Samstock '08

Hey guys,
Just letting you know Samstock '08 is coming up fast. If you are keen to go, you need to get $25 to Shannon or Ray by Monday so we can book the earlybird tickets. In the meantime go check out the website: www.samstock.org.nz .

God is flippin' fantastic

http://www.odt.co.nz/your-town/dunedin/21218/church-ramps-snow-fun-pupils

Well, it's all happening up in Dunedin. This one snow-party event was advertised to 5 of the high-schools, including Taieri College, which according to Ps.James, they'bve never been to, and handed out thousands of cecreams and fliers. Over 250 turned out for the event, and the youth band did fantasmically, and Ps. Jordan Smith from equippers Auckland did his thing, and we took note of 55 salvations!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

so praise Jesus, it was beyond expectation!!!!!!
apparently the spotters at the back were sooooo shocked, it was crazy! with gapping mouths and everything, even Jordan was stoked as!!

so that was crazy crazy crazy, and the article link was on pg2 of the ODT in Saturday's paper, the day after the event.

Next year it's gonna be bigger and THEN we will be FRONT PAGE NEWS!

Like woah! it is intense in Dunedin, bring it!!

If a picture tells a thousand words...

Then how many words are said in a four minute video clip? Love this, and lost it for three years, as I couldn't remember who sang it!

Our youth pastor

Uploaded by www.cellspin.net

10 Keys to Servanthood

Key number 6: Servants do what it takes, and love it!

One of the most important things that we need to realize is that there is a big difference between a slave and a servant: a slave works for wages, begins work at clock in time and knocks off at the end of the day and has no real care for the work outside of that, but a servant has a lifestyle of work based on love for the master and finds rest and recreation under the roof of the house.

Having said this, we can get under the illusion that we have to love the work before we are willing to put our hand to it, when in reality we often need to serve first before we develop a love for the work because ultimately it is a reflection of our love for the master.

I think that maturity says “you don’t need to feel like we love the work to know that we do”

The first step to understanding this is investment. In Matt 6:21 says that “wherever your treasure is there will your heart be also”, so if begin to invest our time, finances and effort then we automatically begin to develop a love in those areas.

Let’s continue to develop a love for Gods expression of his Kingdom which is the local church by investing our time, finances and effort weather we like it or not and let us refuse to let our feelings sabotage excellence in the house simply because we don’t like doing something.

Dr Horrible is the man...

Oh, and Joss Whedon also... seriously go and check it out... no really... what are you still doing here? GO!



Oh, and lions are cooler than ligers...

Just do it

Today I am the queen of procrastination.

I have a mountain (unfortunately not really an exaggeration!) of work that I should be doing, papers, figures and text books all over my office, assignments due in, and goodness knows what else but it is all very important & I am avoiding it all like the plaque.

I fell asleep on top of my desk before and considered as I awoke in my pool of drool that I lock the door, turn off the light and curl up under my desk (out of site in case anyone walks past cos oh my gosh how embarrassing!) and go to sleep.

But I didn't. I kinda wish I had. Maybe I wouldn't be so tired now. or maybe I would have be busted and looked like an idiot!

It has been 3 hours since I was last productive in my work today. In that time I have checked my facebook and bebo, looked at the comments on my photography website, had lunch and then something else to eat, said hi to Phil in the tech cafe, pondered over the new bilboard outside SIT (which featured Phil in make up- ok so it was for Cats) checked my facebook (cos a lot can change in 20 minutes) paced in my office, peeled an orange, drank 3 bottles of water and subsequently visited the loo a lot more than I would have liked (and probably more than the people whose offices I have to continuously walk past to get there.)

So. yeah I got a lot done today.

So you're reading this and going well if you have work to do and its important then why don't you just do it? Why are you on the blog?

Good point......

But no, I have a reason for being here (ok so to begin with I was reading a friends blog and then I thought I should see whats been happening here and well ,you get the picture..) This has got me thinking though - along with reading another awesome blog post yesterday Be strong and courageous (http://www.mnssams.blogspot.co.nz/) Why do we always put off the things we know that we should be doing? Likes of our homework or doing the dishes or changing opur undies (hey I don't have a problem with it! Its good to be clean). Think about it. how many times this week have you procrastinated? How about today? was it worth it?

If we can so easily put off the little everyday things, the ordinary things, then how do we react when God gives us something big and extraordinary to do? Will we recognise the significance, the priviledge , how amazing it is that He trusts us - you and me- with something lifechanging for us and others!

But how would we treat it? Will we have to tell God sorry we are unavailable because we are behind in our homework, the house is dirty and we have yet to change our undies - can He call back later at a more convenient time? What if there is no convenient time because we put off so much of the small things that we don't get time for the big stuff? What if its only a split second of a window of opportunity? What it we miis out? What if we aren't prepared?

And if we can't be trusted to do the small things, is our character ready for the larger ones?

hmmmm... interesting thoughts.

