africa

i am kicking myself for never having gone on a short-term mission to Africa. True my man has only been a Christian for a couple of years now and I have been with him since we were 21....but still!!!!

I'm 38 years old about to have a child and another next year...when will I actually be able to go? When the kids can walk and talk - 3 yrs time? My mum would shoot me if I said I was taking the kids to Africa.

My first step would be to go to Watoto and see all the great stuff they are doing over there and volunteer if possible.

I have lots of dreams and visions about missions in Africa and yet I've only been there once and not on a mission. I'm one of these dreamers who thinks we can remove poverty from Africa. I say that to some people and I can see from their faces they think I've lost the plot.

Oh well, as Joyce Meyer says I would rather ask for a lot and get some of it, then ask for nothing and get all of it :-)

If I end up standing in front of the LORD not having fulfilled one of these I will be very disappointed with myself. I'm not sure how the LORD will feel...disappointed too :-(

God's chosen people

Had a bible study last nite - talked about the relationship the LORD has with the Jewish people.

It was great to hear that most people in our group believed they were still his chosen people.

To me, they are still his first born, his beloved children. Even though the majority of them rejected Jesus, our faith still stems from their faith. Jesus and all the disciples were Jewish.

I don't believe the LORD ever abandons those he loves. I believe he has a plan to save them. You just have to look at the history of his relationship with them - they were disobedient, he disciplined them, forgave them, they were disobedient, he disciplined them, forgave them....when they were unfaithful he was and always will be faithful.

There relationship is a perfect example of Father and child. Our God is the ultimate Father - he will always try to save his children. He is generational and eternal...I believe he is waiting for that generation of his children to set free and fulfil a key role in his final master plan.

I have a special place in my heart for the LORD's chosen people. They have struggled for survival and still they survive. Israel is surrounded by enemies and still it survives. Jerusalem still stands and is sacred to all three of the major religious groups. God still has a plan for them.

It looks like the LORD has set them up to struggle - I use to wonder why he would pick a home land for them surrounded by enemies...what is he trying to teach them? I think he is embedding in their very character a determination to stand in the midst of adversity. A mentality to never give up and to persevere against all odds like no other race. A spirit of unswerving faith in their one true God. To me, it seems he's preparing them for battle - perhaps at the end of days.

They have now until Jesus returns to turn to him. When he comes back the second time it will be like they imagined it would be - all powerful and all conquering. I hope then they will recognise their Messiah and ours is one and the same. Now that would be another great reunion!

aunty

My Uncle's wife died thurs 14 sept in New Zealand. She outlived my uncle who died back in 1989. They had her family service last week. I found out recently that none of my aunties or uncles spoke at her service. This is very sad because in my family, at least one person needs to get up and speak to represent our family.

It made me wish even more that I was there. I couldn't go but I desperately wanted to go to be with my cousins. I have been waiting for the busyness of the funeral preparations and family visitors to be over so I can ring them again and see how they are coping.

I just assumed my mother would say something because she knew Aunty best. And she made a special trip back down to Wellington when she found out she had taken a turn for the worse.

If I had been there I would have said this:

Aunty was someone who spoke her mind and didn't try to hide her feelings. She was a strong woman and reminded me of all my mother's sisters who are also very strong.

She was a no nonsense kind of person - what you saw was what you got with her. If she thought you were a naughty child, she let you know, so all the little ones in our family were very scared of her. That always made me laugh because no one messed with her.

She was always good to me and I thank her for that. I use to wonder what it was about her that captured my uncle enough for him to marry her. I loved my uncle. He was someone I always admired and respected. Actually he commanded respect so you never messed with him. He was the kind of person that you always had to speak the truth to because you knew he would know it anyway. It was the same with my Aunty.

Maybe that's what captured him. Here was someone who was his equal, someone without pretence, someone strong. For me, the greatest compliment I could pay my Aunty was that she was my Uncle's wife. I always thought she had to be an amazing woman to catch my uncle.

