This is a story of a Brother in South Africa who attended Sabbath worship yesterday at his local church for the first time since March 2020 when the South African government started Coronavirus lockdowns and restrictions.
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| Sabbath worship yesterday at Kelvin-on-Athol SDA Church/ Faith Reporters |
Thato Mashishi is a practicing lawyer in South Africa, a family father, member of Kelvin-on-Athol Seventh-day Adventist Church in Trans-Orange conference Union, Southern Africa Union Conference.
Currently, most churches in South African are open for physical worship services and so, Kelvin-on-Athol located at 124 South Avenue, Atholhurst, Sandton, 2196 opened for the first time yesterday.
About 40 people attended of the 300 who used to attend, according to Attorney Mashishi.
“We stopped going to our church just before the hard lockdown was introduced in South Africa around March last year,” he told Faith Reporters on Sabbath 13 November 2021 after worship services at his local church.
He said that almost everything seemed to be new including the faces he was familiar with before church services were stopped in South Africa.
“The experience was amazing. It was great connecting with believers that I have not seen in almost two years” he said
He explained that there was evidence of the impact of the Coronavirus on the church members, remorseful for the sad experience that some church members shared.
“COVID-19 had an impact on us all with different challenges being faced,” he said adding that he realised that “some of our brethren had lost their jobs while others had to shut down their income-generating activities”
Attorney Mashishi did not learn of any family that suffered separation tendencies due to the hardships brought by Coronavirus restriction and thanked God that he noticed that some families had got new members.
“We saw some families with new babies they had during the period within which the church was closed which was amazing to all of us,” he said.
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| Children's church at Kelvin-on-Athol Seventh-day Adventist Church in Trans-Orange conference Union, Southern Africa Union Conference |
After the worship services, the church members had lunch together at church and got more experiences of where and how they had been since they last fellowshipped at their church.
“We had a lovely lunch packed for us after the service which was also a great time to come together,” he said concluding that “When all is said and done, nothing can be compared to in-person worship. Physical fellowship is something we have been missing”
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