Merry Christmas from the Hawkins

 

December Hawkins' Headlines

 

Merry Christmas & Happy New Year! 2023 has been a whirlwind of a year from South Africa to the US and back - a year full of blessings from God! In October we returned to South Africa after a 3-month home assignment in the United States. We drove over 7,000 miles (11,000 km) and visited many friends and family. We also had the opportunity to have all our children under one roof for a week! Our time in the US was a blessing. Brandon & Brianna continue to serve with Word of Life in Taiwan, and they are expecting a baby in June. Please pray for them as Brianna has been experiencing morning sickness and fatigue, and navigating the maternity system in another culture can be a challenge. We are thrilled to be Grammy and Pappy soon - another blessing! Marissa came back to South Africa with us, and she is planning to continue her studies remotely. Please pray for wisdom as she makes decisions in this regard. Mya is continuing homeschool and will be starting Grade 11 in the new year. We are blessed to have time with them as we know it won’t last forever. We have two young men living and working with us currently, Joshua Mashele and Ngcebo Buthelezi. They are continuing in their studies of the Word of God, alongside with working on support raising so they can continue in the ministry. They are a blessing to Mary and I as both ministry and property maintenance would be too much for us to handle on our own. It was spectacular planning the 2024 ministry calendar together. It is a blessing to be able to pour into them and to work side by side! Joshua Ngcebo The end of the calendar year in South Africa means the end of the school year as well, as schools run from January-December. This means, amongst other things, planning and executing year-end functions and Christmas parties for children’s ministry and teen ministry, as well as our Christmas Carol service at church, and the gospel message was clearly presented at each one! It has kept us on our toes and is just now beginning to wind down. We are looking forward to celebrating the birth of Christ and taking some time to remember that this blessing is the foundation of our lives and ministry. Please pray with us as we look at the year ahead and strive toward every student everywhere hearing the gospel from a friend.

Global Evangelism Day!

On 11 November, we hosted a Global Evangelism event with Dare2Share ministries at Grace Baptist Queensburgh! This involved evangelism training and an outreach into the community. Our team had 22 in-person gospel conversations, and 1 decision for Christ. 7 of the youth in our team made dedications to be more intentional about sharing the gospel in their daily lives!

May Hawkins' Headlines

Sanibonani from Afrika!

In April, we took a SMASH team (Students Ministering And Serving Him) to Johannesburg for a week! It was a privilege to serve in various ministries together, including evangelism, Kids’ Fun Day, high school youth meetings, children’s ministries, and some work projects on the Word of Life property. We had 267 gospel conversations, and 102 people came to know Christ as Savior. We are excited to be able to plug those new believers into local church ministries right in their neighborhoods! (See more photos here: https://www.facebook.com/groups/995727587177235.)

On May 6, Mary graduated from Calvary University with a double major, earning her bachelor’s degree in both Bible and Biblical Counseling. We are grateful to God for providing this opportunity, and for more tools to be able to better serve others.

We have quite a few events coming up in quick succession that you can be praying for. Coming up first is Kids’ Fun Day May 20. This is an evangelistic event that provides the opportunity for local churches to reach out and invite other children to come together for a day of fun games and food as an avenue to share the gospel. This event requires over 20 teen and adult volunteers to help the day run smoothly. Please pray that everything falls into place and the weather cooperates for this outside event.

The next event on our calendar on June 3 is the Mid-Year Leadership Conference for youth leaders and pastors. This will take place at the Word of Life Durban Property, and we have invited Pastor Kelly Smith from The Fellowship Baptist Church in Umhlanga to be our keynote speaker, with a focus on Holding the Line: Encouraging the Youth to Hold onto Their Faith.

June 8-12, Brad has the opportunity to fly to Cape Town and serve alongside teammate Thato Sathige, ministering to local churches and training up pastors and youth leaders, equipping them to better serve their children and youth. 

Later, from June 15-17, we will hold our annual BattleZone Camp in Durban for high school students. This camp is designed to help equip the youth to take up their crosses daily and follow Christ. Our theme this year is Lords and Ladies - teaching what God’s Word has to say about being a man or woman of God. 

Then from 26 June - 1 July, we will be running Holiday Bible Club (VBS) Keepers of the Kingdom, teaching the children in our local church and community to stand strong using the armor of God in the battle for truth. 

Next, we head to Johannesburg to join a Word of Life Student Fusion high school missions team from the US on July 5 for 10 days, after which we will fly to the US for a few months of home assignment. We would love to see you and update you in person on what God is doing through Word of Life South Africa while we are in the US! We will be traveling from a home base in Pennsylvania to Florida, New York, Maine, and Michigan. If you are en route to any of those locations, let us know so we can meet for coffee and catch up!

January Hawkins' Headlines

 

2022 flew by and we look back on the whirlwind of life and ministry, and we can truly say that God is faithful. There was much change in both our family life and ministry. In August, Marissa transferred to the New York campus of the Word of Life Bible Institute to continue her studies. We were so excited to have her home for three weeks over Christmas, though it did not seem long enough.

In October, Brandon and Brianna returned to their ministry with Word of Life in Taiwan! Once the country opened it’s doors to new visa applications, everything fell into place pretty quickly. We are so excited to see how God is using them to minister to the SYME students there, the staff, and also in their local church. 

Mya is continuing homeschool and started Grade 10 in January. Within the last year she has taken up tennis and violin, and was able to assist backstage at a local school theatre production. 

Also living in the Hawkins household is a young man named Lihle Sogoni. He was a youth at our church, and just gradually became a part of the family. When he needed a place to stay so that he could study at a local university, we were happy to open up our home to him, and he has been living with us for the last few years. He is a help and a blessing, both in the ministry and in our home.

Bowling on Brad's 50th Birthday (from left to right)
Lihle Brad, Ngcebo, Lamoudie, Mya, Johrin

2023 brings with it some new adventures! Some of you know that Johrin January was an intern with us in Durban for the last part of 2022. Not only did she return to intern for 2023, but we also welcomed two new interns. The first is Lamoudie Nawezi. You may recognize her name from a previous prayer letter. She started as a student at our other campus, and when she finished her studies, she committed to intern with us for at least the next 6 months. The third intern, Ngcebo Buthelezi, just matriculated (graduated) from high school in December, and he is planning to be with us for the year. Each of the interns will be studying and working with Word of Life. They live with us on the Word of Life property during the week and go home on the weekend to minsister in their local churches, with the exception of Johrin, who lives too far away to travel weekly.

NextGen Class

Among our new and exciting news here at Word of Life Durban is that we are working with our local church, Grace Baptist Church Queensburgh, to teach NextGen Bible Institute classes in coordination with the South African Theological Seminary right here in our classroom. These classes will be attended by the three interns, but also a couple of local pastors that are working toward their degrees. The first course is Biblical Worldview taught by Pastor Louis Fourie and it started tonight!

Raising the Bar Leadership Conference

The 2023 theme in both ministry and in our personal lives is “Raising the Bar.” We do not want to settle for mediocrity. Just last Saturday we had our Leader’s Kick Off conference for the local youth ministry leaders, and we were excited to have around 30 in attendance. We were challenged by Ed Ransami and S’bu Nyawo to raise the bar in the areas of evangelism, discipleship, and leadership. We are looking forward to an exciting year ahead serving God together.