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South Africa Partners In Harvest (PIH), 4 Missionaries
White River Center: Near Nelspruit, the Mpumalanga (MQP) International Airport and World famous Kruger National Park. The White River Center is directed John and Dawn Redworth. It houses our South African Bible School. A children’s center is in the works. White River is also the home of our International Director of Pastors, Surprise Sithole. Surprise is also the Director of Africa Partners In Harvest (PIH).
Surprise Sithole 27-13-751-1448 Hm PO Box 4608, White River 1240, SA
27-72-203-5585 Cp, South Africa
258-82-381-616 Cp, Mozambique
Website: www.surprisesithole.com
PIH/Iris Africa, PO Box 20017, West Acres 1211, South Africa
Approximately 500 churches
John and Dawn Redworth with some pastors
in White River, South Africa
John Redworth PO Box 1174, White River, 1240, South Africa
Cellphone: 27-76-102-8058
Pictured above are Suprise Sithole, on the right, and Franzie, who was raised
from the dead after being beaten to death by a drunken mob.
Pictured above are several senior pastors at our Harvest Bible College in South
Africa. Dawn Redworth (upper left) is the wife of Director John Redworth. The
lady (bottom right) is our cook.
October 10, 2008, New Pictures of Harvest Bible College
Pastor Mabila, Director
Pastor Petrus Khoza, Vice-director
May 1, 2008
Dear Friends,
We are back in our Back Door, Gutchwa, home in South Africa and almost settled in again. As we get older, it takes us longer to adjust to the time difference after the two long flights to get here. But it is good to be here amongst our bible school pastors and leaders!
A few days after our arrival, we had a week with an ISOM ("International School of Ministry") run especially for our pastors by a couple from England who are the same age as ourselves. The ISOM is a condensed version of the month long Partners in Harvest course that began at Toronto Airport Christian Fellowship. It is centered on knowing and experiencing the Father heart of God. As many of our pastors either grew up without a father, or with a poor father image, it was really beneficial for them. For me, John, it was especially meaningful as the following Sunday was the 24th anniversary of my overwhelming life changing experience in a North Vancouver school hall as God the Father's love poured into my totally disillusioned ex-pastor/missionary heart! May our pastors and leaders continue to experience the fire of His love in increasing measure, and share that with their people!
On Monday,April 5, we begin bible school again with 20+ pastors, most coming for the second time. Please pray for them and our teachers, including John, who will be teaching on spiritual gifts. Other courses this session will be Relationship with God, Christian Family, and The Eternal Christ.
Our little converted garage classroom is now too small for all who wish to come, so we are purchasing the lot next door. There we need to build new classrooms and dormitories. We need to find someone with construction experience and a heart for God who can oversee the project. This is important since this is not John's gifting, and much of the local construction here requires frequent costly maintenance. Please join your prayers with ours concerning this. Pray also for the two single mothers who currently rent broken down rooms that will need to be demolished on that lot. One of our local leaders has offered for them to use a little house he owns for the balance of the year. May this be a good experience for them, not produce resentment in their hearts, but lead them to Jesus and a better future.
Another concern on our hearts is the need of orphans in the area of one of our senior leaders for whom an orphanage would not be the best solution. Our senior teacher and church planter has three such children living with them in addition to their own four. His wife could not leave then to be abused by their father when their relative died! There are also others in their semi-rural community in similar need. The Lord surely has a blessed future for them in His heart!
We were sorry and disappointed that we were not able to see many of you during a brief visit the Canada recently due primarily to John having a lot of work to do. We are booked to return for part of August and September and look forward to getting together with many of you at that time!
Dawn adds that "we are both keeping well, and the weather is getting colder up here on the hill, though we have had some nice sunny days"
In the love of Christ Jesus!
Dawn and John
February 22, 2008
Dear Praying Friends,
One week from today we will be motoring the 350km to Johannesburg to catch the night flight to Vancouver via London, a little over eleven months since we left. Many challenges have been overcome through the Lord being faithful and very gracious to us.
Yes, we are tired and look forward to some rest (although John does have work to do while at home).
Over the past eleven months there have been a number of significant milestones, of which two particularly stand out: firstly, the final graduation in October of five students who completed all 42 bible school courses, and secondly the planting in November of our first church in Swaziland. The school ended on a really blessed note in our living room as we as teachers prayed over each of February’s students. The Holy Spirit graced us by coming powerfully on each and every one. And then it was the turn of the students to pray for us teachers, including Dawn who takes good care of them while they are with us.
