My 1st official sermon

After my discipleship training school I felt like God wanted me to do some Bible training with YWAM.  The course I am involved in is called the Biblical Core Course and we study and teach the Bible in Australia and in Indonesia this time.

This week we are learning about preaching and teaching.  Monday we learned about preaching and Monday night we prepared one.  I got really stressed out but in the end God came through and I am really proud of how it turned out.  It was on how we deal with defeat as Christians using 1 Peter 5:6-10.  I learned something as well.  Below are my teachers and fellow students.

Tomorrow we start teaching and this weekend we will be going away to a house on the beach to learn the 1st 5-6 books of the Old Testament. please pray... Love you all.  More good news soon, Shelly

Africa, Indonesia, and more....

Hello friends and family... Shelly here...still in Australia.

I want to give you a brief glimpse of what God has done in the 3 months prior to this school. As you know i went to Indonesia, Mozambique, Swaziland, and South Africa.  On these missions trips my worldview has expanded greatly.

My dream was to go to Africa, one day God gave me a heart for Africa and I longed to go and now I'm longing to go back.  In Africa my team was able to teach in bible schools, preach sermons, hold the children, interview a community for a church so they can address needs of the people and plant a church, lead youth groups, see really old cave paintings, we painted the walls at the orphanage, went to two African weddings, visited and spoke to Heidi and Roland's ministry (Iris) in Maputu, visit the villages, worked with an orphanage in all 3 African nations...and we did much much more...  We also tried chicken throat, fish eye and cow heart.

A story from Africa: One night our team was sharing with a village and with little notice I was going to speak to the group (this is in the outskirts of Mozambique) and i was kind of stressed and frustrated... praying hard... trying to put together something fresh especially for them and i didn't get anything... (the people were worshiping by lanterns and they just worshipped and worshipped and when we got there... and they said we are hungry to hear what God has put on your hearts.. pressures on) so i asked... chasity one of my leaders to share a testimony 1st and just as she started to speak a few lines in.. i got it.. and out of no where... the Holy Spirit spoke... and gave me a beautiful message for the people... and it spoke a lot to me too.. Through that i realized even more... just how faithful GOd is...

Indonesia: we united the youth of two churches together... and together they made a 2 year commitment to minister to a slum, we taught english in the slum every tuesday night, shared about Jesus with even the taxi drivers, we taught in schools of all types, we read the entire bible out to the city, we visited our slum at least twice a week... and were able to paint a mural just as you walk into the slum (it brought a lot of life and color), played lots of games, told stories, ... and we ate lots of interesting food like sketchy squid.. (the whole thing)...

one story from Indonesia: Fishing by faith... my leader Alicia and i (the other leader) were talking with the people in (Tanamara) the slum (a muslim slum...with a translator of course) and we were looking for a new place within the slum and we came about a fishing pond.. so we sat next to the fisherman and began to talk with them... and we started with telling them about Jesus and praying that they'd catch fish.. we started with the story when he told them to cast the net on the other side and they caught so many fish they had a hard time bringing it in... and they loved it so we began to tell them every story we could think of.. and almost on que... we'd tell a story and they'd catch a fish... and they said... this is because you are praying... so we kept talking with them and were invited back to fish... Fishing by faith part 2: we went back and this time ready.. we were praying for 12 fish all day.. the men caught 8 but God grew our faith so much.. i usually caught the little ones... but it was a lot of fun. We told them as many stories as we could... the rest of our team was praying and we were able to report to them the number of fish every once in a while... we were able to share the gospel in many ways and one of the men took a bible... they call it an alkitab...

Ultimately.. dts was different than i thought.. the teaching time... rocked my socks.. if i wore any i guess... and i loved every minute... took lots of notes... lots of quiet time.. processed a lot... definitely life changing.... and outreach.. well... outreach was stretching... changed my heart... and i am excited to tell you about what God is doing now..

