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So much has happened today!

We spent some time in Cape Town lately. There’s not too much to talk about. We drove in on Wednesday, hung out all evening, and stayed in a hotel. The next day we went on a walking tour (think scavenger hunt) in 5 groups and enjoyed a wonderful lunch on the waterfront. After that we hung out in the hotel for the evening and spent time together. This morning we woke up and drove out to the Bible Institute. It’s beautiful! The campus isn’t incredible, but the location is so great. The beach is right down the hill, and walking down a road goes to downtown Fish Hoek. The beach is wonderful, and there’s a tide pool area; there’s a pool filled with sea water, where the waves regularly fill up and roll up to. Pictures soon, don’t worry. After we arrived we walked around for 5 hours, and headed off to dinner. At dinner, Matt and I met our homestay family. Their names are Thelma and Le-something, and they are hilarious. The first Afrikaans term I learned tonight was a term for a gay, and then I learned the Afrikaan words for penis, vagina, and motherfucker. And while I’m having difficulty remembering “good day,” I’m having no trouble at all remembering the others.

My family is hilarious and fun to hang out with. Matt and I talked to them for 4 hours after dinner, just sitting and talking with the TV on. Logan and Derek’s homestay family came over as well, and their names are Blair and Brian (or something close. I’m so bad with names!). We sat around and talked about nothing. I learned that Thelma doesn’t think as highly of Mandela as everyone else here does, and she appreciates F.W. De Clerk for what he did even more. (He’s the one who released Mandela from prison, and began to allow Apartheid to crumble). When they found out I was a youth ministry major, they started calling me pastor, and when they found out I’m a Biblical Studies major, they began to ask me questions about that stuff. One of the subjects they started asking about was tithing and firstfruits. I told them that I think the important part about tithing is the principle, and the idea of giving everything to God. Apparently, the church that they go to here has all the money from offering go directly to the pastor. That’s frustrating to me, because the church is supposed to be doing God’s work and they aren’t because they’re using all the money on themselves. So that’s where I started to get frustrated. Then they told me about how they used to try to get creative with their 10% tithe, but the church told them they couldn’t feed the people who need food; apparently only the church can do that. But the church isn’t doing that, and some people are going hungry out there. The church has no monopoly on giving; the church doesn’t even have a hand in giving. They don’t have a monopoly on giving, but they try to dictate who can and can’t give directly to the poor.

It’s frustrating to me because they want to take what their pastor says as law. They think that it’s going against God to go against their pastor. It may be my cultural background, or the protestant churches, but I think that the pastor needs to be doing his job or the church won’t be effective. They didn’t seem to agree with me, but it’s so hard to see how much influence this man has on these people’s lives. I’m going to be a youth pastor soon. I study the Bible. They allow me much more influence than I deserve up to this point. I’m scared that they’re putting more emphasis on what a man says rather than what the Bible says, but I don’t know them or the culture well enough to do something about it. And I don’t know if I’ll be in a place in a week where I can tell them how I feel.

Homestays are great. It really does feel like I’m in a place I can consider home. I’m upstairs after spending an evening talking to my family with the tv on. We had the door open but the screen door closed, to keep out the unwanted. I brushed my teeth and got ready for bed, and now am sitting on my lower bunk with my little brother right above me, already sound asleep.

And as much as it feels like home, it’s not something I’m used to. I’m upstairs after spending an evening with a colored family and black family teaching me swear words in a different language, watching rugby highlights. The door was open to let in the breeze, but the screen door that was closed was actually just bars over the door, to keep out unwanted intruders rather than bugs. I brushed my teeth in the bathroom that’s the farthest possible room in the flat from my room. I’m sitting in my bed, unable to sit up because the bed is too small, with my feet hanging over the edge, and my little brother snoring at an incredible volume above me. While this could be home, it still feels foreign to me. Someday, it may feel normal.

I think this homestay family would be willing to have me come back. That’s an awesome feeling. It’s interesting to be living in a township now. This is the type of place that I’ve been helping lately; it’s the area that needs my help because of their finances, and I can ride in on my white steed to save the day before I retreat back to AE. And now, I come to live here for a week with a family. I’m not the savior anymore, and I don’t know how I’ll respond. These people are going to give me a taste of the lifestyle of the people I just helped. And I don’t know what to expect.