, and generally just being available. As one member of our team notes:

Reflecting on my role in this team, I realized that I often wait for big tragedies to hit to be able to care. Pastoral care is however less about counselling and fixing the problems of the world, than it is about intentionally seeking out every possible opportunity to walk with someone along their path – whether that path is something as devastating as death, divorce, losing a house or something as ‘trivial’ as loneliness, feeling unworthy or hurting relationships. We all as God's ambassadors need to use every opportunity to genuinely bring Jesus love into each person’s life and guide them to a deeper relationship with Jesus. 


Maybe people in our community and congregation never ask for help, because maybe they also expect that their problems need to be catastrophic before they have the “vrymoedigheid” to approach us. But we should be serving in the simplest of ways – praying with someone through a tough decision, talking about fears and hurts and doubts, being a friend to the lonely.  Isaiah 61 sums up pastoral care well: “The Spirit of the Lord God is upon me, because the Lord has anointed me to bring good news to the poor; he has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives, and the opening of the prison to those who are bound; to proclaim the year of the Lord's favor, and the day of vengeance of our God; to comfort all who mourn; to grant to those who mourn in Zion—to give them a beautiful headdress instead of ashes, the oil of gladness instead of mourning, the garment of praise instead of a faint spirit; that they may be called oaks of righteousness, the planting of the Lord, that he may be glorified.

This about sums up what we have been doing this past year and although we are not qualified as psychologists, we have managed to cope with most things that have come our way. We have also managed to identify a number of suitable Christian professional people to back up the ministry in case of need. It is really a matter of serving Jesus by being available, using your common sense and doing a lot of praying, before engaging an issue. Caring is not confined to the poor community only, there are many wealthy people in our neighbourhood that are in dire straits, but for various reasons, prefer to carry their own burdens. How sad is this! It is the responsibility of every one of us to intentionally seek and save the lost.

The Care team is currently a small but dedicated team, but it is important to expand the Care ministry to the HomeGroups, because it is there where most of the caring should take place. To this end we have arranged an evening with Grant Hopkins, from Durbanville Methodist Church, to give us a coaching workshop and we are asking all HomeGroup leaders and everyone else that is interested to come and get equipped so that you too can be part of caring for the community that is PVFC. I am therefore making an earnest appeal to all of the Home Groups to seriously consider coming to this meeting on Monday, 16th April at 19h00, please contact Paula to RSVP for this training.

Grace and peace

Leon     

PVFC starts a third service

Protea Valley has started a third service on Sunday afternoons to meet the needs of the broader community that calls PVFC home. The elders see this as an opportunity to minister and serve others, discipling them up in the faith. It is difficult to listen to preaching in a second or third language and we see this service as an opportunity to make a difference. This idea was spawned by the elders and then independently a week laterby one of our HomeGroups who is thinking out of the box on how they can get on mission and serve...the Spirit leads and we are trying hard to keep following!

This kind of stuff is exciting to see! Please keep this new initiative in your prayers and ask that God would grow us in this area that we might present a unified witness in this predominant white neighbourhood.

5 Community Killers

In talking with some of the members of our congregation I was reminded of how easy it is to kill Christian community. We can easily create a shallow form of Christian fellowship, but genuine, gospel-centred community is something that can be fragile and needs to be worked at to be strong. Over the years that I have been part of God's family I have been part of groups that had very little community and then had the privilege of other groups that were very close. 


There are a number of things we can do that can easily kill community and the books of Proverbs and it's modern counterpart James (often called the proverbs of the New Testament) have some helpful reminders about dealing with the deep relationships of faith:


Loose lips - Whoever goes about slandering reveals secrets; therefore do not associate with a simple babbler. Prov 20:19
Christian community is often about dealing with the gritty mess of life: hurting marriages, tough to overcome sin and the results of past hurts. We need to create the environment where we know that whatever we say will go no further than the group. Confidentiality is a key characteristic of healthy community and it creates the environment where we can share our struggles and find comfort, prayer and hope through those that Jesus has put around us. Loose lips make people withdraw and it makes them internalise their pain rather than find restoration through the ministry of others. If there are those in your group who find it hard to keep confidence the leader needs to walk closely with them and disciple them, to ignore such issues will be to the detriment of the group. 

Stinginess - Whoever oppresses a poor man insults his Maker, but he who is generous to the needy honours him - Prov 14:31

Acts 2 reminds us that in the early church they gave to each other as there was need. And we too need to learn to imitate that behaviour. It is part of the work of the Spirit in our hearts that makes us hold loosely to our possessions, our time and our gifts that God has given us. We serve God by being generous to each other and genuine community is about opening up our homes and our hearts to those who follow Jesus with us. It is easy to talk the talk, but much harder to walk the walk and genuine community is prepared to walk the extra mile to make a difference.

Pride - One’s pride will bring him low, but he who is lowly in spirit will obtain honour - Prov 29:23
When we're proud and self righteous it makes us unapproachable and it makes it tough to live out faith together. We're reminded in James to "confess our sins to each other" and it takes genuine community to allow people to open up, and we need to put our pride aside and be vulnerable. This is important for leaders to be able to acknowledge our weakness and need of Jesus. It becomes a powerful reminder to others that they are in need of Jesus too. There is no place in the heart of a follower of Jesus for pride, and yet it is the one area where we all will struggle at some time or another. Pray that God would give you the humility we need to become the people he calls us to be.

