Pick and Pray

Hello From The Hornes

June 30, 2004

OUT OF AFRICA: "What is so rare as a day in June? Then, if ever, come perfect days". When James Russell Lowell penned those words, he must have had the beautiful hill country here in Kerrville, Texas, in mind. Not that Al, unlike Donna, spent all his time this month in Kerrville. The first week he was in Houston three days for a thorough medical check-up. His internist had recommended it since Al had that hemorrhaging stomach in January, you remember, which hospitalized him at the time. Another out-of-town trip took him all the way up into Oklahoma where he reported on the Bible College to congregations in Hennessey and Shawnee. On the way back, he collected and loaded 40 boxes of religious library books and teaching materials donated by the Richland Hills congregation in Fort Worth. Al also preached one Sunday (two services) here in Kerrville, as well as (both services another Sunday) at a newly-established congregation in Ingram, Texas. In addition, two of the major theme speakers (Harold Taylor of Lewisville, Texas, and Freddie Anderson from Huntsville, Texas) scheduled for our annual SABC Lectureship in September had to withdraw because they faced some insurmountable obstacles. They hope to be with us next year. These circumstances plunged Al into a huge project of trying to find other suitable speakers at short notice. He eventually persuaded two first-rate speakers (Milton Wilson of Sugarland and Henry Stevenson of Hankamer) to participate in the this year's SABC Lectureship. The Lectureship remains the high point of the year's activities at the Bible College because it is so inspirational to people who attend both from all over South Africa and also from other countries. Just ask them! Better still, plan to attend this year. The dates are September 26-30th.

MEANWHILE BACK IN THE JUNGLE: We have been in almost daily contact with our co-workers at the Bible College in Benoni. True to life, we get both sad news and glad news. Among the saddest was the news that we had another two funerals at Benoni church this month. One of our long-time members, Elizabeth Lilford, passed away after a lengthy illness as well as Grace O'Callaghan, the mother of one of our church families and a frequent visitor to the services for many years. Perhaps the biggest event of the month was a seminar for African church leaders held at the college campus. There was, as usual, a good attendance and it afforded an excellent opportunity to supply each one there with a copy of the Christian Advocate, a publication.printed at SABC and distributed throughout the country. The 12 baptisms we've had so far this year at the Benoni congregation is the cherry on top of the pudding! And...we are expecting more!

CRIME - USA: We are amazed! We used to think of this town where we headquarter whenever we are Stateside, as "little 'ole safe Kerrville". But all of a sudden, even though the population is only 20,000, there have been several incidents of crime this month. First, a 79-year-old member of our Ladies' Bible Class was knocked down and mugged in the parking lot of a supermarket in town. It happened around noon and the result was one stolen handbag, and even worse for Gertrude, a broken hip and a dislocated shoulder. Then Al walked by a store a mile from our house and discovered a shoot-out had just taken place between a senile pensioner and the cops, represented by five patrol cars and several EMS vehicles on the scene. The pensioner lay dead in his car. The following morning, it made the headlines of the local newspaper. Finally, the mall where Donna walks two miles every morning, had a break-in last Monday night. Two shops were burglarized and robbed -- the cell phone store and a hair-dressing salon. Al laughed and said for the crime to be this high all of a sudden, there must have been a lot of South African immigrants move in! Reminds us what they say about New Yorkers. That they can't get along but it's not true. The other day, two New Yorkers, complete strangers, were sharing a cab. One guy took the tires and the radio, the other guy took the engine.

THEY'VE GOT TO BE KIDDING: Here are some rules now for the Johannesburg area as published by the Sunday Times Newspaper.

1. No person may trade close to a church or a public monument, an ATM machine or a government building.
2. Traders may not litter (Yeah, right!)
3. They must make sure no smoke, odors or pollution are caused by their business.
4. They can't sing profane songs or shout insults in public.
5. Road rage is forbidden.
6. Dogs are free to enter Joburg's parks with their owner who must clean up after them.
7. You can't repair or wash a car on a public road. (So just leave it there, we thought, and then they won't have to come back for it. Some kind person will remove it or most of it for them!!)
8. No taxi passenger may refuse to pay a fare.
9. A taxi driver may refuse to carry a "filthy" person or one who has a contagious disease (although how they would know the latter in every case is a mystery to us!).
10. No littering on public roads (Is this Africa we're talking about??)

--Now our question is, "Do they intend for us to take this LITTER-ally?"

"PICK AND PRAY" IS MORE LIKE IT! Pick and Pay Grocery Store, the largest of its kind in South Africa, is recalling three products in cans they've sold. The reason? They discovered a container with three cans in it -- one is Pilchards (eaten extensively by Africans) and a note, saying that if they did not pay the demanded price, cans containing various foods would be poisoned. From the news report it appears that those cans were already poisoned. So they made an announcement from the CEO of Pick and Pay to return any of those products for a full refund. Shades of Tylenol!! Does that sound like "Anything you can do, we can do better?" Horrors! Whatever will they think of next? Of course, we have all kinds of instances in South Africa where the pure gospel of Jesus Christ has been polluted and distributed to the masses, but not too many get excited about that. How sad.

IN CLOSING: Thanks again for holding up our hands in the work of taking Christ to the unsaved of Africa. We were reading the latest Christian Chronicle this morning and were amazed at how far afield the work of the Lord has taken some of our SABC graduates. Louie Gerber of Benoni was quoted regarding the national Prison Ministry in South Africa and Manuel de Oliveira, it was reported, has just moved from Mozambique to Cape Town to publish religious literature in Portuguese. Apparently South Africans certainly make an impact where they immigrate. In watching the sunset interment ceremony of the late President Reagan in California, you might have noticed that their Presbyterian minister had an unmistakable South African accent. (We had to smile when we heard it related that President Reagan once had a meeting with Desmond Tutu, a well-known Anglican archbishop. When he was asked afterwards "how the meeting with Tutu went", the President answered, "So So.". And now bye-bye!

SIGNING OFF with our love,

From Al and Donna Horne,
Your Missionaries to South Africa.

P.S. I'm finding out it's really tough raising funds in the summertime because it's tough to "raise people"! A lot of people seem to be out of pocket, perhaps on holiday. Another thing I've found out is that answering machines in this country don't always tell the truth! They always say, "Your call is important to me so leave your name and number and I'll call you right back". So we do...and they don't! [Bottom line -- if you want to save wear and tear on this ageing missionary from the Dark Continent and you have funds to spare, why not send a check today to our "SABC Library Building Fund", in care of Memorial Church of Christ, 900 Echo Lane, Houston, Texas, 77024, who will acknowledge it. It will be m-o-s-t appreciated and you will be blessed for it.].
 

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