Christmas Time is Here!

So it is Christmas week! How bizarre is that??? Christmas decorations are everywhere and we are all trying to get into the Christmas spirit. We watched "How the Grinch Stole Christmas" this week which helped a little . . . but since we were watching it outside on our patio because our house was like a sauna from the heat of the day some of the Christmas spirit was lost in translation. However I am happy to announce that I finally found some Christmas lights this week! People just do not put up Christmas lights in this area of Perth and after seeing one house with Christmas light a couple of weeks ago, I realized I was missing them since EVERYONE puts up Christmas lights at home and makes everything look so pretty. But my outreach leader Elisha took me to a neighbourhood nearby where there were a ton of Christmas lights so I was happier to see that!

As well as preparing for Christmas, we also had our commissioning night this week. Everyone got really dressed up and we had a formal sitdown dinner complete with people to serve us food (which by the way was fantastically delicious). It was a nice time of celebrating what God had done in each of the schools during lecture phase and then all of the schools got up on stage and the leadership team here on base prayed for us and commissioned us to go out into the nations. It was a very nice night though I would just like to say that pretty much everyone here treated the night like prom so came in really nice fancy dresses and fancy hairstyles and everything. I on the other hand dressed in the nicest clothes I brought and just looked like I was going to church. I looked nice of course, but felt very out of place next to all the "prom-goers." But it's fine . . . lots of people went out and bought new dresses for this, but I don't how they are planning on getting the dress home/keeping them nice for the next 3 months of outreach! So I may not have looked as fancy, but I was far more practical!

In terms of lectures this week, we had an amazing time. The topic of the week was Spiritual Warfare/Freedom in Christ and our speaker was one of the base founders, Peter Brownhill. He did an amazing job of introducing us to the topic of Spiritual Warfare and I found the topic fascinating. It is an area that a lot of people ignore because they do not want to acknowledge or deal with the spiritual rhelm, but the reality is there is a constant spiritual battle waging and it is better to be informed and equipped to deal with it rather than ignore it all and plead ignorance. So I found the week enlightening and interesting, and it is definitely a topic I would like to continue to learn more about.

As far as prayer goes, my outreach team still needs quite a bit of prayer . . . we still don't know where we are going/what we are doing for the first week and a half of outreach and we are supposed to leave in a week and a half! So that's interesting. We were supposed to be working with a church in the city (because we are staying in Perth through the month of January so we can be around for the big celebrations at the end of the month to celebrate YWAM's 50th birthday and YWAM Perth's 25th birthday), but the church for whatever reason decided not to take us after all so we have been pursuing other churches and other options, but so far nothing has panned out. We need to move out of our houses by the beginning of January because the January quarter students will need to be moving in, but we have nowhere to live since we don't know what we are doing. So you could definitely be standing with us in prayer about that one! Also there are still people on the school who do not have all the finances they need for outreach. We have seen God move powerfully to bring in the money that has already come in, but we are still short about $23,000 and 3 of our leaders still need a large chunk of finance as well. We are standing together in prayer that God will bring the money in so no one is left behind, but we need as much prayer as possible in this area. Also just be praying that God continues to be preparing our hearts for outreach as it is quickly approaching!

I think that is about it for this week! Next week will be my last regular update as we will be on outreach mode after that I don't know how regular our internet access will be. However I will try to update as frequently as possible to let you all know how outreach is going here in Perth and then on into Mexico City!

Another week in paradise . . . if 40 degree weather is paradise!

It was another fabulous week here in Perth. The temperature is currently 41 degrees Celsius which for all those who have not experienced that before is HOT! I was on car wash duty this morning so am well acquainted with just how hot it is! Let me just say that you know it is going to be a hot one when you wake up sweating at 5:30am because it is so hot in your room! It's good though . . . I think I am getting better acquainted with the heat, but of course that means I will be cold all the time once I come home! Oh well!

We had another exceptionally busy week filled with fundraising, classes, and other adventures. Yesterday a group of friends and I took the train to Fremantle which is on the coast not too far from Perth and enjoyed strolling through the summer markets there. As I already mentioned I was on carwash duty this morning, and on Tuesday our whole school participated in a trash-a-thon and picked up garbage around the city in an attempt to raise money for outreach. I personally picked up 527 pieces of garbage which was the most out of the school . . . I am not referred to as the garbage queen! I was really amazed at how much money some people were able to raise from the trash-a-thon alone . . . one girl raised $3,800 and she had already paid all her outreach fees! It's been really encouraging to see how giving people have been as we have been working together to get our outstanding outreach fees down to $0. It is a slow process, but we have gone from a deficit of $73,000 to about $23,000! We still have some money to raise but we are getting there and are really praying that the money will all come in in time for outreach.