My cousins said that she was with the LORD the last few days of her life so they are confident she is now enjoying eternity with our loved ones. What a reunion that will be!

worth the risk?

that's the amazing thing about this desire to have children of our own....it doesn't matter if we don't have any previous experience. Even teenagers have children.

This desire in me is so strong it doesn't matter that we have been unsuccessful for 5 years, or that we lost a child, or that we were told I would never be able to conceive. We still kept trying because I felt like the LORD kept opening a window for us, and giving us hope to persevere.

It's weird because I have held my nieces and nephews and immediately I know I have no idea what i'm doing. I loved them as much as I would my own. I know this because I didn't think twice about changing their dirty nappies. But I can't cope with other people's babies.

I've never really been into 'babies' like some women are. They go all gooey just at the sight of a baby.

Yet this hasn't put me off. I still want children. I have this desire to shower them with love. Even if I prove useless or they end up being brats. I am more than willing to take the risk.

That must be what it's like for the LORD. Except worse for him because he knows for sure some of us will be children from hell. No matter how many opportunities he gives them to change he knows that in the end they will reject him. Imagine knowing a child would grow up one day to be Hitler. That's a scary thought.

what if i suck as a dad?

oh well...at least its not stopping me from trying!

life changing

Last nite had our antenatal class. Watched a video of a Father looking after his newborn baby girl. It made it more real to me...if the baby knew just how inexperienced her Father was, how it was just as new for him as it was her....how much he was making it up as he went along...i doubt she would have come out of her mother's womb.

Our baby is going to turn my world upside down. No longer will I be spending my days alone. I will have this permanent companion with me every moment of my day. My day will revolve around our baby. Feeding, clothing, bathing, entertaining him, and washing everything he spews or pees on, or dirties during the day.

I am about to go from one extreme to the other...and this will be my life for the next few years. Next year I'm doing it all over again except with the added responsibility of looking after a little boy at the same time. Two children under 2 is going to be one crazy fulltime job.

I will be just like that Father in the video, making it up as I go along. Sure I would have done classes, read books, but these all go out the window when faced with a baby who's only means of communicating with you is crying. Hungry, tired, wet or sick - they cry.

Everyone thinks Myles and I are going to be great parents. What if we suck??? What if we end up raising brats from hell that we can't control or even worse can't love???

Oh well, we can always send them to their grandmothers in New Zealand :-)

my future?

if i sow anger, mistrust, selfishness, judgement, apathy, disobedience and destruction

I will have no future

if i sow love

mercy

trust

hope

and faith

my future will be eternal

What can I as a christian learn from Steve Irwin

I dont know if Steve was a christian - though I did hear that Australia Zoo had a Chaplain which suggests that he did appreciate a spiritual element to things. However , I get distracted.

My main question is: what can I learn from him. I can learn from him what the Bible already tells me.

That what God wants us to do is follow our passions - our gifts. To not just mingle in church groups. But to get out to the world and do what we are passionate about. And while we do these things - be like Christ. Show people Christ.

If we only do christian ministry programmes etc which we are not passionate about - then we will give less than 110%. We will give as little as we can. And we will not be getting out to the world.

So, if I am in to playing rugby - play rugby. Mingle amongst other rugby players. And at the same time, show them Christ through me.

Honour the un-honourable

It's been a while since I have blogged and a reason is that I have been pondering the 'post that has stopped me from blogging'.

I have been reading the Bible story of Saul and his son Jonathan (read: 1 Samuel 9 onwards).

The main lesson I learnt was that God wants us to honour the un-honourable. Specifically - "honour your father". It says this even though the father may not be very honourable. There is no condition on this statement.

This made me reflect HEAPS on my Dad. I know my Dad is not perfect - but I was not honouring him - when I should be. God wants me to honour my father - and to make sure my Dad knows it. So I am going on a trip to my father's place - at a time when I should be at home with my pregnant wife. But I feel compelled to go.

