My name is William Goxo
I was born some 43 years ago,
in a small township, a black area, called Parys Tumahole.
I am a Xhosa by tribe, but I grew up in a Sesotho-speaking environment.
William was born into a South Africa where blacks were supressed by the apartheid regime.
Blacks and coloureds were kept separate from whites, and lacked many vital rights.
I thought that apartheid was a very unkind system.
Especially to those who were on the receiving side of it
It really messed up people's lives.
And it tore our country apart.
So I think it was a very bad system.
At the same time, Tielman Slabbert, an Afrikaner, grew up in the same South Africa, but on the other side of apartheid.
I was born on a farm under apartheid.
What I can remember from growing up, I sensed it was extremely unfair.
Especially the racism in apartheid.
But I was fortunate from my parents' side, they were a bit enlightened, more than the other people.
And if you think back to the kind of treatment they got, and how they took it, then you can really have respect
for many black people. Especially today, when people are not better at accepting one another, that you can also respect.
When William was about 15 years old, he became a Christian and light began to shine.
But still, he had a longing for something more.
The question I had in my heart and that I was really searching for was: "Where can I get people who live this life that I see in the Bible?"
I really longed for what I saw there.
And I thought, "But they lived in the times of Paul and John, and those people."
And I read in Acts how the friends lived there, and I thought, "I want that life, too!"
In 1990 William met Tielman Slabbert who had now become a Christian and an active missionary.
I learned to know William the first time when I arranged a meeting, where I invited a brother from Europe to come and speak.
I advertised it and I invited as many as possible, students and staff.
And I thought, maybe they can hear something about the gospel.
When Tielman spoke to me I sensed the same spirit and the same things that he was looking into in the Bible.
When I found them it was like finding a well in the desert, an oasis.
When I first met the friends it was in the dining hall at the Slabberts,
and I met these people and I sensed such warmth from them, and a spirit of humility that I'd never seen, especially in white people.
It was something unique for me,
something different, and I thought, this is it - I've found this jewel!
Lately, I've thought about it almost like a coincidence,because it was around the time when Mandela was about to be released.
About a week, or a few weeks before he was released, I remember I was watching it on TV,
I saw him released, and a few weeks after that I made contact with the church.
It was like an interesting coincidence;
Like a liberation, the one is more earthly, and the other one I got a kind of spiritual liberation.
Tielman Slabbert belonged to Brunstad Christian Church and William started attending their meetings.
But apartheid was still present in South Africa.
I think it was quite a challenge for him to come.
We didn't roll out the red carpet for him.
All of the families in the church come from an apartheid background.
But of course, we came to the church and a better understanding of the gospel,
But that doesn't mean that you, in your way of doing things, are saved.
Some of them had baggage from the past,
and they were not used to interacting with black people.
It was something new for them.
Initially they were stiff,
And I would be thinking, OK, I understand... I would try to greet them. Sometimes they wouldn't greet back.
I remember one brother, I don't know wether I should tell the story.
He said to me, when he was a young boy, he thought if he touched the hand of a black person, he would also turn black.
It was not because he did not like them, but he had that fear.
I remember I met him for the first time, and he was this new "friend" that I met,
who, when I tried to greet, he didn't greet me back.
If I had known that background I would have understood much better.
But he changed so much!
At one stage we went as a group of friends,
we went to the white part of my hometown.
We went to do a few things, and one of the things was to go for a swim.
It was around 1990-91, so things were still separate.
Although on paper they were integrated, but in reality, in some small towns, like my town, the races were not allowed to come together.
We went together as friends, to swim there.
It was very hot so we really needed a swim.
Everybody swam, so when I tried to go into the pool,
this big-bellied man tried to stop me. He said, "No way, we don't allow black people here!"
I remember that brother, he took him on.
The one who couldn't greet me initially.
He took him on, he was zealous! He said, "No, he must be allowed to swim!"
He meant me and he fought on my behalf, so I was amazed.
I have never seen him reacting to any of these things in a bad way.
But I know he sometimes talked to the people,
and told them in a nice way, that it is not good to say it that way.
But I have never experienced any bad from him,
or that he was offended or bitter. That I have never seen.
The way I react to people when they behave poorly or badly towards me has been,
that I am tempted, obviously, as a human being,
to be upset by what they do, or to be angry.
And it's there in my nature,
but through the gospel it has been possible that I could find that
and not see the problem as being the other person,
although I 'm tempted to think that is them,
but the problem is in me.
And I could get light and God could speak to my heart,
and say, "But you are angry -- it's you who needs help!"
"It is you who are blind and naked, and needs salvation!"
So I would find that and I would hate it, with my whole heart.
Then I am not limited by who they are, what they do or what they think.
Then I have more room to accommodate as many as possible.
To repay evil with good, then you really have to hate your own life.
Because somebody can do evil to you,
you can react or act good,
but it is only when you find your own life,
and your own pride and your own greatness, and you humble yourself there
and accept it from God's hand, then you come to freedom.
And the freedom that is born from that,
that is a real life; that is not something you act.
Then you come to real goodness, and you really have nothing against anybody.
Many groups of people try to bring the different races together, but it is very much outward.
They can't deal with what is inside, and that is what I find unique in the church.
We zoom into the sin, and we tackle the problem that is in us.
That brings true brotherhood, and longlasting friendship. Eternal friendship!
I have known these people for 20 years now, and it has only been good!