WELL!! Hasn't this been a fun journey!!
I am officially leaving my little, beautiful and cow infested home here in Matamata at 1am on Friday night!! Yup thats right! We like to do things the unconventional way :) it's gonna be legit!! driving up to Auckland in time for a 6am flight! FLIP I can't believe it.... I'm LEAVING!!!
I've had to take all of my pictures off the walls... put everything back into my suitcases and try and cram everything that I'm going to need for the next two months into a SMALL pack... bahaha packing is NOT my forte...
Although I'm super excited (and a tad SCARED) of what's up ahead for the next two months... I'm also super sad.... :( This is literally the last time we (This little YWAM family) will ever be living together.... I mean we do come back for a week together after outreach... but that will be more like a holiday then legit living together.... AND THEN after that.... who knows??! They're all going back to like Germany... and Canada... and the US... and The Netherlands... and other stupidly far away places like that!
Arrrg! It hit my the other day when I was looking around at everyone... I love them ALL so SO much!! aaaaaaarrrrh!! I have a feeling there are going to be a lot of tears happening at 1am on Friday night....
Cottage 5 is having a little party this evening... :) we're going to buy a lot of tasties and put all the mattresses on the floor in our room and have a little sleepover and dance party in our now foreign looking cottage...
I love those girls... Like actually! Hahaha they are all sooo funny :p we've had such good times!!
You know that you've got to the sister stage when you can pee comfortably while still holding a conversation with the others who are still in the room... and I'm glad to say that we are at that stage hahaha!
Man... I'm in such a sentimental mood... I just want to go up to everyone and tell them how much I love them!! ARRG! Also I really need to shave my legs... but I think my razor is packed... AARRG!
It's hard...
But God is still ever so faithful....
And I know that I can totally trust Him with all of my relationships with everyone here! It's cool... He's just been bringing me back to the realization that He's my Daddy... He is and will continue to care for me! It's mot me going out to face to whole world by myself... No... He's holding my hand and will provide everything that I need for every situation! Thankyou God!!
We went star tipping the other night... Mwahahaha!! Most of you reading will have NO idea what this is... BUT YOU WAIT! Everyone who is with me while the stars are out will know what this is when I get back!!
Anyway.... Soooo When I'm overseas I'm not allowed to use my current email address... because I have previously sent emails containing lots of talking about YWAM and God and stuff... which is NOT allowed in the place that I'm going! Sooooo I've created a new email address to use while I'm over there... So flick me an email or a message on Facebook with your email if you want to keep in contact with me... because I won't be able to use this blog or Facebook either while I'm over there...
BUT!! It's really important that if you email me that you don't say anything about God, or missions or YWAM or Christianity or anything like that!! So all emails I sent have to be really vague and with lots of hidden meanings... and the same if you email me!
For exmaple... I could say something like... "I've had an awesome day hanging out with our Dad... He helped us catch a lot of fish!"
Rather than... " Lots of people were saved today and God's power was really moving through us!"
You get the drift... It's SUPER important coz it could put the people we'll be staying with in danger...
Yup... So I geuss this is goodbye for the next two months my stalkers.... I'll catch you later...!
Peace out.
Wednesday, 21 November 2012
Sunday, 18 November 2012
Weddings, Haircuts and Faith Weekends
Hello all....
I think I can honestly say that I am a very different person since I last wrote on this blog! even though it was only a few days ago.... SO MUCH HAS HAPPENED!
So... lets start with Friday....
Wow....
We had a 'tabernacle' day! We're basically we started at nine am and finished at like 11 pm... and went through the old testament tabernacle but in a new testament way... if that makes sense...
Basically this day was about completely getting rid of anything that comes before God in your life... It was a radical day of saying "God.... You can have ALL of me! Have your way in my life! I WILL go wherever, speak whatever and do whatever you want me too.... I will follow you wherever you go!"
It was incredible! We started off with a time a just praising God! and it was WILD! There is something amazing about 20 young people who are ALL madly in love with Jesus praising God with everything that is within them that is just amazing! We were all asked to bring things that we could praise God with.... it was saweet! and do you want to know the crazy thing??!!
Wait for it...
Like 3 people had a word from God that God wanted to recreate a wedding for me!! So Hannah D comes up to me and is like "Hannah! You are getting married right now!" Someone had brought a whole lot of flowers along and had decorated the cross with them at the center of the room, and someone had made a bouquet for me... I was just bawling!! Like seriously... WHAT??!! God... in all His perfectness has chosen ME to be His bride??!! It get's me every time!! So I walked down the aisle towards Jesus and just fell on my knees at the cross... There was nothing else I could do! Flip God is amazing!!
We also had this super powerful time of confession! Where we all basically completely laid out all of our sin for everyone to see.. and got rid of it! Lots of people gave stuff away or burned stuff... Anything that got in the way of God!! So yeah... there was a lot of laying stuff down for God...
One of the things that God has been laying on my heart for a while was my hair... if think in a lot of ways I hide behind my hair! and actually a lot of my identity was wrapped up in it! "Oh... Hannah! The girl with the beautiful long hair!" And every time I went to cut it, someone always talked me out of it... so in a way it was also a form of people pleasing I think... so yeah... and at first God kind of put cutting my hair of in my mind and the first thing that went through my mind was "NO... boys won't find my attractive if I have short hair!" Anyway... as soon as this thought went through my mind I knew that I had to cut it off! So... it took I while to actually convince myself but I did it! So did Steph and Elisa... we cut our ponytails off... and it felt SOOO freeing!! ARRRG!
Thankyou Jesus! So basically we spent the whole of Friday just worshiping God with everything in us! and declaring that we will be men and women of FAITH! It was sweet...
ANYWAY! So we get up on Saturday... and have breakfast... and get put into teams... but not told what they are for... I get put with Steph and Jacob... which was AWWEESSSOOMME! then we get told to go and get warm clothes on, good walking shoes, a rain coat, and per team one bible, one camera and a pen. We were told NOT to bring: a bag... a phone... and ipod... ANY money of any kind... or anything like that....
So we go and get all this stuff together in total ignorance...hahaha.... Then we get told to pray as a team and hop into one of the three vans... So we do... and get handed a bag with a packet of uncooked pasta, 2 sanitary pads and a mysterious envelope inside!!
We are then driven to Rotarua and told to hope out of the van and open the envelope... then the van leaves...
Hahahahaha!! So me and Jacob and Steph get out of the van... and this is what the sheet of paper inside the envelope basically said...
"Welcome to Faith weekend!!
You've made all kinds of commitment to God yesterday and now it's time to put them into practice! Just be back at the base by 5.30 tomorrow, be open and have a great weekend!"
We just all crack up laughing.... for a long time!!
So here we are... in Rotarua with NO money... NO food.... NO shelter...NO transport aaaaannnd.... We've got to totally trust that God will provide!
aaaannnd he did!! To cut a long story short, we ran into a random but awesome church doing an outreach... and had the opportunity to lead a worship session in the middle of town! Then got invited into this awesome group of friends home for dinner... had another worship sesh... then got offered a place to sleep by this AWESOME couple! Who were just soooo hospitable! Then got given money for lunch the next day by this random guy at the church of the couple we stayed with!! Then got driven around town to go sight seeing with them! AND then... a guy even insisted on driving us all the way back to MATAMATA this afternoon!!
hahaha... we just spent the whole time being like "WHAT?! is this actually happening?!"
BUT basically... GOD PROVIDES!!! arrrrg... it was incredible....
annnd tbh I can't be bothered writing anymore right now coz I'm tired... :p
BUT I love you :)
I think I can honestly say that I am a very different person since I last wrote on this blog! even though it was only a few days ago.... SO MUCH HAS HAPPENED!
So... lets start with Friday....
Wow....
We had a 'tabernacle' day! We're basically we started at nine am and finished at like 11 pm... and went through the old testament tabernacle but in a new testament way... if that makes sense...
Basically this day was about completely getting rid of anything that comes before God in your life... It was a radical day of saying "God.... You can have ALL of me! Have your way in my life! I WILL go wherever, speak whatever and do whatever you want me too.... I will follow you wherever you go!"
It was incredible! We started off with a time a just praising God! and it was WILD! There is something amazing about 20 young people who are ALL madly in love with Jesus praising God with everything that is within them that is just amazing! We were all asked to bring things that we could praise God with.... it was saweet! and do you want to know the crazy thing??!!
Wait for it...
Like 3 people had a word from God that God wanted to recreate a wedding for me!! So Hannah D comes up to me and is like "Hannah! You are getting married right now!" Someone had brought a whole lot of flowers along and had decorated the cross with them at the center of the room, and someone had made a bouquet for me... I was just bawling!! Like seriously... WHAT??!! God... in all His perfectness has chosen ME to be His bride??!! It get's me every time!! So I walked down the aisle towards Jesus and just fell on my knees at the cross... There was nothing else I could do! Flip God is amazing!!
We also had this super powerful time of confession! Where we all basically completely laid out all of our sin for everyone to see.. and got rid of it! Lots of people gave stuff away or burned stuff... Anything that got in the way of God!! So yeah... there was a lot of laying stuff down for God...
One of the things that God has been laying on my heart for a while was my hair... if think in a lot of ways I hide behind my hair! and actually a lot of my identity was wrapped up in it! "Oh... Hannah! The girl with the beautiful long hair!" And every time I went to cut it, someone always talked me out of it... so in a way it was also a form of people pleasing I think... so yeah... and at first God kind of put cutting my hair of in my mind and the first thing that went through my mind was "NO... boys won't find my attractive if I have short hair!" Anyway... as soon as this thought went through my mind I knew that I had to cut it off! So... it took I while to actually convince myself but I did it! So did Steph and Elisa... we cut our ponytails off... and it felt SOOO freeing!! ARRRG!
Thankyou Jesus! So basically we spent the whole of Friday just worshiping God with everything in us! and declaring that we will be men and women of FAITH! It was sweet...
ANYWAY! So we get up on Saturday... and have breakfast... and get put into teams... but not told what they are for... I get put with Steph and Jacob... which was AWWEESSSOOMME! then we get told to go and get warm clothes on, good walking shoes, a rain coat, and per team one bible, one camera and a pen. We were told NOT to bring: a bag... a phone... and ipod... ANY money of any kind... or anything like that....
So we go and get all this stuff together in total ignorance...hahaha.... Then we get told to pray as a team and hop into one of the three vans... So we do... and get handed a bag with a packet of uncooked pasta, 2 sanitary pads and a mysterious envelope inside!!
We are then driven to Rotarua and told to hope out of the van and open the envelope... then the van leaves...
Hahahahaha!! So me and Jacob and Steph get out of the van... and this is what the sheet of paper inside the envelope basically said...
"Welcome to Faith weekend!!
You've made all kinds of commitment to God yesterday and now it's time to put them into practice! Just be back at the base by 5.30 tomorrow, be open and have a great weekend!"
We just all crack up laughing.... for a long time!!
So here we are... in Rotarua with NO money... NO food.... NO shelter...NO transport aaaaannnd.... We've got to totally trust that God will provide!
aaaannnd he did!! To cut a long story short, we ran into a random but awesome church doing an outreach... and had the opportunity to lead a worship session in the middle of town! Then got invited into this awesome group of friends home for dinner... had another worship sesh... then got offered a place to sleep by this AWESOME couple! Who were just soooo hospitable! Then got given money for lunch the next day by this random guy at the church of the couple we stayed with!! Then got driven around town to go sight seeing with them! AND then... a guy even insisted on driving us all the way back to MATAMATA this afternoon!!
hahaha... we just spent the whole time being like "WHAT?! is this actually happening?!"
BUT basically... GOD PROVIDES!!! arrrrg... it was incredible....
annnd tbh I can't be bothered writing anymore right now coz I'm tired... :p
BUT I love you :)
Tuesday, 13 November 2012
FLIP flip FLIIIP
Hellllooooo my stalkers!
