Normalcy!?!

In my last post I stated that we were starting to settle in and were heading towards some normalcy for the year. Well if this is normal, then this year is looking very eventful.

In a rather short space of time we have had to rearrange our plans for the year as Marty was not able to do his study (He is now working 2 part time jobs, which equals being a fulltime worker). This was soon followed by a rather scary and emotional hospital visit (all is well now), which was very quickly followed by a family wedding, and the start of uni for Jess.

Well, what is normal anyway!?!

Arrived

Well it seems that often I have to start my posts with an apology for our lack of posts. Once again, very sorry to our dedicated followers!

We have arrived in Tassie and are settling into life in Kingston. It feels both strange, and nice to be back 'home' in Tas. Strange in that Sydney in many ways also feels like home. But nice in that we have been very warmly welcomed here and things are familier to us.

It seems that time has gone by very quickly and we are not really sure what we have been spending our time doing. But with February upon us and as Marty starts his chaplaincy work, it feels that we are heading towards some normalcy now. Well as normal as things can be with lots of changes coming up this year...

Leaving

Well the week of lasts turned into exams, graduation, & then packing. The latter of these continues with this being our last day in Sydney!!

People keep asking what our Sydney highlight has been. This is easily answered with "Bible College and learning about God every day." But otherwise it is very hard to pin down what we have loved about the place Sydney. What we have hated about Sydney is a lot easier: The traffic...the roads...the weather.

Its quite cliche but I'm guessing we wont know what we really love about the place until we are no longer here. Well not long to wait for that now. We hit the homeland in just 5 days!!

Lasts

This week is very much a week of lasts. Last chapel, last church history lecture, last time of lining up for food, and so on.

The funny thing is you would think that finishing up would give us some confidence in what we have learnt. But if anything college has shown me that I am a mere human, and don’t know much, and never will!! So the feeling of inadequacy is definitely there at the moment.

But there are also lots of other strange feelings. Like the fact that we realise we are really going to miss the strange place that is Bible college.

We are going to miss the three sermons a week we are privileged to hear. We are going to miss the constant learning about the Bible. We are going to miss eating our meals with 100 other people.

This has lead to this week of lasts being a rather emotional week, and not just cause exams are just around the corner!

Holidays...

So we just spent our 2 weeks of holidays at home hanging around. Here is a bit of a snapshot of what we did:

• Thought through decisions about next year...which resulted in the booking of the boat!


• Visited different parts of Sydney including the Pleasantville village of Breakfast point...which resulted in being weirded out by Sydney.


• Read Jane Eyre & reflected on the loss of the English language in today’s society...which resulted in many conversations in old English.


• Watched lots of the West Wing...which resulted in me thinking that I was receiving all the up to date news.


• Surfed the internet, cause it was actually working...which resulted in many ebay bidding wars.


• Went shopping for clothes...which resulted in many fustrating hours spent, & nothing bought.


• Marty went on some fishing trips... which resulted in once again being disappointed by the lack of fish in NSW.

Cookies farewell

Today is a rather sad day for SMBC. After 26 years, the Cooks are leaving. David has served as the principal of SMBC for that whole time! That is kind of incomprehensible to us, because we haven’t even been alive for that long!

Just thinking about the fact that they have faithfully served God that whole time and maintained the centrality of the Bible to the college is an awesome thing. While others around them may have pushed for other things, they have kept the main thing, the main thing. This is just a huge testament of perseverance to us.

Yet, it also shows that Gods word withstands time. It is just as relevant 26 years ago as it is today and it still needs to be kept central for the next 26 years.

Cake theology

I think I have a new fav book: A Meal with Jesus by Tim Chester

Here is a little snippet:

"Every time you bake a cake, you're fulfilling that creation mandate. Every cake is a reminder of our freedom to create and be creative in the image of the Creator. Every time you place a meal on the table with quiet satisfaction, you're sharing the joy of the Creator at the creation of the world when he declared everything good."

Job

Whilst going through the book of Job in class, we have been reflecting on the very comforting fact that God is far beyond our wisdom. He is in control of the whole universe. He made it all and sustains it all. This is comforting because there are many things that don’t make sense to us in this world, but it does to God and he is in control.

So, this begs the challenging question in regards to Job, are we ever going to know the reason for our suffering? Or maybe the better question is, should we go and try and find the reason for our suffering?

If someone we know is suffering, so often we try and figure out why it is happening. But maybe the book of Job is showing us that this is not necessarily the best response. Instead, the best response seems to be to admit we dont know why, but God does and thats what matters.

Church...

It seems that many churches, and the idea of church, have very much been influenced by individualism and the consumer culture of our society. Church seems to be more about what one can get out of it. So people choose churches based on what suits them best. This is often based on music styles, and demographics.

The sadness of this is that it is not at all what God seems to have intended for church. Being Gods people in very nature gets rid of all selfishness and individualism, so the idea of church should also be nothing like that. Instead Christians should see themselves, and the church they go to, as part of being involved in Gods plans for the earth.

One week in...

So, we have started second semester for 2011, which is also our last semester! The load seems lighter at the moment, which is very nice. And the classes seem more practical in nature as well. So it does kind of feel like we are wrapping up. They are preparing us to get out there, and start implementing some things we have been learning. So it’s a nice way to start the end :)

But, another great way to start was to share oliebollen with our college community at our International Dinner :)

We made it!!

