What I miss about Australia...
1) the Aussies! who knew I would make such good friends in a couple of weeks. The community we had was amazing!
2) the slang & abbreviations
3) all our jokes. cheers!
4) TimTams! and TimTam slams
5) footy
6) all the different types of food-dumplings, sushi, kabobs, etc.
7) taxes included, and no tipping....makes splitting bills so easy
8) trams that can take you anywhere you want to go
9) the 'pew-ticka-ticka-ticka' noise that occurs when you cross the street
10) the reliance on God each and every day
Saturday, August 15, 2009
Monday, August 10, 2009
let the processing begin
So I am home, back in the RVA. It seems unreal that I am back at home and in a week I will be back at Virginia Tech. The past six weeks have been pretty amazing. God has taught me so much and is continuing to teach me even after I have left Australia.
In talking to students we found many who were curious, many who had never really thought about spiritual things and others who were not really sure about what they believed. We were able to talk to them and answer questions and challenge them to think about deeper issues. Australia has some tough soil, but the harvest will come.
There are so many people I met in Australia that it was hard to leave and say goodbye. The ministry is small, but growing and the students, STINTers and staff need prayer support for what they are doing in Australia. Even though I have left please continue to pray for Melbourne.
There are so many stories to tell about my summer project in Australia from me and others. Keep looking here to see them appear as I have time to write. Thanks for all the support!
Thursday, August 6, 2009
California, here we come!
I'm going to make this short and sweet. We leave for the airport one hour. goodbye are going to be hard.
Pray for our travels and for us to process our feelings.
See you in the States!
Pray for our travels and for us to process our feelings.
See you in the States!
Sunday, August 2, 2009
all good things must come to an end
So it is our final week here in Australia, and I can honestly say that I am going to miss this place. The internet is a bit flakey in the hostle so I havn't been able to update very much and dont have heaps of time right now but while it is working I thought I would say something.
On Thursday Bess, Evan & I ran an outreach on the LaTrobe campus. The goal is to gain an understanding of the Uni culture, raise awareness about Student Life and to get into spiritual conversations. We set up a table with information and had four posters with the words love, sin, sacrafice and renwal. We got students to write down thier reaction to one or more of the words on a post-it note and stick it on the poster. The guys started up a frisbee game and invited students out to play with them, which worked quite well! Another group prayed for the campus and the rest of the team went out in pairs of an Aussie student & a summer projecter to do surveys and soulariums. This allowed the Americans to teach the La Trobe Student Life members how to get into conversations with thier own classmates. We were able to get a heap of contacts that were interested in learning more and everyone felt really good about the whole day.
This past weekend we got to hang out with some of our new friends that we made on the different outreaches. We watched the Americans play the Aussies in footy, won cheap front row tickets to Wicked, and had a movie night.
This week we are on campus some and wrapping up things with followups with contacts and getting ready to hand things over to the STINT team & Studnet Life members. I am savoring every moment here and can not believe that the time to leave is so close.
On Thursday Bess, Evan & I ran an outreach on the LaTrobe campus. The goal is to gain an understanding of the Uni culture, raise awareness about Student Life and to get into spiritual conversations. We set up a table with information and had four posters with the words love, sin, sacrafice and renwal. We got students to write down thier reaction to one or more of the words on a post-it note and stick it on the poster. The guys started up a frisbee game and invited students out to play with them, which worked quite well! Another group prayed for the campus and the rest of the team went out in pairs of an Aussie student & a summer projecter to do surveys and soulariums. This allowed the Americans to teach the La Trobe Student Life members how to get into conversations with thier own classmates. We were able to get a heap of contacts that were interested in learning more and everyone felt really good about the whole day.
This past weekend we got to hang out with some of our new friends that we made on the different outreaches. We watched the Americans play the Aussies in footy, won cheap front row tickets to Wicked, and had a movie night.