Classes were also really busy this week. We had Jono Turner from New Zealand come to speak to us about the Fatherheart of God. It was a really good week of teaching, but an intense and emotional one as well. Everyone here comes from such different backgrounds some with terrible fathers or no father at all, so the topic of Fatherheart of God can be a painful one and definitely hard to grasp. The focus for this coming week is on Spiritual Warfare and Freedom in Christ which will again be very full, intense, and emotional I'm sure! We have Peter Brownhill speaking to us, and he is one of the base founders as well as quite schooled in these topics, so it should all be really great.

Christmas is fast approaching, and outreach begins right after Christmas so pretty much all our free time is spent preparing for the two of these. My outreach team currently has no information about what we will be doing during our month of outreach here in Perth, which is abnormal for sure! The other 2 outreach teams from our school both know what they are doing at least for their first week of outreach in Perth and one of the teams knows exactly what they will be doing for their whole time in Perth! I know there are people on my team who are really itching to know more about what we will be doing, but I'm okay with it. My biggest concern was the people who would be on my outreach team and I am thrilled about every single person on my team with me, so I am not too concerned about what we will actually be doing. I am somewhat concerned about the heat though! It is only December and it is reaching 40 degree heat! January will be far hotter and we won't have the air conditioned classrooms we are used to. In addition we will probably be out in the sun more during the week, or at the very least in areas of high heat and the heat is just exhausting! So we will all need immense pray covering for energy and protection from the heat and sun here in January. At this point I am far more excited about outreach in Mexico City than here in Perth, but I'm sure what we will be doing in Perth will be great fun as well!

So that's about it for now. We are getting very excited for Christmas around here and many people are itching to get out on outreach. I am excited for outreach but also really enjoying lecture phase too, so I am just enjoying each day for what it is and not looking too far ahead. As always health is an issue in our communal living situation so please continue to be praying for health for our school. And as we prepare for outreach please be lifting up our outreach teams and praying for unity as we begin to bond together and spend more time together.

Pelicans, Penguins, and Carwashes . . . Oh My!

So I just completed a super busy weekend filled with pelicans, penguins, and car washes, so am only now getting a chance to update my blog. You may be curious where the penguins come into play here, so I will tell you. A group of my friends and I headed off to Penguin Island on Saturday for a day of fun in the sun an exploring more of Australia's wildlife! Did you know penguins are native to Australia??? Well I don't actually know if they are native, but there is an island a short train ride from Perth where penguins live during their molting season. So that was pretty sweet! These penguins are actually the world's smallest penguins so they also had a bit of a claim to fame. But I am of the personal opinion that the island should be renamed Pelican Island because there were far more pelicans than penguins around! So that was my Saturday: visiting Penguin Island, getting almost attacked by a pelican, and then coming home in the evening to do some of my homework! Then Sunday was filled with carwashes! Actually we had teams carwashing on Saturday too, but my time slot was Sunday. We are madly trying to fundraise right now to raise finances for outreach. Our money is due on Wednesday and as of this morning we are still short about $68,000, so that is interesting! Prayer for our finances is definitely appreciated right now!

But getting onto the meatier substance of this update I shall fill you in on our topic of the week. This week's topic was The Fear of the Lord and we received amazing teaching from Ari Sloots. It was a great, though challenging, week. Ari was a phenomenal speaker and is in my top three favorites for the whole time I have been here. Probably the most important thing we learned is that fear of the Lord is not being afraid of God, but rather living in reverence of who He is. There are many practical ways this can be demonstrated in our lives and it was encouraging to learn that we need to always be asking for and striving for greater fear of the Lord, so I don't have to feel bad for not having enough because we never will until we get face to face with God in heaven. So the whole week was exceptionally informative and practical and mostly encouraging, though as I already mentioned it was also very challenging!

Outreach details are starting to come together now which is very exciting since we leave for outreach in a little more than 3 weeks which is absolutely crazy! As I already mentioned our biggest concern and point of attention right now is accumulating finances for outreach. We did a weekend full of car washes and are doing a trash-a-thon tomorrow. Individuals are also doing specific things they feel God is calling them to do to see release of finances, and we are making steady progress, but it does seem rather hopeless for the money to come in . . . it is a good thing we don't have to live in hopelessness because we have a God who is an amazingly good Father and provider and while it doesn't seem possible for this to work out in the natural, we serve a God of the supernatural, so we are continuing to press in in faith that God will work this all out!

Christmas is also starting to come together around here right now. We had the base decorating day on Friday so everything is all decked out for Christmas and looks really beautiful. If you ignore the blazing heat outside and constant sunlight it is almost starting to feel like Christmas . . . almost! Luckily there is still a bit of time mentally prepare for an Aussie Christmas! It was be fun, fabuolous, and exciting I'm sure! I think this is about it on my end for now though. Prepare yourself for another outstanding update next weekend as I recount the wonderfulness of our Fatherheart of God week!