Back to the rest of the week: Tuesday evening Pauline and I taught the Bible study course at St. Luke's covering the last two signs in John: the man born blind and raising Lazarus. We had 21 people attend! I had a great time teaching an adult Bible study for the first time! Everyone seemed to enjoy it and there was a lot of positive feedback for Pauline and I.
Wednesday I went to Ken's class at the Bible college. It was neat to see him in action teaching his students all about Biblical exegesis - we learned about the early church fathers (100-300ish AD). Everyone seemed very engaged with his teaching and there was a lot of discussion/questions throughout the lesson which was neat to listen to. It was also Pepper's 3rd birthday, so we gave her a new toy and some yummy treats (they fit inside the toy and she has to shake the toy to get them to fall out). Fun times!
Pep can smell a treat
Just playing around
Friday youth was a fun night - the youth were supposed to be having play practice for the next three Friday nights, but no one showed up to the first practice so the woman leading the practices cancelled them. So, Ken thought it would be good to have a fun game night this Friday and invited me to come along. We played "broomball" (indoor hockey but using a large ball and broom sticks!) and it was a blast! Unfortunately however, that family we've been having issues with for the past year put a damper to the event by not playing and enticing two other youth to not play. So rather than have a split youth group, Ken decided to end the game early and just the youth all hang out together in the supper room. Please continue to keep this issue in your prayers - we've been talking to some of the church leaders about this family and how they need to address how involved and controlling they are in the church because it isn't healthy and will be just as difficult for the next youth leader as it was for Ken and as it was for the youth leader before Ken! Ugh...
Saturday the sunshine came out and we decided to go to the beach. But after driving through Longburn (about ten minutes outside of town) we realized our engine was overheating and we couldn't drive over 50kms! So we turned around and mozied our way back home at a slow pace. We decided to take Pepper to the park instead and after that got ready to go to the Turbo's game! Once there, the computers were all down so we couldn't buy tickets!!! However, a lady walked up to us and asked if we wanted her tickets. We said no because we didn't have any cash, but she said that she just wanted to give them to us! Awesome! So we enjoyed a free game shouted by a random lady! Thanks whoever you are, wherever you are! Unfortunately, the Turbos lost, but that didn't surprise us too much. Haha...We ended the night having dinner with Sam and Jen and a bunch of their friends to celebrate Sam's 30th birthday! It was an awkward dinner as he had three totally separate groups of friends there who didn't all mix very well together. But we had a good time regardless.
True green-eyed Turbo fans!
Turbo Man
Sunday we took the slow route out to Feilding going about 35-40kms (took us about 40 mins to get there, double the normal driving time) but we were thankful we made it in one piece! Ken was worship leading and preaching - everything went really well! It was great to be back at Trinity - I hadn't been there for about a month and half. Ken and I love going there for church.
After Trinity we went back to St. Luke's where Ken prepared for confirmation. Again, he ran into problems with that family and again we found ourselves frustrated that although the leadership knows that this family must be dealt with, no one wants to do anything about it!! It is very frustrating and makes it hard for Ken to have energy to do much with or for the youth because he knows that no matter what he does or offers, this family will have make it as difficult as possible for him to do any type of ministry! But we're thankful that we have learned one thing: we want to be transparent with our feelings. So, Ken is going to make it clear to the PLT this coming Thursday how we feel and our frustrations with this family. That way, on our side of things, we're being honest and straightforward.
After church and confirmation, Ken went on a 10k "Human Race" run that Nike sponsored for runners all around the world on the 31st of August! All the runners are linked together through Nike's website (Ken bought the Nike Plus sports band for runners and it links him up to Nike's online community of runners). It was a pretty fun experience for him. The rest of Sunday was spent basking in the sun (literally) and reading. Ken is working his way through a 600+ page book on New Zealand's history (yuck - but he seems to be enjoying it). I'm reading a new book entitled: The Shack by William P Young. So far, 60 pages in, it's really good.
The Human Race runner!
Enjoying the sunshine in our front yard
Pep playing in the grass
And that now brings us to Monday, which is where this blog began! We're looking forward this week to meeting our next interim pastor, Pastor Rob Strelan, and possibly a few more days of sunshine!
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