This week we are on campus some and wrapping up things with followups with contacts and getting ready to hand things over to the STINT team & Studnet Life members. I am savoring every moment here and can not believe that the time to leave is so close.
Saturday, July 25, 2009
The GREAT Ocean Road
Did you ever think it was possible to visit a rainforest and see a whale in the same day? So did I, until the Great Ocean Road! We piled into five cars and caravaned down The Great Ocean road, stopping along the way to see the sites and explore...here is a little outline of what we did...
1. road trip and bondng in the car...starting bright and early at 7am
2. the beach- we got our feet wet, ran down the beach and played a bit of footy
3. koalas! koalas! koalas! (and a kageroo)
4. fish & chips
5. we saw a whale. no joke.
6. rainforest hike to the triple waterfall
7. rocking out to Bohemian Rhapsody in the car
8. saw the site; the 12 Apostles, Loch Ard Gorge, Thunder Cave & Blow Hole
Bess, Evan and I road with the STINTers, Pat and Geoff, the whole time and had a wonderful time getting to kow each other better while we drove to each new adventure. By the time we got home it was after 10pm, what a day!
I can't wait to put pictures up so you can get a little of an idea of what I saw. It was breathtaking. In particular Loch Ard Gorge stands out to me, just symoblizing Gods power as the waves crashed into the rock walls and the surf came up and surrounded my feet then gently going back into the water. Amazing.
1. road trip and bondng in the car...starting bright and early at 7am
2. the beach- we got our feet wet, ran down the beach and played a bit of footy
3. koalas! koalas! koalas! (and a kageroo)
4. fish & chips
5. we saw a whale. no joke.
6. rainforest hike to the triple waterfall
7. rocking out to Bohemian Rhapsody in the car
8. saw the site; the 12 Apostles, Loch Ard Gorge, Thunder Cave & Blow Hole
Bess, Evan and I road with the STINTers, Pat and Geoff, the whole time and had a wonderful time getting to kow each other better while we drove to each new adventure. By the time we got home it was after 10pm, what a day!
I can't wait to put pictures up so you can get a little of an idea of what I saw. It was breathtaking. In particular Loch Ard Gorge stands out to me, just symoblizing Gods power as the waves crashed into the rock walls and the surf came up and surrounded my feet then gently going back into the water. Amazing.
Wednesday, July 22, 2009
Power of Prayer
Today we were back at RMIT Bundoora. We talked about how yesterday went and decided we wanted to focus more on praying for God to bring us to people and to work in our conversations. Josh and I paired up together and after walking around for a good bit not finding anyone to talk to came across a guy eating soup at the tables outside. He was egar to take our Soularium survey and introduced himself as Abs. We went through the survey and got to understand more about what he believed. Like many he though that God created the world, the rules (gravity, elements, etc.) and is now just watching everything play out. He believed that the way we get into heaven is based on a point system...do bad things and you get points deducted, do good things and point get added. Simple enough but the big question is what rules do you follow and how do you know if you are 'good enough'? We explained to him that God is holy and perfect and we are sinful. Abs brought up the 10 Comandments as a basis for what is right and wrong...which is right, those are some of the requirments God has set in place. The problem is no one can ever keep all of them. No one. "You shall not murder"...so some people have and some people havn't. "You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor" (aka lie)....everyone has lied. We have all fallen short.
The amazing thing is that after telling Abs this he got it. He understood that we are sinful, God is perfect and that becasue God is just and holy he can not be with us. It clicked. But what if it ended here? We are sinful, "For the wages of sin is death" which means what we earn for our wrongdoings is eternal seperation from God.
Thankfully we have grace. This is the second part of what we told Abs. God loved us and desired to have a relationship with us. In order to do this he sent Jesus Christ to earth and Jesus lived a perfect, sinless life. When Christ was crucified he bore all of our sins. God took this sacrifce as a payment for our sins. At this point Abs stood up and excalimed "I understand it!".
