Well my first month or so of living in Swaziland was pretty rough. I didn’t like it very much. I missed Jeffrey’s Bay and all the friends that I had made there. Satan kept lying to me, telling me that I didn’t have a purpose here in Swaziland and that God didn’t want me here. But after a huge falling out with satan and a lot of prayer from my teammates and I things started to get better. I have been praying since late January that God would break my heart for Swaziland and that He would bless me with great relationships here. Ever since I started praying this prayer God has been answering it. I have building some really neat relationships with a few Swazis and I’ve come home crying or with a heavy heart for Swaziland on numerous occasions. God has been faithful in answering my prayer but it has been hard.
You see, the culture in Swaziland is extremely different than our culture back home. Here it is completely okay, even normal, for men to have two or three or four wives. The king of Swaziland actually has 13 wives. He picks a new one every year. Also, the men and women of Swaziland are not treated equally. Men are far more superior over women. It is perfectly acceptable for men in this culture to beat their wives or to bring their girlfriends home and make their wives sleep on the floor while their girlfriend sleeps in the bed with them. Swaziland has signed a convention saying that women have equal rights as men but just because it is written on paper doesn’t really mean much. There are some Christian men who only have one wife and they do not beat their wives but they are the minority. Although the men in Swaziland are hugely at fault, we can’t blame everything on the men.
The women in Swaziland don’t respect themselves at all! It’s not like in America though, In America most women know that they should and can respect themselves; a lot of women just choose not to. In Swaziland I’m not so sure the women even know that they can respect themselves. I have a couple friends, Futhie and Naomsile, that work at the market and I visit them every Monday morning. They are sisters. The first time I met them I was asking them about their lives and their families. Futhie is 21 and had her first child when she was 14. Naomsile is 26 and had her first child at 17. I was asking them what made them have sex at such young ages and they said that the didn’t really know that they could say no. They felt pressure from the men and they thought it was just something they had to do. Also, the woman has no say in whether or not the man wears a condom or not. They are from the rural areas of Swaziland and no one ever taught them how to respect themselves as women. No one ever told them that they are precious creations of our Heavenly Father and He has so much more for them! It’s not that no one told them about God. They are taught about God and most Swazis will tell you that they know God but that doesn’t mean they have a relationship with God. They just know who He is. They know about Him. As you can see, they mix God with a lot of culture and ancestral worship.
After numerous conversations with girls and women with similar stories as Futhie’s and Noamsile’s I know that my purpose here is to teach Swazi women of the love that God has for them and that they can respect themselves. I want them to know how precious, beautiful and lovely they are! God has made them to be so much more than bunching bags! If I teach only a few Swazi women how to respect themselves then they in turn can teach other women and they can teach other women and so on.
Prayer will also be a huge part of this process and this is where YOU come in! Please be in Prayer for the women and men of Swaziland. Pray that they would actually read the bible and realize their roles as men and women of God. Pray that hearts would be changed and that the culture would change as well.
Listen, O heavens! Pay attention, earth! This is what the Lord says: “The children I raised and cared for have rebelled against me. Even an ox knows its owner, and a donkey recognize its master’s care but Israel (Swaziland) doesn’t know its master. My people don’t recognize my care for them.”
– Isaiah 1:2-3 –
