The night before Otago

Today I organised some last things for the trip to Otago. Myself and the Ku's plus 3 students are going on a vision trip down there for the next week to experience life on their campus ministry and see if there's any outreach ideas we can bring back to the Waikato.

I took a break from normal work today and did some games programming in the morning. Then I went grocery shopping and listened to a couple of sermons on the gifts of Exhortation and Discerning of spirits. I found 23 hours of preaching on my computer about the gifts of the Spirit and the Holy Spirit in the believer by Pastor Chuck Smith of Calvary Chapel. It will be interesting to hear an in-depth pentecostal view on this theology now that I have researched the cessationist view (the miraculous gifts are no longer in use).

Tonight I write a devotional to share with the team one morning down in Otago. The devotional is on 1 Th 5:16-18 "Rejoice always, pray without ceasing, give thanks in all circumstances; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you."

I went to church tonight and Parachute Band were there playing. They were loud. I enjoyed it, but was dissapointed there was very little preaching of the Word. After church we had some fellowship at Lucy's place. Lucy and Katie made us gormet pizza. Thepizzas had random toppings - spaghetti, brocolli and cheese sauce, carrot,... hilarious! There was even a dessert pizza. I really enjoyed it! Fun times!

For some reason I have been distancing myself from people more than normal recently. I just don't seem to have anything to say around them. It's slightly depressing. I don't understand myself sometimes...
I always have this conscious desire in me to do huge things for Christ, and when I'm doing simple things that Christ even commands us to do, I feel like it's not enough. I'm finding it hard to live in the moment I guess - my focus seems to be on the future. I feel like I don't fully belong anywhere really, and I'm pretty misunderstood. Yet at the same time, I know I'm where I'm meant to be by the call of God. I guess feelings can be deceiving sometimes.

A call to preach?

I went for one of my long walks today, as I do quite often. I take my mp3 player and listen to lectures at covenant theological seminary by Dr Bryan Chapell about preaching (homoletics). I've learnt so much interesting things about preparing sermons that I'm inspired, along with reading John Wesley's journal, to start writing sermons. By doing so I will at least be preaching to myself, but at best I may learn a lot while doing it, and even be able to start sharing with friends or practicing. Or maybe do what TD Jakes did and start preaching in forests. It's still doing God's will :) Just not very strategic :p either way, God seems to have ignited this passion within me after 2 years of not really giving it any thought.

I met with Jeremy the evangelist today, a real encourager. It was cool just to talk through stuff and share our passions. I talked through some questions I had about church and issues I'm working through in scripture which need to be wrestled with. Thanks Jeremy!

I was able to use the gift God gave me this afternoon of a logical mind and knowledge about computers to help Tim get started and motivated to work on an assignment that he's already late to get done and is struggling with.

I finished reading the book "Master plan of evangelism" a very good and almost academic book. Extremely rigorous with scriptures. I need to do the study at the back of it to really apply it to my life. I read Colossians today.

Yesterday I prepared a bible study about the prodigal son. It's going to go along with the la busqueta video we got given at the Christchurch CCC conference in May (which is a modern retelling of the story). I'm going to lead the outreach group next Wednesday with both resources. Hopefully God will provide a good mix of non believers, new believers, and mature believers to hear the message and discuss it. We already have 4 non-believers who are keen to come. Some are coming to learn English, some because they are just friends, and some because they are seeking Christ. Pray that they would all find Christ through our plans.

Start of mid-semester break

I'm doing one paper at the moment, human development. Today was spent mostly working on the assignment I have due for that before I go off to Otago. This morning I woke up at 6am to pray when everyone was quiet and there were no distractions, then went back to sleep. I am still believing strongly for revival.

Recently I've been re-evaluating some large aspects of my faith. I've been getting back into God's word and trying to read it objectively. At the moment I'm trying to come to a conclusion as to whether the miraculous gifts are still active today through "miracle working" people like the apostles. It really comes down to the question of revelation: does God reveal new or personal knowledge to certain individuals?

This afternoon I finished the first draft of an article I am writing to go in the University Nexus magazine. The article starts with my testimony and gets into why you need Christ and how to start a relationship with Him. I pray that people will be able to relate to my story and see how real this is.

Ripple effect

Back in late February I was reading the bible when I got mad at how software piracy is normal in the church. I realised I was guilty of it myself, so I got all my pirated cd's and smashed them.

Well, since then, God has used me to create a ripple effect. The waves are still travelling through the pond! Daniel was next after me to delete his music - the very next day after myself. Daniel's flatmate got convicted when he did that. Now my flatmate Aaron repented and smashed his cd's (Hilarious video at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BncD5zS0l4U), and Trinity has smashed his copied PS2 games. Aaron lead a talk with all the men who came to our student lead Spring Retreat and everyone was challenged to get rid of the stealing in their lives. Stephen, Neil, and Trinity are deleting their music. Rom 2:21 says "You who preach that one should not steal, do you steal?". Well now, more guys are getting keen to live a life of integrity - away from hipocracy and are taking the disk smashing challenge! Praise the Lord! Will you join us? Will you lead your families or future families with corruption or with godly integrity?

