It is hard to be away from the ranch at this time, but then, it is ALWAYS hard to tear ourselves away from home! Right now though, we are expecting new kids 🐐to arrive, so leaving for necessary R&R was a hard decision! We travelled to a small South African coastal town, Port Alfred, for a short break. 🇿🇦 Back on the ranch in Zimbabwe, mamas with big tummies are waddling around preparing to surprise us with a delivery or two! Already this birthing time we have been presente

UBUNTU Definition: Kindness, caring and looking after the people around you Nkosi has started High School! On 7 January 2019, Nkosi, accompanied by 12 of his Georgia, USA ‘fan club’, arrived at King George VI Centre to start his first year of high school. In 2018, he achieved the highest pass mark in his final year of primary education, at the rural school he has attended for 8 years. It was an emotional time and Nkosi was a little sad and very apprehensive about the unknown

Sometimes stepping out of the front door can trigger a miracle! When Norma and I are in town, we usually go for an evening walk. On most occasions, nothing significant happens. The neighbors’ dogs bark 🐕, other walkers nod greetings, cyclist whizz past 🚴‍♀️, a few cars zig-zag, like drunken drivers, avoiding the numerous potholes on the ‘paved’ suburban road. 🚗 Last week, however, something unique happened on my evening stroll. A metal gate slid open, as I was walking past

Firstly, we would like to thank the amazing humans who responded to our September post asking for donations to assist Jabulani. You truly humble us with your willingness to help where you can. 💖 Several months have rushed by and Jabulani has been following the treatments prescribed by the clinics and the orthopaedic surgeons. He has improved and is much more positive now as he experiences that there are caring folk around who want to see him recover from a situation in which

Lord of all he surveys, is our Bruce! Here he is investigating how he can join us in the area fenced off around our Homestead. What he cannot understand is why we should fence HIM out. We have tried to explain that the fence is there to keep his herd out and the dogs in, but he still likes to make us feel guilty as he finds a large rock to stand on and view us over it – calling out to us to invite him in! He is growing into a delightful young buck, greeting us gently when

Have you ever been on a summer Vacation With A Purpose? These guys travelled over 5,000 miles from the USA for a 40 day VWAP on Morning Star ranch in the Matobo Hills, just outside Bulawayo - the 2nd largest city in Zimbabwe. For most of us, summer is a time to indulge ourselves on a beach, a mountain or a cruise-liner on the ocean. But a few, take the ‘road less chosen’ and head off the beaten track to serve others on a VWAP They seek out the poor, the ailing, widows and or

That’s all the time it took for Lance and his team of twelve to complete enclosing the sports hall and adding a store room and utility room at the Community Center. The team worked from dawn to dusk each day and did an incredible job.🌟 All that remains to be done before we can start using the Center is to cast the floor and build a house for a caretaker. Hopefully this will be completed with the assistance of two teams of volunteers in June. The kids who walk past the Center

Six weeks ago, Norma and I were on the Interstate between Atlanta and Florida. What an eye-opener – three lanes going North and three, speeding South to find the sun - all jam-packed with vehicles – RV’s with trailers, monstrous twenty-two wheelers travelling at seventy miles per hour and an assortment of new luxury cars from Mercs, BMW’s to the latest models in everything else! Then we were suddenly back in Zimbabwe – pot-holed roads and bush paths! We visited a granny wh

His granny was so excited when it was pushed in to her homestead. ‘This will help me so much to make his life more interesting and mine easier’, she cried. It is an old pushchair with probably not many miles left in it, but the miles it will cover will be made so much easier for Thabo’s granny. We are expecting a donation of at least one wheelchair in the next week which will substitute when Thabo grows too big for the pushchair. Sadly, just after Thabo was ‘discovered’, we w

Visiting a remote village in the rural Matobo Hills this week, we were asked if we could help a grandmother source a wheelchair for her 4 year old grandson, Thabo, who had never walked. We asked to meet him and Thabo was introduced to us. It would appear that Thabo suffers from Cerebral Palsy. His is a sad story of being rejected by his young mother and her family and ‘returned’ to the father’s family, where his young grandmother has looked after him since he was 3 months o