As I write all of our Commission members (Mabila, Shongwe, and Dube) are out visiting and encouraging churches in Swaziland, KwaZulu Natal, and Limpopo Province. Each of them has taken other leaders with them. This is a real answer to prayer. In addition, Surprise is ministering in Taiwan.
More and more new people are coming to the Bible College, and more wish to do so. With this, and the overcrowding of our classroom this year, I finally accepted the need to build two more classrooms on our return. It will probably need to wait for our return. After initiating enquiries through one of our leaders, I learned yesterday that the owner of the small rental lot next door to the bible school is willing to sell it.
As there isn’t an appropriate person to stay in our house while we are away, we will be just locking it up. All our immediate neighbours are friendly and have accepted our presence among them.
We are both grateful to all of you who pray for us. You are certainly sharing the burden of this work in South Africa, and you will also share the reward. So also share the joy of participating in what God is doing in this part of His world.
With our love in Christ Jesus,
John and Dawn
South Africa: Phone 011-27-76-102-8058 Mail PO Box 1174, White River 1240, South Africa
Canada: Phone 1-604-530-3614 Mail: 112, 21975-49th Ave, Langley, BC V3A 8J7
Canadian office: Iris Ministries Canada, 3092 Shannon Court, Oakville, ON L6L 6B4
December 12, 2007
In our last letter we requested prayer concerning the acquisition of land for a church in Swaziland. Praise God, both that land and the actual evangelistic church plant came to fruition in November! We thank those of you who joined us in interceding for this. But it was not without some drama.
After the elders twice postponed a meeting with us to finalize the land, they suddenly responded to another phone call with "we have been waiting for you to come!" Needless to say, after settling title to the land, the outreach team were quick to arrange to go to the village of Matata, near Big Bend, in the sugar belt of eastern Swaziland. They took a large tent and commenced two weeks of evangelistic evening meetings. The team made the most of sleeping on the concrete floor in the future pastor’s simple house. From the first night, people began to come to Jesus. The team had to keep borrowing additional chairs from the local school for the increasing numbers attending.
On the fourth day, Dawn and I traveled the 330 kilometers down there to visit. That evening, Sam, the sole missionary on the team, and Pastor Mabila, our bible school director, joined us in the motel for dinner. That evening there was an extremely heavy rain storm. While returning to the village, Sam’s pickup was swept off the bridge by a torrent of water. Both Mabila and Sam barely escaped with their lives as the pickup first began to float and then filled with water and overturned. Thankfully they were able to get out of the cab and swim to safety. They had to walk home in their bare feet over the sugar cane fields in the pitch dark. Next day, Sam hired a tractor to pull his pickup out of the river some 400 metres down stream. It was smashed and is a complete write off, but thankfully insured. We only learned of this situation the next morning, and were so thankful they were both safe and determined to continue with the outreach.
That afternoon several of us visited the homes in the village and spoke and prayed with all the adults and children. We saw some ancestor and demon worship stuff, but all except one man in a cult church, allowed us to lay hands on them and pray in the name of Jesus. It was a privilege and pleasure for me, John, to preach that evening even though the generator ran out of diesel and we were plunged into almost complete darkness just after I started. Amazingly, now without electricity and a loud speaker system, I had more voice than usual. More importantly another 30 or more people put their faith in Jesus that night! We were sorry to leave after three days, but the team pressed on, a new church has been born, and Jesus is being exalted in Matata. The Lord told John in prayer before their first official church Sunday meeting that the simple pole and corrugated iron worship shelter that our team built before they left will be known as the "House of Joy". May many in Matata be born again into God’s family and live their lives in the "joy of the Lord."
Please continue to pray for the Swazi people in their material poverty, and that they will be exceedingly rich in the things of God. Pray also for Clifford Cantriel, their new pastor, that he may have great wisdom and continual encouragement in the Lord.
Last Sunday, after having our local church people pray for the new church in Matata, John preached/taught on the Kingdom of God, especially the words of the Lord ’s Prayer: "May Your Kingdom come. May Your will be done on earth as it is in heaven." When he finished he had the whole congregation stand and pray those very words. After he invited the sick to come for prayer, an old man who had slipped into the back of the tent just as the message began, shuffled slowly to the front painfully bent over. As we prayed for him John saw the man had faith to be healed so John and one of the church leaders encouraged him to stand up. Then as John helped him walk around he was healed and gave praise to the Lord! He was amazed at his healing and so was the congregation. After walking out the tent he came back and thanked the Lord who had healed him. Later that day he was seen exercising by walking up and down the steep hill where he lives as a neighbor of the church’s pastor! Praise God with us that His grace, kindness, and power are manifesting on this hill!