Sorry... that was a bizarre start to this blog entry... BUT this has been a bizarre week!! Last week was absolute madness!!
Firstly... WE GOT THE VISA's TO THE OUTREACH LOCATION THAT I"M NOT ALLOWED TO TALK ABOUT!! :D
I'm actually so stoked! Myyy goodness! It was a legit miracle how it happened... especially for Kyle... (who is American) and this means that generally they have a hard time getting visa's to the place we are going! BUT he got one! :D PRAISE GOD!!
THEN we had this thing that the boys did for us, then on Thursday we had a little base concert where all the music and worship students and staff performed their songs... AND THEN the weekend was spent at a recording studio in Hamilton recording our songs!! So the week was also very full of practicing and writing and singing and stuff!!
My song is called "Not my Love Song"... basically because it's not my love song! I went to try and write a love song to God that expressed how much he means to me, but I couldn't find the words to express it... and then God kind of gave me the revelation that he's singing over me! and that's totally His merciful and gracious love!
Here are the lyrics:
I just want to write You a love song that conveys
Just how much You mean to me
But I can't find the words to say
Then something incredible occurs
That in my mess I don't deserve
The God who died for me
Could sing a song of love over me
CHORUS:
"You are my princess
All beautiful you are to me
You are my bride
Come away, come away with me"
What is this love so faithful in spite of me
There's only one thing left for me to do
I kneel before You my King
Then something incredible occurs
As I'm kissing the feet of the one who set me free
The God who died for me
Would gladly choose to say to me
CHORUS
And there's nothing I can give that's worth anything to You
Yet You exchange these ashes for Your beauty
Yeah, there's nothing I can give that's worth anything to You
Yet You exchange these ashes for Your beauty
And the God who died for me
Would gladly sing to me...
CHORUS
And THAT is basically the whole song! Just imagine a little bit of guitar in there... some beautiful box drum percussion played by the spectacular Jacob! Aaaannnd some ravishing violin played be the incredible Elisa and you have it!!
So Yeah... through all the hectic-ness of last week, God was still revealing Himself to me in His beautiful loving nature !
Basically he was telling me stuff about my identity in Him.... and about the plans that He has for me and the journey that we've got together... God is so good! haha and knows me SOOO well... He actually took me on a walk! Showing me this little river walk that I've never noticed before.. God told me to go on this walk... So I did! Some of the part were so beautiful! Some where muddy (and I was wearing Marit's shoes... DANG it!) and there was one interesting part where I thought I was going to fall off the bank into the river!! But I got to the end and came into this beautiful field with long grass and this spectacular sunshine shining golden through the trees! I felt God say to me (super clearly!) This is what your journey with me is going to look like! There will be parts where God is so evident and beautiful! and parts where you legitimately question whether you are doing the will of God (muddy!) and some parts that are just down right scary!! But God told me that in the end it will be beautiful! and that He will be with me all along the road! to TRUST Him!!
So yeah... that was awesome! Myyyy goodness... And other stuff like that!!
BUT THIS WEEK... myy word!! God has been convicting me like crazy! We have Mark Parker speaking on the Lordship of Christ and God is mooovvviinng! Today... Matt K had a picture for me of a hedgehog... it was in ball and birds were trying to peck at it, and it was going tighter and tighter into this ball... Then God said "Open up and reveal the underside" So the hedgehog rolled over and revealed it's soft unprotected belly and the birds were about to try and attack it, but then the power of God came and just destroyed the birds...
It sounds kind of weird... but this picture had me in tears....
This is basically what God is doing in me at the moment... I feel like there is all this stuff on the inside of me that I don't let people see... Sin and fears and attitudes which I'm so scared that people will judge me for and that I'll be hurt or destroyed or stomped to the ground if I show... But God is challenging me... bit by bit... to lay myself down... to be vulnerable and completely open even if that person (which it is!!) is totally broken and scared and so NOT perfect!
So yeah.. God is in the process of bringing things into my heart which I would normally keep to myself and getting me to confess them publicly... Which is actually the most humbling thing! And means that these walls are in the process of crumbling down! Thankyou Lord! I want to be in absolute and complete surrender to God... All my rights and entitlements and will and everything! That is basically what this week is about... which is a mixture of scary and ... BRING IT ON GOD!!
We leave for outreach in ten days......
AAHHH!
What??!!
WHAT!!!??
I still don't even have all of my fees!!
the time is going way too fast!
The pity is... is that while I'm overseas I'm not allowed to update this blog where I'm going, so It will appear that I've disappeared off the face of the earth for a couple of months.... Sorry.
But that's not for another ten days... so lets just enjoy this time together :)
Peace out
Sorry... that was a bizarre start to this blog entry... BUT this has been a bizarre week!! Last week was absolute madness!!
Firstly... WE GOT THE VISA's TO THE OUTREACH LOCATION THAT I"M NOT ALLOWED TO TALK ABOUT!! :D
I'm actually so stoked! Myyy goodness! It was a legit miracle how it happened... especially for Kyle... (who is American) and this means that generally they have a hard time getting visa's to the place we are going! BUT he got one! :D PRAISE GOD!!
THEN we had this thing that the boys did for us, then on Thursday we had a little base concert where all the music and worship students and staff performed their songs... AND THEN the weekend was spent at a recording studio in Hamilton recording our songs!! So the week was also very full of practicing and writing and singing and stuff!!
My song is called "Not my Love Song"... basically because it's not my love song! I went to try and write a love song to God that expressed how much he means to me, but I couldn't find the words to express it... and then God kind of gave me the revelation that he's singing over me! and that's totally His merciful and gracious love!
Here are the lyrics:
I just want to write You a love song that conveys
Just how much You mean to me
But I can't find the words to say
Then something incredible occurs
That in my mess I don't deserve
The God who died for me
Could sing a song of love over me
CHORUS:
"You are my princess
All beautiful you are to me
You are my bride
Come away, come away with me"
What is this love so faithful in spite of me
There's only one thing left for me to do
I kneel before You my King
Then something incredible occurs
As I'm kissing the feet of the one who set me free
The God who died for me
Would gladly choose to say to me
CHORUS
And there's nothing I can give that's worth anything to You
Yet You exchange these ashes for Your beauty
Yeah, there's nothing I can give that's worth anything to You
Yet You exchange these ashes for Your beauty
And the God who died for me
Would gladly sing to me...
CHORUS
And THAT is basically the whole song! Just imagine a little bit of guitar in there... some beautiful box drum percussion played by the spectacular Jacob! Aaaannnd some ravishing violin played be the incredible Elisa and you have it!!
So Yeah... through all the hectic-ness of last week, God was still revealing Himself to me in His beautiful loving nature !
Basically he was telling me stuff about my identity in Him.... and about the plans that He has for me and the journey that we've got together... God is so good! haha and knows me SOOO well... He actually took me on a walk! Showing me this little river walk that I've never noticed before.. God told me to go on this walk... So I did! Some of the part were so beautiful! Some where muddy (and I was wearing Marit's shoes... DANG it!) and there was one interesting part where I thought I was going to fall off the bank into the river!! But I got to the end and came into this beautiful field with long grass and this spectacular sunshine shining golden through the trees! I felt God say to me (super clearly!) This is what your journey with me is going to look like! There will be parts where God is so evident and beautiful! and parts where you legitimately question whether you are doing the will of God (muddy!) and some parts that are just down right scary!! But God told me that in the end it will be beautiful! and that He will be with me all along the road! to TRUST Him!!
So yeah... that was awesome! Myyyy goodness... And other stuff like that!!
BUT THIS WEEK... myy word!! God has been convicting me like crazy! We have Mark Parker speaking on the Lordship of Christ and God is mooovvviinng! Today... Matt K had a picture for me of a hedgehog... it was in ball and birds were trying to peck at it, and it was going tighter and tighter into this ball... Then God said "Open up and reveal the underside" So the hedgehog rolled over and revealed it's soft unprotected belly and the birds were about to try and attack it, but then the power of God came and just destroyed the birds...
It sounds kind of weird... but this picture had me in tears....
This is basically what God is doing in me at the moment... I feel like there is all this stuff on the inside of me that I don't let people see... Sin and fears and attitudes which I'm so scared that people will judge me for and that I'll be hurt or destroyed or stomped to the ground if I show... But God is challenging me... bit by bit... to lay myself down... to be vulnerable and completely open even if that person (which it is!!) is totally broken and scared and so NOT perfect!
So yeah.. God is in the process of bringing things into my heart which I would normally keep to myself and getting me to confess them publicly... Which is actually the most humbling thing! And means that these walls are in the process of crumbling down! Thankyou Lord! I want to be in absolute and complete surrender to God... All my rights and entitlements and will and everything! That is basically what this week is about... which is a mixture of scary and ... BRING IT ON GOD!!
We leave for outreach in ten days......
AAHHH!
What??!!
WHAT!!!??
I still don't even have all of my fees!!
the time is going way too fast!
The pity is... is that while I'm overseas I'm not allowed to update this blog where I'm going, so It will appear that I've disappeared off the face of the earth for a couple of months.... Sorry.
But that's not for another ten days... so lets just enjoy this time together :)
Peace out
Wednesday, 7 November 2012
The boys...
OH MY GOODNESS!! Well... there has been a lot of stuff going on for me this week.... which I will definitely talk about at a later date! BUT FIRST! I must tell you all about this evening *sigh* while it's fresh in my memory... it was beautiful...
So... two weeks ago, we (the girls) became increasingly aware of some secret collaboration going on between the guys.... and all of us (at some point) got handed a beautiful personalized invite to a dinner... on the 7th of November, with the instructions to dress up fancy.... needless to say we were flattered... yet extremely curious... but no matter how much we pressed them for information, we got nothing...
Anyway... The 7th of November is today... and us girls spent the afternoon curling hair, swapping clothes and doing each others make-up while the boys were mysteriously absent!
Anyway... this is how this evening panned out.... at 5.30 we get a knock on our cottage door... and a very spiffy Rich is standing outside! "Good evening ladies! Your taxi service has arrived!" He then escorts us to the van and drives us the 30 second trip to the A-frame...
We get there and there is a line of dashing boys all dressed up with shirts and pants and ties and stuff.. who help us out of the car and escort us to our seats!!
Flip!! The whole lecture room was filled with candle lit tables.... flowers and each girl had a named seat with a block of chocolate! and there was live music and...Gaaah!
Anyway... so we get a whole evening of being serenaded too with beautiful songs such a One D, songs in French and dutch... and also original's... such as "Woman"... a song by Brent... probably a highlight for me! HILARIOUS! we also got waited on by all of them all evening! with fizzy.. and a beautiful chicken and pasta dish.. and ice-cream sundae's, and coffee... we had poem's said to us, and even a Fijian haka performed for us! we all felt so loved...
It was all so beautiful... they're all such gentlemen!...
*sigh* and THEN they set up a photo booth so we got some good pics, and pushed the tables back and had a DANCE PARTY! which was sweet :)
AND TO FINISH.... we had the last dance... and we all slow danced... it was so sweet :) I got to dance with Van :) it was lovely! he's like my little bro... :)
AND we even got escorted... like PROPERLY escorted back to our cottages! Me and Hannah got escorted by Matt :) it was also lovely!
We all felt so special... like princess! naw... I love them ALL so much! they actually put so much effort in to it! my heart was actually melting... gaaah....
beeeaaauuutttiiifffuuulll......
Catch you laterrrs
So... two weeks ago, we (the girls) became increasingly aware of some secret collaboration going on between the guys.... and all of us (at some point) got handed a beautiful personalized invite to a dinner... on the 7th of November, with the instructions to dress up fancy.... needless to say we were flattered... yet extremely curious... but no matter how much we pressed them for information, we got nothing...
Anyway... The 7th of November is today... and us girls spent the afternoon curling hair, swapping clothes and doing each others make-up while the boys were mysteriously absent!