Thank you so much all of you who supported me, and pray for me, and read my updates... it means a lot to know you are loved... and that others around the world partner with me.. i am thankful for you.. very thankful... be looking for an update about the biblical core course this week.i love you, shelly

shell's adventure in the nations (YPDTS outreach)

Going to africa was a dream come true... i love africa... i love the world but... i love africa a lot... the people were so beautiful esp. in the villages... and the food... was amazing... sketch sometimes but amazing in africa... we went to a village one day and it was the harvest celebration they have once a year of all the different kinds of food they grow and make... so cool...

We went village to village in mozambique... and our time ran over in some villages because they wanted to feed us and stuff... one village we were like 3 hrs late and all of these people had come to meet with God and to see us and they praised and worshipped the whole 3+ hours waiting on us.. incredible... really makes you want to have something amazing to give them...

It is weird to see all the cell phones.. esp. in the villages... they are in traditional clothes... and there are like 2 power lines and you see a cell phone... everyone in africa has them... they have power storages so they shift the power from region to region so everyone can have it most of the time.. and in the time when an area does not have power... some of the african people remove the copper wires from the ground and they sell them somehow.. so that is why they no longer have landlines for the most part...

We worked with a lot of orphanages an we painted and spoke a lot.. mainly in churches... i realized i like to tell stories... i'm not too good at making them up off the cuff yet but... i enjoy telling the stories of the bible and i'm hoping this school... (the biblical core course) will help me get better at it... i got to draw lots of cartoons too... teaching english in the schools... this is a? pizzan... banana ... that's right... (indonesia)

Have you heard the banana song?.... bananas unite.... that one.. ? we did it so many times... if nothing else worked with the kids.. the banana song always does it... we played lots of games too... they like singing and dancing songs... the kids... esp . in indonesia... the little girls were so cute they gave us girls cute jewelry... meeeess, meeeeeess... selly.... they were so cute...

In cultures like that you can really tell you have an influence... when we came back from africa my friend marissa and i came back with long braids (extentions) and after a week or so in the Tanamara (the water slum) the little girls started to braid their hair in small braids..

In indonesia we united two churches.. the purple church and the white church.. we call them ... and they committed to adopting a slum.. a 2 year commitment to visit, help, minister to a slum... our slum was called tanamara or the water slum... we taught english there every tuesday night and visited at least once a week... it was a muslim slum.. so we weren't supposed to talk about Jesus but... we a had some opportunities and it was great...

In the front of tanamara we painted a colorful mural... i helped paint and design it... that was def. a hightlight for me... i learned a lot.. and i grew a lot.. i enjoyed outreach... there were def times when i was counting down the days till it was over but.. those days were few and my heart and endurance is consistently growing... looking back it was an incredible adventure and i can't wait to do it again...

So... what am i doing now? i am doing the biblical core course here in ywam perth.

"this course is designed to teach me how to employ many creative and diverse methods for reading, interpreting and applying the scriptures. i will also be involved in topical seminars, dramatic re-creations, and various forms of research, including historical, archaeological, literary and geographical studies... during the course i will read through the whole Bible, and study many individual books in depth from both the Old and New Testaments... besides learning the skills needed for studying the Bible, the Biblical Core Course (BCC) provides a means for learning how to incorporate the scriptures into areas of evangelism including, public proclamation, street preaching, worship and intercession and the lecture phase will be followed by...

an Outreach which is a key part of the BCC as it is all about taking the skills taught in the classroom and applying them in a cross-cultural situation. It is a time to practice our teaching and preaching skills and to minister to people in their situations. This allows us to share the Gospel using the Word of God. "

I am looking forward to the bcc... the biblical core course... it starts tonight... it is supposed to be pretty full on... i'm learning how to trust God, how to communicate better, and how to walk in obedience... all really challenging stuff... i find the hotmail inbox a bit intimidating sometimes... but... i am learning to slow down and try harder... and be less lazy in the field of communication...
Yeah.... so i'm doing good working through stuff everyday... learning to surrender over and over again... and it is good.