How is it already the end?

Wow. It's week 11 already. I cannot believe how fast these past weeks have gone by! So much has happened it seems, but at the same time I feel like I just got here. It's so strange that Christmas is next week, it's been so hot over here that I don't even feel like Christmas is actually going to come! Seeing Christmas decorations and Christmas trees isn't right when it's 90+ degrees outside. I miss the snow a little bit, but I think I prefer going to the beach than shoveling a snow laden driveway.. For sure. 

Last week was an awesome week. The topic was evangelism which I have really grown to love since being here, and we had a sassy Brazilian woman named Anabel speaking. Her testimony was pretty crazy; she has spent several years in the Amazon ministering to the Indians there and now she is head of the YWAM base in East Timor. Her stories were so inspiring and convicting, she really challenged us to step out of our comfort zones and follow the call that God has for our lives. But the coolest part about last week was that all of our outreach funds came in! At the beginning of last week we needed about $10,000 by Wednesday. Every morning we spent 30 minutes as a group praying for those finances. God was faithful and by Wednesday, which is when all the money was supposed to be due, we were down to only $5,000. So Wednesday afternoon we met as a school in our classroom and for two hours before dinner we just worshipped and prayed that God would bring in all the money that we needed. I was so confidant that He was going to provide, so the whole time I was just so joyful and excited as we were worshipping him. It was so awesome, after about an hour of worship and prayer the money just started to come in. People were getting random emails from their friends saying that they wanted to help get us to outreach and people in our school started giving money to other people who didn't have all their finances. By dinner time we were down to $500, it was truly a miracle. It was such a good day because not only did we see God do an awesome miracle, but I also got to help someone make pies for a fundraiser which was so much fun because I haven't baked in so long, so that was a real joy :)

Last Thursday was our last night of evangelism before outreach. It was an exciting night because we had been learning about evangelism the entire week so I was pretty pumped. Me and my two partners were able to have three awesome conversations with people about the gospel and about God's love for them. They were so open to hearing it and I think we really planted some seeds. God did some really awesome things through other people in my school that night too, it's so much fun to see God working! I can't wait to see what he's going to do on outreach!

Speaking of outreach, today we met in our outreach teams and kind of went over what we would be doing during the three months in Nepal and Thailand. It was a lot of information so I don't remember all of it, but here's what I know: we will be together as our entire school in Kathmandu for three weeks and then our teams will be splitting up and going to three separate places in Nepal for two weeks and then my team will be returning to Kathmandu for another two weeks. My team will then be flying out to Bangkok and we will stay there for three days just adjusting to the culture and everything else, we will then be taking a train to the northern part of Thailand for about 23 days (the train ride will probably be 11+ hours..). After that we will travel back to Bangkok for a couple days and then back to Perth! It crazy, I feel like it will go so fast because of all the traveling. But I am so excited! I'm especially excited to use the squaty potties and eat all the yummy fried cockroaches.. Okay, I'm not too excited about that, but I am excited for all the adventures I'm going to have and all the pad Thai I'm going to eat! 

Oh, one more thing! Last night during our last soccer league game I scored the winning goal! It was so much fun!

Here are some pictures from these last couple of weeks!

This was during Carols by Candlelight, it was a beautiful night of singing and dancing

These are some of my wonderful friends :)

This is a gingerbread house, there was a contest!

Me and karoline and Kaitlin went to get our toes done last Saturday :) it was so much fun!

Okay, that's all for now. Next week is Christmas so it's going to be such a busy, fun, exciting time, but I will try to write at least one more post before I leave! I love and miss everyone at home! 

Merry Christmas :) 

Xo, Helen 

Time flies!

Wow! It's already the end of week eight! We have three weeks left of lecture phase and then we have one week to prepare for outreach and Christmas! I feel like I just got here but it's crazy the amount of stuff that I have learned and experienced so far. Two weeks ago our topic for the week was spiritual warfare. We learned that Spiritual warfare is always going on and that if you want to do anything for God then you are guaranteed to be apposed, but we have authority over satan and his lies because Jesus gave us that authority when he died for us on the cross. It was a  really good week. And last week our topic was on lordship, submission, and authority. It was very convicting because I realized that I have been holding on to a lot of stuff and not fully submitting my entire life under the lordship of Jesus Christ. So yes, last week was very eye opening and it probably was the fastest week yet because the lectures were so good that the time just flew by! Next week our topic is relationships, I'm really excited to see what God is going to teach me.