Anyway... this is how this evening panned out.... at 5.30 we get a knock on our cottage door... and a very spiffy Rich is standing outside! "Good evening ladies! Your taxi service has arrived!" He then escorts us to the van and drives us the 30 second trip to the A-frame...
We get there and there is a line of dashing boys all dressed up with shirts and pants and ties and stuff.. who help us out of the car and escort us to our seats!!
Flip!! The whole lecture room was filled with candle lit tables.... flowers and each girl had a named seat with a block of chocolate! and there was live music and...Gaaah!
Anyway... so we get a whole evening of being serenaded too with beautiful songs such a One D, songs in French and dutch... and also original's... such as "Woman"... a song by Brent... probably a highlight for me! HILARIOUS! we also got waited on by all of them all evening! with fizzy.. and a beautiful chicken and pasta dish.. and ice-cream sundae's, and coffee... we had poem's said to us, and even a Fijian haka performed for us! we all felt so loved...
It was all so beautiful... they're all such gentlemen!...
*sigh* and THEN they set up a photo booth so we got some good pics, and pushed the tables back and had a DANCE PARTY! which was sweet :)
AND TO FINISH.... we had the last dance... and we all slow danced... it was so sweet :) I got to dance with Van :) it was lovely! he's like my little bro... :)
AND we even got escorted... like PROPERLY escorted back to our cottages! Me and Hannah got escorted by Matt :) it was also lovely!
We all felt so special... like princess! naw... I love them ALL so much! they actually put so much effort in to it! my heart was actually melting... gaaah....
beeeaaauuutttiiifffuuulll......
Catch you laterrrs
Saturday, 3 November 2012
In a cafe in Taupo
So... as the name would suggest I am at this moment sitting at a cafe in Taupo!! and have ordered a vanilla latte... my second coffee for the day and it's not lunch time yet! Darn this coffee addiction...
Well it's free weekend this weekend :) and what a weekend it's been! Me and five other lovely ladies decided it would be a fabulous idea to rent a car and just go and chill for a weekend in a tent by lake Taupo and just have a lovely relaxing weekend.... sunbathing by the lake and having a glorious time!
So yesterday, with Marit at the wheel, Steph, Elisa, Rebekka, Hannah and I piled into our rented family van and set sail for TAUPO!! Ha! It's funny how plans change.... :p
So this is basically how our weekend has panned out so far.... we arrive at le campsite and it is pouring with rain and there is a severe southerly blowing... hahaha! we all just cracked up laughing.... soooo in the midst of this we in a big hurry begin to set up the two tents that we rented from the OP shed... only to discover that one of them didn't have a fly! .... HA! more laughter.... as the guy that showed us our tent site and who was waiting patiently for us to sort ourselves out so that we can pay him, gives us that "Wow... you are all obviously completely insane... but harmless so I'll just look at you sympathetically" look....
So to cut a long story short, we spent a nice day browsing the shops in Taupo yesterday... had a lovely date with Rebekka... AND THEN with Hannah :) it was lovely!!
AND Marit, Elisa and Rebekka slept in the van!
THANKGOODNESS for people movers.... that is something I never thought I'd say... but I have a new found appreciation for those things... they have a lot of inner beauty...
We also listened to a LOT of T-Swizzle.
Then this morning we a woke to the beautiful glaze of sunshine streaming into the tent... and the sound of lake taupo licking it's shores... mmmm BEAUTIFUL!! I love God's creation! AND do you want to know something completely profound??!! He created it for US! WHAT?!
Hannah and myself had a revelation of this yesterday as we looked out across the lake with the sun breaking through the clouds and sparkling on the blue.. BLUE water... Man... and as Hannah said "SO much better then a bunch of roses"
I had tears running down my cheeks... AGAIN! I don't think I've ever cried as much as I do... ALL THE TIME at Dts...
Anyway... after a lovely breakfast I am now sitting in a cafe... about to go and meet up with the others again... and we're gonna go SWIMMING!! maybe... We'll see! :P
God's about to start doing something crazy in me again... I can feel it... he's starting to highlight even more areas in my life which he's got to sort out... I am so BROKEN! it's crazy... But allll good! God's got it!
I'll tell you more about this at another date! God bless!
Well it's free weekend this weekend :) and what a weekend it's been! Me and five other lovely ladies decided it would be a fabulous idea to rent a car and just go and chill for a weekend in a tent by lake Taupo and just have a lovely relaxing weekend.... sunbathing by the lake and having a glorious time!
So yesterday, with Marit at the wheel, Steph, Elisa, Rebekka, Hannah and I piled into our rented family van and set sail for TAUPO!! Ha! It's funny how plans change.... :p
So this is basically how our weekend has panned out so far.... we arrive at le campsite and it is pouring with rain and there is a severe southerly blowing... hahaha! we all just cracked up laughing.... soooo in the midst of this we in a big hurry begin to set up the two tents that we rented from the OP shed... only to discover that one of them didn't have a fly! .... HA! more laughter.... as the guy that showed us our tent site and who was waiting patiently for us to sort ourselves out so that we can pay him, gives us that "Wow... you are all obviously completely insane... but harmless so I'll just look at you sympathetically" look....
So to cut a long story short, we spent a nice day browsing the shops in Taupo yesterday... had a lovely date with Rebekka... AND THEN with Hannah :) it was lovely!!
AND Marit, Elisa and Rebekka slept in the van!
THANKGOODNESS for people movers.... that is something I never thought I'd say... but I have a new found appreciation for those things... they have a lot of inner beauty...
We also listened to a LOT of T-Swizzle.
Then this morning we a woke to the beautiful glaze of sunshine streaming into the tent... and the sound of lake taupo licking it's shores... mmmm BEAUTIFUL!! I love God's creation! AND do you want to know something completely profound??!! He created it for US! WHAT?!
Hannah and myself had a revelation of this yesterday as we looked out across the lake with the sun breaking through the clouds and sparkling on the blue.. BLUE water... Man... and as Hannah said "SO much better then a bunch of roses"
I had tears running down my cheeks... AGAIN! I don't think I've ever cried as much as I do... ALL THE TIME at Dts...
Anyway... after a lovely breakfast I am now sitting in a cafe... about to go and meet up with the others again... and we're gonna go SWIMMING!! maybe... We'll see! :P
God's about to start doing something crazy in me again... I can feel it... he's starting to highlight even more areas in my life which he's got to sort out... I am so BROKEN! it's crazy... But allll good! God's got it!
I'll tell you more about this at another date! God bless!
Thursday, 1 November 2012
Horses
Heya!!
Sooo what else has been going on?? WELL this week is about RELATIONSHIPS! woooohhh! aaaalll types of relationships! Family, Friendships etc .....AND good old Rooommmaaannntttiiiiccc ones! ooo lala!
Haha na it's actually really good! I've learnt so much already... flip it's awesome!! We have Josh Cole speaking with us again.. but this time his wife, Misty is speaking too! They are super amazing :)
God (through Johanna) gave me a beautiful flower the other day.... right after I had laid down all of my pride and judgementalness... and asked him to show me how to love others truely! it's funny how he does that! Come and sweep me off my feet with his love when I lay down control once again.... He also said to me "I love you, and I will teach you how to love"
Thankyou Jesus! I love you... falling more and more in love with you everyday!!
mmmmmm!
What else has been crackalacking??!!
Well! yesterday I had a lovely evening! There was a light party at a local church which most of the YWAM fam too... a few of us however, stayed back! So...after helping to cook up a beautiful roast (AND THEN EATING IT!!) it was amazing..... I went into the recording studio to try and record some of my songs and brought Matt with me because I am terrible with anything technological things! aaaannnd then it didn't work! So me and Matt wrote a song about singing instead! then Van joined us and we went on a walk to see the four beautiful horses nearby!! Welll... first we went to nearby shop and brought some ice cream and then we walked HALFWAY to the horses and then walked back because it was getting dark... and talked about the difference between Canadian and New Zealish words... I said Van had bum fluff on his chin and they both cracked up laughing... Apparently.... this is a phrase only truely appreciated in New Zealand...
I love my cottage! they are brilliant!! Marit got a maassiivvee box of german chocolate and she's been sharing with me... I love her! and Steph.... we always seem to end up talking about poo or gas! we have a funny joke about how she is like saturn... full of gas! Ha! it's funny :)
I also had a short but brilliant date with Hannah today :) I love her! I love our Hannah squared dates! I can't find the button on my laptop for the actual squared symbol, being the technophobe that I am, but if I could I would have used it! Last week we went swimming at the hot pools :) it was BEAUTIFUL!
We also had our second outreach prep meeting today :) drama with the visa's! So if you could pray for that, that would be brilliant! BUT I have no doubt that we are going so God will provide :) hahahaha we also had a veerryyy funny game of the whole 'write a phrase, then the next person has to draw that phrase, and then the next person has to write what they see in the picture and soo on...' it was verrryyy funny :) I love my team! Maybe I'll do a team profile next time??!! we'll see...
Oh yeah... I also walked into a pole today and broke my sunglasses... so if you could pray for healing for my glasses that would be appreciated.
I'm kidding... about the healing thing.
Not the walking into a pole thing.
That actually happened!
Anyway... Catch you laterrrr!
Sooo what else has been going on?? WELL this week is about RELATIONSHIPS! woooohhh! aaaalll types of relationships! Family, Friendships etc .....AND good old Rooommmaaannntttiiiiccc ones! ooo lala!
Haha na it's actually really good! I've learnt so much already... flip it's awesome!! We have Josh Cole speaking with us again.. but this time his wife, Misty is speaking too! They are super amazing :)
God (through Johanna) gave me a beautiful flower the other day.... right after I had laid down all of my pride and judgementalness... and asked him to show me how to love others truely! it's funny how he does that! Come and sweep me off my feet with his love when I lay down control once again.... He also said to me "I love you, and I will teach you how to love"
Thankyou Jesus! I love you... falling more and more in love with you everyday!!
mmmmmm!
What else has been crackalacking??!!
Well! yesterday I had a lovely evening! There was a light party at a local church which most of the YWAM fam too... a few of us however, stayed back! So...after helping to cook up a beautiful roast (AND THEN EATING IT!!) it was amazing..... I went into the recording studio to try and record some of my songs and brought Matt with me because I am terrible with anything technological things! aaaannnd then it didn't work! So me and Matt wrote a song about singing instead! then Van joined us and we went on a walk to see the four beautiful horses nearby!! Welll... first we went to nearby shop and brought some ice cream and then we walked HALFWAY to the horses and then walked back because it was getting dark... and talked about the difference between Canadian and New Zealish words... I said Van had bum fluff on his chin and they both cracked up laughing... Apparently.... this is a phrase only truely appreciated in New Zealand...
I love my cottage! they are brilliant!! Marit got a maassiivvee box of german chocolate and she's been sharing with me... I love her! and Steph.... we always seem to end up talking about poo or gas! we have a funny joke about how she is like saturn... full of gas! Ha! it's funny :)
I also had a short but brilliant date with Hannah today :) I love her! I love our Hannah squared dates! I can't find the button on my laptop for the actual squared symbol, being the technophobe that I am, but if I could I would have used it! Last week we went swimming at the hot pools :) it was BEAUTIFUL!
We also had our second outreach prep meeting today :) drama with the visa's! So if you could pray for that, that would be brilliant! BUT I have no doubt that we are going so God will provide :) hahahaha we also had a veerryyy funny game of the whole 'write a phrase, then the next person has to draw that phrase, and then the next person has to write what they see in the picture and soo on...' it was verrryyy funny :) I love my team! Maybe I'll do a team profile next time??!! we'll see...
Oh yeah... I also walked into a pole today and broke my sunglasses... so if you could pray for healing for my glasses that would be appreciated.
I'm kidding... about the healing thing.
Not the walking into a pole thing.
That actually happened!
Anyway... Catch you laterrrr!
Wednesday, 31 October 2012
Beach.Thanksgiving.Beach
Helloooo all my lovely people!!
How are we??!!
I am doing great!! and have had the most spectacular week so far!!
