Couple opens rehab centre for women in Secunda

The Yahweh Rapha Addiction Treatment Centre opened its doors for men on June 1, 2021, and has now opened a centre for women.

Since the women’s centre opened on March 4, they have already admitted three women. The initiators of this centre, Marc and Chantelle-lee Fick, said they found the Lord after struggling with their own addictions.

The couple met Jean du Plessis who was in Secunda that time for contract work, and he became the couple’s mentor towards not just becoming a “Christian”.

He guided them to understand that the Gospel is not just about being saved but to act out the Lord’s mandate set out in Matthew 10:8. That is where “religion” turned into a “relationship” with the Lord.

The couple began to realise that God is Love and therefore they needed to love as well. With Jean’s guidance the couple began reaching out to people living on the streets and prayed for them before they were asked to lead the addiction support group at Lighthouse Church in 2018.

“We realised one man in the support group needed rehabilitation, so we sent him to the Yahweh Rapha Addiction Treatment Centre in Vanderbijlpark,” said Chantelle-lee.

“This man lived on the streets of Secunda for a long time and is HIV+. Doctors said the medication would not work for him anymore, but we kept praying for him and he kept on fighting to stay clean and to proclaim truth in who is in Christ. Today, he is clean, married and has a baby.”

Such success stories and the will to obey the Holy Spirit drive Chantelle-lee and Marc to continue doing what they do.

“Before we opened the centre between Secunda and Evander, we sent many men to the one in Vanderbijlpark. Marc still said he never wants to open a rehabilitation centre, because it takes a lot out of you emotionally, physically and spiritually.”

However God had other plans, and without planning it the Holy Spirit put it in Marc and Chantelle-lee’s hearts to actually open a rehabilitation centre.

“Marc called Gary Mortimer, whois the owner of the centre in Vanderbijlpark, and told him what we had experienced. He said it answered his prayers because he prayed for someone else to open a centre in a different town.”

Abby Beukes is Chantelle-lee’s right hand at the centre, and her background working as a youth leader at the church equipped her to work with recovering addicts.

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This women’s centre can house 40 women, and they are planning for a gym, which already has twee treadmills and also, at a later stage, a hairdresser.

“This is a community project with several churches, businesses and individuals involved,” said Chantelle-lee.

These centres survive on donations, and the addicts’ families who can afford it pay for their recovery programmes.

Those struggling with addiction who do not have any family to sponsor them financially, depend on the centre’s management to find them sponsors via churches, businesses or individuals who want to reach out.

Part of the recovery programme is to help those who complete it to set up their CVs and help them find jobs.
The Yahweh Rapha Addiction Treatment Centre is a registered NPO.

Marc took a leap of faith and resigned from his full-time job for involvement at the centre, also on a full-time basis.

Chantelle-lee works part time and invests the rest of her time at the centre. She invites anyone interested to the support group on Thursday nights that still runs at the Lighthouse Church. For more information or to support the centres, call Chantelle-lee on 082 602 1561.

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