HAPPY BIRTHDAY 2 U!!!!!

It's Pete's birthday today! (the 7th)

Happy Birthday Petey, hope you have a wonderful day!!!!

It's also Mum's birthday on Friday, so Happy Birthday Mum!!!! and Happy Mothers' Day too!!!!

Times like these make you wish you were home again! Still we're having an 'enlightening' time here at Darwin Corps. This week we have 4 days of being the CO's and the 'parents' of 3 teenagers while the Woods' are off on a conference in Melbourne! We're coping pretty good, but can't wait to get a day to ourselves to spend some birthday time just Pete and I!

It turns out we're guns at Mainly Music, who'd have known!!!! "Hip, hip hip, hippopotamus!" (Those songs must be the most irritatingly catchy songs in history!). Having a great time connecting with the mum's and kids, some came to church on Sunday and a women's event the night before (come on God, bring them in!). What a ministry!

Recently we had a go at MASH (Mature Aged Social Hour - group for senior citizens), we spoke about Justice, Human Trafficking and Fairtrade. Full credit to the MASH bunch, they got on board and bought a bunch of chocolo chocolate and Jasper coffee, but more importantly, seemed to really connect with these Social Justice issues.

The African Service celebrated their one year anniversary last Sunday, complete with singing, dancing, testimonies and fervent prayer..... and a MASSIVE lunch! It was great to see the African's sticking around to share with each other and celebrate together with the Salvos!!! Exciting to see a new addition to the African service, a Salvo from Zimbabwe, who was healed from epilepsy as a boy and is now a doctor up here in Darwin - I can see God has big plans for this man of God - in the African Service and beyond! God bless the Africans!

Pete preached at the FUSE combined Youth church last Saturday, it went off! The theme was "Run" (from their "Stand, Run, Fight" series), check out Pete's blog soon, hopefully he'll post some of the footage of his preach that night. Darwin youth are beginning to connect in, hopefully they'll get into spending time with some of these young people at FUSE - they have a huge passion for God that only inspires you to go further and deeper for Him!

A friend of ours that has jumped into life following God, recently went on a night of outreach with us and some officers to connect with the homeless and offer a bit of food and drink to get them through the night. He eagerly changed into a Red Shield shirt and during the course of the night, gave his own shirt to a indigenous man who was shirtless - he's living a life of self-sacrifice! Awesome to see someone getting serious about their beliefs so quickly - lets all live out what we believe, a life of holiness - and yes, that means giving stuff away!

God is faithful!

Easter - Jesus died for YOU! Get to know him!

Whew! What a whirlwind that Easter was! Pete & I had opportunity to share a Good Friday "preview" at Sunrise last Thursday (Chapel). Pete laid the "Jesus died for you" message right out there on the line, answered a bunch of questions the guys had and challenged them to take Jesus as their life-saver... The classic line used to preach the gospel was "God is like KFC, we can't just walk up and take the chicken, there is a person we need to go through to get to the chicken (Jesus as a check-out chick with a difference!). The guys really connected with that one!

That night (Thursday) we went to a Passover meal at Darwin Corps, more than a hundred people rocked up! It was awesome to explore that last meal Jesus had, which he celebrated as a Jew and we can now recognise as a way to celebrate Jesus himself as the promised Messiah! (Messiah=a saving leader the Jews have been expecting for thousands of years, many recognised it was Jesus, others are still waiting to this day!).

Friday saw the kick-off of the NT Youth Easter Camp, we went to church (the Drama was awesome! that couple who were acting... second to none! hehe), then stayed out at Howard Springs at "Camp Beazley" (really a big property where the Beazleys live, they were great hosts). Camping out in tents during the wet season was a huge experience - we had two ridiculous rain storms, one which blew a big marquee tumbling across the yard! Only one person's bed got wet in the storms (guess who! grrr).
I spun-out at the go-karts (going too fast), Pete looked hilarious in his full-face helmet and one of the girls crashed while she was too busy waving! The Beazley's pool was well-used by all, especially the Melbournians! (it was HOT!). During the camp we learnt about prayer, justice and were challenged in our understanding of Jesus death and ressurrection - what did that mean personally?
The Camp Leaders had a rocking prayer meeting where the power of the Holy Spirit fell - everyone was amazed by God as leaders knelt, faces to the floor in prayer for the campers. The last night we sat round a campfire and shared about what camp meant to each of us, talked about Jesus' impact on our lives and how life from now on could be different, we could feel the Holy Spirit was there and active!

Where to from camp? We've invited the kids to our Sunday night Revolution Group, an opportunity to go deeper in learning and experiencing what it means to be a Revolutionary for God.

Monday Pete and I hung out at home, caught up on some sleep and reading, then Tuesday slept in some more and after lunch spent some time praying with one of the Sunrise guys that God is really working on (*please pray for him*). Afterwards we did the afternoon shift at Sunrise Homeless Mens accommodation.

Only a week to go here at Sunrise, then on to Darwin Corps... time is really flying by!

A final thought (as shared at Sunrise devotions today):

We can know OF people, we can know ABOUT people and we can KNOW people.
Do you know OF Jesus? Know ABOUT Jesus? or KNOW Jesus?

Because Jesus KNOWS YOU!!! - see Psalm 139!

CONNECTIONS 07!!!

Off to the first of many Connections 07 meetings today... (my first Officers Councils! yeah!).
I hope you've signed up to be a delegate, but if not, there's plenty of events you can rock up to at no charge. Check out the Connections page here. Make plans to be at the march, its gonna be awesome!

