In early December, the AR team traveled to Bulembu, Swaziland, for a week for the dual purpose of visiting a friend of Allan’s from seminary, Lee-Ann McFarlane, who runs a ministry there that provides early care and education to children ages 2-6, and to check out whether Bulembu could serve as another site to which to send AR interns in the future.
Bulembu is nestled in the highveld of the northwest corner of Swaziland, just over a tiny border crossing from South Africa. It is a beautiful place with a remarkable story—God’s fingerprints are everywhere there.
For decades since the 1930′s, Bulembu was a thriving mining town that produced much of the income sustaining the entire country’s economy. At its height, the town’s 10,000 residents had everything they needed: jobs in the chrysotile mines, homes, an abundance of food, education, ahead-of-the-curve health care facilities, recreation options. The year 2001, however, brought drastic change to the people of Bulembu when the mine shut down. With no prospects economic livelihood, the town was abandoned; it’s as if people just up and left with little notice. For instance, it was eerie to walk through one portion of the old hospital ward and see how x-ray slides were still hanging on x-ray machines as if just used or to hear about how, at the golf course club house, dinnerware was left on tables, drinks left half-finished…one definitely gets the sense that the place, most likely overnight, became a ghost town with few residents left, facing a bleak future.
A few years ago, a team of Christian entrepreneurs and social developers saw the potential of Bulembu and the spirit of its people and, when the town went up for auction after the closing of the mine, purchased the 7,000-acre town with the vision of restoring it, little by little. What one sees today when one visits Bulembu is a picture of God’s redemptive hand at work.
And your ancient ruins shall be rebuilt; you shall raise up the foundations of many generations; you shall be called the repairer of the breach, the restorer of streets to dwell in.—Isaiah 58:12
The entire town is a nonprofit, run by Bulembu Ministries Swaziland (BMS), and is infused with the vision of creating a totally self-sustaining community by 2020. For what purpose? More than two-thirds of Swazis living on less than $1 per day and national unemployment is at a staggering rate of 40%; but on top of this, HIVS/AIDS which has ravaged this tiny kingdom. In fact, Swaziland’s HIV/AIDS rate, at 43%, is the highest in the world. The HIV/AIDS problem has left an orphaned population of more than 80,000 children, predicted to grow to 120,000 by 2010. Swaziland is considered a fatherless country, with little male ownership of unwanted babies and a frightening lack of male leadership and positive role models. Taking a business-based approach, BMS has the vision to make Bulembu completely self-sustaining in order to care—physically, emotionally and spiritually—for Swaziland’s orphans. By 2020, this little town has the vision to care for at least 2,000 vulnerable girls and boys, taken in from all over the country, and to rear these children as the next godly leaders of Swaziland.
Today, although the mine remains inactive, the town is beginning to grow. The population has increased from just 100 people to more than 1,000, more than 500 jobs have been created, buildings occupied by local cows and birds are being renovated and occupied and several industries—including timber, honey, bottled water, an arts & crafts gift shop and the Bulembu Lodge—have been established to contribute to the vision of self-sustainability. BMS acts essentially as a umbrella ministry, overseeing the overall progress of the town’s mission, while other ministries, including Lee-Ann’s, work in cooperation to care for and ultimately rear the children of Bulembu.
While it took us a few days to get our heads wrapped around this very unique, totally unconventional place, I continue to ponder why I consider Bulembu a very special place. Death is necessary for rebirth. We see that all over the Scriptures and of course most poignantly in Christ’s death and resurrection and His gift to us of new life. In Bulembu, we saw for ourselves a picture of a town’s physical death, necessary for God to start from scratch rebuilding and reconstituting a place, wholly in His name. Bulembu is a place where the Lord’s work has full permission to reign, and to an outsider, this is clearly felt. For me and Nate, God’s mighty redemptive touch was most obviously seen in the lives of the children there (watch one story of a Bulembu ministry, Abandoned Babies for Christ). Additionally, the community there, though we’re aware it has not always been easy, is genuine; and the ways in which the missionaries and ministries work side-by-side as collaborators and not competitors is something for which to praise God. The people we met and spoke with were always candid with us that Bulembu is a work in progress and that they, admittedly, are figuring it out as they go, trusting God’s direction and provision. I am thankful for our week in Swaziland, enjoying the beauty of that country but most especially the beauty of God’s work unfolding, simply by His grace and by the obedience of followers of Jesus.
If you’re interested in learning more about Bulembu, we encourage you to visit the town’s website and, in particular, watch the town’s video.