Day 26 – Pray for Our Communities in Eswatini (#40Days2025)

Day 26 – Pray for Our Communities in Eswatini

Within South Africa, there are five communities being supported and cared for:

Bhandeni, Msengeni B, Phophonyane, S'bovini, Shoka (supported by the Lomahasha and Phophonyane Service Centres, Eswatini)

Today we invite you to pray for the challenges that exist across all communities in Eswatini:

• “Please pray for the expansion into a new community, Matlabathini, and for the involvement of pastors. We also ask for the community's support in our initiatives on the ground.

• May God grant the leadership of the Service Centre wisdom as we plan to enter new communities.

• We praise God for the sense of responsibility shown by pastors and the Chiefdom in the Phophonyane and S'bovini. We are working together and supporting one another in our efforts.

• We thank God for the successful graduation of Msengeni A last December, which marked the first community graduation in Eswatini. This success has enabled us to consider further expansion.

• Please pray for the Service Centre as they plan to enter new areas. May God give them strength, and wisdom, and guide them to the right communities to serve.” – Mnelisi, Service Centre Coordinator (Eswatini)

To learn more about Eswatini, the communities that we serve and about our Service Centres (local Hands at Work teams), please visit: https:

Day 25 - Pray for Our Partners in South Africa and Eswatini (#40Days2025)

Day 25 - Pray for Our Partners in South Africa and Eswatini

Across the world, Hands at Work has dedicated partners from the International Church, who are committed to seeing the mission and vision of

Hands at Work grow and flourish. Today, we invite you to pray for the partners who are supporting the work in South Africa and Eswatini:

• “We praise you Almighty God for each of our faithful partners across the world, who are steadfastly committed to care for the most vulnerable children in communities across South Africa and Eswatini. We lift them up to you as they advocate and are a voice for these children who have no voice and we ask for your continued provision. As our partners join Hands at Work to arise and build the wall so that the children will no longer be vulnerable, may you strengthen their hands for this good work as you did in Nehemiah 2:18. We pray for your blessing to be upon them as they serve you in their own communities and may they also care for the most vulnerable around them.” – Rachel McLaughlin, International Office Volunteer (Australia)

• Pray that international team members and visitors encounter God’s heart among the vulnerable, encourage the work of the local teams on the ground, and further the goals of the partnership between the local and international Church and stir up momentum to further the partnership.” – Suzette Tay Lee, International Office Volunteer (US)

Day 24 - Pray for the Church in South Africa and Eswatini

Day 24 - Pray for the Church in South Africa and Eswatini

Hands at Work envisions the local church in Africa effectively caring for the orphaned, the widowed and the dying in partnership with the International Church. Today we invite you to join us in praying for the local church in South Africa and Eswatini:

• “For South Africa may we please pray together for our churches. As a Christian organisation whose foundation is Christ, mobilising the church in serving the most vulnerable is the main thing. However, in South Africa, we have many kinds of churches with different doctrines, thus it becomes a challenge for us with Primary Caregivers, Care Workers and children coming from families that mix Christ with traditional worship. Pray for God’s guidance and intervention as we try to teach and preach about Jesus to our people and trying to get them belong to the right churches. - Nontobeko, Service Centre* Coordinator sharing on behalf of the Hazyview and Oshoek Service Centres.

• “We can stand in prayer for pastors, because we know that pastors are the only people that can influence the whole church. If they buy into the Hands at Work vision, it’s easy for the whole church to follow because they trust them. A big problem in Eswatini is that the pastors themselves they don’t have relationship. There is this thing of different churches, different denominations. So, they look down upon each other and it’s not easy for them to come together even though they need to work together so they can care for the children after we graduate. Also, inside one church, you find that there is division which if the church is divided, it’s not easy for the church to take ownership at the Care Points. Please pray for unity in the church.” – Futhi, Service Centre* Coordinator, sharing on behalf of the Lomahasha and Phophonyane Service Centres*.