Soooo I said in my last blog that I would let you know a bit more about the spiritual warfare lectures that we've had this week... so here we go!!
We had Beryl speaking this week... maaan such a Spirit filled, powerful woman of God!!
And basically she was talking about Spiritual Warfare and kind of giving us all a lot of insight into the whole "Our struggle is not against flesh and blood but against the rulers and authorities and powers of this dark world..." type of stuff! It was actually really interesting and made a lot of sense... because when you actually look at a situation you can see that often it has a spiritual root!
So we've been doing a lot of stuff like deliverance and stuff this week which is always pretty intense, but so good! We also had some pretty crazy like angelic encounters and stuff! Like one of the girls' (I won't sasy who for privacy reasons) was having some pretty major deliverance, and a lot of us could hear a trumpet blowing at the same time and assumed that someone was just playing one of the shofer's which we have... later on, when we were asking who played the trumpet, no one had....!
An angel was playing a trumpet in the lecture room...??!! FLIP! I realise that this probably sounds super weird to you all and a little bit crazy... but I wanna let you know that it sounded pretty crazy to me too before coming! But seriously... the more I am getting to know God, the more I'm realising that a lot of this spiritual stuff is very real! Try asking Him about it if you really wanna know!
Anyway... what else...??!! Soo God has been showing himself to me even more this week... teaching me even more about just how deep and merciful and beautiful his love is for me... and totally not dependent on what I do or don't do for him! Infact God's been teaching me about how it's not about doing stuff FOR God, but actually it's about doing stuff WITH Him... Flip! Jesus is still helping me get my head around this one!
The other day God told me that I'm beautiful... but didn't just tell me... He gave my heart a revelation about what this actually means... God thinks ALL of me is beautiful??!! even the bits that I struggle to accept He thinks are beautiful! Man... I was in tears... (I seem to be doing a LOT of crying!)
The other day God told me that He brings me too His banquet table and that His banner over me is love...
He showed me a picture of a table with a MASSIVE Feast on it! SO much food! And I was sitting at the table looking at kind of hesitantly, and then I felt him say to me "All of this I give to you my love... This abundance of gifts and good things I give to you..." This was crazy! so yeah... little things like this... God is continually giving me little glimpses of his love... and what it means to be intimate with Him... Annnd a lot of other awesome stuff! God is good!
Also.... we (just the muso's) spent the weekend at this beach house at Raglan! it was sweet! We wrote songs, ate pancakes, WENT TO THE BEACH!!! and I had my first thanksgiving! aaaannd it was a good one!! SO MUCH YUM FOOD! it was beautiful... plus... we went to the beach... which is definitly worth stating twice!
Soo... I'll update you on what has been happening THIS week, tommorow!... darn it! I'm getting behind myself!
Anyhow! love you all! :)
How are we??!!
I am doing great!! and have had the most spectacular week so far!!
Soooo I said in my last blog that I would let you know a bit more about the spiritual warfare lectures that we've had this week... so here we go!!
We had Beryl speaking this week... maaan such a Spirit filled, powerful woman of God!!
And basically she was talking about Spiritual Warfare and kind of giving us all a lot of insight into the whole "Our struggle is not against flesh and blood but against the rulers and authorities and powers of this dark world..." type of stuff! It was actually really interesting and made a lot of sense... because when you actually look at a situation you can see that often it has a spiritual root!
So we've been doing a lot of stuff like deliverance and stuff this week which is always pretty intense, but so good! We also had some pretty crazy like angelic encounters and stuff! Like one of the girls' (I won't sasy who for privacy reasons) was having some pretty major deliverance, and a lot of us could hear a trumpet blowing at the same time and assumed that someone was just playing one of the shofer's which we have... later on, when we were asking who played the trumpet, no one had....!
An angel was playing a trumpet in the lecture room...??!! FLIP! I realise that this probably sounds super weird to you all and a little bit crazy... but I wanna let you know that it sounded pretty crazy to me too before coming! But seriously... the more I am getting to know God, the more I'm realising that a lot of this spiritual stuff is very real! Try asking Him about it if you really wanna know!
Anyway... what else...??!! Soo God has been showing himself to me even more this week... teaching me even more about just how deep and merciful and beautiful his love is for me... and totally not dependent on what I do or don't do for him! Infact God's been teaching me about how it's not about doing stuff FOR God, but actually it's about doing stuff WITH Him... Flip! Jesus is still helping me get my head around this one!
The other day God told me that I'm beautiful... but didn't just tell me... He gave my heart a revelation about what this actually means... God thinks ALL of me is beautiful??!! even the bits that I struggle to accept He thinks are beautiful! Man... I was in tears... (I seem to be doing a LOT of crying!)
The other day God told me that He brings me too His banquet table and that His banner over me is love...
He showed me a picture of a table with a MASSIVE Feast on it! SO much food! And I was sitting at the table looking at kind of hesitantly, and then I felt him say to me "All of this I give to you my love... This abundance of gifts and good things I give to you..." This was crazy! so yeah... little things like this... God is continually giving me little glimpses of his love... and what it means to be intimate with Him... Annnd a lot of other awesome stuff! God is good!
Also.... we (just the muso's) spent the weekend at this beach house at Raglan! it was sweet! We wrote songs, ate pancakes, WENT TO THE BEACH!!! and I had my first thanksgiving! aaaannd it was a good one!! SO MUCH YUM FOOD! it was beautiful... plus... we went to the beach... which is definitly worth stating twice!
Soo... I'll update you on what has been happening THIS week, tommorow!... darn it! I'm getting behind myself!
Anyhow! love you all! :)
Monday, 22 October 2012
Pizza, Pancakes and Tim Tam's
Oh man! it seems that every blog title is about food these days! But I have eaten so much lately...
Ha! I've actually had the best few days! Not only did we have such a relaxing weekend, YESTERDAY we had our last small group time ever coz from now on we're going to do prep for outreach in the time where we would normally have had small groups... SO! we (Rebekka, Marit, Miranda and myself lead by the lovely Janessa and Tiff tiff) decided that we would get all pretty-ified and hit the raging town of Matamata for dinner :)
Tiff sadly was/is sick :(
but the rest of us got all dressed up, donned bright red lipstick and a LOT of hairspray (Marit!) and basically just got dressed up :)
This was a lot more exciting then it sounds because this is literally the first time we had got dressed up in a long time! So it was nice to feel like a eye-popping female for a little while ;) I also shaved my legs... for the first time in a loooong time... it was like trying to mow a field of unruly wheat!
THEN! this morning... we all made our way to the A-frame for brekkie at 7 like normal, only to find a concerned looking Rich outside....
"We've had a break in guys... everything in the lecture room has been stolen...." needless to say we were all shocked... particularly when we realized that the beautiful guitars had also been supposedly stolen! We all formed a huddle and started praying... Korean style! we then turn around to find a line of smug looking staff waiting behind us... looking surprisingly spiffy! "Got ya!" they say... eyes twinkling... "Come on inside!"
So we enter and what a surprise meets our eyes!! Candle-lit tables, beautifully set, each person had a place set for them with a name tag and encouragement note... *sigh* it was soooo lovely! THEN we were all literally waited on by our lovely staff members to a feast of french toast, pancakes, bacon, egg, hashbrowns, coffee, juice, fruit, yogurt.... THE WORKS! We even got serenaded by Rich with a beautiful song in his John Travolta voice.... maaaan we all felt so blessed! Needless to say any thought of trying to eat extra healthy to make up for the food extravaganza the night before went out the window...
I am now growing a food baby.... my belly button even momentarily became an outy! anyway... it was a delicious experience all round...
ANYWAY! This week we are having Beryl talk about spiritual warfare! man it's awesome! learning so much stuff which I had just never really thought about! It's only day two at the moment so I'll let you know how it all pans out later on, but I have a feeling it's going to be a killer week!
God is still working in my heart... it's a daily process of coming fresh into his abundant grace and allowing him to take the control... NOT trying to doing it by myself! yeah... so God is slowly pulling out the things that need to pulled out, and planting the things that need to be planted! Setting my heart more and more on fire for him, and I'm falling more and more in love with Him...
We are all going to come back from this very changed people! It's going to be good!
The boys all learnt the haka yesterday... it's pretty entertaining! I love how into it they get!... also many of them a growing mullets... WHY!!??
Soooo I'll catch you laters :) gotta go for work program!! WOOOHHH
Ha! I've actually had the best few days! Not only did we have such a relaxing weekend, YESTERDAY we had our last small group time ever coz from now on we're going to do prep for outreach in the time where we would normally have had small groups... SO! we (Rebekka, Marit, Miranda and myself lead by the lovely Janessa and Tiff tiff) decided that we would get all pretty-ified and hit the raging town of Matamata for dinner :)
Tiff sadly was/is sick :(
but the rest of us got all dressed up, donned bright red lipstick and a LOT of hairspray (Marit!) and basically just got dressed up :)
This was a lot more exciting then it sounds because this is literally the first time we had got dressed up in a long time! So it was nice to feel like a eye-popping female for a little while ;) I also shaved my legs... for the first time in a loooong time... it was like trying to mow a field of unruly wheat!
THEN! this morning... we all made our way to the A-frame for brekkie at 7 like normal, only to find a concerned looking Rich outside....
"We've had a break in guys... everything in the lecture room has been stolen...." needless to say we were all shocked... particularly when we realized that the beautiful guitars had also been supposedly stolen! We all formed a huddle and started praying... Korean style! we then turn around to find a line of smug looking staff waiting behind us... looking surprisingly spiffy! "Got ya!" they say... eyes twinkling... "Come on inside!"
So we enter and what a surprise meets our eyes!! Candle-lit tables, beautifully set, each person had a place set for them with a name tag and encouragement note... *sigh* it was soooo lovely! THEN we were all literally waited on by our lovely staff members to a feast of french toast, pancakes, bacon, egg, hashbrowns, coffee, juice, fruit, yogurt.... THE WORKS! We even got serenaded by Rich with a beautiful song in his John Travolta voice.... maaaan we all felt so blessed! Needless to say any thought of trying to eat extra healthy to make up for the food extravaganza the night before went out the window...
I am now growing a food baby.... my belly button even momentarily became an outy! anyway... it was a delicious experience all round...
ANYWAY! This week we are having Beryl talk about spiritual warfare! man it's awesome! learning so much stuff which I had just never really thought about! It's only day two at the moment so I'll let you know how it all pans out later on, but I have a feeling it's going to be a killer week!
God is still working in my heart... it's a daily process of coming fresh into his abundant grace and allowing him to take the control... NOT trying to doing it by myself! yeah... so God is slowly pulling out the things that need to pulled out, and planting the things that need to be planted! Setting my heart more and more on fire for him, and I'm falling more and more in love with Him...
We are all going to come back from this very changed people! It's going to be good!
The boys all learnt the haka yesterday... it's pretty entertaining! I love how into it they get!... also many of them a growing mullets... WHY!!??
Soooo I'll catch you laters :) gotta go for work program!! WOOOHHH
Saturday, 20 October 2012
Coffee
Hello all!!
Soooo for those of you who know me well, you'll know that it's been on my heart for a long while to write a song about my dear friend and companion... COFFEE!! and I'd like to inform you now that it has been written!! and it goes like this...
Ooooooooooo Yeah I love you baby!
Ooooooooooo I'm addicted to you!
Some people people love you,
but some hate you,
but almost everyone likes your smell
You're so dark, so smooth, so handsome
Sometimes even covered in chocolate sprinkles
Mmmm so dark, so smooth, so handsome
I wanna drink you in! Yeah drink you in!
I love the way that you make me feel, first thing in the morning,
just the way that you look, the way that you taste
mmm you make my heart skip a beat
Babe you don't have to say a word (and you don't really ever say a word)
Just let me drink in your love!
Soooo there you go! it has happened!