After a bit more discussion and answering questions Josh explained that now comes our response. When we know the Gospel message, that Christ has died for our sins, it is our decision...the ball is in our court. It is like a free gift. You have to accept it in order to claim it. We explained that you have to agree that you are sinful and put your faith in the fact that Jesus died and paid for our sins. In putting this faith in Christ we become Christian and recieve the Holy Spirit which works in us to help us grow and understand. Another 'ah-ha' moment occured here.
Abs, Josh and I talked for a bit more and it seemed that Abs really understood what we were telling us. When we asked if accepting Christ was something he saw himself as wanting to do he replied telling us that he wanted to be able to give himself wholeheartedly to it, knowing it was a big decision, but didnt think his lifestyle matched up. He also stated that he 'didnt have time and right now he was focused on Uni and after Uni he wanted look more into things'.
We explained that it isnt by works, doing good things, that we earn our way into heaven. It is by God's grace, the gift that we do not deserve, and by faith, trustuing that Christ paid for our sins, that we recieve eternal life. The timing in life reason is a common one. If it is 'I'm too young' or 'I'm too busy' or 'I'm too old' it will always remain 'mot the right time'. But it is. It is never too early, too late or inconvient to accept Christ. It is the biggest decision of your life.
Abs understood all of this and wanted to think about things, still saying he didnt had too much going on right now in his life and was pretty happy at where he was. Pray that he understands the importance, and the God continues to work around him, bringing Christians into his life.
The reason this post is labled 'power of prayer' is what Josh and I discovered later. The conversation went so well and had so many moments where normally people get stuck on the point that we are sinful or that Christ died for our sins or they dont see that 'all religions are the same' is wrong or so many other issues. We hit so many in our conversation and each time we brought up the Biblical truth Abs accepted and understood them. After our talk we Josh and I went upstairs where four of the girls on project were praying. They had seen us from the window and had prayed for our conversation the whole time. Later we found out that Erin and Allen had passed by us, saw us talking and prayed for us too. At the end of the day I was talking with Geoff, a STINTer (misionary), and he told me that him, Evan and Mel had also seen us and prayed for Josh, Abs and I. That means that the whole project team on campus at that time had been praying for us. And it showed with how Abs' eyes were open to the truth. God is faithful!
So in talking about prayer here are some prayer requests...
*For Abs, that he truely understands what we told him and is convicted to seek out the truth and make a decision.
*For the other students that we have talked to.
*For a technical error in the O-Week Surveys that is not sending us the girl's online responses
*The team- for us to see why we are here, our individual walks and also our health
*The students- for God to soften thier hearts, open thier eyes and for us to be able to talk to them.
Yes, another long post. I understand that some of the Biblical information might be new to you, and if you want to know more, have questions or want to talk PLEASE e-mail me (lapierre@vt.edu) or you can get help at http://www.ccci.org/wij/index.aspx or www.everystudent.com.
The amazing thing is that after telling Abs this he got it. He understood that we are sinful, God is perfect and that becasue God is just and holy he can not be with us. It clicked. But what if it ended here? We are sinful, "For the wages of sin is death" which means what we earn for our wrongdoings is eternal seperation from God.
Thankfully we have grace. This is the second part of what we told Abs. God loved us and desired to have a relationship with us. In order to do this he sent Jesus Christ to earth and Jesus lived a perfect, sinless life. When Christ was crucified he bore all of our sins. God took this sacrifce as a payment for our sins. At this point Abs stood up and excalimed "I understand it!".
After a bit more discussion and answering questions Josh explained that now comes our response. When we know the Gospel message, that Christ has died for our sins, it is our decision...the ball is in our court. It is like a free gift. You have to accept it in order to claim it. We explained that you have to agree that you are sinful and put your faith in the fact that Jesus died and paid for our sins. In putting this faith in Christ we become Christian and recieve the Holy Spirit which works in us to help us grow and understand. Another 'ah-ha' moment occured here.
