End of the New Testament

Well, Today is the official end of all New Testament studies. The school went to the Pig&Whistle pub to celebrate. It was really nice to just go out with everyone, take our minds off of the studies, and just have fellowship with one another. We have been extremely blessed to have the leaders we do here in the Sunny Coast. This is probably the only YWAM base in the world to take the students out to a pub in celebration of a milestone. The leaders know what people need, and that is to have the option to choose for ones self how they are to act. YWAM Sunshine Coast is really what one would make of it. If people came here just for the beach, then they would only get the beach. If they came here seeking a deeper more intimate relation with Jesus, then their world will be changed.

Here on the SBS, we have a group of 15 students and 8 leaders who are passionate about seeking God in worship and prayer while actively letting the Word of God transform their lives. I am extremely blessed to be put here amongst the other people that are here. God is melting peoples hearts and showing them their roll in the Kingdom.

I'd just like to say thank you to everyone who has, and is supporting me in this school! Your prayers and faith in God are above words. I'd like to ask any one who reads this blog to continue to pray for me as we pick up things in the Old Testament as the work load increases.

God Bless!

David

Revelation

Been in the book of Revelation this week. Not going to start giving a huge teaching on the book, but it is challenging. this book is all about comfort when going through times of great trial and persecution. Jesus tells the church in Smyrna right off the hop that they will be thrown in prison and tortured until they die.

I just keep looking at places in the world where this is reality for people, and wondering what have I done/what can I do to help? Praying for all the saints to be kept sanctified until the day is really the only thing I can do at the moment. Right now, God has me stationed in a bible school, learning the word, preparing me for what is to come. I have often gone into the community to tell people about Jesus to show them Gods love and be a light in this world. I take joy in that. Later though, am I willing to go out into a place where I will die by the sword, by being thrown in boiling oil, be crucified for whom I profess as the Saviour of my Soul? Am I willing to leave the comfort of family and friends, the comfort of a well paying, stable job to go to a place where I will be alone, stripped naked of all my belongings, sleep on freezing concrete floor, often not having any food? This is a reality that people have to face every day in areas of oppression.

Where is their comfort? where is their hope? In the Lord! They know that if they die, they will not taste death again. they will be safely under the alter of our Lord. We need to encourage these people, and also be encouraged by them as well. In the end, all who remain in Christ will have the Crown of life and will live forever in the glory of Him who called us. We need to be praying for people in hardcore situations of trial and persecution, wherever on the globe it is. If we aren't are we really supporting the rest of the body?

These are just things that I have been challenged by in this book. It isn't anything of fear, or being scared of what is to come, but out of love for the rest of the saints that need help and comfort that their Lord is in control.

Sorry. my thoughts are all over the place.

The Geltch Family

If any one who follows this blog could pray for one of the families on the base here. Mark and Mellissa Geltch (along with their children) are two very passionate missionaries who have given up pretty much everything to continue on making waves in Indonesia. This week, Marks Dad passed away. The Geltchs are in the process of moving over everything to Bali, and in two weeks time are to be living there for good. Please pray for Gods hand to move in their lives in this time.

I have only talked to Mark a few times in the time that I have been here, but every time has left me with encouragement and faithfulness. Again, please pray for them.

-David

Christmas and now...

During the Christmas season, one of my good mates down here invited me to his parents house for Christmas down in Huskisson, south of Sydney. That week, we had a really sweet barefoot bowls session, saw many beaches, kicked back on the porch and had many beers, went to the blue mountains, played aqua golf, played Cricket, played football(American), ate snaggs, ate ice cream, and went surfing. Words could not describe how blessed it was for me to be apart of the Windred family this Christmas. They took me in, treated me as their own, and supported me on my walk with the Lord. This Christmas, even though I was away from my family back home, was the best Christmas ever. I'm a poor Bible School student, yet the Lord decided to provide only in a way that he knows how to provide.

After the break was over, it was really easy getting back into the school, and all that comes with it. This last week though has just been stupidly hard on my soul. Not the work, nor is it anything in the work that is causing me such distress. I'm doing my work, and doing it well, getting high A's and having lots of time to just chill. What is causing my distress is a mixture of questions, passions, realizations and just a feeling of escape. Right now, the thing I want to do most is just take a flight to a place I have not been before, preach the word until I die, whether it be 60 years from now, or one day from now. Its not going to happen. The Harvest is ready, yet the workers are so few. This storm will pass, and I'll take joy once again, it'll just be in a little time. that's all. Just need to have patience I guess.

Family

Mark 3:33-35

^"33And he answered them, "Who are my mother and my brothers?" ³⁴And looking about at those who sat around him, he said, "Here are my mother and my brothers! ³⁵ For whoever does the will of God, he is my brother and sister and mother."

The past few weeks have been pretty hard with being away from family and friends back home. There has just been lots of feelings of longing to see people, wanting to be there to see my niece and nephews grow up. Times where I just want to sit back, talk with my dad about things, or make a feast with my mom, and brothers, or just times of sitting back, and chilling with my friends talking about random things, just having a good time. But time and time again does God bring me back to his purpose for my life, not his. That there is nothing to big, nothing to small that I should be willing to surrender for the name of the Lord.

Not saying that the people out here are bad or anything. They have been here for me when I needed to talk, they have been here for me when God has been working through me, but there is just a different feeling, knowing that this is the only nine months that I will ever know/see these people for any extended amount of time. They play a very significant role in my life for the next nine months, but after that, what? Are they only to be acquaintances of mine?

