A Future Not Our Own

New bank notes have entered the money supply this week - with Nelson Mandela's face on all denominations.  I have said to several people that I can remember a time when it was illegal to even photograph him - so all we had to go by were those black and white photos from the Treason Trials in the 1960s.  Times change!



I can remember when the prevailing view was that majority rule would never happen in South Africa because the Boers were just too strong and stubborn to permit it.



Once in 1988 when I was visiting Canada I was invited to speak at Hillside Baptist Church.  I was working in Mozambique at the time and I lived in Zimbabwe.  So I was pretty outspoken against the racist republic's policy of Destabilization, which was wreaking havoc in the "front line states".  I can remember a South African member of the church getting up and walking out of the sanctuary during my sermon.  Then how the pastor - who was also sitting in a pew - put his forehead into his hands in prayer.  He knew us both.  Looking back, I would say that we were both right.  Canada's prime minister at that time was Brian Mulrooney and he led the Commonwealth drive to pressure SA with sanctions.  But there were (it turns out) forces for change at work inside of South Africa, too.  Including among the Afrikaners.



If you haven't seen the movie END GAME, it is worth seeing.  It was made by the BBC and tracks the top secret negotiations that started around then between "liberal" Afrikaners and the ANC.  These happened in the UK, sponsored by LonRho's Tiny Roland.  The ANC's negotiator was a bright young man named Thabo Mbeki.  But I digress...



What occured to me is that South Africa does have a way of re-inventing itself.  This gives me some hope when I look at the news.  For example, this week the Opposition parties have tried (for the first time ever) to introduce a motion in Parliament of non-confidence in the statepresident.  This would never pass, but it would allow the question of President Zuma's record to be openly debated.  (Not just behind closed doors in the NEC of the ANC, but by all parties - publicly.)  Of course this is anathema to the group that I call "the Triumphalists".  Some of them are even saying now that a law should be passed to prevent people speaking badly of the President!



My thoughts answer this sentiment with a recollection of Nelson Mandela saying that he devoted his life to fighting white supremacy, but that he is equally opposed to black supremacy, and will fight that too if it ever emerges.  That is pretty much where South Africa is getting to, as I see it.  Black leaders "get away with murder".  Quite literally here in Mpumalanga, when you consider the "January murders" between 1998 and 2011.  Fortunately, this culture of death squads seems to have passed but now there is so much Triumphalism that government is finding it hard to contain it in its diverse manifestations.



This is reflected in the exchange rate which sank to 8.94 this week.  Foreign investors are worried.



It is in this light that I reflected this week on a favorite meditation written by Oscar Romero :

It helps, now and then, to step back

and take the long view.

The kingdom is not only beyond our efforts,

it is beyond our vision.



We accomplish in our lifetime only a tiny fraction of the magnificent enterprise that is God's work.

Nothing we do is complete,

which is another way of saying

that the kingdom always lies beyond us.



No statement says all that could be said.

No prayer fully expresses our faith.

No confession brings perfection.

No pastoral visit brings wholeness.

No program accomplishes the church's mission.

No set of goals and objectives includes everything.



This is what we are about:

We plant seeds that one day will grow.

We water seeds already planted, knowing that they hold future promise.

We lay foundations that will need further development.

We provide yeast that produces effects beyond our capabilities.



We cannot do everything

and there is a sense of liberation in realizing that.

This enables us to do something,

and to do it very well.

It may be incomplete, but it is a beginning, a step along the way,

an opportunity for God's grace to enter and do the rest.



We may never see the end results,

but that is the difference between the master builder and the worker.

We are workers, not master builders,

ministers, not messiahs,

We are prophets of a future not our own.  Amen.

I am processing this meditation in the light of what C4L has been going through in 2012.  It has certainly been a year of transition, but not to the future that we expected.  We cannot do everything - even everything that we wanted to.  Resources have thinned out and clashes of core convictions and values have put us into open conflict with a partner NGO.  We are just not both traveling to the same destination!


But C4L can do something - we can be prophets of a future not our own.


It is becoming evident that in the next two years we have to think of the next generation, not just of the next election.  There is an Advocacy role in this for C4L.  There is an awareness raising role in it for me.  There is a need for voter education - especially among youth... and above all, those who will be voting for the first time.  The population of Mpumalanga is so young the this target group can be considered a "swing vote".  And I do not mean from one party to another.  I just mean from Triumphalist to Constitutionalist.


Please pray for guidance, just how to approach this opportunity - for C4L and for me.


This is not the kind of ministry that donors - especially government - are likely to finance!  Are you willing to keep walking with me down this road, in prayer and ministry support?