I think its time I did some work:)

[RT: edited so spaces were littler... love you honey...]

Boldness

Acts 4:31

After this prayer, the meeting place shook, and they were all filled
with the Holy Spirit. Then they preached the word of God with boldness.

Want to know the definition of boldness? Here it is:



Oh, and random link for your viewing goodness:
Manscaping 101
No real reason for giving it - I just like the title.

Peace out.

Flocking Awesome...

Tee hee... I'm currently trialling a new web browser which could mean there's a few more posts than before.  Oh, btw, Shannon and Jo, your posts were awesome.  Heidz, hey man, thx for the link, it pretty much made Shannon a mess for an hour...

Oh, and sorry bout the inappropriate title...

Oh, and we've had some pretty amazing stuff happen at church over the last couple of weeks.  Clarke Taylor was off the charts, and I'm excited to see what the next while will bring...

Peace out

Ray

Blogged with the Flock Browser

Team Hoyt

My cousin sent this to me - it is a moving story of a father's love for his son. As far as I know, my cousin isn't a Christian. I shared the Gospel with him when he was a teenager and am praying for him to this day. I don't know why he sent this video to me out of the blue, but I believe that he too has been touched by its message.

I am both humbled and grateful that God our Father loves us enough to fight our battles and win our races every day, however big or small. It is something that I haven't reflected on quite enough from day to day - I hope that that will change.

May you be moved by His love today.

For more information about this father and son, visit www.teamhoyt.com.

Bourke - a few thoughts & a broken heart.....

My heart has broken. Well and truly gut wrenchingly, utterly shattered, and broken so much that the usual cure of sticky tape and super glue will not do. My eyes have laid witness to a dispair, a hurt, a brokeness that run so deep it was bred into the very blood of generation. It was a sight I never would have believed in a nation so beautiful and similar and "civilised" as ours, but my eyes did not deceive me, what I saw was true.

But no matter how deep my grief, God's is deeper. No matter how badly my heart breaks, God's breaks more. In the places and people I see brokeness, despair and pain, God sees HOPE.

Four of us from Invercargill joined with the guys from Highway Christian Church in Ulladulla (Australia) to help at REACH 08 - a conference with a complete missions focus and a desire to see God to move in a new way. We were equipped as the army of God to go into the community and show love as Chirst loved us in a real and practical way.

Bourke, NSW Australia is a beautiful outback town and to look at it I really wondered if what I had been told was as bad as what I had been led to believe. But closer inspection showed me a deep level of dysfunction and hurt. Almost every house in town was surrounded by high metal fences, with an almost as big dog, the main street at night looked like an industrial area with big garage doors and windows barred and then in the Aboriginal "missions" the houses were nice and normal but then you saw the smashed glass and boarded up windows.

And the kids. The beautiful children who knew no different from what they lived in everyday. 3, 4, and 5 year old children who are on the streets at all times of the night, abused and taking drugs and alcohol like they were lollies, whose idea of a good time was stealing cars and then burning them.

But despite it all, God is in that place.

You could see Him in the smiles of the children, in the fresh greening of the ground that had been drought-stricken for years, in the passion and perserverence and faith of the Christians in Bourke who had been faithfully praying for and serving in their community.

God was seen on the lives of young children, as small as 4,5 and 6 years old, as they stood silent and still in His presence. He was there in the midst as 200+ young people from throughout New South Wales, wider Australia and New Zealand stood and worshiped Him freely, separated not by race or circumstances but united in love as the whanau of God.

God was in the riverbed as the drunked, just released from prison, wandered aimlessly with his bottle of booze. He was there when he was struck by the power of the Holy Spirit and set free from his sin and pain, and came into the Kingsom of Heaven.

My time in Bourke has shown me a fraction of the heartbeat of God. Jesus died for these people, each and everyone of them, of us, saved or unsaved, black or white, male or female, old or young. We are not different. We are all seen the same through the eyes of God - His children.

I am still processing what I saw, what God has done and is doing in Bourke, and in me. It is beyond our comprehension to know how deeply God mourns over the blood shed there in the name of "civilised people" and government policy. How His heart aches for the children of Bourke, many who have never known a fathers love, a tender touch or a kind word.

But God IS in that place. And He is moving. Heaven linked with earth during the time Reach 08 was in Bourke, and even though we have left there, God hasn't.

Heaven hasn't.

Hope hasn't.

God is in that place, and He is moving. It begins with HOPE........

How come...?

How come we scream out 'I love you' to people completelyunknown to us, but say 'I hate you' to those who care for us?

How come it takes until they're gone to realise how much we need them?

How come the God of the Universe is on our side, but we act as if we go it alone?

How come humans are so smart, yet so stupid?

The Next Generation...

Matthew 24:34
I tell you the truth, this generation will certainly not pass away until all these things have happened.

As a geek, there are few things as world changing as the advent of Star Trek: The Next Generation. It forever split all trekkies into two camps: those who thought the next generation would never live up to the originals, and those who believed that the next generation would be the one which would make Star Trek relevant to a more mainstream audience (stop me if you know where I'm going here...).

