Last week was the first chance for our outreach team to work and serve together. Last week was Church Serving Week. Basically, what this means is that all the students are split into our outreach teams and we’re assigned a church somewhere on the south island to serve for a week. We were sent to Rangiora Baptist Church (only about 20 mintues away). So of the other teams were sentfar north or south (6 hours away) to work at churches and camps. Everyone’s work varied from moving rocks, painting, mowing, construction, playing games with kids, running Bible studies, cleaning, landscaping, etc. Our team was in charge of painting the Youth House next to the church. THis building had a few offices, a prayer room and a huge youth hang-out space with “graveyard furniture” (old crappy looking furniture). We spent the whole preping, scraping, taping, painting walls, doors, doorframes AND a mural in the youth hang-out. Christine is one of the students on our team and she is an amazing artist. She incorporated the church youth group’s vision statement into a beautiful, three-wall mural. She drew the mural out and told us where to paint what color. We spent the entire week painting in it and it is beautiful. Here’s a link to photos I’ve posted online. I didn’t get a shot of the finished mural (I forgot my camera on the last day…dumb) but you can see the progression.
http://umt.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2043978&l=016c1&id=23502342
While we were at Church Serving Week, we stayed with a family from the church. Sue and Layton Baker. They had a huge house with 12 rooms, on about 10 acres of land. We were right next to a huge apple orchard and they gave us heaps of fresh apples and apple juice. They had a newly retired race horse on their proprty names Tilly. She was a very sweet and gentle horse and I loved to go down and feed her apples. She loved the attention. Since we had so many rooms in the house, we each had our own room. It’s the first time I’ve had my own room since I’ve been here and it was definately a blessing. I’ve been sleeping in a sleeping bag in an uncomfortable bed where I can feel the slats beneath me. A whole week in a huge bed with sheets was AMAZING! it’s awesome how a small blessing can make such a huge difference. The family had four kids and the two younger boys (12 and 15years old) made us pancakes one morning. THey were always hanging arounf trying to help clean-up and do dishes. We had our own space upstairs with a kitchen and livng area. It was wonderful to cook our own meals, I’ve missed that. Basically, it was awesome that we were there to bless the church through painting and this family was blessing us right back! Oh, cool thing about the mural. We found out at then end of the week that the youth pastor, Grant, had been praying for an artist to come to the church and do something in the Youth House. He had just been to a youth pastor conference
that talked about having your surroundings inspiring so that you can inspire the youth. That’s why he was repainting his office in the first place. When we got there and saw the furniture graveyard room and how grundgy it looked, we asked if they wanted something special done. It was exactly what he had been praying about. The room is now an inspriation to him and the youth! I love how God works!
It’s a little bit hard to be back in lectures again after a joyful week off. Our speaker this week is Hank. He’s originally from the Netherlands but has lived in New Zealand now for forty years. He is lecturing about the Deity of Christ and the Holy Spirit. He spent the first fews days explaining what Jesus claimed about himself and describing his authority. Now we’re moving on to the Holy Spirit. We’ve discussed the Holy SPirit’s presence in the Old Testament, the Gospels, the general characteristics of the Holy Spirit and how it all fits in with the trinity. To be honest, the Holy Spirit is not something that I usually understand, search after or pray to. However, I feel like I beginning to understand His purpose and desiring more of Him in my relationship with God and Jesus. There has been a lot of talk here about the Holy Spirit and how He moves. I’ve been pretty confused since the first week…I don’t come from a church that openly shows or talks about the Hily SPirit. I know that there are charasmatic churches out there, but I never understood them. I’ve talked with a lot of people, heard a few lectures on it, prayed about and questoned God. I’m still trying to formulate an idea of what I believe. So far, from what I understand: When we are saved (when we turn our lives over to Jesus and ask for the forgiveness of our sin) we recieve the Holy Spirit. Totally, 100% Holy Spirit filled. This filling of the spirit is for me. He guides me, encourages me, teaches me, is my helper, etc. However, there is another annointing (or filling) of the Holy SPirit that comes from what’s called “Holy Spirit Baptism” This Holy Spirit is totally for other people. That’s where you have people that propeshy, speak in tongues, discern spirits, speak wisdom into people’s lives, etc. These spiritual gifts are for helping other people. I still don’t understand all about how that works…but it gives me a better understanding. We have one more day talking about the Holy Spirit. I think we will talk about our spiritual gifts tomorrow! Well.. that’s what’s happening down here. I have three more weeks left until Thailand!!!