But why was this so hard to post? Because I wonder how it reflects on me. I have done some un-honourable things - we all have - and while I am ok to admit it - I dont like the fact that I have been un-honourable. It makes me feel like I have no integrity. No authority. No validity in anything I post on.

But I know that I dont need to be perfect in God's eyes...and I have pushed through the barrier and posted. That's what studying God's word does for me...helps me know where I should be and push through barriers to get there. All praise to God.

rantings and ravings of a mother-to-be

The day before my birthday I kind of went on a bit of rampage against christians - including myself. Put it down to turning 38 on sept 11 or because I am almost a mother....or both.

I just get kind of sick sometimes at how INACTIVE the majority of God's people are - ordinary christians like me. We get soooo preoccupied with this life that we forget we are meant to be part of God's ETERNAL solution against evil. We spend so much time learning but not enough time DOING.

I'm having a child which renders me very inactive but i'm always thinking of ways I can DO SOMETHING. I'm not waiting for my life to be perfect...to have enough savings, to have an awesome business or job, or even to have the perfect family of 1 boy and 1 girl with two loving parents.

I give out of what's in my hand. Sometimes I give more than what's in my hand and then kick myself for being so impatient and not being a good steward. I'm good at giving but I know I can be even better!

My biggest project at the moment is building an orphanage home for 8 orphans and an adopted mum in Uganda. It will cost AUS$17,000. I want to make Jeremiah 29:11 true for these kids. So far I've raised $4,000 with the help of my fellow notaboutus girls. I am impatient to raise this money by middle of next year.

Yet I'm planning to raise and pay for two children of my own in the next coming years. But I want to do so much more. I'm afraid my kids aren't going to have a very normal upbringing because I'm not planning to settle down I'm planning to do more!!!!! I believe all things are possible with the LORD.

So yes, I ranted waay too much in my post 'WE CAN DO SOMETHING' but sometimes I just feel like kicking Christians out of their 'SLUMBER' as the bible puts it.

Our Lord and Saviour was a rebel - he did not accept the status quo. He did not sit back and build empires, or live a life of pleasure because he was going to suffer unimaginable pain at 30 something. He went out amongst the lost, he broke lots of religious rules of his time, and just with the power of his words and actions he changed history.

He did it by loving those that needed love, telling off those that thought too highly of themselves, and meeting peoples EVERY DAY NEEDS in REAL TOUCHABLE WAYS that CHANGED THEIR LIVES AND FILLED THEM WITH HOPE FOR A BETTER FUTURE!!!

ok, i thought i had finished ranting but i'm still doing it.

Finished now...go back to your safe little worlds and ignore me.

trust

you think you trust the LORD but you don't realise how small that trust is until he takes away the ground you stand on.

some rely on their education, on knowledge, on their family, put their security in knowing they will always be able to take care of themselves - the security of a job or a career, of being able to provide. Or if they're one of the priviledged few - rely on their true love. Their future seems secure and safe.

So what happens when the LORD takes it all away? Why would he let this happen to us? I believe he does it to show us that we don't really trust him. We don't know the meaning of trust. The moment he takes something from us, we try to to fix it, take back control of our lives, we put everything on hold until we can solve this problem. We stop trusting.

Because if we really trusted him we would know he let this happen to us for a reason. To teach us something about ourselves. To help us to let go and grow.

When the LORD answered my prayers to save my husband, to have a child, he did it in a way which showed me I had to trust him more than I have ever trusted before. I have to keep believing in the impossible, even when bad things happen, even if it means losing a child, losing a husband. I have to believe he knows what he is doing.

He teaches me that holding on to his hand as I step out into the dark is the safest place to be. Not the light that surrounds the little world I have created for myself and who I think I am. That was great when I was a child, but if I want to be everything I can be, I have to step out the door into the dark. Just me holding on to his hand.

