Look at That Mountain. . . How'd That Sheep Get Up There?

One thing we learned on our weekend retreat to Rotorua, which I will tell you about in a minute, is that sheep will and can get anywhere on giant hills.

Well, it was a decently long week of ministry, topped off by our mid-project retreat to a town 6 hours north, Rotorua. Ministry continues to go well and develop. One of the things that I love about being here sharing in a foreign country is the diversity; and we have seen a lot of diversity while we've been here. At our project meeting on Thursday (July 19) we had sharing time, which I loved because I felt a little deprived in regards to God's work within our group. Well, we finally shared it with each other; being on different campuses all day, sometimes you don't hear everything that goes on. One of the coolest parts of that was hearing that the gospel had been shared with 24 different nations, including Iraq, Malaysia, and Germany (complete list on project blog).

A lot of people on project have follow-up appointments going on this week, which is a huge blessing of 4 solid weeks on campus; not only do we get to see people come to Christ, we get to see them grow in the Spirit as well. Some of the follow-ups are to essentially share the gospel again with people willing to hear it again, if that makes sense. Please pray for these follow-ups.

I am looking forward to our third week doing missions work in Wellington. My week is shaping up, but I have some prayer requests to go along with it. I am hoping hardcore to have a meeting with Sergio this week, but it has been hard to set it up through email, so pray for that. He is a Chilean PHD student (Hunter you will appreciate that), and I was hoping to set up Spanish conversations with him and share my hope in Christ with him. This has proved to be hard with him originally not knowing his schedule, and then with email tag, so pray that I can share with him, and improve my Spanish :D!

I have also been able to get involved in a type of evangelism the STINTers focus on, along with initiative evangelism, called "oikos" evangelism (hopefully I spelled that word right, it's all Greek to me :P). Basically this is relational evangelism, and can take part in many ways. What the STINTers do is join clubs and ministry to friends they make in the clubs. Matt Wounderly, one of the staff here does this oikos evangelism on the Ultimate Frisbee Team, and we were extended an invite to come practice with the club team on Tuesday mornings. Dave, the project director, two other guys (Ron and Chris), and I took Matt up on the offer last Tuesday. It has been cool, because we can bond over sports, but I have also seen some of the frisbee guys around campus and get to talk to them there too! Matt is currently pouring into Brock on the team, so the oikos ministry has been successful. Some of the other oikos ministries going on include the Spanish club, the Vegetarian club, and the late Improve Comedy club (Chris Burton, an Illinois STINTer having gone home).

As for our weeks other activities off campus, it was also an eventful, fun week. The black and white picture is our creative picture we took at our mixer dinner Monday night. Our band (Caleb, Kim, Kay, and I) are still looking for a band name...any suggestions? This picture is of some of us at Harry Potter 5 on Tuesday! It was a fun night, which included some awkward moose action when Harry kissed a girl in the movie. Ask me to do the awkward moose when I get home. And, all the way back to the first picture: a pic I took of the Wellington bay from the Kelburn campus on the hill.

Another exciting time was our Thursday meeting. We held a weekly meeting, but it was just for project members because the actual Student Life meets monthly. I actually got to MC the event with Emily (there is a picture up on the NZ blog of this), which was fun and included a hyphy madlib for our game we were required to come up with as MC's. Bringin' Hyphy Back (the Apartment can't kill everything!). It was fun, and like I said, included a very enlightening sharing time.

This weekend was full of fun aswell, after four days of campus ministry. We had a mid-project retreat to Rotorua, known for its natural hot springs, and as a result, for its sulfur smell. We had a lot of fun and got ready for another week coming up. The scenery on the way up included some of New Zealand's famous terrain, snow capped mountains and lots of sheep!

One of the more entertaining events of the retreat, seen here, was when Dave smashed into an Asian kid and I caught it on camera, haha! This was during our luge outing. You may also discover a picture of my wipe out on the summer project blog. No worries, I am alive and well, just a couple minor flesh wounds, haha. It was a fun whip out though. We were racing down the advanced track (after conquering the intermediate and scenic) and I decided it wise to pass one of the girls on a tight corner :D Nonetheless, my jeans are now in fashion, complete with holes and mud stains!

Some other people did zorbing and agroboating, but I headed back to the hostel after luging, and may or may not have read Harry Potter 7, the British version(don't hate).

I am looking forward to this week, but a couple of prayers:

1) Constantly for those hearing the words of God; unfortunately Peter didn't email me back, so hopefully I will see him around campus (this is a theme that has happened on a couple other occassions for me), so just prayer for that.

2) Meeting up with Sergio and witnessing to the frisbee team (as mentioned above).

3) One personal one, that I would be more and more teachable; something I have struggled with lately in all areas like reading and listening to people talk about God's Word, thinking I know it all.

See and talk to you all soon!

-ae