Its Been A While

Well after a couple of weeks without blogging I thought I should let everyone know I’m still alive. There has been heaps going on, in fact I can’t even remember the last time I blogged and as I don’t read my own blog I’ll just guess and try and include everything that has been significant since my last blog.

The other week I opened my diary up to put something in there and as I flicked over the pages I noticed that on Friday I had two assignments due. So from Wednesday til Friday morning I was off trying to produce to assignments that were worth a pass. I finally did complete them and hopefully in the next week or so they will return with a pass mark attached to them.

Nanna and Pa were still over and still tripping around Melbourne, I think they enjoyed their stay, I know that on their last Sunday night here when all the youth leaders ended up back at Sarah’s house they enjoyed meeting them and talking with them. Nanna and Pa left Monday night, it was good to see them again and I’m sure they’ll be back.

With assignments out of the way all the focus turned to State Youth Games. It was a pretty insane week of running around organising last minute stuff. On top of this I had to help find a place to live for one of our guys as where he’d previously been staying was no longer working out. It was a pretty stressful week in some ways it’s was probably a relief to actually start camp. I had never been to SYG before and it was good to go and see what it was all about, and over all it was a pretty good weekend, a massive amount of effort for two days but pretty good and I know all the youth enjoyed it.

There’s no doubt about it, Warragul is freezing cold even with two fires cranking, two pairs of track pants, two jumpers, another jacket, shirt and singlet on to go with the beanie and gloves it still is colder than cold. The food was fantastic, Sarah worked some serious magic on the BBQ and webber along with the rest of the kitchen crew with Laurance, Marianne and Paul the food was the best camp food I’d ever had.

Our sporting success was not too bad, we started the weekend well with a grand final win in the U18 Basketball and a runner up in the U18 Darts we thought we’d do alright but our success became less and less was we all became a little more sleepy.

A huge thanks to Sarah who’s support to me over the weekend and the weeks leading up to camp kept me sane and allowed me to just get on and do my job and thanks to all the leaders who gave up their long weekends to come down especially Laurance and Marianne our “camp parent’s/cooks”.

I am still nacked but its good to be home and sleeping indoors. Mum and Dad will be over in less than a week, which will be great. Looking forward to that.

Proverbs Thought
When the righteous prosper, the city rejoices; when the wicked perish, there are shouts of joy.

Be Good
Bakes

Another Blog

Friday Night was youth group where we reached our highest number of attendance, 29. That was pretty exciting but what I thought was more exciting was that one of our girls Ally brought along 6 new friends. It frustrates me sometimes that our churches and our other ministry groups fail to grow and often are declining. If everyone decided to invest in one other friend outside of church and bring them along to church our churches would double in size in no time. Then we would do it again and again and again, I think too often we’re satisfied if we meet our average attendance on a Sunday. There are many issues to this but if we’re not inviting people to be apart of this thing we believe has transformed our lives and is the saviour of the world then we are either not sold out to it, or you need to get a life and get friends outside of the church or we don’t like it and we know its not working, but we’re holding on for dear life because that’s how we did it "when I got saved". Wow that might be a bit controversial for my blog. Anyway Friday night was awesome, we have new people coming a long and the group seems to be getting closer together and I think State Youth Games will do that even more for us. Friday was spent at an indoor playground it was very cool, we had sports, foxtel and the playground. The night ended with a massive game of chasey won clearly by the leaders.

Saturday was wet cold and just yuck. My first wet whether game in Melbourne and so out came the footy boots, and out go the footy boots i think they've died, they are still pretty gross nearly a week on from the game, as you know our uniforms are white but I came off with black shorts. Nanna and Pa came to watch but left just before half time cos it was too wet and they couldn’t really see, I’m still trying to work out the too wet part as they were sitting in the car. The game it’s self was a really good game for the conditions it was close and hard fort with both teams going in hard. 2 points in the end but for the most part of the last quarter it was only one but with the football being the size of a basketball and as heavy as a lead balloon it was always going to be tough to score. I’m up in 2nd division this week so that good.