Anyway in other news we have a free weekend this weekend, all the OP's are away on a boat so all the muso's have the base to themselves!! WOOOOHH!! Me and Noemi and Steph are going to build a FORT!! and it's going to be ammmaaazzzinnng !!
I was however, talking to Schnegg the other day about his forting habits and he said (and I quote) "Robinson! I'm 20! Twenty year olds don't build forts!" WHAT??!! BLASPHEMY!! Building forts is an essential part of life that should be enjoyed by everyone! anyway.... it's going to be good!
We had Luke Parker and Strahan come visit us today to do a song writing workshop... it was good! and I learnt heaps!
Flip... God is/has totally wrecked me this past week! We had Goldie Gibson come and talk to us about having a heart transplant from God... I asked him at the beginning of the week for a revelation of my heart (always dangerous!) and that he did! Turns out I have been repressing all of this stuff in my heart... all this anger and resentment and pride and selfishness and self hatred and BLEUGH! it was disgusting! maaan I was in tears... but God's been teaching me that he wants to meet me where I am, AS I AM! maan that was a big revelation! infact he's still giving me revelations about it! Teaching me not to repress it all or to try and fix it myself, but to actually let God take control and give it to him to deal with... which was super scary for me... because it meant that this part of my heart, so carefully hidden from the public eye, would have to be dealt with... and he is dealing with it in his loving faithfulness... I've literally had to just run outside and just scream and sob on a couple of occassions this week as God taught me that he died for THAT part of me! Not just my "Good christian, I never doubt God, or ever struggle to love God" image, he LOVES the part of me that is STRUGGLING!! Man this completely tore me apart.... and I get the feeling that this is going to be a process! But God is in control... Your will be done in my heart Lord!
What else is there to report?! Hmmm oh yeah! I CUT HANNAH'S HAIR!! haha I've never cut anyone's hair before and it was pretty exciting! It wasn't just a trim either... like she used to have hair down to her waist and now she has a bob! I love her so much and I'm so proud of her her cutting it! It was a big deal... I'm also secretly quite proud of myself... coz it looks really nice! (haha when I said this to Matt and Brent they said "Hannah, you're not secretly proud at all! You're telling everyone..." this is probably true!)
We're also getting more into this whole song writing thing which is awesome!
Also.... THANKYOU MY BEAUTIFUL FAMILY FOR THE PACKAGE!! It literally made my day :) it had coffee and chocolate in it...and socks (typical Tom) and vitamin tablets (typical Mum) it it! I love you!
Also... I'm going to do a bit of letter writing! So keep your eyes on the mail people!
AWESOME
Love you lots! xxo
Soooo for those of you who know me well, you'll know that it's been on my heart for a long while to write a song about my dear friend and companion... COFFEE!! and I'd like to inform you now that it has been written!! and it goes like this...
Ooooooooooo Yeah I love you baby!
Ooooooooooo I'm addicted to you!
Some people people love you,
but some hate you,
but almost everyone likes your smell
You're so dark, so smooth, so handsome
Sometimes even covered in chocolate sprinkles
Mmmm so dark, so smooth, so handsome
I wanna drink you in! Yeah drink you in!
I love the way that you make me feel, first thing in the morning,
just the way that you look, the way that you taste
mmm you make my heart skip a beat
Babe you don't have to say a word (and you don't really ever say a word)
Just let me drink in your love!
Soooo there you go! it has happened!
Anyway in other news we have a free weekend this weekend, all the OP's are away on a boat so all the muso's have the base to themselves!! WOOOOHH!! Me and Noemi and Steph are going to build a FORT!! and it's going to be ammmaaazzzinnng !!
I was however, talking to Schnegg the other day about his forting habits and he said (and I quote) "Robinson! I'm 20! Twenty year olds don't build forts!" WHAT??!! BLASPHEMY!! Building forts is an essential part of life that should be enjoyed by everyone! anyway.... it's going to be good!
We had Luke Parker and Strahan come visit us today to do a song writing workshop... it was good! and I learnt heaps!
Flip... God is/has totally wrecked me this past week! We had Goldie Gibson come and talk to us about having a heart transplant from God... I asked him at the beginning of the week for a revelation of my heart (always dangerous!) and that he did! Turns out I have been repressing all of this stuff in my heart... all this anger and resentment and pride and selfishness and self hatred and BLEUGH! it was disgusting! maaan I was in tears... but God's been teaching me that he wants to meet me where I am, AS I AM! maan that was a big revelation! infact he's still giving me revelations about it! Teaching me not to repress it all or to try and fix it myself, but to actually let God take control and give it to him to deal with... which was super scary for me... because it meant that this part of my heart, so carefully hidden from the public eye, would have to be dealt with... and he is dealing with it in his loving faithfulness... I've literally had to just run outside and just scream and sob on a couple of occassions this week as God taught me that he died for THAT part of me! Not just my "Good christian, I never doubt God, or ever struggle to love God" image, he LOVES the part of me that is STRUGGLING!! Man this completely tore me apart.... and I get the feeling that this is going to be a process! But God is in control... Your will be done in my heart Lord!
What else is there to report?! Hmmm oh yeah! I CUT HANNAH'S HAIR!! haha I've never cut anyone's hair before and it was pretty exciting! It wasn't just a trim either... like she used to have hair down to her waist and now she has a bob! I love her so much and I'm so proud of her her cutting it! It was a big deal... I'm also secretly quite proud of myself... coz it looks really nice! (haha when I said this to Matt and Brent they said "Hannah, you're not secretly proud at all! You're telling everyone..." this is probably true!)
We're also getting more into this whole song writing thing which is awesome!
Also.... THANKYOU MY BEAUTIFUL FAMILY FOR THE PACKAGE!! It literally made my day :) it had coffee and chocolate in it...and socks (typical Tom) and vitamin tablets (typical Mum) it it! I love you!
Also... I'm going to do a bit of letter writing! So keep your eyes on the mail people!
AWESOME
Love you lots! xxo
Tuesday, 16 October 2012
Hair cut
So, the reason for the title is just that Steph is about to give my hair a slight trim, and I couldn't think of a title... so this is the best I could come up with! Soooo I know I promised that I would update you all on what God's been doing the past two weeks last Friday... but truth be told... we were out evangelising till almost midnight aaaannnd by that stage I couldn't be bothered... and then I forgot... sooo I'm doing it now....
 |
| me and Mimi chillin in a van! |
Oh man… where to begin! God has been doing some crazy stuff! The whole
school was about Evangelism, which to be honest I was quite sceptical about at
first (“Street evangelism? Reeeeaaallly…?” ) BUT it was actually incredible and
I learnt so much about God and his character and his heart for the lost. It
also totally changed my view on street evangelism! Mostly cause we were doing
it! And God actually used us! Maaaannn totally by the grace of God, I was able
to be a part of leading some people to Christ!! AAARRG! That’s so exciting! And
they were hungry for it… Revival is starting in New Zealand for sure… it’s
going to be incredible! In the last two weeks we saw 120 people give their
hearts to God (people on the street that is) and also incredible healings like
a person’s leg growing to the right length before their eyes!! FLIP! God is
good…
So the two
weeks consisted of lots classes with these crazy Californian speakers called
Sammie and Chase (I may have mentioned them in my last blog?.. can’t remember…)
and basically what we were doing in these classes were allowing god to come and
heal us spiritually from stuff like shame and fear and unbelief and rejection
etc… because when we’ve got that stuff in us it’s like a cloud hanging over us,
making it harder to hear God’s voice and thus making us not so effective during
evangelism..
 |
| all of us (minus Beth and Dan) on free weekend with Sammie and Chase and co... who we got to hang with! |
God literally hit me with stuff everyday.. The biggy for me was shame!
God totally freed me from the shame of something that had happened which I had
totally repressed in myself and didn’t even realise was an issue (Ha! Thank
goodness God knows better), he just brought it to my attention, and I knew that
I needed to confess this to someone… So I had a little heart to heart with
Hannah, and as I was pouring out my heart, my eyes began to pour out aswell… I
had so much shame attached with that one thing that I didn’t even know about!
But in that moment God totally released me from that! He is sooo good! And then
later on that day he said to me “Hannah, now that the shame is out of the way,
I can begin to show you who you are in me” hahaha so that’s what he’s begun to
do!
So far he’s
told me that I am a warrior for him, that I am his bride (He’s still speaking
to me about this one…), that he’s going to give a new name, and that he created
me to be free!! He’s also begun to break fear off my life and is teaching me
about what it means to be weak and vunerable, but to step out in his strength!
Hahaha so yeah… as you can see God is doing some pretty major stuff in me at
the moment… and teaching a lot about intimacy with him aswell!... The last two
weeks were a little bit scary, fun, pretty draining but completely and totally
worth it! Maaaannn God is good!
There was a
lot of “AND I REBUKE FEAR IN JESUS NAME!!” and “GLORY SAUCE” and “JOYFUL
REPENTANCE!” basically a lot of shouting involved… which meant that by the end
of the week… some would say that my voice had a nice husky drawl… others would
say that I’d just lost it! But either way it was doing weird things!
Anyways…
peace out g-units! Thanks for all the love and prayers and stuff!
LOVE YOU J
Wednesday, 10 October 2012
FOR NARNIA!!!!
Oh myyy goodness!!
Firstly.... I'm so happy right now!! God is flipping amazing... I just wanna say I love my amazing Matamata family!! Like actually... we are family :)
Anyways.... where do I even start?? NARNIA!!
So... this weekend... we had our free weekend and decided that it would super fly to rent a couple of vans and go up to the Coromandal to Cathedral Cove and Hot Water Beach and just kind of hang out!! Sooo big props to Becc and Henk and everyone who organized it it was awesome... We decided that it would be more way more fun to kind wing it and not plan places to sleep or anything, just rent a couple of tents and see where the adventure takes us! and ohhh what an adventure it was! On Saturday morning we loaded up our vans, with music pumping and with Marit and Kyle at the wheel set out into the sunshine! It was so fuuun! and we met Sammie and Chase and thier pals completely randomally at this look out so hung out with them for the day aswell! It was SWEET! (Sammie and Chase are these two crazy Californians who are speaking at the Circuit Riders conference that we've been going too for last week and this week) So that was sweet! We all frolicked on the beach and swam in the sea and took lots of pictures and pretended we were in NARNIA!! Aaarrg! it was amazing :) aaaannd I think we all learnt that God totally has our backs! hahaha basically God got us out from a four hundred dollar fine!! we parked weirdly... and apparently in an illegal fashion, but this lady talked the cops out of giving us a fine!! THANKYOU JESUS! and theeen Kyle accidentally left the lights on in the van... so the batterry went flat... but completally randomally we found this guy who had this box thing so we were back on the road in like 5 mins... PRAISE GOD!
aaaannndd then... the big thing was the sleeping arrangments!! We were totally hoping that we would all be able to sleep outside under the stars... BUUUT it was pouring with rain! hahaha soooo tensions were running high when it was after dark and we couldn't find anywhere to sleep... hahaha and then completally randomally this lady came up to us at while we were getting food and was like "Hey... there's this really cheap hostle place that you could stay at!!" So we get there and geuss how many beds they had available??!! 18... and geuss how many of us there were.... 18!!!! PRAISE GOD!!
hahahaha so yeah... God is a really good Dad!
Also!! We found out where we are going on outreach....!!!! OHHH BOYYYY!!!!!! My goodness I am so excited!! It is going to be amazing... like actaully.... My team is aweeesssoooommmeee... The leaders are Johanna and Matt and the others are Miranda, Matt, Elisa and Kyle! Saweeettt! Sadly I can't tell you where I'm going online for protection reasons... soo if you really want to know call me or write me or VISIT me :) buuut tis going to awesome and God's hand is totally all over it!
sooo this is just a snippet (I like that word!) of whats been happenning! I have yet to tell you all the exciting stuff which God's been doing in me and in everyone at Circuit Riders! (Flip it's exciting!) buuutt that will have to wait until tommorow coz Hansy has just put on Pride and Prejudice... sooo yeah! :)
But catch yous laters!! :)
Firstly.... I'm so happy right now!! God is flipping amazing... I just wanna say I love my amazing Matamata family!! Like actually... we are family :)
Anyways.... where do I even start?? NARNIA!!
