Daily Living

This past week we started a "new quarter." We run different schools through out the year here at YWAM Perth. They all have a lecture phase of three months so every three months we get a new batch of students who have come into our various schools. So this April we have 5 schools that are running and they official kicked off last week!

I have been working in our registrar office at the base helping these students get here! My job is answer e-mails, phone calls, and drop in visits of potential students who are enquiring about our different training programs. Over the past few months I have seen and heard so many amazing stories of God speaking to people to come here to Perth.

I had this one girl write me a bout a month ago explaining that God spoke to her in her dream to go to YWAM Perth. She didn't know anything about us or about what it would look like to come. When she        e-mailed me enquiring about our Discipleship Training School she said, " I don't know what this is about but God spoke to come to YWAM Perth. I have a job,  I am 25 years old which is probably to old, but I need to know more about your organization because I think I am supposed to come."

Incredible! She just arrived last week and has started our Media, Arts, and Photography Discipleship Training School. I couldn't believe I was meeting the woman I got to communicate with and help arrive here in Perth. I am so excited for her and to see what God is going to do in her life because of her willingness to say okay I'll drop everything and go because you are worthy. You spoke and I need to obey!

We have had so many incredible stories like this of God speaking to people, doing radical things to confirm His calling in their life and they are here now with us for three months to learn more about Him and allow Him to change their lives!

Apart from work, I have been playing lots! ;) God has recently blessed me with a CAR! Incredible to have wheels after not having them for over four years! I have been able to cruz around Perth in a whole new way exploring the city I am now calling home! Last weekend I was able to take some of my roommates to this little market that runs every sunday morning. We picked up a chest for our lounge room that matched perfectly to our couch for ten dollars!

Last night we had a welcome house party! We have been living in our new house for almost two months now! It was so much fun to have people that we live and work with come over and be able to have a good time in our house! We have a giant back yard that needs people in it!

Here are some pictures just for fun! :)

Market Day

My new Car! 

Happy Driver! Yes coffee in hand! 

At the office! 

With my ministry team - The Rego girls! 

you are blessed to be a blessing.

What's your next step?

I was in class the other day when the guy speaking said "how do I use this gift of free will?" 

I have a gift. A choice. What am I doing with it? Will my choices impact for eternity or will it get me by for today or the next 5 years? 

In the movie Gladiator there is this line "What we do in life echoes in eternity." 

I believe it. I believe God has given us the authority and the choice to live for Him, say Yes to His plans, and be apart of bringing His kingdom Here. Now. To echo for all eternity.

What if someone came to know Jesus because you told them the good news? That would echo in eternity. 

You have a gift. If you believe in Jesus then I ask us, as a church, what are we doing with it? 

Back in the swing...

A time to transition! I came back to Perth after being at home for 3 months and it was full of transition. First off let me say that being at home was amazing. It was three months of good times with family, friends, rest, relaxing, lots of driving, snow, holidays, and so much more! Thank you all you people who met with me and let me fly in and interrupt life for a little bit :)

Transitioning back was much harder than I ever expected! This past month has not been easy or with out challenge but at the same time has been the most rewarding and peaceful time of my life. Yah, doesn't make sense huh?! Jesus helped with that I'm sure.

I started a new job at the base.  I work in our registrar office. My main job is to answer e-mails. Any    e-mail that comes into YWAM Perth comes to me, so I answer all questions or enquires for all our schools and ministries. Or I direct you to the person that knows the answer :)

I also changed houses! This was bitter sweet. I lived in one house for the whole two years I was on staff, and I came back to a fast and furious goodbye to that house and hello to a new one! It is hard work to move a house, especially a house that has 12 girls living in it and only 4 of them were present to help with the move!

The house we moved into was already being rented by YWAM. So it was a mixed of the stuff that was already in the house, with all the stuff that we brought over from our house! It was crazy! I will post pictures and you will see.

We have been settling into our new house slowly. There are lots of fix me up jobs and some security jobs that are in process but it is a great house. We have a GIANT back yard and two lounge rooms. Yes we are spoiled! We have the potential to house 13 girls, with yes still only one bathroom :) At the moment there are 8 of us living here.

More to come...

Here are the pictures!

                                          The Lounge room before

                                           Same room - now! We pulled up that naste blue carpet! Praise the Lord.

     
                                           our back room during the move

                                         Our back room after
                                                                                  

                                           Our lounge room during the move

Our lounge room after

                                              Our entry hallway

                                        This was my master piece! I did this in our backyard one day! I love it! You can't really see but there are mason jars with candles in them, so at night it is great! You could put that on pinterest! =)

 
                                          Our backyard during the move. ugh i know. junk yard!

                                          My housemates ripping up the naste blue carpet!

you are blessed to be a blessing.

Preview

How do I re-cap 8 weeks? All the change, emotion, revelation, and goodness? This school has been so transformational to the way that I view the world. It is about communication - which has been challenging in and of itself, but then there is also the advocacy. The justice and righteousness of God. And the lack of it in the world.