"I hear the sound of a rising generation." Shannon on Friday eloquently talked about how we are the generation of choice. We can either choose to usher in the generation that changes the world, or we can BE that generation.

I think that sometimes our theology is a bit twisted around the whole ideas of generations... yes it means father to son, mother to daughter, and so on, but nowadays we count the generations in terms of some kind of arbitary 20 year period. What is with that? Isn't it weird?

While we are living and breathing, we will be part of this generation. So I guess that explains what my opinion is of the verse above. We are the rising generation. God has assigned tasks for you and I to do, and until we do them, this generation will not pass away. Are we going to leave the work assigned to us for future generations?

How does that relate to youth? Well, I guess it means that it doesn't mean if you are really young, or really old, we are still relevant. We only need to look to our leadership team for proof that age does not dictate a youthful spirit, nor attitude, nor enthusiasm, nor any other factor. I don't have to be the circumstances that raised me. My age does not dictate who I am. It does not dictate what I am capable of.

And like the movie Star Trek: Generations, we are stronger when we work together. And we get to ride in a kick a** vehicle on the way (yes I did just compare the local church to the Starship Enterprise... WARP SPEED!). If we aren't already united, then I pray that God make it so (oh my gosh, I can't believe I made such a bad joke after a good post...)

I refuse to grow old gracefully. Beam me up Scotty.

Letters from home 1.0

Hi Guys!

Had a fantastic idea - thought it might be a great idea for those from afar, to have a letter from home every once in a while - kinda like a catch up for all the randoms who decided to leave sunny Invercargill (Wallaces, you know I'm talking to you...)

Currently watching a lot of Flight of the Conchords, since they won a grammy, they must be quality right? Right? Absolutely! Check them out on you tube to see what I mean...

Other happenings this week:

• Had Faylene Sparks come, a really prophetic lady who comes from Clark Taylor's church. She was awesome... oh, and she can spot acting talent when she sees it...
  
• O Week was pretty awesome - may need a sign though so people may actually remember who we are...
• Recieved a huge shipment of games for the games cafe at church - currently loving Hamsterrolle and Pitchcar
• Op shop ball is coming up next week - Shannon will probably put pictures up once we've had it...

Other than that things are going pretty well - connect groups started again this week - still in a building phase really, but that's ok.

How's everyone else doing out there?

Weenie Roast Rules!

Hung out at the Otepuni river run yesterday where we handed out free sausages for the O Week students. Christine and the other organisers were stoked as it was the biggest turnout they've ever had (free food bribery was a big drawcard apparently).

Shannon took photos I think, but in the meantime, here is an artist's representation of the BBQ we were actually using (may or may not be accurate or to scale... in fact I know so little about engines, using this may have literally killed me...)

Hanging out for Op Shop ball now... how's everyone else in the other centres?

O Week 2008

Hey guys,

If you are new here (in Southland or on the blog), click to find out what we're all about! We've got some exciting activities planned for OWeek 2008 in Southland. Hopefully you saw us around @ the lifestyles expo (when you weren't busy watching guys and girls change clothes - seriously though, who does that???). On Thursday we'll be at the Otepuni cheering on the river runners, and providing a barbecue for potentially hypothermic people...

Also we've got some cool stuff happening soon... the first exciting thing is the Op Shop Ball! Here's a flyer:

Pretty cool eh? Contact me if you need any more info.

We also run some other pretty cool regular events, like cell groups, youth services, and some great outreach activities like games cafes:

as well as XBox and Lan parties, Student meals, and a whole heap of other awesome activities. If you're at SIT, TColl, or Community College down here, you'll see us around... we'll be the ones wearing badges with this on it:

We're Christian, almost 100% pureblood geeks, and unashamed.

Raydog.

Rock on 2008!

2008!! Wahoo!! I am so excited about this yeaR!

The new year brings a whole heap of changes - people leaving, new ones coming along, new adventures and craziness! Exciting times

Resonate has some awesome stuff lined up for the year. Of course, we are starting off next Tuesday night (thats the 15th) with a bbq and of course, come Feb and the arrival of the students we have our usual O'Week antics - Good times.

Something that is REALLY exciting is in April there is an 18yrs+ mission trip to Bourke, Australia. We are going to be joining the crazy crew from Ulladalla and helping with the Liberty concert there. This is going to be pretty hard out - Its 2 days straight driving through the Outback to get to Bourke and thenm another 2 back. Tentative dates for this are leave April 10 and back on the 22 but more details will be finalised soon. If you are keen, let me know asap so we can get on to the finer details. All going well we will try for some fundraising, but that depends on time and stuff.

If Bourke isn't your thing, or it doens't work with tech/work etc then listen out for the youth India trip that will also be happening later on

So get ready to be stretched, challenged and to grow this year! Awesome things are happening!!

Bless ya,

The RESONATE Team