Saturday night Sarah and I went up to the Eastern Salvo's Cricket Club Presentation Night. It was bring and share and yeh, I think I'll leave it at that. I think it's fair to say that it was a bit different to the Baysie and WAFL Functions we use to go to.

Sunday was the Sabbath so I rested. Nah Sunday was pretty full on actually. After morning church we had a ministry coordination survey day, and it took all day. The corps management want to get a full understanding of everything that happens within the corps and so every leader of every “department” was invited to come and fill this survey out. It was long but it was interesting to answer the questions and I think the review will be good and it will be interesting to see what happens from it. Sunday night Stu came to visit, he was over for his nephews birthday and both of us finally found time Sunday night to catch up, it was good to see him even if he is short a walking leg due to snapping his achilles tendon.

Monday night we won basketball, which is always good. Tuesday Nanna cooked us a roast and last night we had steak. Nanna fills my plate up like I haven’t eaten since arriving in Melbourne, its crazy there’s no way I can finish it, its worse than when mum cooks stir fry and she fills the bowls up with rice just cos theres rooms.

Well that’s about it. No other news here.

My Shout Outs
Sarah you are incredible.
Mum Hi.
Insane is coming up – no secrets here.
State Youth Game forms are due this Friday.
Freo need to win some games.
Well done to the Sparks on their first win this season.
Sarah is my favourite.
Ryan even though we don’t bounce in the EFL I can still out bounce you any day.

Proverbs Thought

Train a child in the way he should go, and when he is old he will not turn from it.

Be Good

Bakes

Back to Blogs

Once again its been a while since I blogged. I’d love to tell you that my life is so exciting that it requires me to blog each day in an effort to keep you up to date with all that’s happening in my life, but unfortunately its not, maybe it will be one day.

So in the last week Nanna and Pa have arrived and have moved in to Sarah’s house, I have never seen so much food in Sar's fridge. It’s good that their here its good to see them and catch up with what’s happening and have a laugh and I’m sure over the next three weeks there will be many funny story’s to pass on.

My footy game on Saturday was an absolute cracker! After two weeks in a row of 100 point plus blowouts I had the thriller of the weekend. The ground conditions were terrible, a rock hard turf cricket wicket in the middle and then part of the beach making up the rest of the centre corridor and forward fifty, we’d find ourselves out on the wing where we discovered grass but it was clumpy and bumpy. All of this combined made running difficult, always having in the back of your head that you may go over on your ankle, each quarter I lost my footing on a number of occasions. But we’ll go back and talk about the actual footy played and it was brilliant. Over forty goals kicked for the match (glad I don’t run the boundary) and there was only one goal difference at the final siren. Each team would edge a head at different times during the match only for the opposition to claw there way back and then to take the lead. The game was hard fort in the middle and then once it found it’s way out it was free flowing. Just a great game to be apart of.

On Friday night we had to change our plans from going to a indoor play centre we couldn’t find one that was open or open for the right price. We changed our plans to a game of dead fish. Nah only joking, the night was an op shop disco with lots of different games. We were pretty nervous at the start of the night, we new this could fall flat on our faces but as it turned out, it was a fantastic night and everyone really got into it and had a great night. We then also found a cheaper indoor playground and we’re heading there this week so it’s all turned out pretty well. (Don't forget your socks)

I spoke at Byways today about the Trinity. Byways is Ringwood Salvo’s weekly community lunch, where a lot of the less fortunate people from the community come and grab a meal. It’s a great time down there, people get up and sing, play music laugh and just share each other’s company. After the meal there is a short chapel service where a couple of songs are sang and a short message is given. I spoke about how the Trinity is a three way combo thing, if you get one you get the lot, and how sometimes its hard to get our heads around the idea of how three can be one and one be three. It was good fun.

My Shout Outs

Ryan wear pants when your playing drums.
Sarah is my hero – Sarah might be insane in three weeks.
Hello Mum.
Congrats to Deano the other week for his 100th AFL Match (as if he reads this).
I hope to see everyone at “insane” in 09 the territorial youth conference – the secrets out.

