MARCH LETTER    see also MARCH PHOTOS
Dear friends and family,

Greetings to all of you in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ. We apologize that this newsletter is arriving so late this month. Since our last newsletter both Elizabeth and I have been riddled with illness. Every week it seemed we would come down with something new that neither of us were accustomed to. We have been told that it is a common phenomenon for new teachers while adjusting to foreign viruses. We are praising God that we are through this month, and on to what we hope will be an illness free year. Please pray that God will sustain our health for the remainder of this year.

This month has also seen the answer to a lot of prayers. Within my Grade five class there is a group of girls, who have earned the reputation of being the bad girls. They were led by a girl in my class named Zimasa. She had decided this year that she wanted nothing to do with God. She was disruptive and rebellious in the classroom, and outside of the classroom she was trying to lead as many girls away from God as she could. When we would begin to pray or talk about God she'd fall asleep, or get angry. This went on and was a huge strain on me both emotionally and spiritually. We prayed constantly for her, then last weekend after prayer and fasting she woke up on Saturday morning with a glow in her face. She has turned around 180 degrees. She's pleasant, friendly, helpful and she participates in worship. She even stays after class to help clean the classroom and whatever else she can help me with. This last week she's been going through the girls dorm and making sure everyone's on time for Bible study. It's a total and radical change. It blesses me and grips my heart to see this change. The attitude in my class has improved so drastically. The Lord gave me this verse as a confirmation of what we are doing here. In Psalm 126:5,6 it says: "Those who sow in tears will reap with songs of joy. He who goes out weeping, carrying seed to sow, will return with songs of joy, carrying sheaves with him." The labour we do is hard, and not without its share of tears. I have wept many times for my class, thinking all I've tried to pour into Zimasa and the other students was in vain. Yet our work comes with a promise, the work is hard it's painful at times, but the reward, the harvest brings such joy. I have experienced a taste of that joy with this reformation in the heart of Zimasa.

As for Elizabeth, she has been doing so well, she loves teaching, especially the music classes. She gets to spend time with some of the most adorable little children you'd ever meet. Elizabeth and I have contemplated adopting some of them and bringing them home with us…the problem is that they already have loving parents!

We have only three more weeks in this semester then we take a break for the Easter Conference. Which, of course, is not a break for us teachers. It will be 18 hour days working, preparing food for the hundreds of people who will be gathering from all corners of the Eastern Cape to come to our school for three days of seminars and worship. I'm not sure what my role will be in the conference, but I know Elizabeth is dreading the long hours in the kitchen slaving away. This all transpires in the beginning of April, so your prayers would be most appreciated. We will write our next newsletter following the Easter Conference in the middle of April. Until, may God richly bless you and keep you.

In Him,

Tyler & Elizabeth Jorgensen
Willowvale, South Africa