So... this weekend... we had our free weekend and decided that it would super fly to rent a couple of vans and go up to the Coromandal to Cathedral Cove and Hot Water Beach and just kind of hang out!! Sooo big props to Becc and Henk and everyone who organized it it was awesome... We decided that it would be more way more fun to kind wing it and not plan places to sleep or anything, just rent a couple of tents and see where the adventure takes us! and ohhh what an adventure it was! On Saturday morning we loaded up our vans, with music pumping and with Marit and Kyle at the wheel set out into the sunshine! It was so fuuun! and we met Sammie and Chase and thier pals completely randomally at this look out so hung out with them for the day aswell! It was SWEET! (Sammie and Chase are these two crazy Californians who are speaking at the Circuit Riders conference that we've been going too for last week and this week) So that was sweet! We all frolicked on the beach and swam in the sea and took lots of pictures and pretended we were in NARNIA!! Aaarrg! it was amazing :) aaaannd I think we all learnt that God totally has our backs! hahaha basically God got us out from a four hundred dollar fine!! we parked weirdly... and apparently in an illegal fashion, but this lady talked the cops out of giving us a fine!! THANKYOU JESUS! and theeen Kyle accidentally left the lights on in the van... so the batterry went flat... but completally randomally we found this guy who had this box thing so we were back on the road in like 5 mins... PRAISE GOD!
aaaannndd then... the big thing was the sleeping arrangments!! We were totally hoping that we would all be able to sleep outside under the stars... BUUUT it was pouring with rain! hahaha soooo tensions were running high when it was after dark and we couldn't find anywhere to sleep... hahaha and then completally randomally this lady came up to us at while we were getting food and was like "Hey... there's this really cheap hostle place that you could stay at!!" So we get there and geuss how many beds they had available??!! 18... and geuss how many of us there were.... 18!!!! PRAISE GOD!!
hahahaha so yeah... God is a really good Dad!
Also!! We found out where we are going on outreach....!!!! OHHH BOYYYY!!!!!! My goodness I am so excited!! It is going to be amazing... like actaully.... My team is aweeesssoooommmeee... The leaders are Johanna and Matt and the others are Miranda, Matt, Elisa and Kyle! Saweeettt! Sadly I can't tell you where I'm going online for protection reasons... soo if you really want to know call me or write me or VISIT me :) buuut tis going to awesome and God's hand is totally all over it!
sooo this is just a snippet (I like that word!) of whats been happenning! I have yet to tell you all the exciting stuff which God's been doing in me and in everyone at Circuit Riders! (Flip it's exciting!) buuutt that will have to wait until tommorow coz Hansy has just put on Pride and Prejudice... sooo yeah! :)
But catch yous laters!! :)
Sunday, 30 September 2012
Sleeping under the Stars...
Oh my! OH MY! Oh myyyyy!!! WHAT A WEEK! Where do I even begin.... Ok... the rap!!
As I stated at the end of my last blog, all of us muso's were given our little assignment for the week... this week me and Steph were given the bible story Jonah and the Whale and had to perform a musical item about this story in the genre of rap/hip hop to the whole base :) ahaha it was so funny! We downloaded a piece of music from 'beats.com' borrowed a few items of clothing from a few of the guys (Thankyou Matt for lending us your pants!) and unleashed our inner ganster... Needless to say, I think we both have a great future ahead of us as rappers... perhaps with the stage names JONIZZLE and WHALEZILLA! It was a gooood night which included Noemi and Schnegg performing a musical/opera, Matt and Jacob performing disco, Kat and Elisa performing country, and Henk and Hannah D performing a fabulous regae number :)
We had Frank Naea speaking this week about the Father Heart of God.... man oh man! This guy just radiates the Father heart of God! He is this massive guy who has the most gentle spirit and kind of looks like a marshmellow! He gives the BEST hugs and it kind of feels like you are being swallowed by a huge marshmellow :) Man was he the perfect guy to speak about Gods Father Heart! This was definitely a week of breakthroughs for so many people! Me included! On Tuesday we all fasted for the whole day and had this flipping awesome time of ministry in the evening... Man... God is breaking so much stuff off my heart and changing me so much! It seems like he's doing this really deep healing of my soul which even I'm not quite sure what's happening... But something is! God just began breaking off things like my insecurities and my tendency to always STRIVE for God's approval and just things like how I'm constantly trying to get my self worth from those around me etc... It was kind of a painful week for me actually because for me it was more about God highlighting these things and beginning to change my heart... So yeah... Gods changing me!!
We did this awesome prophecy workshop on Saturday (which was amazing) and someone had the word for me "God's doing an evolution in you" so true.... I'm going to be a totally changed person by the time this is all over. We all are... Gods breaking me apart and rearranging and changing me in ways I couldn't even imagine!! God's also blessed with the most amazing friendships out of this!! We are literally like family :) and it's only been a MONTH!! flip! it's crazy... I love everyone here so much and... hahaha we've had some goood times.....
Sleep...I need more.... I slept outside TWO NIGHTS IN A ROW this weekend! The first night on the trampoline snuggled with my favorite Hannah and little Mimi, which ended when it started raining at about 3 in the morning, and the second night because we had a bonfire (made by Kyle, our resident Bear Grylls) and it was such a beautiful night! SO MANY STARS!! It started out with Elisa, Becc, Marit, Steph, Mimi and myself, but by the time I woke up in the morning (To the sound of Matt and Schnegg's lovely voices.... "ROBINSON! what are you doing??!") I was the only one left... it was awesome though... and you know what they say... YOLO!
Anyway... The next two weeks are going to be AWESOME!! We are doing this thing called Circuit Riders! Where basically our DTS and two others, plus some extra's are coming together to do this evangelism school... myyy wooorrrd I am so excited!! We went today and my Spirit just stirred when these two guys from the States were talking... we were praying over each other and being physically healed! God used me to heal someone!! :O Maaaan revival is coming to New Zealand! I truly believe it!! Something in my soul gets so excited when they were speaking! We're going to go out and basically preach the word to Tauranga this week (after some training) and God is going to move...
Watch out guys... God's stirring up a storm in New Zealand... Stuff is going to happen aaaannnnd I don't know about you but I wanna be part of it!! AARRG SO EXCITING!!
As I stated at the end of my last blog, all of us muso's were given our little assignment for the week... this week me and Steph were given the bible story Jonah and the Whale and had to perform a musical item about this story in the genre of rap/hip hop to the whole base :) ahaha it was so funny! We downloaded a piece of music from 'beats.com' borrowed a few items of clothing from a few of the guys (Thankyou Matt for lending us your pants!) and unleashed our inner ganster... Needless to say, I think we both have a great future ahead of us as rappers... perhaps with the stage names JONIZZLE and WHALEZILLA! It was a gooood night which included Noemi and Schnegg performing a musical/opera, Matt and Jacob performing disco, Kat and Elisa performing country, and Henk and Hannah D performing a fabulous regae number :)
We had Frank Naea speaking this week about the Father Heart of God.... man oh man! This guy just radiates the Father heart of God! He is this massive guy who has the most gentle spirit and kind of looks like a marshmellow! He gives the BEST hugs and it kind of feels like you are being swallowed by a huge marshmellow :) Man was he the perfect guy to speak about Gods Father Heart! This was definitely a week of breakthroughs for so many people! Me included! On Tuesday we all fasted for the whole day and had this flipping awesome time of ministry in the evening... Man... God is breaking so much stuff off my heart and changing me so much! It seems like he's doing this really deep healing of my soul which even I'm not quite sure what's happening... But something is! God just began breaking off things like my insecurities and my tendency to always STRIVE for God's approval and just things like how I'm constantly trying to get my self worth from those around me etc... It was kind of a painful week for me actually because for me it was more about God highlighting these things and beginning to change my heart... So yeah... Gods changing me!!
We did this awesome prophecy workshop on Saturday (which was amazing) and someone had the word for me "God's doing an evolution in you" so true.... I'm going to be a totally changed person by the time this is all over. We all are... Gods breaking me apart and rearranging and changing me in ways I couldn't even imagine!! God's also blessed with the most amazing friendships out of this!! We are literally like family :) and it's only been a MONTH!! flip! it's crazy... I love everyone here so much and... hahaha we've had some goood times.....
Sleep...I need more.... I slept outside TWO NIGHTS IN A ROW this weekend! The first night on the trampoline snuggled with my favorite Hannah and little Mimi, which ended when it started raining at about 3 in the morning, and the second night because we had a bonfire (made by Kyle, our resident Bear Grylls) and it was such a beautiful night! SO MANY STARS!! It started out with Elisa, Becc, Marit, Steph, Mimi and myself, but by the time I woke up in the morning (To the sound of Matt and Schnegg's lovely voices.... "ROBINSON! what are you doing??!") I was the only one left... it was awesome though... and you know what they say... YOLO!
Anyway... The next two weeks are going to be AWESOME!! We are doing this thing called Circuit Riders! Where basically our DTS and two others, plus some extra's are coming together to do this evangelism school... myyy wooorrrd I am so excited!! We went today and my Spirit just stirred when these two guys from the States were talking... we were praying over each other and being physically healed! God used me to heal someone!! :O Maaaan revival is coming to New Zealand! I truly believe it!! Something in my soul gets so excited when they were speaking! We're going to go out and basically preach the word to Tauranga this week (after some training) and God is going to move...
Watch out guys... God's stirring up a storm in New Zealand... Stuff is going to happen aaaannnnd I don't know about you but I wanna be part of it!! AARRG SO EXCITING!!
Saturday, 22 September 2012
Daisy chains and Burn nights
Soooo...
It is a official... I have a fractured toe... and Guess how it happened?! No... it wasn't playing catch like the last time a fractured a bone... This time it was playing soccer! The Hannah's (plural) v Matt and blond Hannah missed the ball and instead kicked Matt in the back of the foot. hard! Thankfully he's ok but I'm now limping around with a broken toe after a doctors visit that consisted of.. "Ok... this x-ray shows you have a crack in your left big toe... we can't do anything about it so... don't go playing soccer or kicking anybody else for a while! Now can I have $60...." hahaha typical Hannah senario...
Toes aside... we had a Burn Night on Friday night!!! My GOODNESS it was amazing!!! 24 hours of solid worship and fasting!! BOOM God's presence was so intensely there... it was incredible!! So I've come away from it with no voice and several profound revelations about God's grace, and about how life with God is like a waltz with him... We just need to let him lead, trust him and let him sweep us off our feet!! MAN it was profound!! God is so amazing!!
After a much needed sleep in today, all the music and worship peeps decided to go on a picnic! as it's such a beautiful day today!! We a good time... including daisy chain making, piggy back races, head stands and much frolicking!! it was a beautiful thing... We also got given our music assignment this week!! BAHAHa we got paired up randomly, given a genre and a bible story and have to perform it this Thursday night during base open mike!! So this Thursday me and Steph (aka The Blondes in the Back) will be performing a spectacular rap/hip hop number about Jonah and the whale!! It's gonna be off the sheeezyyy!!
I'm also veerrry excited about our speaker this week!! His name is Frank (can't remember the last name!) and I've heard a lot of good things about him!! We're going to be learning about the father heart of God which should be amazing!! Bring it on God!!
Anyway.. must go as I've gotta go for my weekend duties :) catch you!!
P.S Thankyou Alex for my LOVELY parcel!! You are amazing and HAPPPPYYYY BIRRRTHDAY!!!
It is a official... I have a fractured toe... and Guess how it happened?! No... it wasn't playing catch like the last time a fractured a bone... This time it was playing soccer! The Hannah's (plural) v Matt and blond Hannah missed the ball and instead kicked Matt in the back of the foot. hard! Thankfully he's ok but I'm now limping around with a broken toe after a doctors visit that consisted of.. "Ok... this x-ray shows you have a crack in your left big toe... we can't do anything about it so... don't go playing soccer or kicking anybody else for a while! Now can I have $60...." hahaha typical Hannah senario...
