Sunday afternoon I helped Ken lead confirmation. They recently finished learning about the difference between Law and Gospel. So to relate living out these out in our daily lives, Ken had them go on a scavenger hunt to find certain fair trade or organic/locally grown items. The point? That how we use our money affects the world (are you supporting slave-labour, or fair trade? etc) and that as Christians, we are called to think about what we put in our bodies (organic foods without additives are much healthier for our bodies, which we are called to take care of). It was a really fun afternoon.
Sunday was also Mother's Day, so we called our mother's at home (and again on Monday, when it was mother's day in the states). It was good to catch up with family - we really do miss you guys!!!
Tuesday, Ken hosted the local youth ministry network meeting at St. Luke's. About eight of them were there (sometimes as many as 13 show up) but it was a great morning of exchanging ideas, expressing joys and frustrations, and getting to know each other better as youth ministers in Palmy. That evening, Ken hosted the Oxfam Great New Zealand Coffee Break. Only 17 people attended (we were hoping for more with the amount of publicity we did), but we raised over $100 towards helping coffee growers plant more coffee trees! The evening was really fun - there was free coffee for everyone to try (all fairly traded, meaning the farmer receives at least 1.?? for every kilo, whereas non-fair trade coffee buyers only pay the farmer .08 per kilo)! After a bit of socializing, there was an education video about fair trade, and then the evening ended with a raffle drawing for fair trade coffee, mugs, and the video we showed (Black Gold - really good documentary! Get it! And then start buying fair trade coffee - you're dollar makes a difference)!
I was greeter/ticket saleslady for the coffee night
The poster
Ken talking about fair trade before seeing who wins the coffee raffle
Wednesday was the third monthly all-music-team meeting and about 10 people were there! I am very pleased at how all the teams are sending representatives to these meetings. There has been a marked difference in communication since these meetings have been going. And it's fun to choose songs that we want to introduce to the congregation as a whole united body of musicians. But please keep these meetings in your prayers - there have been some hurt feelings as we've gone through each team's songs to decide as music leaders which songs we should all "take a break from" versus which ones we should continue to play. It is important for this type of communication to happen, yet we need to make sure it's done in a sensitive way. However, it is also important that all teams are coming to this with a servant-heart, open to positive ideas for the congregation.
Wednesday also had some good/bad news. The good news is that there is funding for the NOISE worship conference in June to cover all five people attending! The bad news is that Ken's application for a grant for the Indonesia trip was rejected because 1)the PLT forgot to sign it and 2) confusion on the emphasis for the trip (to obtain the grant, the focus needs to be on Ken's growth as a church worker in New Zealand while the PLT wanted Ken to focus on how this trip would help the church). However, with this clarification, Ken is resubmitting the application and it should have no problems being accepted. But please keep this in your prayers as well.
Thursday we left for Wellington - I had a meeting with Mark Whitfield (musician/pastor at the Lutheran church in Welly) and Guy Jansen (worship speaker/church musician widely known in NZ). We began planning for the Lutheran Music Conference in late October! I am excited to be a part of this group as we are doing something that's never really been done here. We're hoping for a weekend for Lutheran church musicians (but also open to anyone else interested, Lutheran or not), where we can grow deeper spiritually (especially since most of our church musicians have never been trained) and also have break-out sessions to learn hands-on new techniques for worship leading in bands, organ, sound system, etc. Then on Sunday, those break-out sessions will lead part of worship (ex, if you were in the organ session learning a new intro for a song, you would play that intro on Sunday). The conference would end with sharing of resources/ideas between everyone and a Bach Cantata (Mark's church has been doing a Cantata Series using professional musicians as an outreach into the community). As much work as this is going to be, it is going to be awesome!
Enjoying another sunny day in Wellington
Kapiti Island
Friday Ken took the youth to a Palmy-wide youth concert called Fuse. He said it was a great success - everyone had so much fun, and the band was awesome. Saturday we relaxed in the morning, and took Pepper for a long walk to enjoy the autumn leaves at Massey University. Ken also worked a lot on his Habakkuk Adult Bible Study which begins next Tuesday at church. We ended the night with some pizza and beer, watching some Indiana Jones to get ready for the newest movie coming out next week!
Look at these leaves!!
Pepper loving life
We're "falling" in love...get it? It's fall, and we're in love... :)
Sunday at church we had some great conversations with the Satherley family. It's getting very hard for them as Aunti Joy came to church in a wheel chair today. The love the church and the family has for Aunti Joy is absolutely astounding - it is truly an awesome thing to witness.
After church, I went to Himatangi beach with Jen. We took our dogs and had some nice girl time to talk about life...she's going through a bought of homesickness/upset with jobness/etc and I can relate!!! So we just talked, vented, and listened to each other while watching the dogs have a blast in the ocean. Ken was back at the house cleaning our car (for the first time in 10 months!!) That evening we went to Roy and Lois Price's for dinner to talk about Indonesia - they will be going with Ken. It sounds like an awesome trip! However, it's a huge leap of faith working with the Indonesian church as all three of them are "dot-ever-i" type people while the Indonesian people they are working with are much more relaxed. They still don't know details about transportation/billeting, but know that all will work out. Other teams from Australia have recently gone and had no problems, so it's just a matter of being patient and waiting to dot those i's!
Pepper and Anna
Monday was our day off - we ran errands, called my sister to wish her a Happy Birthday, got ice cream in the square with our friends from Feilding, and took Pepper on another long walk down at the Esplanade. The weather has been just beautiful lately, and autumn brought to mind how even in death, there is such beauty. And isn't that true for Christians? That in Christ, death is no longer something to be scared of, but instead something truly beautiful, to be enjoyed knowing that we are headed for eternal life with Him?! How awesome...
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