In other news, last week in our soccer league we played the other YWAM team and we won! It was so exciting because it was the only game that we really cared about winning. Now we have bragging rights :) it was a really good time though! And it was our first win, so that was exciting.

The base is being decorated for Christmas which is super exciting! Although it doesn't really feel like Christmas is coming because of the warm weather. Even though it is so hot outside I have been listening to Christmas music just to get into the Christmas spirit. A few of us watched elf last night which was really fun. But anyways, the base is really nice. There is a huge "Christmas tree" in the middle of the base and soon they are going to put stockings up for every person note he base! We get to fill each other's stockings with goodies, I'm so excited! 

This is them building the Christmas tree..

And this is the finished project! It lights up at night, but it isn't really the same as a real Christmas tree.

Last week the whole base went to the beach for dinner. It was a much needed break and it was so fun!

I also had the opportunity to bake someone's birthday "cake" last week! (It was actually a peach tart, not a cake). I had so much fun! I made the recipe up as I went along and the finished product looked good! I didn't actually get to taste it, but someone that did try it said it was so good, so that's good.

Last night I saw the first scary spider that I've seen in Australia, it was dark so I couldn't see the details of it, but what I saw was enough.

This picture doesn't really do it justice, but you can kind of tell that it was incredibly scary!

Well that's all for now, I'll probably write again in a week or so. If you guys can please be praying for my school because a lot of people still need finances for outreach! I have all my finances by God's grace, but a lot of my friends still need money, so please pray that God will provide that for us! If you want to help by sending some money just Facebook me or email me and I can let you know how you can help :)

Okay, I love and miss all of you!

Xo, Helen

Two weeks worth

Wow it has been a while! Last weekend was really busy because we spent Saturday at the beach and then we had people over that night for ice cream and cookies and games at our house.  And on Sunday I had weekend duty which consisted mostly of preparing meals for Sunday and Monday. So that was kind of fun, but also very tiring. But last week was really good. We had teaching on the the fear of The Lord and it was very powerful. We learned that the fear of The Lord is respect and reverence for God's holiness and a hatred towards sin. Evangelism was also really really cool this week, my friend Julie and I walked around Northbridge praying for the people there and mostly for young teenage girls, that they would find their identity in Christ rather than guys, and then God led us to this girl who was waiting for a date outside of a club and we were able to talk to her for a while. It was crazy because before the night I felt so sick and so tired, but then during evangelism God gave me the strength to get through the night and I felt great! 

Okay I have lots of pictures now to share so bear with me.

This is from the beach last Saturday, we went to a different beach and it was actually nicer and even more beautiful then the other one we go to. ( I'm getting really spoiled)

This is my team that is going to Thailand with me! I'm so excited, these people are awesome!

This is one of my best friends! Her name is karoline and she's from Norway, she's actually helping me practice my Swedish. It's really fun because we can talk to each other and people don't know what we're saying :)

This was on Thursday before evangelism, I was so tired so I took a little nap on the couch. These guys thought it was pretty funny..

This was yesterday! The sports dts helped out for a sausage sizzle during one of Perth's biggest festivals. There were around 120,000 people there and it was so crowded! But we had lots of fun. I was made team leader for one of the shifts and it felt a little like I was on master chef, it was pretty exciting.

Last one. This is Kirsten and Felix, and this is right before I started writing this post! Exciting, I know :) 

Okay well that's all for now! I have been a little homesick lately so just keep praying for me please :) 

Xo, Helen 

Worship, intercession, and dancing.

This week has been so awesome. The teaching was on worship and intercession and we were taught by Hyung Myung Kim who is the leader of the school of worship in South Korea. The lectures were in Korean and then translated into English which was kind of hard at first, but I got used to it by the end of the week. And on Friday for application day we spent the morning worshipping and glorifying God, and interceding for the nations, it was an awesome time.

