A Memoir of God's dealings over 22 years at Rosettenville Baptist Church through Darryl's eyes

Preamble

Late one night around May 2000, as Marianne and I were preparing to go to bed, Rosettenville Baptist Church (RBC) called us to say that they had just had a church meeting and that we had been unanimously called to be the Senior Pastoral Couple of RBC. There had been no interview or trial sermon preached, to forewarn us of this invitation. God then clearly led us to accept this call. We became one of the youngest pastoral couples to serve in this role. God released us from Port Shepstone Baptist at the end of August 2000. He provided for us to take a month of unpaid leave for prayer and planning and we began ministry on the 1st of October 2000.

The first five years of adaptation and growth (2000-2005).

In the first five years we saw God uniting us together as a church. Some predicted that our church would need to close its doors within five years, but God had other plans. By His grace we would be a shining light for years to come. In those early months John Abrahamse was guided by God to establish J-Life and so we began the search during 2001 to find a youth pastor and God provided a young couple, namely, Brian and Liezel Watts. In those years God emphasised youth ministry and we saw Him work amongst us.

There were two Lay Renewals during this time and many cell groups participated in the study of “Experiencing God”. One incident that stands out for me was when some ladies from our hospitality team came to me before a large church fellowship gathering and said that there would not be enough food for everybody. I said: Well! Let us pray that God would multiply the loaves and the fish. That night God provided enough food for everybody and there was still food leftover, enough to share with some of our families.

God brought in new Deacons and new Elders onto the executive. Ron Seabrook joined Frank Pretorius and Mike Wood as Elders. God shaped our church through many weekend ministry events/renewals and the ongoing missions thrust. He gave us the vision to be a biblically based church, where every person bears the fruit of the Spirit, and reaches out to our local community and fulfils the Great Commission.

The first 5 years were years of finding our feet and getting to know the members and adherents of the congregation. Then God gave our family the privilege of a Sabbatical, enabling us to travel around the United States to learn new ways of approaching pastoral issues in the modern world. One issue that came up that taught us a great deal was the issue of the scattering of ashes after cremations in the gardens of the church property. This initially appeared to be an issue linked to race, preference and privilege. Some people also struggled with cremation as opposed to burial. There were many factors that God revealed in this complex issue. After seeking the wisdom of a number of pastors across the United States and South Africa, it was a Baptist Union Executive Member from Pretoria who pointed out that the real issue was the issue of the weaker brother. Some brothers who had come to Christ out of witchcraft, were troubled by the remains of the dead being attached to a place of worship. So for the sake of the weaker brother and sister, through God’s guidance, we agreed as a church not to scatter ashes within the property but rather to continue remembering our loved ones with the name plaques on a wall of remembrance in our entrance hall.

As a church, God has strengthened us to tangibly show love to those who might find themselves in places of weakness due to sin or circumstances. We have always had grape juice for Communion rather than wine, so as not to cause the recovering alcoholic to fall. Even when the 10:30am service mostly migrated to the 9:00 am service, we retained the ministry opportunity of the later service. When the 9:00 am service became the largest service, we continued with the 10:30 am service out of practical love, using traditional music as the preferred worship style, to minister to traditionalists and the Sunday School teachers. The 9:00 am service grew as a blended worship service catering for young and old.

In 2005 there was great celebration when the 2:00 pm African Languages service grew large enough to employ a full-time pastor. So, RBC now had 3 pastors, (senior, youth and African language). There was much rejoicing as we reached out multiculturally to people in their heart language. God multiplied ministry opportunities and we became one church with preaching in English, French and Zulu in five services most Sundays. The fledgling French work began as a Bible study, after God enabled the EE3 teams to minister to some refugees in the area.

The ministry of Prayer became stronger at RBC through the years. The upper room prayers morphed into the 3-day prayer chain. Each year the church began the ministry calendar with a week of prayer. In an early prayer meeting the Zulu Pastor Themba, brought a prostitute to the meeting after leading her to the Lord on the streets. Sadly, she was martyred by her pimp within 2 weeks. Yet out of this tragedy, Rainy Makgati and later Lyn Abrahams were equipped and called by the Lord to try to start ministries to the many street women in our area. When I ministered as an invited speaker at an Emmaus Walk weekend, a man from the northern suburbs spoke to me about turning from his sin and surrendering to Christ. He then confessed that he frequently came to Rosettenville to pick up prostitutes. When I again saw him a year later, he bounded up to me to announce that Christ had truly saved him and he was free from being a “street crawler” in our area. Even now God continues His work of connecting people with our church, in their journeys of surrendering to Christ.

The years 2005 to 2010 were years of change and development of many ministries.

The next five years were marked by a different direction of growth in the youth ministry and the Lord took us through a time of struggle in finding suitable staffing. In 2006 through financial constraints the African languages pastor Patrick Diba, was led by God to accept a call to Cape Town and our youth pastor accepted a call to the Glenvista Baptist Church. God pruned the youth ministry as some went to minister and serve alongside the Watts’. In this time of transition, God rebuilt the Senior Youth and we adopted the AWANA program for the junior youth with much success. In these years the Evangelism Explosion (EE3) training program began to reach many people. We especially saw a huge crop of faithful young men being raised up and studying for ministry and serving as youth pastors, amongst them being Isaac Pinto and Shane de Lange. God enabled us to attempt a sports outreach at a local high school with a marathon and donated prizes, as well as an evangelist speaking at the prize-giving. God was definitely using our church in new ways!

