Thursday night we put our apologies in for the PLT/Directors meeting and instead went to the Regent theatre to listen to a debate between a well known Christian apologist/philosopher William Lane Craig from California and the vice president (although former president) of the rationalist/freethinkers society of New Zealand, Bill Cooke. Follow this link to see some clips of the debate on utube:
These clips are from his debate in Auckland (we heard the same/similar debate here in Palmerston North a few nights later). Overall, the debate was not what we expected. The title was "The God Delusion" so we assumed that meant the Christian would state proofs that God is not a delusion and the atheist would state proofs that he is. Well, the Christian made 5 very good proofs for the fact that belief in God is rational but the atheist really only said that it's great if you want to believe in God, but he's just in your head. However, he gave no proofs as to how he could claim this, and he did not counter-argue any of the 5 proofs for God's existence. He took the ignore-the-Christian route and pretty much said by not saying that the debate was a waste of his time. He was however, very adamant that we stop arguing and instead work together to end human suffering. Ken was interested in this as he is always advocating Christians to work to help the poor, buy fairtrade, etc. After the debate he asked Bill Cooke what he means by working together to end human suffering, but was disappointed to hear Bill simply say to just put some money into an organization, any organization. Ken's been doing so much research in this area and has learned that to just throw money into an organization, any organization, actually does more harm than good. But this will lead into a long drawn-out sermon that you should ask Ken about if you are interested in learning more. :)
Friday youth went well, and Ken had a long conversation with one of the youth regarding some tuff life questions/and how God fits into all the evil and suffering we so often see around us. It was a great time for him to delve deeper into the Christian faith with this student who doesn't often come to our youth group! What a cool thing!
Saturday was a very very busy day - I was up early making muffins before heading over to see how radio talk-show hosts run live events at a store that was having a huge sale. It was an interesting experience, although I was disappointed that the host himself didn't seem too interested in having me tag along to see how he "did his thing" so instead I ended up flipping sausages. Then I went to Trinity in the afternoon to learn to knit with the women's group (it's mostly older women and they've been asking me to come and learn the art of knitting). I picked it up fast and have a goal to make a scarf! They meet fortnightly, so maybe in a few weeks I'll have one done. Ken was doing last minute jobs that needed to be done at church before the next two big days: Sunday we were in Wellington most of the day for his first half-marathon! He came in 1 hour and 40 minutes, exactly his goal! woohooo! Enjoy some pics below that his cheerleader/paparazzi took (moi). That evening we had dinner at Judi and Lawrence's before heading home for him to pack pack pack for Indonesia. He left monday afternoon with Roy and Lois Price. Thank you for all your prayers and thoughts in preparation for this journey - they finally got some emails back regarding who would be picking them up, where they would be staying, and other nominal, but important, details!
Ken stretching before the big run!
Number 3476 is ready
The start line
GO!!! (I think that's Ken, the blur on the far right)
Pep and I searching for Ken to get some pictures of him in the race!
Running by the waterfront...
...running in the city
DONE!!!
WOOHOO!!
YEEEEAAAAYYYY!!!
Monday night I went out to Trinity for a meeting regarding the two winter holiday programs in July for children ages 5-12. I will be leading the music sessions at them and teaching the other leaders the songs later next week. I'm looking forward to that! It's always fun doing these "vbs-like" programs.
Other than that, it's going to be a long ten days holding down the fort while Ken is away. I'm a little jealous that I was unable to go too, especially with my passion for multicultural missions (and the music in Indonesia is amazing!) Please keep me in your prayers that I won't be too bored but find stuff to keep myself busy with for the next few weeks (ahh - that sounds so looooooong!)
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