No Accountability - Whoever conceals his transgressions will not prosper, but he who confesses and forsakes them will obtain mercy - Prov 28:13

We have to hold each other accountable before God. Cain asked the question 'Am I my brothers keeper' and the answer is that we are. We need to hold each other accountable for following Jesus and being obedient to all that he has commanded (Matt 28) Like any normal family we have a way of living together that can create life or destroy it. I recall a group where we had a guy who was immensely cynical and sarcastic. It was horrible to listen to and hurtful to us all in various ways. We tried to help him be accountable for his behaviour and he refused and eventually left. It was a great sadness but helpful for genuine community to be maintained. Unconfessed sin will quickly consume a community.

No Prayer - The Lord is far from the wicked, but he hears the prayer of the righteous. - Prov 15:29
Prayer is a necessity for genuine community. Praying together draws us into God's presence and it draws us into the unity of the Spirit, putting us onto God's agenda rather than our own. Praying for others in your group, especially those who are hard to work with or who annoy you is the surest way to allow God to soften your heart. God hears our prayer and we should take him seriously at his reminder. Someone in your group straying from Jesus? Pray. Someone struggling to understand biblical truth? Pray. Someone in need of healing? Pray. Prayer is a powerful tool in the hands of a community to keep us close to Jesus and close to each other.


Community is part of God's great witness to the world and we do it best when it is real, spirit-filled, gospel-centred community. It's worth getting this community thing right.  By this all people will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.” - John 13:35

Growing community is God's work, not ours

Our congregation has more than a dozen groups totalling around 150 people that meet midweek to encourage each other, to worship Jesus, to share life and to mobilise for mission. One of our group leaders writes about growing their community over the last season and some of her insights may encourage you.


Acts 2:47 ...and the Lord added to their number day by day those who were being saved.


When starting a home group last year our dream was to grow quickly, as I am sure it is with all home group leaders. We started with 6 people in our group and a long list of people attached to our group but not attending. We faithfully contacted them every quarter to try and motivate and persuade them to be in community. After numerous calls, texts and emails I got despondent and frustrated and couldn't understand why people didn’t want to join. It was then that the Lord reminded me of what is written in Acts 2:47 “...the Lord added to their number day by day....”. We realised that it was not up to us to persuade people to be in community but that the Lord will add people to our group. Our instruction from the Lord was to love them like Jesus loves them and to care for them and to keep reminding them that we are there for them. In addition to this our group prayed for them every week and we included them in our communication as if they were part of our group.


Almost a year later our group has doubled in numbers and we are a group of committed followers of Christ. People were added to our group by the Lord. Of the non-attending people we were able to assist some of them to slot in with other home groups and four of them are now regularly attending our home group.


We believe that this is because of faithfully praying for and loving and caring for non-attending members. It is our responsibility to love those outside back onto the flock so that they do not go missing. I now understand and truly believe that all home groups should have a non-attending list. It is the responsibility of the home group leader and the group to care for and love those non-attending members, but we should not forget to pray earnestly for them as it is the Spirit that gives life (John 6:63) and it is God who puts the desire in our hearts to worship Him (Jeremiah 33:40).


We must constantly remind ourselves to trust Jesus and not our abilities - it is after all His church!

Kony 2012

This video has been going viral over the last while. And rightfully so. Jesus cares about justice and this is a call for justice in Uganda and some of the surrounding areas. I love how the internet has opened up opportunities that we've never had before to crowd-source for good. Imagine if Jesus' church  started thinking this big!

If you've not yet seen the video click here or watch it below:

How to pray for unbelievers

We all know someone who does not believe in Jesus and as we think about being God's missionaries part of our role is to pray for them, but what do we pray? Most of us pray quite simply but there are a number of things that are important for a person so that they might understand the Gospel of Jesus. Here are a ten pointers that are worth praying for. Many of them are things you could pray for others in your groups or teams who are young in their faith and need to grow. Prayer is one of the most powerful and yet underutilised weapons we have at our disposal and this list is helpful in equipping us to pray effectively.

1. Pray that God draws them to himself (John 6:44). 
2. Pray that they seek to know God (Acts 17:27, Deuteronomy 4:29).
3. Pray that they believe the Scriptures (1 Thessalonians 2:13,Romans 10:17). 
4. Pray that Satan would be kept from blinding them to the truth (Matthew 13:19, 2 Corinthians 4:4). 
5. Pray that the Holy Spirit works in them (John 16:8-13). 
6. Pray that God would send them someone to lead them to Christ (Matthew 9:37-38). 
7. Pray that they would believe in Christ as Savior (John 1:12, 5:24) and confess him as Lord (Romans 10:9-10). 
8. Pray that they would turn from sin (Acts 3:19, 17:30-31). 
9. Pray that they would yield all to follow Christ (2 Corinthians 5:15,Philippians 3:7-8). 
10. Pray that they would take root and grow in Christ (Colossians 2:6-7).