Abs, Josh and I talked for a bit more and it seemed that Abs really understood what we were telling us. When we asked if accepting Christ was something he saw himself as wanting to do he replied telling us that he wanted to be able to give himself wholeheartedly to it, knowing it was a big decision, but didnt think his lifestyle matched up. He also stated that he 'didnt have time and right now he was focused on Uni and after Uni he wanted look more into things'.
We explained that it isnt by works, doing good things, that we earn our way into heaven. It is by God's grace, the gift that we do not deserve, and by faith, trustuing that Christ paid for our sins, that we recieve eternal life. The timing in life reason is a common one. If it is 'I'm too young' or 'I'm too busy' or 'I'm too old' it will always remain 'mot the right time'. But it is. It is never too early, too late or inconvient to accept Christ. It is the biggest decision of your life.
Abs understood all of this and wanted to think about things, still saying he didnt had too much going on right now in his life and was pretty happy at where he was. Pray that he understands the importance, and the God continues to work around him, bringing Christians into his life.
The reason this post is labled 'power of prayer' is what Josh and I discovered later. The conversation went so well and had so many moments where normally people get stuck on the point that we are sinful or that Christ died for our sins or they dont see that 'all religions are the same' is wrong or so many other issues. We hit so many in our conversation and each time we brought up the Biblical truth Abs accepted and understood them. After our talk we Josh and I went upstairs where four of the girls on project were praying. They had seen us from the window and had prayed for our conversation the whole time. Later we found out that Erin and Allen had passed by us, saw us talking and prayed for us too. At the end of the day I was talking with Geoff, a STINTer (misionary), and he told me that him, Evan and Mel had also seen us and prayed for Josh, Abs and I. That means that the whole project team on campus at that time had been praying for us. And it showed with how Abs' eyes were open to the truth. God is faithful!
So in talking about prayer here are some prayer requests...
*For Abs, that he truely understands what we told him and is convicted to seek out the truth and make a decision.
*For the other students that we have talked to.
*For a technical error in the O-Week Surveys that is not sending us the girl's online responses
*The team- for us to see why we are here, our individual walks and also our health
*The students- for God to soften thier hearts, open thier eyes and for us to be able to talk to them.
Yes, another long post. I understand that some of the Biblical information might be new to you, and if you want to know more, have questions or want to talk PLEASE e-mail me (lapierre@vt.edu) or you can get help at http://www.ccci.org/wij/index.aspx or www.everystudent.com.
At the Unis
This week we are on the Unis. This is the main purpose of our coming to Australia and it is exciting seeing what each conversation and each day brings. I'll try to explain as much as I can about what exactly we are doing on campus to give you a better idea of our day-to-day.
The Unis
RMIT City- Like most city campuses RMIT City is spread throughout Melbourne but has a few main buildings. We spend most of our time in 'the Caf' and 'the Hub', two places students gather to eat and relax in between classes. The thing about a school here is most students still live with thier parents and travel by bus or tram into the city for school. This means if they have a break in between thier classes they often do not have much to do or that they plan classes on after another. The city school has alot of fine art majors so it is a very diverse and creative crowd.
RMIT Bundoora- A part of the greater RMIT Uni, Bundoora is on the outskirts of the city and is quite a deal smaller. Most of these students are engineers or science majors, a contrast to the City students. Because the campus is smaller and closer to many of the students homes there are not a lot of students who are hanging around. Here there is a lot more guys than girls too. Here they are having trouble getting girls involved in the movement.
La Trobe- Close to Bundoora, this is the campus that feel the most like what I am used to. There is an academic side and a dorm (or 'college') side where international and students who live father away live. School starts next week so we have not been able to see what the character of the student body is but just by walking around this campus has the most Socialist and Muslim influence. They have the opposite problem than RMIT Bundoora, finding it hard to get guys to be involved.
The Outreaches
What are they? Outreaches are ways for us to get into spiritual conversations with other students without it being too awkward. It also gives us a way to approach anyone without intruding becasue they are done in a way where our request can be turned down. They take many forms but the goal is the same, to understand the individual person better, see where they are spiritually and hopefully share the gospel message with them.
