Love Upon Grace Ministries © Agapaō | C haris

Mission.
Turning the hearts of youth and families to God and each other.
Developing our God given potential in order to win every area of out lives.
Advancing the Kingdom of God, fist throughout our
circles of influence, then the nations aboard.
Vission
We’re a multicultural Church that seeks to make full devoted followers of Christ

and to make and deploy mature and equipped followers of Christ for the

sake of Family, Community, and Global Transformation.

How we started

Love Upon Grace started in 2006 where Pastor Martie started ministering and serving in the less fortunate communities, squatter camps, different institutions etc. She was still an active serving member of a church and was working full time as well, but it has always been her passion and desire to assist and minister to the less fortunate – even though they weren’t part of the actual church she was a part of. Then in 2009, she started serving and ministering with her husband, Dirk Coetzee. They started with an initiative to provide the individuals living on the streets with a plate of food, both on Friday and Saturday evenings. In this time, they kept their involvement with the different squatter camps etc. In her free time Pastor Martie then also started with counselling in various squatter camps and less fortunate areas in the Northern side of Pretoria. During this time, they stayed connect and serving in their own church community and environment as well but they still had the desire and passion to provide for and assist individuals outside of their church “boundaries” and they felt, and to this day still feel, that no-one should be turned away if in need of help, irrespective of their churchly orientation and or involvement. With the COVID19 lockdown, the need for both food parcels and spiritual food rose significantly. As Love Upon Grace is situated on a small holding, in the Haakdoornboom area, it came to pass that some of the community members started gathering, when restrictions allowed, everyday – from Monday’s to Saturday’s to receive the Word of God. These gatherings were held on several of the small holdings in the area. Then, when the restrictions were lifted completely – the members and individuals in the community felt the need to still receive the Word – as they have been. It was then decided that there would be a gathering every Friday night – at the premises of African Mission – where Pastor Martie and Dirk stays. These evening would comprise of Worship, Word ministry and then fellowship. The first Friday night gathering at these premises were actually held under a tree! From there we “moved” to gathering in front of one of the buildings on the premises and from there we “moved” to a dining room! After we held our fist camp, people started noticing our efforts and then the Lord provided a tent! Someone just phoned us one day and indicated that they would like to make a monetary donation in order for us to purchase the tent! We then erected the tent and our Friday gatherings just went from strength to strength! As we grew, the members started asking if we could not perhaps also have a gathering (service if you want) on Sundays. We then emphasized that we are not a church but merely gathering on Fridays to have fellowship. After a lot of thought went into this, we decided to not close the door on people and we then decided to also “open” our door on Sundays to welcome whosoever wanted to attend and have fellowship and worship with us. The first Sunday morning we were a mere 7! We’ve since grown and grown and we are extremely grateful towards the Lord! The initial vision was to register our ministry – Love Upon Grace – as an NPC so that we could gather and ask for donations for essential food items to distribute amongst the needy as we’ve seen that people are a bit hesitant to donate, in whichever way, to a “company” that does not have the necessary NPC / NPO numbers. We can with a thankful heart now say that we are a successful ministry. We are ministering the Word 7 days a week via FB live. During the week (Monday to Thursday) we have a different pastor every night that brings Word via FB live ; Friday nights we have our gatherings and fellowship at The Tent ( live via FB as well) and on Saturday mornings, we have Pastor Dominic that brings the Word @ Men @ 08:00. On Sunday mornings we then have our service at 09:00 (live via FB as well) We’ve since then started with having a number of Women’s and Men’s camps – which is always a huge blessing! Our vision and mission is starting to become more and more of a reality with each day as we strive to make a difference in the lives of those whom need it the most, be it physical or spiritual! We strive to not see people differently, irrespective of their appearance and or background – we strive to LOOK differently! We strive for Mark 16:15; to not only read and believe it – but to LIVE it!