There were treasures in this world which I couldn't do without. My security blankets. I feel like the LORD has stripped the most important ones away. Stripped away anything which I relied on. So my faith is in him alone. Not in who I am, but in who he is. My strength is in him not in who I am.

In the last couple of years I have been through trials and tests which have turned my world upside down. Yet I thought my faith was in the LORD. I know now that trusting the LORD is a life journey. It means believing that he knows better than me what's best for me. Especially when bad things happen. It's an every day commitment to choose to follow him.

I have so much to learn and it's not been easy. It wouldn't be a test if it was easy ;-)

WE CAN DO SOMETHING

My son is so vulnerable to the world that we are his only protection. This would scare me tremendously if 'we' didn't include the LORD. With the LORD as his protector and provider, he couldn't have a better start to life.

Yet there are children out there who suffer and don't have any protection.

Yesterday I read an account of such evil about the sexual abuse on a 12 year old boy . I cried at his suffering. People must read stuff like that in the news and think where is God? How could he let this happen?

Where was my LORD when this was happening to this little boy? Was he as upset as me? Or is he like a lot of people today who have heard stuff like this on the news and it's like nothing, like listening to a weather report because it's so common.

We accept the world is full of evil and there is nothing we can do about it.

For Christians, like me, it's one thing to be angry and upset, but what about us? What are we going to do about it? These men and young boys who abused this 12 year old boy, how did they become like this?

I am just as responsible as every other christian in this world. What are we doing to change the lives of these communities, of not only the little boy but the abusers? What are we doing to make Jeremiah 29:11 true for them as it is true for us?

I live a comfortable life. But I have known evil and I never want my little ones to suffer at the hands of evil. So it's my responsibility not only to protect them but to change the world they walk in. The LORD said we are to remain in the world but not be of this world.

To all the christians out there trying to make a difference, working in the frontline. Thank you for following the LORD's calling on your lives. You are our Father's hope in this world.

The rest of us, we ARE of this world when we accept evil reigns, when we do nothing but sit in our comfortable homes, building our safe churches in safe suburbs, our little empires and accept that outside this protected environment there is evil but we are fine.

I'm not saying go out to the enemy frontline unprepared. But WE KNOW OUR LORD HAS A HEART FOR THE LOST, FOR THE PRISONERS, FOR THE BROKENHEARTED. (Isaiah 61). Jesus said, in Luke, he came to proclaim the year of the LORD's favour which is from Isaiah 61. He is God's character. The LORD would leave the 99 sheep and go out searching for ONE lost sheep. That's his heart. He celebrates when ONE lost son returns home.

Aren't we meant to be becoming like Jesus more and more every day? We are all work in progress...but what are we progressing towards? Who do we really resemble - our Lord or this world??

In this world we are his body. We are meant to be like Jesus to the world. Yet we give the world an image of Jesus which resembles this world. We take care of ourselves. We take care of the saved. There is nothing wrong with equiping the saved....but if they NEVER leave the safety of CHURCH then what exactly are we equiping them to do??

If it's not our calling or our gift to go out to save the lost in such communities, then we work in our own communities.

Instead of doing nothing EVERY CHRISTIAN can do something.

We can ALL pray. Imagine if every single christian prayed for at least 1 minute a day for the lost, the brokenhearted ........ there are millions of Christians ....... imagine the power of our united prayer? What the LORD could do with our prayers would blow our minds away. Even Jesus took time out to pray.

We can pray that the LORD raises up a generation with his passion for the LOST. An army who will go out into all the world to proclaim his good news. We can do something, we can pray he would equip them with discernment, wisdom, his heart, and his power to break through the darkness.

But in all truthfulness we can do something to change ourselves, our loved ones, our neighbours. Not by judgement but by love. God's love is irresistible. It's us, we are such bad examples of God's love that we make God RESISTIBLE. We are not enough like Jesus for the world to recognise him in us.