Toes aside... we had a Burn Night on Friday night!!! My GOODNESS it was amazing!!! 24 hours of solid worship and fasting!! BOOM God's presence was so intensely there... it was incredible!! So I've come away from it with no voice and several profound revelations about God's grace, and about how life with God is like a waltz with him... We just need to let him lead, trust him and let him sweep us off our feet!! MAN it was profound!! God is so amazing!!
After a much needed sleep in today, all the music and worship peeps decided to go on a picnic! as it's such a beautiful day today!! We a good time... including daisy chain making, piggy back races, head stands and much frolicking!! it was a beautiful thing... We also got given our music assignment this week!! BAHAHa we got paired up randomly, given a genre and a bible story and have to perform it this Thursday night during base open mike!! So this Thursday me and Steph (aka The Blondes in the Back) will be performing a spectacular rap/hip hop number about Jonah and the whale!! It's gonna be off the sheeezyyy!!
I'm also veerrry excited about our speaker this week!! His name is Frank (can't remember the last name!) and I've heard a lot of good things about him!! We're going to be learning about the father heart of God which should be amazing!! Bring it on God!!
Anyway.. must go as I've gotta go for my weekend duties :) catch you!!
P.S Thankyou Alex for my LOVELY parcel!! You are amazing and HAPPPPYYYY BIRRRTHDAY!!!
Tuesday, 18 September 2012
strawberry, rasberry and logansomething tea!
Hey Home dogs!!
Sorry it's been a while... my internet screwed up a couple of days ago and then I thought it had run out and that I had to buy some more and havn't been able too.... and then I realised that I actually don't!
Sooo.... where to begin!! This past week (like the one before) has been totally and utterly life changing! This place is starting to feel more and more like home! Cabin 5 is definitely the better girls cabin ;) despite the slight hike we have to embark on every time we need to make a trip home! I luurrrvvveee my roomies Mimi and Marit Carrot! We are definitely one of the messier rooms... (Much to Noemi's dismay) but we are fabulous none the less!!
Some of the funnier moments during the week include accidentally cooking a pen... Bahaha which is now proudly kept in our room! Kyle (our resident hunter who has already caught a possum and two eels) accidentally breaking a vase with a toy hippo, having an epic sock wrestling match for our combined girls small group this week (we unleashed our inner animal!)... Hmmm there has been lots more hilarity but by golly I can'y remember it!!
Other highlights include watching Tarzan and The Prince of Egypt, having my first bite of a peanut butter and jelly (jam) sandwich! Thanks J-dog... it was a beautiful moment! drinking LOTS of tea and discovering that black english breakfast tea and honey is AMAZING!! tryyy itttt! jamming in a local Matamata coffee shop with Steph, Jacob and Henk, and of COURSE hanging out with all of the amazing people here!
But of course the BIGGEST highlight is the amazing stuff that God is doing..... Myyy gooodness!! We are all going to be totally transformed people by the time we finish this DTS! The speaker that we had last week was this awesome guy called Josh Coles!
Maaannn God gave me revelation after revelation about Him and his absolute power and authority and his BEAUTY!! and just the fact that God enjoys me?!! He doesn't just love me because he's my Father and he has too, he actually likes me... as I am... and enjoys me??!! This totally blew my mind!!
I just have this sense that God is totally starting to deepen my relationship with him... that's he's pulling out the roots which need to be pulled out (I had this real time of healing last thursday... where in my mind I wasn't even sure what was going on, but I could sense God doing things in my heart and I was just weeping uncontrollably!) and planting seeds which need to be planted!
God also really spoke into my life through others last week revealing some of the stuff which he's got planned for my future... I won't go into them here but if you wanna know about it flick me an email and I'll let you know! I'm excited!! :D
We've also started splitting into our two courses during the weekends (Music and Worship/Outdoor Pursuits) So while the OP guys were swinging from a rope somewhere in the tree tops, us muso's went on this river walk for inspiration for song writing (which when compared to what the OP's were doing sounds kinda lame, but was actually amazing!) we all just did this walk at our own pace with God and it was BEAUTIFUL! Like it was stunning... and we all kind of had this really intimate time with God while enjoying his beauty... And when we got to the end (despite the winter-ish temperatures at the moment) we all jumped into this water hole! Bahaha it was so funny and FREEZING!! aannd then we went to get COFFEE which was worth mentioning because the company and the coffee was outstanding!
ANYWAY! Our little mission for the next 24 hours after that walk was to write a song... many of the people including myself had not really/never written songs before, but when we were all got together on Sunday evening I was blown away by the songs that were totally God inspired and beautiful! Like actually it was amazing! And... yes... I did write a song despite my limited guitar knowledge (with God's help) which was pretty exciting! God's going to do amazing stuff through the Muso's... I'm sure of it!!
Anyway... despite all that, there have been struggles... being brutally honest I'm struggling a little bit with pride (eeek.. don't like saying that!) and putting God completely and utterly as Lord in my life... there's still part of me that's holding onto this goal of living an accepted and successful life by worldly standards (you know... things like getting married!) when I really just need to release these things up to him and allow his will to be done!
But yeah that is a BRIEF (believe it or not) overview of what's been going down in Hannah town recently! Arrg there was so much more stuff which at the time I was like 'I must include this in my blog!' but alas! My memory is failing me!! I'm going to try and apdate this more regularly to avoid these rather long rambly blogs!! Sawwweeeet!
Love you AAALLL!!!!
Ola Vache!!
Sorry it's been a while... my internet screwed up a couple of days ago and then I thought it had run out and that I had to buy some more and havn't been able too.... and then I realised that I actually don't!
Sooo.... where to begin!! This past week (like the one before) has been totally and utterly life changing! This place is starting to feel more and more like home! Cabin 5 is definitely the better girls cabin ;) despite the slight hike we have to embark on every time we need to make a trip home! I luurrrvvveee my roomies Mimi and Marit Carrot! We are definitely one of the messier rooms... (Much to Noemi's dismay) but we are fabulous none the less!!
Some of the funnier moments during the week include accidentally cooking a pen... Bahaha which is now proudly kept in our room! Kyle (our resident hunter who has already caught a possum and two eels) accidentally breaking a vase with a toy hippo, having an epic sock wrestling match for our combined girls small group this week (we unleashed our inner animal!)... Hmmm there has been lots more hilarity but by golly I can'y remember it!!
Other highlights include watching Tarzan and The Prince of Egypt, having my first bite of a peanut butter and jelly (jam) sandwich! Thanks J-dog... it was a beautiful moment! drinking LOTS of tea and discovering that black english breakfast tea and honey is AMAZING!! tryyy itttt! jamming in a local Matamata coffee shop with Steph, Jacob and Henk, and of COURSE hanging out with all of the amazing people here!
But of course the BIGGEST highlight is the amazing stuff that God is doing..... Myyy gooodness!! We are all going to be totally transformed people by the time we finish this DTS! The speaker that we had last week was this awesome guy called Josh Coles!
Maaannn God gave me revelation after revelation about Him and his absolute power and authority and his BEAUTY!! and just the fact that God enjoys me?!! He doesn't just love me because he's my Father and he has too, he actually likes me... as I am... and enjoys me??!! This totally blew my mind!!
I just have this sense that God is totally starting to deepen my relationship with him... that's he's pulling out the roots which need to be pulled out (I had this real time of healing last thursday... where in my mind I wasn't even sure what was going on, but I could sense God doing things in my heart and I was just weeping uncontrollably!) and planting seeds which need to be planted!
God also really spoke into my life through others last week revealing some of the stuff which he's got planned for my future... I won't go into them here but if you wanna know about it flick me an email and I'll let you know! I'm excited!! :D
We've also started splitting into our two courses during the weekends (Music and Worship/Outdoor Pursuits) So while the OP guys were swinging from a rope somewhere in the tree tops, us muso's went on this river walk for inspiration for song writing (which when compared to what the OP's were doing sounds kinda lame, but was actually amazing!) we all just did this walk at our own pace with God and it was BEAUTIFUL! Like it was stunning... and we all kind of had this really intimate time with God while enjoying his beauty... And when we got to the end (despite the winter-ish temperatures at the moment) we all jumped into this water hole! Bahaha it was so funny and FREEZING!! aannd then we went to get COFFEE which was worth mentioning because the company and the coffee was outstanding!
ANYWAY! Our little mission for the next 24 hours after that walk was to write a song... many of the people including myself had not really/never written songs before, but when we were all got together on Sunday evening I was blown away by the songs that were totally God inspired and beautiful! Like actually it was amazing! And... yes... I did write a song despite my limited guitar knowledge (with God's help) which was pretty exciting! God's going to do amazing stuff through the Muso's... I'm sure of it!!
Anyway... despite all that, there have been struggles... being brutally honest I'm struggling a little bit with pride (eeek.. don't like saying that!) and putting God completely and utterly as Lord in my life... there's still part of me that's holding onto this goal of living an accepted and successful life by worldly standards (you know... things like getting married!) when I really just need to release these things up to him and allow his will to be done!
But yeah that is a BRIEF (believe it or not) overview of what's been going down in Hannah town recently! Arrg there was so much more stuff which at the time I was like 'I must include this in my blog!' but alas! My memory is failing me!! I'm going to try and apdate this more regularly to avoid these rather long rambly blogs!! Sawwweeeet!
Love you AAALLL!!!!
Ola Vache!!
Saturday, 8 September 2012
First week finished already?? WHAT??!!
SO! Last time I updated this blog I was living with a bunch of strangers and acquaintances... and now only A WEEK later we are family :)
I have literally had the most inspiring and absolutely incredible time and it's only been ONE WEEK :O
hmmmmm where to begin...
Life stories. Right. This literally blew my mind. We all got up infront of everyone after knowing them for about three days and basically spilled our guts... Everyone was soooo honest and laid out everything... For me, someone who is the queen of putting up masks and who is has this fear of being rejected by those around me this was absolutely terrifying aaaaannnd totally rewarding! It was the weirdest feeling because in the space of two days the people around me went from being people who I had just met, to a bunch of people that I literally knew all their deepest darkest secrets... All their fears and insecurities and things which they had never told anyone before... and they ALL knew mine!! AARRG!
I LOVE the people on this course already!! Bahaha! We've had some such good times already :p did you know that in Canada a beanie is called a toque?! and a toastie is called a "grilled cheese" hahaha and in Switzerland the equivalent of "Oh my gosh!" is "Ola Vache!" (or "Oh the Cow!")
other exciting past times have been belting out the air guitar to Queen, having dance parties in the Gap, the all important "Snuggle time!" (a lot more innocent than it sounds!), Extreme Uno, and yes... I have introduced Mao... to which Schegg, the Swiss guy exclaimed (as I was explaining the 'there are no rules' rule) "What?! Do you even speak English?!" hahaha it was so funny! apparently the Kiwi accent is a lot harder to understand then I first anticipated!
The speaker we had this week was Mal Maloney :) he was this 60 something year old guy who was speaking on the Holy Spirit and Ola VACHE, my word, God blew my mind! I learnt so much! I don't know how to condense it down into a blog!
We had this ministry time and God gave me word through Mal saying that God's going to use me to minister with kids! haha I was completely overcome by God and just could not stop laughing!! hahahaha the funny thing is is that the next day God gave me the BIGGEST revelation of the Father's love and I could not stop crying!! God just poured out waves of his love onto me! Life changingly INSANE!
Hahaha so one day I'm CRACKING up laughing! and he next I'm BAWLING! what is this??!! Like everyday God is working in all of us... it's AMAAAAZZZIIINNG!
So yesterday was sooo much fun!!
We went on a trip to the beach.
And anyone who knows me knows how I feel about the beach.