In the love of Jesus,
John and Dawn Redworth
October 6, 2007
Last weekend, we celebrated our Annual Youth Conference with hundreds of youth, and some not so young, meeting for a weekend of worship and ministry. They came from as far as 900 kms, some in a bus-train, extra long double bus, that picked them up at various farm and village locations, and others in chartered mini-buses. For some, this was a first time experience since their churches have been planted during the last twelve months.
Our local Back Door church youth worked hard erecting three large tents etc. for the meetings, and of course, it rained on Sunday morning, with water carving little rivers in the sawdust covered sand floor. The conference speaker was a preacher from South Carolina, accompanied by an adult ministry team. Both our youth and adults love to celebrate the Lord with traditional dance, and by Sunday our speaker could no longer preach, due to the impact of the clouds of dust on his voice.
Traditionally loud group song and dance is a part of all local cultures here. So the Saturday afternoon youth choir competition was again a highlight of the conference as the youth from eleven churches each sang under the scrutiny of three local professional Christian artists acting as judges. It was encouraging to hear loud vocal encouragement given to each and every youth choir, including those from some newly planted churches.
The Sunday morning communion service was followed by our Bible college graduation. As mentioned in our last letter, five of our pastor/students were to be given their diplomas for successfully completing all forty courses over the last four years. Another four in our small senior class were to receive certificates for four more courses completed. As I, John, stood up to speak before giving out the diplomas etc., the presence of God descended so powerfully on that little brick platform that I had to grab and hold a convenient tent pole in order to keep from falling. I briefly traced the beginning of the school, and how from the very beginning four years ago it sovereignly became, not our school, but that of the Holy Spirit, and how we are privileged to be a part of it. I also mentioned a famous South African pastor of 100 years ago, Andrew Murray, said that when Jesus spoke in a loud voice the words recorded in John 7:37-39, He meant that He wants to fill us with the Holy Spirit beyond our capacity to receive Him, in order that others around us will be blessed by the overflow.
As each pastor was prayed for, the Holy Spirit awesomely "graduated" each one as they were literally over whelmed by His presence! He is so gracious, and passionate about the church, and the "bride" He is preparing!
As I am writing this letter, our bible school director, one of the five graduates mentioned above, is meeting with a senior chief in Big Bend, Swaziland. His purpose is to arrange dates for our next tent evangelistic church plant, which will hopefully take place later this month. It will be our first in that country, and will be led by a Swazi pastor who found his way into our bible college earlier this year. We covet your prayers for this outreach, that it will happen, and will prove to be a great blessing to this Swazi community, and bring much glory to Jesus.
We are still praying and believing for a good parcel of land in our own area on which to site a children’s centre. Currently the family of the deceased pastor who owned the land we want to purchase, have not yet met to confirm that they all want to sell, and to fix a price. A British pastor and his wife are to arrive later this month to oversee the children’s centre. Please pray with us for this land, as there has been a great deal of delay in obtaining suitable land near enough to the schools situated on our hill.
In the last few days the rainy season has suddenly descended on us, together with electrical outages, and muddy roads. We are glad that so far roof leaks are mainly over our little stoep, South African lingo for veranda, and that Dawn’s garden hasn’t washed away. The rain sure cools the temperature which was around 36 degrees, and ready to climb.
We are both well, for which we are very grateful, and we thank you all for your prayers. We really appreciate hearing your news.
In the love of Jesus,
Dawn and John Redworth
Phone: 011-27-76-102-8058 or 011-27-76-903-0718 (9 hours in advance of Vancouver time)
Mail: P.O. Box 1174, White River 1240, South Africa
Iris Ministries Canada, 3092, Shannon Crescent, Oakville, ON L6L 6B4, Canada
Email: jredworth@gmail.com
Web site: www.irismin.ca
Iris Ministries, USA, PO Box 493995, Redding, CA 96049-3995
Email: irisredding@earthlink.net
Websites: www.irismin.org & www.irismin.com
Iris South Africa is our international NGO established by Peter & Melodie Wheeler located in Pretoria, South Africa. Please click on South Africa Intl for more information.
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