Returning with excitement

First all the touristy stuff...We got a chance on our weekend break (which by the way is Sunday and Monday, so its a little hard to get used to) to go to the Gold Coast. We went to Surfer's Paradise (the first picture) and hung out on the beach. It was beautiful, but still is a little cold for the beach. It was nice in thesun and the water was not too cold, butthe wind was chilly. So,we will have to make anothertrip some other time. Also, on Monday we leave for ourfirstroad trip to 3differentplaces over 3 weeks. I'm excited to see more of God's beautiful creation and I think it will be a little warmer because weare going north. I don't know if I'll have internet throughoutthe 3 weeks, but I will try to keep everyone updated! The second picture is from Brisbane city at night.

Besides all of those things, it has been a challenging week. Not because of lack of communication with people at home, but just lots of reasons, living in community, being around lots of people all the time, not knowing where to go on outreach (our mission trip to another country at the end of our Discipleship Training School), and just feeling kind of stupid on some things we were talking about. God was good to help ease my mind. Along with that, they challenged us last week while we were discussing intercession to not talk to people at home and anytime we wanted to, to pray for them. It was really cool to think about people and pray for them instead of turning to people instead of God. Also, last week we talked about hearing God's voice. It was exciting to learn more about that and practice it. With hearing God's voice we had to tell our leaders where God wanted us to go for outreach. They gave us four locations and told us to pray about them. I felt God was leading me to go to Vanuatu, which is a small island about 3 hours flight from here. So, we learned more about our locations tonight and the people going to each of those. It was really cool to see pictures from Vanuatu and hear about the people and the work we will be doing there. It will be lots of manual labor, but it is beautiful and right on the ocean. We will be encouraging the local missionaries there, as well. This week we started learning about the Father Heart of God. Its so cool to talk about how God is our perfect father. I had a great earthly father as an example, but its so amazing to think of people who did not have good fathers and how God is their loving, perfect dad. He can be that father that so many people in our world are lacking, so if you think of all the things your dad did not do or you wanted him to do God doesn't miss the mark on any of those things. Its so cool to learn more about God's love and his adoption of us. God is our loving father who always wants to spend time with us and can give us his full attention all the time, which amazing since he can do that for everyone all at the same time! And the last picture is of our entire Beach to Bush school group.

Small Break

Just letting everyone know that I will be unable to email and post my blog for a little while, so I will be updating things again when I get a chance.

Already so much

Wow! I can't believe its really only been a week since we got started with our Beach 2 Bush program. It feels so much longer than that because of how well I feel like I know the team I'm working with and how God has already shown me. Trust...

Kim (our leader) told this story about one of her friends from this base that was diagnosed with cancer and died this past January. It made me think about my friend and how recently she died of colon cancer. Those things are so hard to understand why God, but her point was about trusting God. She actually shared a recorded message that this girl had spoke on trust before the whole cancer thing. It was just very real to me. She also talked about how we give God's characteristics definitions that God has not really defined, but that we have defined, like provider means He will provide everything we want/think we need, but sometimes that's not God's definition of providing....although he really will give us everything we absolutely need. Also, sometimes we just have to trust in God's power. We sometimes make him seem like he has so little power when his power is infinite. Although we don't understand he does and knows what he's doing. I feel like I'm rambling, but my main point is that God is already teaching me things!

Along with all that God is doing here are some interesting facts about being here:

I have to take a 4-5 minute shower (Queensland is always short on water), but its hot water, so I can’t really complain too much.It does get cold here…esp

ecially while camping
You can buy pretty much anything here that you could buy at home, which is much different from anywhere else I’ve been,

but things are actually quite expensive.
We all have work duties because the base is our home-mine is dinner cleanup
I think I was expecting cafeteria type food and its nothing close to that. All the food at the base has been great!
We have actual lectures, which so far is not like real school, but you do learn lots

People you know can actually get lost on mountains
I’m sleeping in room full of bunk beds with 12 other girls-I have a top bunk
We have a Target in the mall, which is only like 7 minutes walk from here. Amazing- since I love Target, but unfortunately its not exactly the same, but its still good.

Some other basic info: We have 20 students and 6 leaders. Most of the students are from the US which is surprising to me, but there's 1 from finland, 1 from sweden, 2 from holland, 2 from australia, 3 leaders from canada, 1 from switzerland, 1 from denmark, and 1 american girl who's parents were missionaries in taiwan so she grew up there. We have 12 girl students and 4 girl leaders. It just depends on the days about our class times. We have been having lectures in the mornings from 9:30-12:30 and we have had intercession times, and worship times in the morning also. We have all shared our testimonies has part of teaching/learning about each other. Other times we do work chores, like mine is cleaning up after dinner with 4 other students. On saturday afternoons we work around our base either yard work, painting, working out in the community, or with youth. We also have some free time to go to the park and meet local people or play sports. All of our meals are at the school and we have 2 leaders who are in charge of cooking and the food has been really good!

A little more about our travels

We found out yesterday in our school orientation that we will be traveling to lots of really cool places and amazing beaches. We will get to visit a few aborigine communities, as well. The furthest we will travel up the coast is to Arlie Beach, which is about 14+ hours away, but we will get to go to the Barrier Reef from there. We will have the opportunity to go to the largest sand island at some point in our travels, too! At all these places we will get to talk to backpackers, people who live in more remote places, and whoever else God puts in our path. I will have more information about all of these places along the way. Today we leave for our first retreat where we will go close to Byron Bay and we will get to know our team a little better. We will be back Monday.

On to Brisbane

Well, I've been in Australia for a few days now and its been lots of fun! It has been pretty cold and breezy especially coming from 100 degree days. Sydney is a big, beautiful city with lots of history. I've gotten to do most of the touristy things (including climbing the Sydney Harbor Bridge) and take lots of pictures. The people we have stayed with have been so great. They are incredibly nice and giving. It is strange to move on to somewhere else already.

I'm getting excited/things are becoming more real as we prepare to leave for Brisbane today. We will be going to the YWAM base and begin meeting all the people we will spend the next few months with. I'm excited to see all God will begin to show me and how he will use our team. I'm excited just to know more about what's next.