The last few weeks we have completed topics like world view, and writing composition. Doesn't sound to intense, but it was. Diving into our mindsets with the world view week, and the mindsets of the world was eye opening. The differences between having a biblical world view and others like secularism, post modernism, and that of other religions is huge. One of the biggest differences has to do with absolute truth. Swaying away from this truth, provided in God's word, can be a huge weakness and is. We have lost the understanding of upholding to the truth and the weight of it. Things are subjective now, we can be easily swayed and I wonder if christians lacking in truth has something to do with it.

I don't mean to write all bleak and doom, it has just been that is what I have seen for a few weeks, and maybe it is a good reminder to settle deep within me that Jesus is it. He is what we need. He is needed in our understanding truth and people's gifting. There are so many different issues in the world. I have been researching into the area of prostitution. I am writing a research paper on how easy it is for women to be tricked, be mislead, or be forced into prostitution. I am calling it 'the easy transition.' This issue is a big one, and the more I scratch the surface, the more I see we need people. We need people who believe in absolute truth - in the truths that the bible teaches and we need them to use their gifting whether in writing, in speech, in law, in media, in education and in many more areas to bring change.

That is where I get excited. The way that we can be used. The gifting that God has put within us. The things we do in everyday life, that we do well or feel confident in. It doesn't stop there, because then God calls us to do things that we are uncomfortable in, things we don't think we can do, but then Jesus comes in and uses us. The simple saying - we do the possible and God does the impossible. We do the possible in what we know, or what we don't, but have been asked to do then God shows up. In all His glory, majesty, sovereignty, and strength.

There are big problems, so its a good thing that there is an even bigger God.

I have just finished week 8. There are now 4 weeks left. I am excited for what is left for God to teach me.

I will be coming home at the end of the school! So get ready Texas! I will be home on October 5th and this visit will be staying a little over three months! I am so blessed to get a longer visit, and to be home for the holidays! I will make more contact when the time comes closer, but friends and family clear a bit of your schedules! I need to be slotted back into your lives and I have three months to do it!

you are blessed to be a blessing.

6 months marks the beginning...

It is finished. Six months of living life together with 20 complete stranger that very quickly became family. I have said goodbye to the majority of them this week, a few remain, a few will return, but all transformed!

First let's recap India! I spent 4 weeks in hyderabad, India. A place that is starting to feel like an old neighborhood of mine since I have lived there three different times. It was an incredible journey to take 5 people from 3 different nations into a culture they had never experienced. We learned how to eat with our hands, wear the brightest arranges of colors, survive crossing streets, and enjoy people we never thought we would get to meet.

Most of our time we spent working at an HIV/AIDS clinic. It is a place called Nireekshana, which means, in the local language, hope. A deep wellspring of hope that comes in the most desperate of situations. The workers at nireekshana give this hope through their actions and love to the people that come to the clinic. It is a place that over 4,000 patient come to each month to get local check ups, meet with counselors, and receive free medications. We were able to sit with the counselors and pray for patients after listening to their stories. We were also able to be in the kids room playing and getting to know the kids that would come to the clinic.

One of the first weeks we got to pray for a little boy about 8 yrs old. He was going to have to have surgery later that week, because of a skin infection. We prayed, and later that week ended up getting to go on a home visit to the boys house. We found out when we arrive that the boy didn't end up having the surgery! He went to the doctor and the doctor examined him and said he didn't need the surgery anymore, he could go home with just medication! It was very exciting to see God heal, and see the faith it produced in this young family of believers!

We also got to work with the homeless. We started realizing how many homeless people were around, especially our neighborhood. We often had extra food every night after dinner, so we would bag up the food and go out in the afternoons and hang out with the homeless around our street. We got to know three different people and ended up spending time with them every week, sharing about Jesus, sharing stories of life, listening to their stories, and praying for them. It was exciting how God provided a translator every time we needed to speak to someone on the street.

I had a interesting encounter with the mice of india. oh the things you NEVER would have done before and then you lead a team, go to a different country, and all the sudden you are a superhero and can kill anything! bahaha! I am not a tough girl. I am as girly as you get sometimes! I used to hate killing anything and now it seems that I have killed just about everything. (well small bugs, cockroaches, and now mice... not everything!)

So one evening one of my students woke me up at about 2 am because she had just been bitten by a mouse! So i got her settled down and back to sleep. The next day we go and buy these mouse traps that work like this - It is cardboard that gets unfolded and in the middle there is this sticky stuff that catches the mice. We lay out a few of these traps and go to bed. The next morning we caught two mice on this one trap! Except one of the mice had gotten stuck half way on the cardboard trap and half way on our marble floor! So like a good leader, I delegate to my students to scrap the mouse off the ground so we can throw it away! But the students all got chicken and wouldn't do it, so it was right as we needed to head out the door for the day, so in a hurry I grabbed the dust pan and started scrapping this mouse off the floor, except that this mouse was still alive! So as I started scrapping you hear this squeaking! So it's like scrap, squeak, scrap, squeak! Then all my students start screaming and calling me a mouse killer, almost crying! In the end, I was the bad guy for throwing away the mouse!
Oh man... I still can't believe I survived doing that... EWWW!