To learn more about South Africa, the communities that we serve and about our Service Centres (local Hands at Work teams), please visit: https:

To learn more about Eswatini, the communities that we serve and about our Service Centres (local Hands at Work teams), please visit: https:

Day 23 - Welcome to Eswatini (#40Days2025)

Day 23 - Welcome to Eswatini

Eswatini is one of eight countries that Hands at Work is serving in across Africa. Eswatini has a population of 1,508,720 people, with 30% of the population living in extreme poverty. Ranking 142 out of 187 on the Human Development Index, there are 5,600 children living with HIV/AIDS and 70,000 children who have been orphaned because of this life-threatening illness. – Sources: UNAID, UNDP, World Poverty Clock

As we start the week, please join us in praying for the country of Eswatini:

• “Please pray in regards unemployment. There are many stories where the husband went to South Africa to look for odd jobs but then never come back home. And now the grandmother or the wife has to get odd jobs, which is rare and if they do, it’s not enough to generate income for the family. We find a lot of under-fives children who are left behind with grandmothers because their mothers went to South Africa to look for a way but they don’t come back.

• Please pray in regards to school fees, which are very high in Eswatini. Some of our youth, they end up not finishing high school and then they go and work in the farms, next to the border of Mozambique.” – Pinky, Regional Support Team Leader

To learn more about Eswatini, the communities that we serve and about our Service Centres (local Hands at Work teams), please visit: https:

When Audrey (Regional Support Team Leader, South Africa) was asked, “If you could ask people to pray for one thing in South Africa and Eswatini, what would it be?” she shared that we need to pray for justice. It is common for people who commit assault against the vulnerable to go free because they don’t have the resources available to them to get the help that they need. Pray for justice!

Day 28 - Care Workers and Primary Caregivers across South Africa and Eswatini (#40Days2024)

Teach me to do your will, for you are my God; may your good Spirit lead me on level ground. For your name’s sake, Lord, preserve my life; in your righteousness, bring me out of trouble. - Psalm 143:10-11

In many communities in South Africa, Eswatini and across Africa, the Care Workers are also the Primary Caregivers of the children that they are serving. A Primary Caregiver is the mother, father, grandparents, aunts, uncles, older siblings or other relatives of the children coming to the Care Point.

• “One of the biggest things in South Africa for the Primary Caregivers is not having identity documents and the kids also don’t have documents. In South Africa, if you don’t have documents, you don’t have access to a lot of service delivery. You can’t get a house, you can’t get food, you can’t get a government grant. My prayer is that even though they don’t have documents, God can provide something for them to live.” (Audrey, Regional Support Team Leader, South Africa)

• “Pray for the Primary Caregivers in our community to be involved at the Care Point and able to understand the vision of Hands at work and know the Jesus we know.” (Mnelisi, Local Leader, Eswatini)

Gogo Rebecca* is a Primary Caregiver in Sommerset Community in South Africa. She cares for her three grandsons. Many families in South Africa have come from other countries, such as Mozambique, meaning that they don’t have identification documents. This limits their ability to access government services and to receive schooling. To support her family Rebecca farms, but life is still a struggle.

Audrey (Regional Support Team Leader, South Africa) shares: “She doesn’t just sit and fold hands and say, 'I'm vulnerable’. She has a farm she ploughs. Some years she didn't even have seeds to plant, so we managed to provide her seeds as Hands at Work so she can plant. But, again, the good thing with her is that after planting, after some years, she stops us to say, “don't ever give me seeds because the seeds that I'm harvesting I eat, grind some to have a mealie meal, and some I'm keeping for planting other years”. When she has challenges with the children, she goes to the Care Point. The prayer request that I have for Gogo Rebecca is to pray for God to keep her for these three grandchildren. She's very old, but she tries to work very hard. Pray that the grandchildren can help provide for the grandmother”.