It was a long 2 weeks of rather intense study and the exams were pretty horrible! But it was great to think through all that we have learnt this semester and hopefully now we will remember it!

We are now very ready for our 3 weeks of holidays!! :)

Swollen

Everything here in Sydney is a little bit swollen at the moment, even more than usual!

• The drains are swelling over with water (Its raining lots)


• The airport is swollen cause no one can leave (The ash cloud)


• The SMBC library is swollen with studious people (Its study week)


• Our brains are swollen from overloads of information


• Our bellies are swollen due to consuming massive amounts of cheese


• Marty has a swollen foot from playing footy


• Jess has a swollen hand from handwriting study notes for 2 days straight!

Hopefully it wont all burst before exams :)

Ants

6 Go to the ant, you sluggard; consider its ways and be wise!
7 It has no commander, no overseer or ruler,
8 yet it stores its provisions in summer and gathers its food at harvest.
(Prov 6:6-8)

25 Ants are creatures of little strength, yet they store up their food in the summer;
(Prov 30:25)

I am finding it very hard to appreciate the ant that Proverbs describes after having them all through our cupboards, shower, floor, & kitchen, resulting in so far having to throw out:

• Half a jar of Nuttela


• Half a packet of chips, and crackers


• Countless packets of nuts, & dried fruit


• Many bags of rubbish, not quite at their prime


• A drink bottle, &...


• A pair of shoes – yes that’s right, they made a nest in my shoes!!

Suffering

I heard a guy with Cerebral Palsy gave a talk the other day on what it is like being part of a church and having Cerebral Palsy. Many of the things he said really hit me. But one in particular...

He commented that often in churches we don't allow people to suffer. When we see suffering that can't be resolved we try and bury it. We don't give expression to it, because we don't know how to deal with it. He pointed out that this doesn't make much sense considering that the Bible is very clear that suffering is going to be part of every Christian's life.

Just thought that was very thought provoking!

Preaching Conference

We spent last week soaked in good teaching, good fellowship, and good food.

The Biennial SMBC Preaching Conference was on, with speakers from college as well as overseas. Yet, this was not the only highlight of the week… we also got to catch up with friends from Tassie, and enjoy a lot of good food with them.

On Monday we went from setting the foundations of biblical preaching, and an introduction to the Psalms to one of the most highly populated Muslim areas of Sydney to enjoy a Lebanese meat feast.

On Tuesday we went from learning how to preach the Psalm and then went to the depths of China town to experience food from a small western tribe of China, which once again consisted of large amounts of meat.

On Wednesday we went from learning how to persevere in preaching and more from the Psalms, to the delights of Asian dumplings – small morsels of goodness that hopefully I will one day be able to enjoy!

On Thursday we went from learning more about how to preach the Psalms, with even a Poets view of the Psalms, to… well by then I was too tired to go out… so Marty went & enjoyed the delights of Indian in Newtown. This, along with all that had been learnt throughout the week stayed with him to the next day :)

Holiday...

After mission we slowly made our way back home. We first went to Tamworth, then headed to the coast, for a very relaxing few days of fishing, reading, and catching up with a friend from Tassie. Below is a photo of us at Port Stephens.

We then wined and dined in the Hunter Valley :)

But now we are back into study, and gearing up for the end of term!!

Mission

We have just come back from a few weeks away. The first part of this was college mission. We went to Narrabri, which is about 7 hours drive North-West of Sydney, in country N.S.W. The population of the town is about 13 000. There is a lot of cotton and wheat farmers, as well as your usual tradies, teachers etc. In other words, it kind of reminded us of home! It was so nice and small, and most people knew each other, or knew of them :)

We worked along side the Anglican church there, doing all different sorts of things. We went along to the many services, did pastoral visits, walk up evangelism, training seminars, school scripture, youth group, kids club, aged care etc. There was a big mixture of a lot of things, so we were busy most of the time. Yet, it was an enjoyable busy. The church there has remand faithful to the gospel, and you can see that in the lives of the people. It was so great to get to know the people in Narrabri and hear about their lives. The sense that I got, was that their lives are hard, yet they have not lost their joy in Christ. That is what gets them through and has enabled them to stand firm. This was such an encouraging thing to witness and be a part of.

Away

Over the next few weeks we will be away from SMBC! Firstly we are heading to Narrabri for college mission. We will be working along side the church there getting involved in their day to day things and learning about ministry in the country. So we are looking forward to that and will learn lots through it. :) Then we are going to slowly make our way home, with a bit of a camping road trip. So we will let you know how it goes… :)

Quotes...

I have two quotes for you today...
One not so useful, and one very thought provoking... I'll let you figure out which one is which! :)

"Dont let the fear of stricking out, keep you from playing the game."

“He is no fool who gives what he cannot keep, to gain what he cannot lose.”

Philippians

God has been teaching me a lot through the letter to the Philippians these last few weeks.

We are currently going through a sermon series on it at church, so we are also studying it in our Bible study group. Yet, I also had to write an essay on it.

It is an amazing letter & there are so many great things within it. Yet, one has really been speaking out to me…

Humility.
Considering others better than yourself.

This is the attitude Christ had, and one that we to should strive for.

C.J Mahoney sums it up well by calling humility “true greatness”. It’s…
“serving others for the sake of Gods glory.”