We are back in Africa!

We are certainly back in Africa and internet availability is seldom possible for us. Here in the farm areas even the land lines can be a headache because the lines are made of copper and thieves often steal miles of it at a time at night. Then you may not have phone for weeks. Another glorious motivation never to make this world our home. We should keep our hearts and eyes only on eternity and not gather money to make this world comfortable because it’s going to burn up and all its citizens with it. But the Lord’s Pilgrims will go on to be with the Lord because they’re aim and vision was on eternal things and they view their life on earth as nothing but a pilgrimage and living in a tent. It is so easy to start gathering and living as if this is our home, is it not? We were freshly reminded of this as we were packing to leave for Africa. Our Lord definitely stepped a little bit on our toes as we prepared to leave for Africa. Oh, that the Lord will keep us, in all areas of our lives, for we certainly are not capable of this apart from His leading grace while we respond carefully as He leads.


Our trip to the airport was made a blessing by two wonderful brothers Elmer Peachey and Nelson Gingerich (who also made his van available for us). We would’ve never survived at the airport without their help - not with 17 suitcases and 12 carry-ons, little boys and girls that need the potty, and enough eyes to watch for thieves. Thank you so much you wonderful brothers! Then there was a hidden blessing coming from the supervisor of the airlines luggage department. Our carry-ons were the right weight but not the right size so the lady had us check it in as luggage without charging us for it. This was a blessing not to pay for it but our problem was that we needed the carry-ons for medicine for the children who were sick and they were not packed to be thrown around under the plane and handled rough as luggage usually is. So we prayed there on the floor that nothing will be lost and praise the Lord we got to South Africa without a single thing lost or any luggage ripped. Then the supervisor had us check more of our hand baggage in because she thought it looked like too much to handle with so many children. This was really a big blessing because we don’t know how we would’ve handled so many carry-ons. The few we kept was hard enough to handle so we praise the Lord for that lady that helped us out so much. The Lord really put her in place to help us on the trip.
On the way to the airport Stephanus(Fanie) started to feel sick with a fever so him not having to carry so many things was a big blessing.


At Frankfurt, Germany, we had a layover of 10 hours. And the Lord had nice benches organized for us. Stephanus and the children slept for eight hours straight with only some little ones needing to potty. Rose was standing guard to watch over the sleeping children and the luggage. We were in a zoo. So many people stopped to take video and photos of seven sleeping children in a row. People’s expressions were really funny but mostly still respectful.

The airplane staff was extremely helpful and intrigued with this rare sight. On both flights the children slept most of the time and only woke up to enjoy the meal. Landing in South Africa, we walked forever to get to customs and to pick up our luggage. We were thankful that there was no searching of our luggage and here another great miracle for us happened. A wonderful caring black lady approached us and asked if we needed help with our luggage and the children. Then she saw how much luggage we had and she quickly organized five other ladies with luggage carts to help us take it right to the vehicle. We did not have to carry those suitcases at all. And they refused the tip of about three hundred Rand saying that they just wanted to help. All of this was really amazing and showed us the Lord’s caring hand. And we were very aware of friends praying.
To God be the glory for this trip! It may not mean a lot to others but it was such an encouragement to us. To see the Lord work everything out in detail that could’ve been extremely exhausting. Before we left for the trip it looked like a big burden, but it was not a burden at all because of the Lord’s Hand that made the way straight before us and made the mountains into plains.

Stephanus’ younger brother Roelf came to get us at the airport with his crew cab Isuzu pickup with a cap on the back and a trailer. We put all the luggage in and on top of the trailer, the children in the back of the pickup on a mattress so they could sleep or play on the four hour trip home. On the way we stopped to see Fanie’s Grandfather who is 96 years old. His wife died recently and they don’t expect him to live much longer. He stared at our family photo for half an hour or more and kept saying how glad he was to see us and that he had thought he would never see us again. He was a glad grandfather and we were happy we had stopped to see him.


We arrived back in Africa in the first week of April and thought we would be ready to move north in May but we didn’t realize how many holidays there were in the month of April. It was bad timing for work because there were more holidays than work days. But it was good to visit family and friends and to catch up on four and half years of absence.


So April did not see much work but we are already almost finished now towards the end of May. The Land Cruiser was in worse shape than what we anticipated. Especially mechanically and is still not the most reliable vehicle. Our thought was that we would have to keep it as a second vehicle for a backup bush vehicle. So we have spent the month of May working on it to get it in a fair condition again.

We are looking for another good 4x4 but they are expensive. A second hand Land Cruiser in good condition is in the region of 100,000 Rand. This is approximately 12,500 U.S. dollars. Vehicles are quite a bit more expensive here in South Africa. This we will have to trust the Lord for.

On June 7th Stephanus is invited to preach in a nearby town, Clocolan, and Lord willing we’ll be traveling the next day, Monday, June 8th, north to Pomfret, in the Northern Cape Province. We will have to stay in South Africa for at least two months till we get South African paperwork done only then can we apply for South African passports. But thankfully we can travel till November on their U.S. passports because then some of the US passports expire.


Please do pray for us for rounding up the fixing of the Land Cruiser, and our paperwork for the children and Rose’s citizenship here in South Africa, but especially for the time of ministry in the Northern Cape in Pomfret. We will give more information about this special place at a later time. For now we just wanted to brief everybody on what happened in our lives and what we are doing.

We hoped to write sooner but it was just difficult to do because of internet accessibility where we are.

A word of encouragement - that the Lord will bless us with His presence in every situation and circumstance no matter what it is and that we may know it. For even what we experience as bad is for our good because He does nothing without meaning love. Even in discipline, He still has our eternal good in mind and even His hardest discipline should be enough reason to rejoice in the sight of our eternal good and His glory. Let us not forget that all is for His glory and that alone and that He is worthy of our obedience.

Love to all our brothers and sisters in Christ,

Stephanus and Rose Blignaut and children