Off To My Mission Field

I wanted to take this time to thank you once again for all of your support! I am so thrilled and couldn't ever thank you enough for your thoughts and prayers! I wish I had the opportunity to thank each of you individually and share untold stories of how God opened up my eyes to a whole new world. It has been a life changing experience and I have grown in so many ways. God is continually opening up doors for my future and showing me the plans he has next for my life. We have just completed debrief week and it is mind boggling that I just graduated from DTS! There is so much going on in my head and it will take a long time to realize everything God has done for me.

Overall, I hope you've been able to learn something from these blogs in the past 5 months of my life and I pray that God has stirred something in each of your hearts. I'd really like to challenge you to take a chance on God and to give all of your heart to him. What do you have to lose? I guarantee if you pursue my God wholeheartedly and challenge him, he will show up and make himself known. So often we put him in a box, because we don't know anything different. Rarely do we step out in faith and allow God to move in radical ways. He is more powerful than you could ever imagine and is longing for you to get to know him. I just really want you to know that God's love is so great, so overwhelming, that he has already forgiven you for everything, yes EVERYTHING, in your past and he is eagerly waiting to become your best friend. Man will continually fail you, but my God is perfect and will never fall short.

By no means do you need to take a DTS to know God or make him known, because he is the same here, as he was on outreach and he will be the same when I return home. I really hope that I am able to see you all once I arrive home and if you see me or want to meet up and hear more about what God is teaching me, I would love to share with you stories of instances that God showed up BIG TIME! It will take more than a 30 second convo though so be ready to set aside some time.

Through out my DTS I've learned numerous things and I've found that the more I study the Bible and learn more about God, the more I realize how much I don't know. What I do know though is that as a disciple of Christ I am called to Love God and Love Others and that is something I will struggle to do every day, but it's not by my strength but Christs strength in me. If you'd like to talk more I gladly encourage you to facebook message me or email (jc7soccer@hotmail.com) me and I would love to discuss anything and everything God has been teaching me here. Thanks for following along! Take care and God Bless!

Check out our Fijippines Outreach Video

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JZzQhdoJM-s&feature=plcp

School Verse: 1 John 2:6 "Whoever claims to live in him must walk as Jesus did."

God's Plan is the ONLY Plan!

I can't believe this journey of my life is coming to an end. My team just arrived back to the base here in Aussie Saturday night along with our fellow DTS members. It is so great to be reunited with them once again and share stories of how God showed up in big ways!!! I am so blessed to have gone to the Philippines & Fiji and God blessed me with an incredible team and leaders!

Our last couple weeks in Fiji were extremely challenging and I wish I could share everything with you. As I wrote in my previous post, my team had planned on going to Kadavu Island for our last week of outreach, but after much deliberation we felt like God was calling us elsewhere. The day before we left for the island, our leader Pia was diagnosed with a staph infection and that same night received two powerful dreams warning our team to not go to the island. We took these as clear signs from God, because that night we had asked for someone on our team to receive vivid dreams. It was a really difficult time for many of us and I'm thankful I had you guys at home praying for me. I had really been looking forward to this island and being the first team there building relationships and a firm foundation for future YWAM teams seemed amazing to me. But instead we left Suva, Fiji and headed back to the YWAM base in Lautoka, Fiji to work with our contacts there. The next few days our team did different hospital, jail and teen ministries and received heaps of confirmations from God. It was awesome to see that God's plan was greater no matter how difficult it was to go against such promising plans in Kadavu. During our last 5 days, we had got news from a pastor in Nacula in the Yasawa Islands that he would really appreciate it if our group came and brought our missions to his village.  Just like that God blessed us with another opportunity to head to an island and it was the such an jaw dropping adventure!

Nacula was like nothing I've ever done before and yet I didn't really feel out of place. It was such a wonderful learning experience being apart of the village culture and becoming welcomed into the exclusive community. We were there for 3 full days and spent most afternoons going around door to door sharing our testimonies and telling them about Jesus, as well as spending time with the kids at the local primary school.  Each night we'd put on a mini "concert" which consisted of 2 skits, 2 testimonies, some songs & a final message giving the locals opportunities for prayer. You could just sense how spiritually dead the village was and all we wanted to do was bring a spark and allow the Holy Spirit to set their hearts on fire.

It has been so sweet to see God work in so many different parts of the world and in such a variety of ways. In the end, there was no better plan then the plan God showed our team. His ways were best and it was our teams decision to live by faith that he would make a way and not by our sight, which didn't look promising.

Our final week here of DTS is debrief week and gearing up for the toughest times that have yet to come. Hopefully I'll be able to comeprehend just a fraction of everything God has shown me. Hope you all have a great week and are enjoying the summer. Thanks for readying :) later mates!

Island Time

Bula Vinaka!  I hope you are all doing great and enjoying the wonderful weather back home!  I'm currently in Suva, Fiji which is the largest city from what I know of here.  It has been an awesome adventure here in Fiji as last week we were staying at a YWAM base in Latoka doing different types of ministry around town.  A few days we went and prayed in the hospitals and saw God perform incredible miracles.  We also worked with kids in after school programs, church services, and college groups.  Often we have gone around door to door sharing the Good News and our purpose for being here in Fiji.  Many of the Fijians are born into Christian homes so we are here to encourage and enhance their faith.  As far as the Indians, most of them are Hindu and Muslim so we are counting on God to perform different types of miracles which is often the only avenue to tell them about the God we serve.

This past week in Suva we went to the prisons and spoke as well as went to Hindu villages and watched God come through again with more healings.  The spiritual world is so amazing here and very difficult at the same time.  If you could pray for the Khan family and more specifically their daughers Mona & Joyce who just yesterday were delievered from demonic possession.  However it is a reoccuring thing and we are praying that this was the final departure.  I can't thank you enough for all of your prayers and support.  God is so crazy and I can't believe we only have a few weeks left.  My God is such a powerful God and nothing can stand in his way.

This Wednesday our team is heading to some more remote islands to build relationships and preach God's word when we get a chance.  It's a really cool experience because no YWAM team has done these things before here in Fiji and we are trying to establish a good foundation for future teams.  Thanks again and Go God! See you all soon!