Partners in the Gospel

Serving in Khayelitsha

Besides being a pastor, Aaron and Maevis operate a small public health center and feeding station for orphaned children in Khayelitsha, a township of 1.7 million inhabitants on the outskirts of Cape Town, South Africa. Aaron, incredibly warm and compassionate, is not a natural leader but a doer. Maevis, his wife, is trained in community health. Weekly, hundreds come here for care and support. Aaron shared with me that once a month he and members of his church go to the local garbage dump. There they search, not for scraps of food or discarded appliances, but for babies. Here, on the outskirts of Cape Town, there are mothers either too sick or in such despair that they cannot care for their children. I cannot imagine the hopelessness that would lead a mother to throw away a little infant. Yet in the past year, Aaron and his church members have found and are caring for 200 newborns, not their own, but loved by God and therefore of immense worth. This is the love and compassion of Jesus Christ working to rescue and bring life to the least of these. Breakthrough Partners is working to empower and encourage Christian leaders like Aaron and Maevis so that the Church will be the Church, reflecting the grace and mercy of our Lord in a very troubled and broken world.