Okay well there are a few stories. Now here are a few pictures! See more on face book if you want!

Just to mention quickly - I am going to be a student on a school in about 5 days! Yes from leader to student, and back into homework! I am going to do the school of communications and advocacy. It is a three month school, learning about how to communicate, God's heart for communication, and how to be an advocate to bring transformation and change to the world. I am super excited about this school but I can see how it is going to challenge me on lots of fears that I have about communicating personally and publicly. I would love your prayers as I enter into this school, and I still need some finances to complete my schools cost, so if you felt to support me, then you can click here http://www.ywamperth.org.au/007/payonline.asp to give towards my school fees through the website at ywam perth. I have 2400 and I still need around 1600 AUD. Thanks!


you are blessed to be a blessing.

This is our pink house

afternoon tea with the team

the local transport

Part of the clinic we worked at

 We taught about 120 youth/kids one day on intercession and praying

 Out in the old city of hyderabad

 My little friend! He was so cute! 

 The biggest pot of rice I have ever seen! You could have cooked me in that pot! 

 My friend feeding his son!

We headed at a VBS, one of the primary classes.

Okay here is a quick update... statistics from all that God did in London plus a few pictures!

Salvation - 4

instant Healing - 3

One/one evangelism (bringing people closer to Jesus) - 128

times we shared the Gospel - 102

Prayer for need for someone - 91

Mercy ministry (giving out food, helping someone ect) - 89

Evangelistic material given out - 657

Number of people we taught - 115

Hours of teaching - 6.5

Hours of intercession - 27.5

Bibles given - 2

From 10 degrees C to 45 degrees C

Oh !ndia. Here I am again. Round three in my city of hyderabad. A small part of me feels like I could almost claim parts of this city as like my neighborhood because I have come so much. I am excited to be back to the smells, color, and life of India. It was quite a shock to the body though, to go from London 10 degree weather to Hyderabad 45 degree. =) Goodbye rain, Hello sweat! 

So not to jump ahead, lets talk about London! What an experience to live in one of the most influential cities in the world for 7 weeks.  I feel like I just got a taste of the history, culture, and creativity that lies in this city. 

We finished up our time in the city with a bang! We were able to take several churches out into the city to have some pretty epic evangelism times, then we were able still continue to meet new churches and join in with their ministry, and even saw two churches come together for the same evangelism time. (they both have churches on the same major street - so it was exciting to see them join forces for their community and area.) 

One of the best times was one Saturday night. We had a church that got fired up to go out and share Jesus, and do evangelism. They had 45 people that volunteered to come out with us one night. Since we had such a big group of people, we decided to do a flash mob, draw in a crowd, and then do an “open air” (public proclamation) of the gospel and testimonies. This church, despite their nervousness, joined in and were champs doing this silly song that I’m sure you have heard at any american highschool football game... The cheerleaders usually say something like “let me see your ...” and the crowd responds “whats that you say?” then you act out the appropriate actions... 

So our last line for the song is “let me see your dead cockroach” then we respond by all lying on our backs with our hands and feet in the air, waving them franticly like a dead cockroach. Pretty ridiculous, but always a good crowd catcher... People think it is funny to watch you act stupid. 

So after the evangelism time I was talking to the pastor, who is this 50 yr old asian man, thanking him for letting us join in with his church, for his hospitality, trying to be very professional when he inturrpted me saying “did you see me?” I was a bit shocked, and stuttered “um um see you?!” smiling proudly he said, “yea did you see me? I did the dead cockroach!” It was the best moment of the night. This pastor was amazing at leading his church out into the street to show the love of God, but also leading out in how to be a dead cockroach! 

My team and I said goodbye a week ago. I gave up four of my student to other teams and picked up four different students to take a new team to India. Confusing, yea I know. I get confused and I am leading them! =) 

So my new team and I are here back in my neighborhood of hyderabad working with some amazing people at their HIV/AIDs clinic. We are doing things like praying for the patients, playing with the kids, teaching the patients, teaching the staff, praying for the clinic, worship, and some street evangelism. 

We have already seen God show up in might ways. This clinic is an incredible story of how to be obedient to God and serve and love people. The couple that started the clinic are incredibly obedient and just trust. They know God has it all under control. The more I read the promised God has for us, His intention for us in creating us, and how His heart delights in those that draw near to Him, I wonder how I could ever doubt and not trust in Him?! This couple here are such inspiring examples of it, and really challenge me and my words matching up with my life. When talking about God, His character, the plans and purposes He has for me, do I live out of that or am I still trying to do it all on my own?! What a silly way to let the enemy steal from us, to not trust in the magnitude of God - just because sometimes we don’t see it with our eyes. I never saw myself coming to India - here I am again for the third time. 

you are blessed to be a blessing