Frida

I've been wanting to do a quick blog about last Sunday's service all week but its been a strange week and time online has been rushed.

I didnt think I'd make it to church last week because I was exhausted after our full day doing the Great Strides and getting very lost on the way back, however I woke at 6am a bit full of beans so I went. I'm so glad I did because our speaker for the day was a guy called Steve and he was amazing.

He talked about his wife to begin with, she had survived the Rwandan genocide but had wanted to die after being buried alive with a number of her relatives. She was presumed dead when she was put into the mass grave but woke when they were putting the soil on top of them. She decided to keep quiet and spent 14 hours in there struggling to breathe, then eventually she managed to get free, whereupon she begged anyone and everyone to end her life because she couldn't bear the horror of what she'd experienced. Nobody would help her to end her life so she tried numerous times to end it herself but each time she survived.

She met Steve and they set up a church with 8 members and to date they now have around 1500 regular members. Steve was in the UK to share their story and we were lucky enough to have him visit us, it can't have been easy for him to help his wife through what must have been a massive struggle mentally but he was about the smiliest person I have met in a long time. I think we laughed more than we prayed last Sunday as he has a gift for spreading 'joy' and what an amazing testimony Frida his wife has.

I felt priviliged to be there to hear him speak and proud that he thought our church and our pastor reminded him of home.

Frida has written a book about her experience, its called 'Chosen to die destined to live' I imagine its going to be a hard read but also very inspirational.