This week we had our first indoor soccer league game. We lost. But now that we know the rules I think we will do a lot better this week. We also had a base picnic on Wednesday which was so much fun! I love having fellowship all the time and meeting new people. Last night was the best night of the week though, one of the schools had a dance and invited everyone to come. It was an old school Danish dance because the leader of the school is Danish, so picture like Pride and Prejudice style dancing. My friends and I got all dressed up and fancy, I seriously felt like I was going to homecoming all over again, but it was so much more fun than homecoming. And they served cheesecake and cake at the dance so that's always a plus!

Yeah so that was so much fun.

By the way, we found out where we are going on outreach. We are all going to Nepal for six weeks and then we will be splitting into three groups and one will go to china, one will go to Malaysia, and one will go to Thailand. I will be with the group going to Thailand and I am so excited! We will be working with an orphanage and I'm sure doing so many other things. I cannot wait!

That's it for now! 

Xo, Helen 

 

Last week

I know I haven't posted in a while, so here's a post about what I've been doing this past week. The week was pretty normal, we had chores and class and work duties every day and then on Thursday night we had evangelism. My evangelism team goes to the city and just walks around praying for people and sharing the gospel and stuff like that. It's such a cool opportunity because there are a lot of hurting people in the city and lots of homeless people.

This weeks teaching was on forgiveness and repentance. It was super convicting and made me realize how much my sin really hurts God. On Friday we had a repentance and forgiveness day; we spent the day repenting of our sins and forgiving the people in our lives that have hurt us, it took about 10 hours. We then had Friday night meeting which is basically like church for the entire base. It was extremely hard to focus after an entire day of sitting in a classroom, but the worship and teaching are super powerful.

The weekend was so much fun and so relaxing! Almost my whole school and some of the other schools went to the beach on Saturday and the weather was perfect! And we ended the night with cookies and a movie at my house which is pretty much what we do every weekend night!

And then on Sunday a couple of my friends and I went to the beach AGAIN which was really nice because the weather was even nicer then on Saturday (I haven't gotten sun burnt yet by the way)! But we only stayed for a little bit because we had a soccer game to get to. The Perth Glory soccer stadium is right by our base so some of my friends and I went to the season opener! It was a blast, but it was extremely hot sitting in the stadium. And then we finished the night off with the Dark Knight Rises. 

It was such a good weekend and I can't wait to see what this week will bring! 

I miss everyone at home!

Xo, Helen 

Teaching

In case you are wondering about what I'm learning here at YWAM, I will tell you right now. Last week the teaching was on hearing God's voice. The teaching was awesome, I learned so much. I knew that God speaks to his children, but I didn't really realize that he is always talking to us. He constantly wants to be in conversation with us because he wants a relationship with us and you can't have a relationship with out communicating. It just really makes you realize how loving God really is. How he pursues us continually and desires us, how he initiates the relationship with us despite our rebellious hearts, it just truly amazes me and makes me fall even more in love with God.

The topic that we are learning about this week is the nature and character of God. We are only two days into it but I already know that I am going to learn so much! We have learned that the difference between the nature of God and his character is that his nature is what he is, it is unchangeable. For example, by nature God is almighty, he is omniscient, he is omnipresent, he is infinite. But his character is what he chooses to be. He does not have to be good or loving, but that is what he chooses to be. He chooses to be merciful and gracious and holy,  and he chooses to love us even though we don't deserve it at all, which makes him so much more awesome. And because he chooses to be loving he also gives us the choice to love him back, he doesn't force us into a relationship with him because that wouldn't really be love. 

I'm learning so much and it hasn't even been two weeks! God is truly amazing.

Xo, Helen 

Kangaroo Island

I came to Australia thinking that I would be seeing kangaroos roaming the streets, fortunately that is not the case. In fact I didn't actually see a kangaroo until Sunday. In Perth there is an "island" called Kangaroo Island where the kangaroos are kept behind a gate to keep them from roaming the city. There weren't even a lot of kangaroos on kangaroo, but I managed to see three. Several people that I went with wee able to go up and pet them, but I was wearing a dress and I didn't really feel like walking through swampy marsh just to pet a kangaroo. Who knows, maybe I will go back before I leave to get a picture with one, but we'll see. Anyways, here are some pictures that I took at Kangaraoo Island.

It was pretty exciting, but I think I liked the beach better :)

Xo, Helen