Proverbs Thought
A truthful witness saves lives, but a false witness is deceitful

Be Good

Bakes

A Week or So

It’s been a while since my last blog so sorry and I’ll try and catch everything up in this blog. So it’s been about a week, I missed Jess’s birthday on my blog so happy birthday to her for the 30th, and I missed Anita’s last day in Australia so smell you later Anita (some people on the plane did). Ohh I’m funny. Hahaha. But in all serious Anita have a great trip, be safe and be good and hope your feeling much better.

Dad’s been over on the weekend and it was really good to spend time with. Got to go to the footy twice, first time at Telstra Stadium and it is a fantastic venue to watch football from and then went to the G on Sunday to watch Fremantle take an early flight home and forget that they had a second half of football to play.

Sarah had her friend over Amanda and so we didn’t get to spend heaps of time together over the weekend but when we did it was great, Sunday night pizza and Grey’s and at the footy all four of us on Sunday was good fun.

Friday night was really good with Roy Malloy (www.roymaloy.com) coming along to our second Impact night to preform and Brad Ellis from 614 coming in to lead us in worship. It was an awesome night we had about 70 people there who all really enjoyed themselves. Roy was fantastic and brought the house down with many funny gags. But for me it was the time of worship that really stood out. When people of all ages get together and are relaxed and come before God in worship its an amazing place to be. We had 70 year-olds to 7 year-olds there on Friday night and even though songs were new to some and old for others people were unified in their love for a saviour and their heart of worship.

We are really looking forward to our next Impact night. We will continue to open it to people of all ages, we will continue to experiment and continue to open up opportunities for people to encounter God. Youth need to see older people worship, older people need to see younger peoples energy in worship. So stay tuned for the next one in term three.

It’s a busy time of year right now with the red shield appeal rapidly approaching and with state youth games only 4 and half weeks away so there’s plenty to be done.

But God is Good

Proverbs Thought
My Son, keep my words and store up my command within you.

Be Good
Bakes

Timing is Everything

I’m really pumped up about Church this Sunday morning, it’s my first all age worship I suppose maybe what use to be called a “family service” and here at Ringwood the mid week groups (old play groups) Mainly music have been asked to come along and the kid’s will sing some songs and everyone off all ages will participate throughout the service.

I’m really pumped because I believe in God and I love him, and I love sitting back and seeing how he’s moving and how his plan is working out and how when people put God first in their lives and love him that he comes through and blesses them so much, more than you could ever imagine.

I’ve seen it in other people’s lives so often and I know that I am so blessed in my own life. I look back over the past few years in my life and just amazed at how God’s moved in it and how he’s blessed so much. I think that if I listed at how much I’m blessed I’d be kicked off this blogging site because I would over load it.

I’m blessed simply because the God of the universe loves me, I’m blessed because I’m saved by grace. I’m blessed with a great family who love me, who care for me and want the best for me; I’m blessed with a great Mum, a great Dad and great sisters, Jess and Mel. I’m blessed with my extended family too. I’m blessed to have Sarah in my life, to have her support and everything she does for me. I’m blessed because I have great friends, and I can say that I have friends that stretch right across this country from Melbourne to Adelaide to Perth.

I am blessed because the creator of the universe has a plan for my life, that he cares so much that he planed it right out. I am so blessed to be at Ringwood; I have a great job and great people to work with. I think that God is really moving in this place, preparing us for something. I think that all of us have been really stretched in our ministries at some stage over the past few weeks. Having watch and been apart of it the character and the integrity of people have really come through. I am blessed to have fantastic Corps Officers who love God and love others, they are leaders and they are incredible to work with.

God loves great endings and is the most unbelievable scriptwriter ever. His plan for his people is indescribable and his timing is perfect. As he rises up new and different people to do his work it encourages people, as he releases people into new and exciting areas of ministry his timing is inconceivable.