Surveys- These are questions that help us dive deeper into conversation. They range anywhere from "What do you value in life?" to "On a 1 to 100 scale, how sure are you that if you died today you would go to heaven?"
O-Week Questions- Basically we hand out flyers to take an online survey & they fill it our online. They last question asks if they would want to talk more about spiritual matters. If they choose "yes" then we get thier information and follow up with them.
Soularium- This is a special type of survey where there are pictures to answer questions. A total of 50 postcard size pictures are given to a person or laid out of a table and a couple of questions are asked. The person is asked to pull out 1-3 pictutes that best descibes thier answer and then is asked to explain why they chose it. This is my favorite outreach and provides the most interesting conversations. For some reason people really open up to you and tell you pretty deep stuff. Some of the questions we might ask are, "What descirbes your life?", "What do you wish was a part of your life?", "Who is God to you?", "What has your spiritual journey been so far?", "What do you wish was a part of your spiritual journey?", "How do you understand Christ's message?" and "Choose an image that best descibe the following; love, sin, sacrifice and renewal?".
My Days
So, finally, what has been going on this week! Monday we were at RMIT City all day. We handed out O-Week flyers at first and when we ran out of those paired up and went out to do Soulariums. Emily, my friend from Australia who came to VT this past semester, and I went out together. We were brought to five amazing women, each going through something unique, but we could see where the Lord was working in thier lives. One girl had only been in Australia a week and had no friends, another grew up in a Christian home but was living to please her parents & was struggling for control, and two more told of they really didn't think of religion or God at all.
The one conversation that stuck out in my mind the most was with a girl named Jane. At the first question she revealed a lot about what was going on with her family and a hard relationship she just got out of. We talked for a while and when she left for class she told us "what are the chances you would come up to ME, with this picture survey that would allow me to tell someone about what was going on in my life and that you would help me. Thank you". That spoke to me so much and showed me that the Lord was working through us to reach His people, whom he deeply cares about.
Tuesday we were back at RMIT City and I went out sharing with Katie, a gril from our project. We got into an amazing six conversations that agian were all drastically different. These included two exchange students from China. They had never heard of 'sin' before and Katie and I were able to share the Gospel with them in a basic and understandable way. They were so attentive and interested in what we were saying and were really processing everything we told them.
Today we were at RMIT Bundoora. The atmosphere was quite different and people were more reluctant to take our flyers and talk to us. But still, a good day. Bess and I had were a bit overloaded when a flock of girls who were friends with a girl we were doing a survey with came over the table and wanted to join in. They loved it and each one came from a completly different background. Later in the day Jane, an Aussie on staff with Student Life, and I got to share with a girl who told us she believed in God and a higher power but was unsure of what that exactly ment. We were able to answer her questions and give her some Biblical truth.
God working through each conversation and it is so apparent on how much He loves the students in Australia. I have had to relayon Him for strength each and everyday as we go to the Unis and approach people. He is the one who puts thoughts into my mind on where to direct the conversation, I know I could never do this on my own. I thank God that I am here and for the blessing it is to be included in His plan and working in Melbourne.
I know, long post...hope that gives you a better idea of what is going on here in Australia.
The Unis
RMIT City- Like most city campuses RMIT City is spread throughout Melbourne but has a few main buildings. We spend most of our time in 'the Caf' and 'the Hub', two places students gather to eat and relax in between classes. The thing about a school here is most students still live with thier parents and travel by bus or tram into the city for school. This means if they have a break in between thier classes they often do not have much to do or that they plan classes on after another. The city school has alot of fine art majors so it is a very diverse and creative crowd.
RMIT Bundoora- A part of the greater RMIT Uni, Bundoora is on the outskirts of the city and is quite a deal smaller. Most of these students are engineers or science majors, a contrast to the City students. Because the campus is smaller and closer to many of the students homes there are not a lot of students who are hanging around. Here there is a lot more guys than girls too. Here they are having trouble getting girls involved in the movement.
