The Snake....

There have been many things that have happened in the last 2 weeks, so I'll start with most recent and go backward.
After returning from a 2 week-long camping/business trip, we were unloading the car and getting "back in the swing of things". Then I hear Alice say, "A SNAKE, Mommy! Look!" Well, I ran to look as well. It was a brown snake, VERY poisonous. It was slithering away between the house and the church (our side yard). I didn't want anyone to get bitten, especially not the kids. I quickly grabbed a landscaping rake, ran up behind the snake, prayed I would hit it square on, and swung. WHAM. Praise the Lord I hit that snake right in the middle of his body--up near his head, pinning him to the ground. I then quickly ran to the cage where we keep the shovel, grabbed it, and chopped the head off. Whew. It was a bit scary, and the snake was as long as the rake handle.

Thank you for praying for our family's safety!! Be assured that I have talked a GREAT DEAL with our kids about staying away from snakes, and getting away from them if they see them. I have also told them to come and tell me if they see one, and they understand. Please continue to pray for safety, as it warms up, the snakes come out more. We haven't seen many, in fact this was the first one in nearly a year.

Here's a picture... not for the faint-hearted.

Sitting in the present with the past and the future.

This past weekend was spent building relationships with many different folks. I was blessed to talk with small children--I met 2 of my grand-daughters!--, with teenagers, with men my own age, my father's age, and with one lady who is older than my grandma. It was a huge blessing to continue to build relationships with "old friends" as well as begin new relationships at this year's Yangbala Kemp (Youth Camp).

I was able to sit around a camp fire with one couple and their elderly mother. She told me a really cool story about herself. She was born premature out in the bush of Australia, and they didn't have a knife to cut her umbellical chord, so her sister used an oyster shell!
She is probably in her 80's, and she was telling me about her grandfather who was a pastor and would reach out to lepers (so this must have been in the 1800's, becuase I'm geussing she was born in the 1920's or so...) . He caught leprosy from the men and women he was serving, and so he was shipped off to a "leper island" off the coast of Queensland, Australia, and that was the last her family saw him. But she told me she was certain she would see him again in heaven.

It was a huge blessing to simply sit and talk with folks, and listen to their hopes and dreams. I was able to sit down with a couple of different YWAM (Youth With A Mission) students and share with them about how we came to Australia, and ask them about their lives. Two out of three nights during camp, I sat around the campfire with a YWAM student and chatted with them. It always started with simple everyday chat, but then got into deeper topics.

One night I talked with a young man who was very zealous to do God's work, and felt he had a calling to write a play that would impact the world. He was planning on selling all his "worldly things" as soon as he returned home, and follow this calling. He asked me what I thought about that, so I told him.
"My uncle told me this before we came to Australia, 'If you think you have a calling from God to do this or that, but the people who know you best can't see you in that calling, you need to rethink if you really "heard from God". God gave us people who are wiser than us and who love us, to help us along. If they can see you going in this direction and they support you in it, and it lines up with the Scripture, praise God! Perhaps He's leading you that direction.'" I encouraged him to stay consistently in the Bible, reading it IN CONTEXT so he understands what it is truly teaching.
All in all, this Yangbala Kemp was a blessing, and I was glad to be a part of it. Thank you all so much for your prayers and support of our family as we "administer God's grace in its various forms" here in Australia. You are a blessing to us and to the people here.

As we look ahead, we are preparing to leave on a PR trip to the Kimberley on Friday, and will be on the road for 2 weeks. Please pray for safe travels, and for good times of fellowship and new open doors for ministry. God bless you all!!

PS I will be posting more pics from Yangbala Kemp at a later date. :)