So where was God when this little boy was being abused? Crying like me, not only for that child but also because his body wasn't there to represent him. To bring light into his world, to heal the brokenhearted. That's just my little opinion.

God is not evil. Satan is. God gave humans from the beginning of creation FREE WILL. We chose to use that free will to help Satan in his quest to be NO. 1. We became a part of the spiritual battle by choosing to believe we knew better than God.

The consequences of Satan's betrayal and our actions, is EVIL in every sphere of our world. God's answer to EVIL is JESUS. Whoever believes in him will have eternal life. That's part of our promise. But in the meantime God waits.

He waits for us to realise that he didn't give us a spirit of timidity but of power, love and self-control. We need to believe that all things are possible in his name. That the Holy Spirit lives in each of us to teach us and guide us in this world.

If God acted now and ended the world to save that little boy from his pain. Then millions would be lost because they don't know him yet. To remove evil, is to remove even the smallest atom of evil...liars, the selfish and self-serving, the proud, anyone who does not believe in Jesus.

The LORD cannot abide by any EVIL. So he waits. He waits for his children to save the world, to go out to this little boy and help him. To go out to the abusers and save them.

I can't begin to imagine the LORD's plan but it's not just about saving one moment. It spans 1,000s of years, it spans an eternity of love. When you add up the hurt caused in the world, and put it next to eternity.......how can you compare?...only the Creator of life can measure this. Only he can make these hard choices that I can't even begin to fathom. He knows the end game.

If it was left to me I would have acted in that moment when that boy was captured. I would have destroyed those abusers and sent them straight to hell. But evil lives in me too. I would have to send myself to hell - all humanity to hell. I am still a sinner and so is every other Christian. None of us are perfect. How can we cast the first stone?

Thankfully the LORD knows better.

He waits for us. He waits for believers in every generation to save as many people as we possibly can. To bring as many people out of the dark of this world into the light. He's not waiting on a chosen few to save the lost - he is waiting on every single christian in his church body to do what only they can. Each of us has a part to play.

Only God knows the hour when he will say 'ENOUGH, the last lost sheep has returned home' and then he will unleash all the power in his hands to remove EVIL once and for all. To balance the accounts of the world in favour of love for all eternity.

dreamin

In the last couple of weeks baby has grown heaps. He's kicking big time now.

It's weird but during this pregnancy i have dreamt about extended family so much - my grand-parents, aunties, uncles, cousins, even family that I don't know but my grand-parents know. Some of them I'm not even close to. Plus my immediate family - my Dad, Mum, sister, brothers nieces and nephews.

I read in my baby 'bible' that dreams about family are seen as connecting the generations. I wonder if that's what the LORD is doing? Some of them are weird dreams and a lot of them are set in Samoa, and they are full of action. We are always busy doing stuff like playing, gardening, having a reunion, etc.

Is the LORD showing my baby what a weird family he belongs to ;-)

Father's day

Missed my Dad today. It's been 3 years since he died and special events are still bitter sweet for me. Went to church today and heard others speak of their Dads and I couldn't stop the tears.

Last week I thought about him a lot in relation to my child growing in me. When my Dad died I didn't feel like having children. I know it was part of the grief but it took me a long time to think about trying again. Whenever I pictured my children they were not with me or myles but sitting on my Dad's lap giggling as he bounced them up and down pulling faces at them.

I imagined them playing games with my Dad like he use to do with us. My Dad was many things - when it came to children he was so full of fun and mischief. Now my son will be born and he will never experience my Dad's love except through myles and me. I will pour so much love into him and tell him about his Grand-father who loved to play just like his mum and dad.

I know he's with the LORD having the time of his life. And still i wish he was with me. Selfish i know but I never really got a chance to spoil him. Yes I was a good daughter and helped carry some of his load. But it's nothing compared to the love he poured into my life, to the lessons he taught me.

One day we will meet again.