Finding God In A Gas Station

          There is a sweet gas station in Manzini called Galp. The first time I went to Galp was in January. Our team was taking our first walk into town and we stopped at Galp to buy some juice. Nothing too exciting happened that day at Galp, but we met some of the employees that day and they were very friendly. Well eventually we started going to Galp a lot. One of my teammates, Gail, started to become friends with a lady named Thandi that works there. One day, a few months ago, I went to the gas station with Gail to visit Thandi. We talked with Thandi and met another employee of Galp that day. His name is Sizwe and he is about 24 years old. Now mostly every guy that we meet in Swaziland asks us to marry him within the first 2.3 seconds of talking with him but Sizwe was different. He was polite and not creepy at all. He didn’t have wrong motive for talking to us, he was just curious as to what we were doing in Swaziland. We told him a little about our program and why we were in Swaziland and we continued to chat with him for awhile. He is a young man from Swaziland who is striving to truly live for God in a country where “living for God” is just a title that doesn’t really mean much.
          After meeting and getting to know the amazing people that work at the Galp gas station we knew we had to continue visiting them. So Gail and I go to the gas station almost every Monday afternoon. We’ve had some really great conversations with Sizwe. He is hungry for God. He asks so many great questions. He has also been able to meet with the guys on our team and chat with them some too. He is in need of some male discipleship in his life. I am praying that God will provide that for Sizwe. I can truly call Him a brother in Christ!
          Sizwe is the cashier at Galp so the drill goes as follows. Gail and I stand in front of the counter, off to the side a bit, while Sizwe is behind the register checking out customers as they come in and out of the store. He stays pretty busy with customers but some how God always allows us to carry on in some  sweet conversation.
          I have seen Christ walk in and out of that gas station so many times. Every week we go to Galp God seems to bring in a customer that either needs encouraging or encourages us. We’ve had the blessing of being Christ and seeing Christ in that gas station on numerous occasions. One time Gail and I had a really cool debate with a Siswati man about marriage, love and if it is okay to have more than one wife or not. The man couldn’t speak English so Sizwe was translating throughout the whole debate. I know that it was truly from God because I didn’t get angry that the man had three wives. I saw him as Jesus and tried to love him as if I were loving Jesus Himself. We were able to leave him with a verse about what love REALLY is. I pray that man comes to know the only true Love that has ever been or ever will be.
          Just last Tuesday Gail and I were at the gas station visiting once again when in walks an older man with a big smile on his face. I tried to greet him in Siswati but Sizwe quickly told me that he was deaf and could not understand me. Sizwe knew the man because he comes into the store regularly. His name is Donald. (Donald is the man in the picture to the left) He had a smile on his face that I will never forget and I could feel the radiance of God all around him. Donald grabbed a piece of paper and started to write on it. He wrote a note to Gail and I basically saying that he could tell we were trying to greet him and he said he likes writing so he asked if we would be pen pals with him. Once again, normally Siswati men are creepy but Donald wasn’t the least bit creepy. We wrote back and forth with Donald for a bit, prayed with him and then he was on his way. Gail and I left the gas station on Tuesday extremely encouraged as we usually do.