La Trobe- Close to Bundoora, this is the campus that feel the most like what I am used to. There is an academic side and a dorm (or 'college') side where international and students who live father away live. School starts next week so we have not been able to see what the character of the student body is but just by walking around this campus has the most Socialist and Muslim influence. They have the opposite problem than RMIT Bundoora, finding it hard to get guys to be involved.
The Outreaches
What are they? Outreaches are ways for us to get into spiritual conversations with other students without it being too awkward. It also gives us a way to approach anyone without intruding becasue they are done in a way where our request can be turned down. They take many forms but the goal is the same, to understand the individual person better, see where they are spiritually and hopefully share the gospel message with them.
Surveys- These are questions that help us dive deeper into conversation. They range anywhere from "What do you value in life?" to "On a 1 to 100 scale, how sure are you that if you died today you would go to heaven?"
O-Week Questions- Basically we hand out flyers to take an online survey & they fill it our online. They last question asks if they would want to talk more about spiritual matters. If they choose "yes" then we get thier information and follow up with them.
Soularium- This is a special type of survey where there are pictures to answer questions. A total of 50 postcard size pictures are given to a person or laid out of a table and a couple of questions are asked. The person is asked to pull out 1-3 pictutes that best descibes thier answer and then is asked to explain why they chose it. This is my favorite outreach and provides the most interesting conversations. For some reason people really open up to you and tell you pretty deep stuff. Some of the questions we might ask are, "What descirbes your life?", "What do you wish was a part of your life?", "Who is God to you?", "What has your spiritual journey been so far?", "What do you wish was a part of your spiritual journey?", "How do you understand Christ's message?" and "Choose an image that best descibe the following; love, sin, sacrifice and renewal?".
My Days
So, finally, what has been going on this week! Monday we were at RMIT City all day. We handed out O-Week flyers at first and when we ran out of those paired up and went out to do Soulariums. Emily, my friend from Australia who came to VT this past semester, and I went out together. We were brought to five amazing women, each going through something unique, but we could see where the Lord was working in thier lives. One girl had only been in Australia a week and had no friends, another grew up in a Christian home but was living to please her parents & was struggling for control, and two more told of they really didn't think of religion or God at all.
The one conversation that stuck out in my mind the most was with a girl named Jane. At the first question she revealed a lot about what was going on with her family and a hard relationship she just got out of. We talked for a while and when she left for class she told us "what are the chances you would come up to ME, with this picture survey that would allow me to tell someone about what was going on in my life and that you would help me. Thank you". That spoke to me so much and showed me that the Lord was working through us to reach His people, whom he deeply cares about.
Tuesday we were back at RMIT City and I went out sharing with Katie, a gril from our project. We got into an amazing six conversations that agian were all drastically different. These included two exchange students from China. They had never heard of 'sin' before and Katie and I were able to share the Gospel with them in a basic and understandable way. They were so attentive and interested in what we were saying and were really processing everything we told them.
Today we were at RMIT Bundoora. The atmosphere was quite different and people were more reluctant to take our flyers and talk to us. But still, a good day. Bess and I had were a bit overloaded when a flock of girls who were friends with a girl we were doing a survey with came over the table and wanted to join in. They loved it and each one came from a completly different background. Later in the day Jane, an Aussie on staff with Student Life, and I got to share with a girl who told us she believed in God and a higher power but was unsure of what that exactly ment. We were able to answer her questions and give her some Biblical truth.
God working through each conversation and it is so apparent on how much He loves the students in Australia. I have had to relayon Him for strength each and everyday as we go to the Unis and approach people. He is the one who puts thoughts into my mind on where to direct the conversation, I know I could never do this on my own. I thank God that I am here and for the blessing it is to be included in His plan and working in Melbourne.
I know, long post...hope that gives you a better idea of what is going on here in Australia.
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