Just thoughts...

So Far...

Hello!

Over the last two months, I've been in a bible school, on the opposite side of the world from where my home is. I can't say I've had a more challenging (Spiritually and Mentally) time in my life so far. Constantly surrounded by a community with little time to get away and live. Always some one around, never any privacy. There is always something that could use a cleaning in the house, and rarely any one ready to clean it. Spiritually, there is much more concious awareness as to an eternal perspective, and the choices that I see people making. Choices that separate further and further from the truth, and from Jesus. Also, to see peoples hard work and labour being turned up in vain. People showing raw emotional love and servant hood being denied by the ones meant to receive it.

As for studying, wake up, read a few chapters of my bible eat breakfast, go to class till lunch, study till Supper, study after supper till bed time, repeat. So little time to do anything else.

But it has also been two of the best times of my life. Being pushed away from my comfort zone into an atmosphere where everyone is working in harmony, in the Sunshine Coast of Australia onlooking a beautiful river. Being able to serve one another in a tangible way, and always looking to help one another out, and being open with one another about struggles, goals, passions, visions.

Being able to be covered in the word of God nearly every waking hour of the day, no where else would I have this opportunity. Also, any time I go out, I've had the opportunity to share in fellowship with some one else who has noticed my bible, and wanted to bless me with encouragement, I have been extremely blessed.

In my studies, the biggest thing that I have been learning, and recognizing is the idea of bowing before Jesus in the throne room of the Almighty, revering him, and serving him. about a month ago, I studied Luke and Acts, two of the books with the most real and practical applications to our lives as Christians. Recorded events and real teachings of Jesus, and his followers. Yet the story does not stop there. after the book of acts, the story goes on. We are Acts 29. we are the people that serve Christ, and seek to see his kingdom furthered, and to help a people who are so lost. More and more what I have been seeing is that if there is no action, no one telling others about Jesus, no one to go out, then there is no point in having faith in Christ. I just finished studying James, and the big thing in James is that if some one has faith, but does not live it out, his faith is dead, and he has no faith. It is the sin of not responding to the call that Jesus has in our lives to out and tell others about him. A theme that runs through Hebrews is how God has spoken to the nation of Israel, yet the fathers had not responded, but continued on. The author of Hebrews is crying out to the readers to not be hard in their hearts, so deaf in their ears to the voice and leading of God. How they will miss the mark because of their inaction. Yet how different are people who call themselves Christians because they go to church every Sunday, and do nothing in between the weeks.

This has been on my heart, and it is more and more what I have been seeing in the scriptures.

Ephesians 2:10 "For we are his workmanship created in Christ Jesus for good works which have been prepared before hand, that we should walk in them."

David

Heyheyhey...

So, I'm back in Australia, and should really pick up writing the blog again. I guess people back home want to know what I'm doing...so, here I go.

A little over a year ago, God said to me, "Go to YWAM." So, last September, I went to the Sunshine Coast to do my YWAM. While I was on outreach, God said, "Go back to the Sunshine Coast, and continue with YWAM, and do the School of Biblical Studies." At the time, I was all hyped up to go. I didn't have anything back home to tie me down, no debt, nothing to stop me really. That was in February of 2011. SBS starts in September of 2011, so there was a little bit of a "waiting period" so to speak. During that time, I worked at a fast food joint, serving others, using my actions to witness to people, rather then preach to them. When I started there, I was the only Christian worker there, no one got along, and gossiped about everyone else. When I left that joint, there was a sense of peace, and calmness, and no hostility towards one another. Then I left to go work at Bible Camp, leading two discipleship programs during the summer, and cabin lead the Senior Teen week.

During the 6-7 months that I was back in Canada, I went deeper in relationships with people, and my family to. The first time I left for Aus, there wasn't a whole lot of emotional attachment. Yea, I loved people, and held them in respect as I would my own blood relatives. This time, leaving was hard. Really hard. If I were to use an example, It would be like pulling apart a string or something. Being attached to so many people, then just breaking off from them for a year with a simple tug. I mean, I can still communicate with everyone, and talk to them, but there is a little barrier of an ocean apart from all of them. Its just not the same. But, its necessary for me to do. Give up everything to follow the Lord. give up family, give up money, give up time, give up everything.
Before we can let God use us, we must first be willing to be sacrifices ourselves. Before we can say "God, what is it that you want me to do?" we must first be willing to say "yes" no matter what the cost. This is something of a cliché, you know, "of course we must be willing to do anything." But it's so much more then just words. Soooooo much more. Something that I have only started to learn, and until later on in my life, I'll never fully understand. I don't have kids, I don't have a wife, I don't have a house, I don't have a car, I don't have anything except me to offer. Even before I can have family, I must first be willing to give them up. I'm not going to use the classic Abraham offering Isaac at the altar, because I have no idea how Abraham felt, and have no idea how hard it would have been to offer up the only child he had bore. No way.

The story I will use is any story where Jesus heals people. The common thing that they all have is that Jesus showed compassion on them, and healed them. Then they went away rejoicing, and telling others about the what Christ has done for them. This is all I can do now. Rather then try and dwell on what I might have back home, I can rejoice with the mercies and blessings that Christ has given me today.

God Bless, David.