Well thats it for now, things are looking good here at college, the Heralds are mega-pumped for their commissioning and the Witnesses are just loving the ride....

See ya there!!!!

Songs for the Revolution

Here's my short-list of songs to keep you pumped for the fight...

Casting Crowns - "What if His people prayed"
Casting Crowns - "If we are the Body"
The Inhabited - "Revolution"
Switchfoot - "Dare you to move"
The Lads - "Favourite Time"

"Love is the movement, love is a revolution.
This is redemption, we don't have to slow back down."
Switchfoot - "Love is the movement"

Group 1 Crew - "A lot in common"
David Crowder Band - "Undignified"
Hip Hop Praise - "Liteshine (declaring war)"
Superchick - "One-girl revolution"
Superchick - "Get up"

"Make a move 'cause talk is really cheap.
You'll never start a revolution in your sleep.
Showing love to everyone is what It's all about."
Stellar Kart - "Activate"

Casting Crowns - "Every man"
Casting Crowns - "What this world needs"
Hillsong - "Hosanna"
Hillsong - "None but Jesus"
Hillsong - "Soldier"

There's something about a good song with passionate lyrics that stirs you up inside, gets you excited, uncomfortable, ready for action... Our revolution generation needs more anthems for the fight... got any other awesome songs up your sleeve???

"going to the Army"

I found an awesome quote recently in Revolution in the Church by Michael Brown, in it he compares church to an Army…. as in military (think war & camouflage, not brass bands & uniforms), what a novel idea!
He is speaking about our perception and experience of "church" and how that affects our mission... doing vs. being. I don’t think he intended it to be directed to the Salvation Army, but it certainly fits us as a movement! Have a read...

“What about the Army? What if the local officers and enlisted members met together once or twice a week and discussed military strategy, displayed the latest weaponry, watched inspirational war films and sang favourite battle songs?
And what if attending those meetings became known as “going to the Army”? What kind of Army would we have? How many battles would we win (if we ever made it to battle at all)?
The problem, of course, is the concept of “going to the Army” instead of “being the Army.” What a life-and-death difference lies between the two!
And what if the Army’s meeting place also became known as “the Army”? Confusion would reign, resulting in misguided and misplaced military efforts, since the focus would be on the meeting (not the results of the meeting) and the meeting place (as if a nice building could defeat an enemy).”

p38-39 Revolution in the Church, Michael Brown

Close to home... do you agree?

Church x 5

I went to 5 services last Sunday... FIVE!

That's pretty extreme, even for a Cadet, but you know what? I didn't get bored, didn't get sick of hearing about God, meeting with His people or getting into worship!

But really, what's the point of all this church stuff? As much as I love it all, sometimes I wonder at how much time we actually spend on preparing a service. Whether its worth the effort if our focus is on the wrong things. Could we we better use our time in the community? reaching new people for Christ? Or do we just need a renewed idea of what 'church' is really about?

I haven't formulated any real answers for myself as to what church should look like (believers meeting together) or how I should go about enabling worship. But I find myself very uncomfortable with anything that smacks of 'performance'... instead, yearning for the 'authentic' when meeting with other Christians in church settings.

Of the five services I went to, I still found myself drawn to the younger, informalish, "authenticity-chasing"-type service, where people don't take themselves too seriously, but seriously worship the Lord and seriously seek to make their faith real in the everday.

But.... praise the Lord for variety in the Body of Christ!!!!

Picnic Church?

I went to an awesome outreach event today... Waverley Corps is where I'm doing a Mission & Ministry placement as part of my officer training (pretty big corps with lots of seperate congregations.. Trad, cont, blended, youth)... They've recently experienced some awesome growth in their Playgroup program, so organised for a picnic for these families (to build on these relationships). Not only did they invite the playgoup families, but also the Brass band & timbrels and older kids ministries... the whole Corps was asked to come along and mix in!

At the picnic (12:30-2:30pm @ a local park) there were balloons, face-painting, parachute games for the littles, ball games for the older kids, puppets and showbags... everyone at the corps pitched in to make this a really positive experience for the Playgroup families. One thing that really impressed me, is how the Brass band learned some new songs to connect with these families (I don't know how many Brass bands you've heard playing music from 'The Wiggles'!!).

On the way home reflecting on the success of the event, I began to wonder... 'What if this was church?'. In a strange way, this was a modern version of an 'open-air' service! If we were to ditch church services on Sundays and go out into the local parks for a family-focussed 'picnic church', would we better reach the lost in our community? Seriously, if we think about Sunday-morning church, we have to admit that it has become a tradition for the people to come to us... and in today's world we have to realise that people aren't just 'rocking up' to a church to see what goes on... they think they know what its like (TV has a lot to answer for!)... and they don't want it. Could we plant a 'picnic church' through the Salvation Army?
...expanding to also hold mid-week discipleship & worship?
...possibly home-church based?

hmmm... interesting... I know this may be taking it a bit too far for those of us who are used to our Sunday-mornings sitting in a pew!

If we can just have a look at Jesus' ministry...

"Now when he [Jesus] saw the crowds, he when up on a mountainside and sat down. His disciples came to him, and he began to teach them..." Matthew 5:1-2, Sermon on the Mount)

"Then Jesus directed them to have all the people sit down on the green grass. So they sat down in groups of hundreds and fifties." (Mark 6:39-40, Feeding the 5000).

What a thought!!!!