I hear about Mike Guglielmucci building lies in front of people's eyes as a Christian leader and falling when he had to admit he lied about having terminal cancer. It's amazing what a small sin in the dark can escalate to! So once again I am reminded how important accountability is, and how I need to be more intentional and vigorous at confessing my sins to others that I trust.

A typical but praiseworthy Thursday

Tried to wake up early this morning to read colossians, but I stayed in bed instead of getting out.

This morning was spent chasing down the man in charge of booking the New Life Theatre with Daniel. I eventually pinpointed a time and place where he would be from talking to people.

I then went out sharing with Sara. We approached a few people sitting around, and ended up talking to two girls in the sun. We had really good conversations with both of them, and I shared my testimony. It was probably the first time I was able to share about before I came to Christ and after, and genuinely proclaim that the joy of knowing Christ has far surpassed any other experience in my whole life, including my first year of university at college hall, which I thoroughly enjoyed.

After lunch I went out sharing with Tom, but I let Tom do the talking. We found three guys, one of whom we knew already, and Tom shared the gospel with all of them. They were extremely apathetic and didn't seem to care less about spiritual things, even though they all claimed to be Christians. We had little time left, so I encouraged them to get in a bible study group and shared from memory how they need to keep in step with the Spirit to avoid the two dangers of self-centred living and self-effort living as a believer (1 Cor 3:1-3 and Gal 3:3).

I received some athelete studies in the post from Timo today to try and do with a couple of rugby players I've met. Looking forward to getting a couple of action groups going next term. Also looking forward to Spring Retreat that our students are organising for tomorrow night!

Praise God that I got to see Him work in another day, and that he used me!

Relaxing Saturday

Started the morning reading through the book of colossians (which I've endeavoured to do once each day for 50 days) and praying - my daily bread.

Listened to a couple of lectures from www.biblicaltraining.org about preaching. Dr Chapel talked about the difference between written and oral structuring. When speaking we want to emphasis key words by repeating them, whereas in writing we simply state the most important point first. In preaching we build a framework and the propositional statement is supported by that framework, but also covers all of the framework. Very interesting and profitable for my life.

I spent the afternoon with friends - Joel and Tim, and then played a two hour intense game of chess with Susannah. It was a rematch because she won last time, and this time I beat her! Susannah and Tim's friend Irene came and watched the game. She's one of those people who is really familiar but neither of us could pinpoint where we'd met before. May St flat invited me for dinner and we enjoyed some fellowship and stories.

A long but rewarding Friday.

I took a short film on my phone with Kate to start spiritual conversation. I felt the Lord was leading me to management block, but it was pouring with rain and I felt equally at peace with 'cutting it short' to teacher's block.We met with a man named Robert who was about my age (22), but was a single father of two children. Robert was a Christian, and he recognised the video to be a retelling of the prodical's son. Robert was finding it difficult to go to church with children, so Kate and I made a few suggestions. The Lord then crossed our paths again at lunch time when Robert wandered in to the food court to have lunch where many student lifers were enjoying fellowship. I called himover and he ate with us. Robert is keen to join an action group bible study I am trying to set up, and he is going to try his best to come to our student lead spring retreat at the end of next week. Praise God for that.

I also tried to meet with a Korean named Yoong Soo Chung, and I ended up meeting his friend, but he never showed up. Unfortunately I was late because of talking with Robert, so perhaps it was my fault. I saw Edward who I talked with yesterday when sharing with Joel, and this time I was able to show him the gospel, but it was difficult to share with him, and he did not agree with the perspective that all have sinned. He said it implied creation theory, and I told him that was true. The message of Christ is a stumbling block to some. I pray Lord, that you would open Edward's eyes to your truth, and reveal falsity in the "secret knowledge" doctrines he believes.

The rest of my day was filled with meetings, reading the bible, prayer, and staff development time (we're going through the book about spiritual disciplines by John Ortberg entitled 'the life you've always wanted'), which is very beneficial to me. We closed the week with muffin time, a time where as a staff team we can reflect on the good and bad points of this week. I had a good week of constant joy, so I found this difficult because I saw God's hand at work everywhere (which was my high point), but my low point was seeing my flatmate Phil's passion fade away more when he didn't get accepted for a mission trip to east asia that he applied for, and then had little desire to apply for a local beach project for the third year running. I am still surprised to see how much God is at work in people's hearts and how thankful they are to hear the good news.

Sowing, sowing, sowing

I shared the gospel with a Chinese man today at the university of Waikato. He was interested in hearing about it. I was once again delighted to see conviction on a man's face and an understanding in the heart of the good news. He said there was nothing stopping him from becoming a Christian, but when I asked him if he'd like to pray now he said no, and we laughed at that. It wasn't God's timing, but we weren't sure what was keeping him from coming to Christ, so I had to wish him a good day and leave the results to God. Another seed sown, which I pray will land on fertile soil.