RBC has also been used by God to be a haven of English language training for Brazilian missionaries who needed to acquire language skills as their mission house was just down the road. These years were times of many dreams and ideas. In this period of time, God guided us to birth the Global Focus committee which united all the ministries and missionaries of our church, in a common vision to reach the world for Christ. This outreach was both across the street and around the world. The old tensions between the missions’ committee and local ministries dissolved as we worked together to be a lighthouse, shining brightest close by and then reflecting to the ends of the earth.

God brought us through some difficult days in 2008 when the global economy went into recession and that affected our church. We needed to cut back on ministries, yet God provided even when we were not able to find full time pastors. We still managed to serve with volunteers and with part-time students from BTC. Throughout the years this church has managed to give opportunities to students from BTC to be trained in many different areas of ministry.

The years 2010 to 2015 were years of struggle.

In the years after the soccer World Cup, God grew the new French service that had been built up by Laurent Meya to around 70 people. God birthed this work as it started from an early Bible study and English class, after Ron Seabrook was used by God to lead Laurent into a relationship with Himself. We as a church even acted as a surrogate family when Laurent married Gina. Laurent studied at the Baptist Theological College and then they served faithfully as a couple in RBC. When God moved them to the USA, God brought Pastor Jean and Nines Monzambe, as the pastoral family to the French service and the work took off, growing to over 200 people attending in these years.

These were years of personal struggle for me. God was at work in RBC: growing the youth and the French works so that these ministries peaked during this time. When church finances were tight God was providing for us as a church in many ways, with sound equipment from the United States and materials for our cell groups. Our church was increasingly multicultural.

The years 2015 to 2020 were years of learning

There came a point after 15 years of ministry at RBC, that I sensed God prompting me to study further. I knew I'd come to the end of all the theological resources that He had taught me through training and experience in previous churches. I needed to find answers for how to guide the functioning of a multicultural church in our South African context of previously homogenous churches. God strengthened me to do my MTh through Baptist Theological College and my PhD though North West University. God revealed answers for the issues that arise when there are many cultures in one church. Whilst some people favour homogeneous churches, God clearly led us to be a heterogeneous church. God led us to try and find ways to make this work through developing understanding of various cultures. We were a prophetic mirror of heaven, when people from every tribe, tongue, nation and people, will be gathered around the throne of God.

These years were years of learning together. Years of experiencing renewal weekends that were aimed at deeper cultural understanding. The French service at 12:00pm now had as many people as the English services that took place at 9-00am, at 10-30am and at 6:00pm. The 2:00pm African Language Service began to decline, after God revealed false teaching. During all this time God allowed us to be a part of a new church plant in Orange Farm, in the Palm Springs area. Now this fledgling church is beginning to blossom under the ministry of Pastor Frank Sibanda. As a church when we have done what God has asked us to do in His Word, He has honoured us, even though it has been difficult at times.

Just before that fateful year of 2020 before the Covid pandemic, we saw a marked lethargy among the members and in one of the messages there was a stern warning from the text about being faithful or being pruned due to unfaithfulness… then we entered 2020.

The years 2020 to 2022 with the COVID crisis and rebuilding

Nobody could have foreseen what God was going to do in 2020 with the COVID-19 crisis. Suddenly we no longer met physically in the building but “gathered” online for several months. God quickly taught us how to offer spiritual food through complete services with songs, prayers, testimonies and messages on YouTube, as audio podcasts online, along with written blogs. Yet the pruning began, as fewer (200) and fewer (100) people joined online and many got into the habit of relaxing at home, without fellowship on Sundays.

God led us to experiment with drive-through communion services. When the lockdown partially lifted, a brave few returned to the 9:00 am and 12:00 pm services and gradually 60% of members came back as more restrictions were lifted and the conspiracy fear-mongering died down.

Through it all, a small Benevolence Ministry of the odd food voucher, some French emergency food parcels and a few Irene Wilson Fund beneficiaries, mushroomed. During the worst of the Covid-19 Crisis tens of thousands of Rands were distributed from donors in the USA, Rotary International and the UK. By the end of the crisis there were 14 monthly beneficiaries from the Irene Wilson Fund, and 46 bi-monthly food voucher beneficiaries (apart from half a dozen individual sacrificial private donations). God has definitely grown the care-ministry of the poor and vulnerable through the past 22 years at RBC.

Through RBC, God has allowed us to try various ventures, like Paradigm Shift to teach entrepreneurial skills to the unemployed and the Box Boutique’s sharing of excess clothes and household goods with the needy in the church and community. The Box Boutique ministry channelled the excesses into the Hidden Treasure Ministry in Alberton (below the Home Affairs offices). However, in the last two years that ministry has mutated under the auspices of the National Baptist Women’s Department and the proceeds of the sales of these donations now go to missions, pastoral care and widows of pastors.

God has done great and wonderful things at RBC over the 22 years we have been privileged to serve Him here. Refugees have found a spiritual home. The needy have been helped. The Gospel has been preached and practised. Multiculturalism, benevolence and holiness have grown within and amongst us. I was encouraged by God when I recently heard a message by Tim Keller, who remarked that the early church changed the cold, cruel Roman culture in 300 years, through those three characteristics. I have prayed daily for this to happen and God has answered and has truly worked among us by His Holy Spirit.

With gratitude for God’s unfailing love and grace

The Rev Dr Darryl Soal

December 2022