Honour Our Heroes

By Trevor Anderson

So one of the great opportunities we have as churches is to serve people with the love of Christ and in times of great need and stress this can have even greater impact. So just to share one idea with you, we wanted as a church to host a dinner to honour the medical staff in our hospitals who were on the frontlines in the fight against covid 19.

It started as an idea we prayed through and believed God was in it and so with Tere Basson’s help and the Exceptional Nurse campaign she got the ball rolling because of her contacts and this last Friday night we hosted a dinner called Honour the Heroes for 100 Nurse managers and senior staff of the public hospitals in Nelson Mandela Bay. It was an incredibly humbling experience as they shared their experiences of how challenging their task was especially during the first 2 waves before the vaccine was rolled out. All of them lost colleagues, many worked double shifts for months, all of them had covid, some still feeling the effects. And what they appreciated most was that we were the first to come and say thank you and honour them for their courage, sacrifice, and service.

And the whole night I was reminded that we are called to be a blessing….God blesses us and fills us and empowers us not only for ourselves, but that we may be His witnesses and serve a hurting broken world with His love and power. And it’s not hard, we just have to look for opportunities to get involved and make a difference. The presence of God was so tangible that night, there were moments when it felt like God just rested on each person.

So I want to encourage you and challenge you to look for an opportunity to serve your community…even if it’s just to thank and honour those in your church that served on the frontlines, the medical staff, law enforcement, and even teachers who were on the frontlines when the rest of us stayed at home in relative safety. We have such an opportunity to show the love of Christ.

If you would like to do something similar in your area, feel free to call me as to how you can set it up and Tere Basson has contacts all over the country in the nursing field.

Here’s to making a difference!