So I’m really pumped about Ringwood, I’m really excited about what God’s doing, and God is Good. I’m pumped about Sunday, when kids come and sing before the Lord the spirit really changes in places and he begins something new in all of us.

God is so amazing

Proverbs Thought
By wisdom a house is built, and through understanding it is established; through knowledge its rooms are filled with rare and beautiful treasures.

Be Good
Bakes

Life in Blog World

Life outside of our reality can be a dangerous place to be. In a world that is all about the individual we face the issue of people forgetting that their life on the Internet is still real life. We live in a society where the media and advertising world is creating a generation that is all about the “I”, we live in a world that is full of it’s self, we have the Ipod, the myspace and the facebook. Where ever we go we are taught to put ourselves first and other second. In ministry we are begging to be taught that a great way to outreach to the young adults of today is to do mission work around our community because this generation likes to be doing stuff to make a difference, but what difference are they really making apart from there self gratification when they can end the day and say “look what I did” and how good am I for doing that, let me just go home and make sure I add that to my resume. Why isn’t that we’re being told in ministry that instead of feeding the world’s ego that we go out and just show what we as followers of Christ are all about? Loving God with all our hearts and because of that love, loving others. I don’t even know how I got there, that’s not even the point I wanted to make in this blog, but its worth a thought anyway.

The point I wanted to make is that our lives outside of our reality - our life on the internet needs to be seen as our normal life. Like it or not our world is becoming more and more reliant on the world wide web, we want information as soon as it’s available, no longer is it that we wait for tomorrow’s paper to read the latest in world news or the day’s footy scores we’re on our PC’s or phones as soon as it’s happened.

In our self-loving world, the Internet really does encourage us to live this sort of life out. With personal web pages so accessible to everyone from a 5 year old to a 75 year old we have the opportunity to really put ourselves out there. More and more I am hearing on the radio of debuting artists being discovered after putting their song up on their myspace and many positive things are coming out of this sort of freedom but what people forget is that everyone gets a chance to have a look or have a read of what we put out there.

No matter how private your settings are on your blog, myspace or facebook people can still see them, and even after years of being deleted they are still there and can still be found. We must remember that we are being viewed by all, and that the image we portray online is the online image of Christ that we represent. Comment’s made or pictures taken there is no context to any of this, be careful while your in your online world, remember that you are the same person logged in or logged out there is no split personalities living in cyber world and the real world.

Proverbs Thought
Buy the truth and do not sell it; get wisdom, discipline and understanding.

Be Good

Bakes

Sarah's Birthdays and All

We did our first cake bake at ImpACT Youth on Friday night and it seemed to work really well. Using the good old formula that worked at Balga and its work again here. The youth really seemed to have a good night and the cakes turned out really well and on Sunday morning they sold out quick and the youth receiving $125 worth of donations for them. So we were really happy with that.

I went over early Saturday morning to celebrate Sarah’s 24th birthday (she’s so old) and we opened her presents, and she got so much, make favourites were definitely the puzzle and also the pokodotted PJ’s she got.

I umpired in the afternoon and it was a pretty good game of footy, I was expecting a lot worst for 4th division. I had a report so we’re off to the tribunal tonight. I am still lacking in the fitness department but there’s nothing new there, but I was really happy with how I got through the game and how I umpired. The quarters at 20 minutes plus time on and so when I wasn’t expecting that during the first I did start to wonder if the siren had broken.

We went out for dinner Saturday night and it was really yummy, it was really good to celebrate Sarah’s birthday with some of our new friends and Jess. The food was good and so was the company. I hope Sarah had a great birthday. Sorry about the lack of cake.

Church was really good Sunday night I thought, it had a really good atmosphere to it. We took Jess to the airport and saw her off; I hope she had a good week.

Well that’s about all that’s happened over the weekend. I’m really looking forward to getting my car back cos driving this massive van around really isn’t good for my image haha, no I’m joking it’s just a pain in the butt to park.

Proverbs Thought
A good name is more desirable than great riches; to be esteemed is better than silver or gold.

Be Good

Bakes