We went swimming... (well... only four of us!) and had a scavenger hunt which including things such as serenading a stranger, having a dance party in the middle of the street, and getting a picture with something Dora the explorer related... It was fun :)
Sooo I promised myself that I wasn't going to do looooong blogs but as you can see that promise is broken already! Meh I was never that good with goals anyway!
Love you all lots :)
hugs and kisses from MATAMAAATTTA! :)
I have literally had the most inspiring and absolutely incredible time and it's only been ONE WEEK :O
hmmmmm where to begin...
I LOVE the people on this course already!! Bahaha! We've had some such good times already :p did you know that in Canada a beanie is called a toque?! and a toastie is called a "grilled cheese" hahaha and in Switzerland the equivalent of "Oh my gosh!" is "Ola Vache!" (or "Oh the Cow!")
other exciting past times have been belting out the air guitar to Queen, having dance parties in the Gap, the all important "Snuggle time!" (a lot more innocent than it sounds!), Extreme Uno, and yes... I have introduced Mao... to which Schegg, the Swiss guy exclaimed (as I was explaining the 'there are no rules' rule) "What?! Do you even speak English?!" hahaha it was so funny! apparently the Kiwi accent is a lot harder to understand then I first anticipated!
The speaker we had this week was Mal Maloney :) he was this 60 something year old guy who was speaking on the Holy Spirit and Ola VACHE, my word, God blew my mind! I learnt so much! I don't know how to condense it down into a blog!
We had this ministry time and God gave me word through Mal saying that God's going to use me to minister with kids! haha I was completely overcome by God and just could not stop laughing!! hahahaha the funny thing is is that the next day God gave me the BIGGEST revelation of the Father's love and I could not stop crying!! God just poured out waves of his love onto me! Life changingly INSANE!
Hahaha so one day I'm CRACKING up laughing! and he next I'm BAWLING! what is this??!! Like everyday God is working in all of us... it's AMAAAAZZZIIINNG!
So yesterday was sooo much fun!!
We went on a trip to the beach.
And anyone who knows me knows how I feel about the beach.
We went swimming... (well... only four of us!) and had a scavenger hunt which including things such as serenading a stranger, having a dance party in the middle of the street, and getting a picture with something Dora the explorer related... It was fun :)
Sooo I promised myself that I wasn't going to do looooong blogs but as you can see that promise is broken already! Meh I was never that good with goals anyway!
Love you all lots :)
hugs and kisses from MATAMAAATTTA! :)
Sunday, 2 September 2012
It's officially started!!
So.
I'm here!! all the preparation and packing and needles and working and buying first aid kits has lead up to this! I"M IN MATAMATA!! on YWAM!! It's ACTUALLY happening!!!
My beautiful loving family decided to make a little bit of a holiday out of dropping me off, so we stayed a few nights in Taupo (and ate LOTS of hashbrowns) and they then dropped a rather nervous, slightly excited and just all round jittery me at the base yesterday afternoon, where I got SUCH a warm welcome! Everyone is so lovely here! and although I still havn't got to know them all that well yet, lovely friendships are in the making! However me and the ONE OTHER kiwi student do feel slightly like foreigners here with so many Canadians and Americans! I caught me self saying something with a slight Texas drawl today... Needless to say I was quite upset by this!! WE'RE IN NZ for crying out loud!! plus I've only been here a day! :O Be warned... there is a very strong possibility that I'll come back with a strong American tang with slight German inflections!
Anyway... God is soo good!! after an interesting night which included my alarm going off at 2.30 am... and being woken up by a cow strolling past our cottage in the early hours of the morning (haha the joys of living in farmy areas!) we had an awesome morning! We all came into the meeting room to find the leaders involved in an EPIC worship session! So we spent the next half an hour just full on praising God! It was so cool... God got me straight away and I had tears running down my face just overcome with the joy of the Lord... God's going to do big things on this course...it's going to be awesome!
The rest of the day was spent doing kind of orientation type things until this evening when all the leaders shared their testimonies with us all. They were all so open and honest and so inspiring each with a massive love and heart for god and others. They then announced that we all have to share our life stories over the next few days aswell!! WHAT!?? So basically tommorow I've got to share my heart... fears and insecurities and everything to about 30 strangers... a TAD nerve wrecking but I'm so sure that God will bless this :)
So yeah :) that's pretty much what has been going on! Feeling excited and I'm not going to lie, a tad overwhelmed by what's to come! But God's got it in control :) and is amazing!
Love all you friends and family and church family back in Welly!
Peace out!
I'm here!! all the preparation and packing and needles and working and buying first aid kits has lead up to this! I"M IN MATAMATA!! on YWAM!! It's ACTUALLY happening!!!
My beautiful loving family decided to make a little bit of a holiday out of dropping me off, so we stayed a few nights in Taupo (and ate LOTS of hashbrowns) and they then dropped a rather nervous, slightly excited and just all round jittery me at the base yesterday afternoon, where I got SUCH a warm welcome! Everyone is so lovely here! and although I still havn't got to know them all that well yet, lovely friendships are in the making! However me and the ONE OTHER kiwi student do feel slightly like foreigners here with so many Canadians and Americans! I caught me self saying something with a slight Texas drawl today... Needless to say I was quite upset by this!! WE'RE IN NZ for crying out loud!! plus I've only been here a day! :O Be warned... there is a very strong possibility that I'll come back with a strong American tang with slight German inflections!
Anyway... God is soo good!! after an interesting night which included my alarm going off at 2.30 am... and being woken up by a cow strolling past our cottage in the early hours of the morning (haha the joys of living in farmy areas!) we had an awesome morning! We all came into the meeting room to find the leaders involved in an EPIC worship session! So we spent the next half an hour just full on praising God! It was so cool... God got me straight away and I had tears running down my face just overcome with the joy of the Lord... God's going to do big things on this course...it's going to be awesome!
The rest of the day was spent doing kind of orientation type things until this evening when all the leaders shared their testimonies with us all. They were all so open and honest and so inspiring each with a massive love and heart for god and others. They then announced that we all have to share our life stories over the next few days aswell!! WHAT!?? So basically tommorow I've got to share my heart... fears and insecurities and everything to about 30 strangers... a TAD nerve wrecking but I'm so sure that God will bless this :)
So yeah :) that's pretty much what has been going on! Feeling excited and I'm not going to lie, a tad overwhelmed by what's to come! But God's got it in control :) and is amazing!
Love all you friends and family and church family back in Welly!
Peace out!
Monday, 20 August 2012
The beginning of unemployment
Sooo last Friday I finished work!! and I am now officially unemployed! WOOH! it was actually quite a good last day... A couple of customers bought me chocolate which was cute, and another apologized for (and I quote).."all the sexual harassment" which was not so cute... I also managed to drop a couple glasses right in front of the entrance, whacked my head on a table and accidentally showed my pink undies to several people... (long story!) but by this stage I was so over tired so it all seemed reeally funny. Needless to say by the time I finished work and joined the lovely friends which came in to celebrate with me I was VERY ready for a beer!
Anyway! It is now only about a week and a half until I fly the nest so I'm busy getting ready doing things like getting raincoats and suitcases, trying to arrange travel insurance and trying to catch up with the multitudes of amazing people that I'm DETERMINED to catch up with before I leave. Today I went and saw the travel doctor and got jabbed three times in a row with three different vaccinations! My poor left arm has never felt more like a pin cushion! and I've got to go back next week to get two more! ARG
But despite the needles I am getting veeerrry excited about this YWAM course!! I got a couple of emails from YWAM letting us know that we're going to Fiji, India and China on our outreach!!!
SO EXCITING!!
They also sent out a list of all the other students coming which was coool! There's apparently only one other Kiwi on the course the rest are from Canada, Germany, USA, Austria and The Netherlands which is CRAZY cool :D God is super cool, and SO faithful! Even just looking back on this year I can fully see his hand in everything that's been going down!! So pretty much Jesus is a legit guy.
SO! I'm probably not gonna update this again until I'm officially hangin' with the home hobbits (...I'm sorry... that was QUITE lame...) up in Matamata!! I'll see ya then!
Peace out!
Anyway! It is now only about a week and a half until I fly the nest so I'm busy getting ready doing things like getting raincoats and suitcases, trying to arrange travel insurance and trying to catch up with the multitudes of amazing people that I'm DETERMINED to catch up with before I leave. Today I went and saw the travel doctor and got jabbed three times in a row with three different vaccinations! My poor left arm has never felt more like a pin cushion! and I've got to go back next week to get two more! ARG
But despite the needles I am getting veeerrry excited about this YWAM course!! I got a couple of emails from YWAM letting us know that we're going to Fiji, India and China on our outreach!!!
SO EXCITING!!
They also sent out a list of all the other students coming which was coool! There's apparently only one other Kiwi on the course the rest are from Canada, Germany, USA, Austria and The Netherlands which is CRAZY cool :D God is super cool, and SO faithful! Even just looking back on this year I can fully see his hand in everything that's been going down!! So pretty much Jesus is a legit guy.
SO! I'm probably not gonna update this again until I'm officially hangin' with the home hobbits (...I'm sorry... that was QUITE lame...) up in Matamata!! I'll see ya then!
Peace out!
Tuesday, 31 July 2012
Beginnings...
1st of August...
So... after a tiring nearly-six months of 5.20 am starts, and full time work waitressing, I've finally handed in my notice and it feels goooood!
I've now got a total of 2 and a half weeks, 12 days and 96 hours of work before I leave Leuven Belgium Beer Cafe forever and embark on a much more exciting adventure. I'm very soon heading up to Hobbiton (otherwise known as Matamata) to start a 6 month music and worship DTS (Discipleship Training School) with YWAM, which is mainly thrillingly exciting but also a tad scary.
On this course I'll be spending 3 months in Matamata learning more about God, chillin' and making some music with some fellow muso's, and serving the local Hobbiton community... The next 3 months will be serving somewhere (yet to be decided) overseas. Previous years have gone to Fiji, China, The Philippines, and other places which I can't remember off the top of my head but I'm sure were exciting none the less!
Anyway... This has all snuck up on me rather quickly and I now have just over 4 weeks to organise my life and do things like pack and get vaccinations (aaaAAaarrg!) before I leave my Wellington home-dogs forever! (well... actually just 6 months, but it still...)
Soo... I'm going to try and update this blog thingy rather regularly to fulfill the promises that I've made to various people to keep them informed about my adventures, and also to make sure that any stalkers that I have are fully satisfied! (I'm joking about that last part, in case you didn't pick that up...)
This babbling has gone on too long so I shall sign off here...
See you later Amigo's!
So... after a tiring nearly-six months of 5.20 am starts, and full time work waitressing, I've finally handed in my notice and it feels goooood!
I've now got a total of 2 and a half weeks, 12 days and 96 hours of work before I leave Leuven Belgium Beer Cafe forever and embark on a much more exciting adventure. I'm very soon heading up to Hobbiton (otherwise known as Matamata) to start a 6 month music and worship DTS (Discipleship Training School) with YWAM, which is mainly thrillingly exciting but also a tad scary.
On this course I'll be spending 3 months in Matamata learning more about God, chillin' and making some music with some fellow muso's, and serving the local Hobbiton community... The next 3 months will be serving somewhere (yet to be decided) overseas. Previous years have gone to Fiji, China, The Philippines, and other places which I can't remember off the top of my head but I'm sure were exciting none the less!
Anyway... This has all snuck up on me rather quickly and I now have just over 4 weeks to organise my life and do things like pack and get vaccinations (aaaAAaarrg!) before I leave my Wellington home-dogs forever! (well... actually just 6 months, but it still...)
Soo... I'm going to try and update this blog thingy rather regularly to fulfill the promises that I've made to various people to keep them informed about my adventures, and also to make sure that any stalkers that I have are fully satisfied! (I'm joking about that last part, in case you didn't pick that up...)
This babbling has gone on too long so I shall sign off here...
See you later Amigo's!
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