Driving through the community yesterday, I came across two young girls on the road. I waved and they smiled and waved back. I stopped, took a photo and gave them each a mango. Their smiles were priceless, but didn’t last long. Three teenage boys appeared; the little girls’ faces darkened and they stepped back off the road. I tried to imagine why they reacted in fear when they saw the boys. Then I remembered reading recently that one in three girls, in Zimbabwe, are abus

In the summer of 2017, a group of college students from Johnson Ferry Baptist Church in Marietta and Southbridge Community Church in Statesboro, Georgia, flew to Morning Star ranch Zimbabwe, got into a truck and headed into the Matobo Hills to spread ‘the Good News of Peace' (Ephesians 6:15). They walked through the hills, climbing over big boulders, looking for people to tell the Good News. No obstacle could distract them from their purpose. Fortunately, Thomas was well-pr

Nokuhle Ndlovu’s story is not a lot different to many other widows’ stories in our community. She and her husband left Zimbabwe for South Africa some years ago when Zimbabwe was going through its first economic meltdown and the job market became over-saturated with desperate people. As she tells her story, it seems they were able to find work in South Africa, but still struggled for enough money to send home to the family who were looking after their children here in Zimbab

BREAKING NEWS! Our first ever T-shirt has arrived! Inspired by the Goat Project and how quickly we have fallen in love with the characters of our goat family, all proceeds go towards our work in the community and of course the Goat Project! what you need to know: Price: USD 15 Available in white (black print) V or round/crew neck. Sizes: XS, S, M, L, XL, XXL Ships from the USA To place your order, email greenislandvision@gmail.com hello@greenislandvision.org #goatproject #Mo

Why would twenty fanatical English rugby supporters spend their own money to fly half-way around the world to a remote corner of Zimbabwe? Crazy? Yes, there is a saying that goes, ‘Mad dogs and Englishmen!’ But these Englishmen were on a compassionate mission to spread the ‘gospel’ of Tag Rugby to rural Zimbabwean school kids. With hardly enough time to recover from their 24 hour, three stop lay-over flight, ending with a bumpy eight-hour car ride, they threw themselves int

Tara is on Morning Star with us helping set up AFCA's Goat Project. Here's a quick video from her featuring all of the goats! After the video was made Piglet gave birth to her kids - twin boys! #AFCA #afcaids #goats #goatproject #MorningStar #GreenIslandVision

In my last message, I referred to a quote from Richard Foster’s book, ‘Celebration of Discipline’: ‘… conformity to a sick society is to be sick’. Consider these two biblical incidents in the life of David: Renewed Minds Scripture Reading: Romans 8: 5 – 17 Meditation: Romans 12: 1-2 In Romans 12 verses 1 and 2, Paul tells us what we need to do if we want to know God’s plan for our lives – change our mindset from a worldly one to a Godly one. Quite simply, it means seeing

Dear Friends When we are exposed to totally different environments or lifestyles than the one they were raised in, are usually shocked by the experience. This happened to Norma and I when we first visited and lived in North Carolina in 1981. Coming from Africa, ‘The Land of the Free’ blew our minds. Initially we were acutely aware of the differences between our two continents, but after a few months we began to assimilate the American lifestyle (even enjoying the crazy game o

Reflection on Summer in Zimbabwe 2015 - by Alice Hall This year I had the incredible opportunity of spending the summer in Zimbabwe with Chris and Norma! I went for two weeks last summer, and all year I felt the Lord calling me back to invest for a longer time. At the beginning of the trip, I went thinking I would serve God for a specific amount of time in a specific place, and I returned realizing that I need to serve God all the time in all places. That was probably the big

In a previous message, I referred to Romans 12: 1 and 2 and drew the analogy of a caterpillar changing into a butterfly. It is an interesting process. The first thing that the caterpillar does is to wrap itself up into a cocoon. Why this is necessary, I don’t know. Wouldn’t it be easier to sit down and do the job in the open? After all, spinning a cocoon is tough, painstaking and time-consuming. Perhaps there is a spiritual lesson for us in this process. Paul says that i