As I prepare to go to Ethiopia, I have to raise around $3000 to cover what I can't afford out of my own pocket (the trip in total is NZ$5100). Sooo, I am having a fundraiser on the 4th of July. My friend Soane is putting together the tickets for me (so watch this space!), but the plans are that I am having a function at 42a Lambie Dr on the 4th of July.
Its an international theme night with a variety of music (anyone want to bring some jams?) and also some food. There will be three menus (Italian, Mexican and Island) and the ticket price will include the feed!
It's just $15 and will start at 7pm and finish around 9pm. I will let you know more details this week!
My other fundraiser is a raffle that is being drawn on the 4th of July. There are three prizes that have generously been donated from Pacific Grace Jewelry .
1st prize is a $100 voucher,
2nd prize is $60 voucher and the
3rd prize is a $40 voucher of any jewelry from the Pacific Grace range.
(I am not usually a fan of raffles as they go against my values of anti-gambling, but if you just see your donation as giving to my cause, the prize is just a bonus!) So please support me.
While I am in the mood, i thought I would also let you know my wish list. These are items that I need to take with me that I don't have yet.
1. Video camera! If anyone has one that I could borrow, please let me know.
2. Still camera.
3. Shoes for the street kids.
4. Material for the ladies to give them material to make their own clothes.
5. Suitcase!
6. Food for the 4th of July. I'll need mince and cheese that would go into our menus. If anyone can help to donate these items, that would really help to drop my expenses =)
7. Other items like drinks, serviettes, plastic forks, decorations.
Let me know if you can help and want to support. Become a follower on my page too so you can follow along my journey to Ethiopia.
Monday, June 8, 2009
Friday, June 5, 2009
How it all began!
Do you remember the songs We are the world and Do they know it's Christmas time? Those songs came out in 1985 while a famine was happening in Ethiopia. At the time, I was a six year old, living in Melbourne Australia, where we had moved a year earlier from New Zealand to be closer to my dad's Greek family. At the same time, my parents had bought a Christian Kids album called Psalty's Kids Praise 6 "A heart to change the World." This album intrigued my little mind as it took me on a journey of mission work around the world. This is where my heart for missions began. At the age of 6, my mother recalls me telling her that one day, I was going to be a missionary to Ethiopia. In my mind, I would be right in the middle of a famine, feeding hundreds of hungry children as they lined up on the side of the street.
The funny thing is, that as that six year old, I hated living in Melbourne. Not because it was a terrible place or that I had no friends (or maybe that was the case lol), but more because I wasn't able to go home. I heard years later about this thing called agrophobia which is a fear of not being able to get back home. My mum said that there is no way I could have had this, but I think in a small way, I did. I hated the fact that I couldn't get back to our home in Glenfield, Auckland, New Zealand. I really, really wanted to go home! I saw this played out in Rotorua, when we moved there four and a half years ago with my daughter Lydia. For a few months, she kept asking to go home. When can we go home? She would cry and I could empathise with her because I had felt the same way. Fortunately, however, Rotorua was only a three hour drive away.
I share this about Melbourne, to show how far I have come. I remember even in 1995, when I first met Asaua, asking my prayer companions at St Anthony's Youth Group, to pray for me as we were planning to go to Camp Adair. The thought of going on camp, even scared me. Fear was a big thing in my life. This was one of the first things that God had to deal with, within me.
But that trip to camp was not as bad as I had imagined. In fact, it was a real awesome experience for me. One that began my search for God. I had just met Asaua and thought he was a bit of a hottie lol. But I didn't know him at all and didn't want to rush into anything. I opened my bible (something I didn't do very often at all back then) and it opened to a verse in Psalms 37:4 and it read "Seek your happiness in the Lord and He will give you your hearts desires." Asaua had become my hearts desire and so I really tried to "seek my happiness" in things that pleased God. Well, I got Asaua, and not long after that, I forgot all about that verse. Asaua and I got really heavily involved in our relationship. We went through a lot of good and bad times. It was through a series of events, that two years later we got pregnant, then married and had our first baby at 19. Even then, I had told Asaua that I had always wanted to go to Ethiopia and asked him if he would want to go one day...you know, when we get old.
While lying in bed one night in the hospital after having Jamal, I had a dream. This dream was so vivid that it felt really real. You know those dreams when you wake up and wonder if you were dreaming or if it was real? Well this dream was about me and my old next door neighbour. We were on Queen St (a place I frequented a lot as a teenager) and we jumped on a bus that was going down town. While turning a corner, this bus got sucked down a black hole and (in the dream) I knew that my life was ending. For the first time, after a lifetime of believing that if I was a good girl (whatever that means) I would go to heaven, I really questioned whether or not, I really WAS good enough! It freaked me out!
A lot had happened in the previous months- I had stopped drinking and smoking, I had given my life to this handsome young man, I had moved out of home and into our own house. I had also been visiting Asaua's brothers church and youth rallies and had heard messages from the Bible that really made me question my relationship with God. The thing that always got in the way of me developing that relationship was things I had done, things I wanted to still do and things that I already had sorted. But this dream just made me rethink all that. It made me realise that none of that mattered. So three months later, when I attended a church service at BBC Otara and heard about the woman at the well and how Jesus offered to be her friend and offered her eternal water for her soul. I went to drink from that well and accepted that living water. My soul was at rest and I wanted to tell the whole world!
We soon moved to Otara to save money by living with Asaua's parents (which didn't last long lol) and also to go to BBC (where we vowed not to go hard out like his brother). But as it happened, we fell in love with the church and really hungered to learn more about the Bible and God. So we attended pretty much almost every day. Eventually, we helped out in a lot of the activities like after school clubs - Asaua helped with the 7-8 yr olds while I helped and led the 5-6 year old club. I loved working with little kids. My mum noted that this was my Mission field. I had to agree. When Jamal was one, we bought a ten seater Ford Econovan so that we could fit all the kids in that we would pick up. We also used it to take a group of youth to Lake Pupuke on late night swims after church- my favourite place on the North Shore! Those were good times.
Anyway, one weekend at church, we were having a Missions weekend. By this time, Asaua and I were teaching the Junior High Sunday school class and, as part and parcel of leading that class, were all involved in putting together a Missions night. This was a chance for everyone to set up a room in the country of their choice and talk about what is happening in that country. Our first year, we did Italy. That was fun and I got to make Italian food! This year, however, we did Samoa. Anyway, that was beside the point. We also had twins at this stage and our family was taking it's toll on our ability to be as involved in church. A couple was visiting this particular year, who had done 15 years missionary work in Ethiopia through the 70's and then done 20 years in Kenya. I eagerly awaited their arrival and was so excited to see their slides! As soon as I got the chance, I talked to the couple and told them of my long desire to go to Ethiopia, to which they responded "God NEEDS people in Ethiopia!". This half excited me, and half scared me as it never ACTUALLY dawned on me, that it was something that I could tangibly do. So I replied, well, you would have to convince my husband of that. And she wisely suggested that we let God do the convincing...this was going to be a long feat! My husband did not even like the thought of leaving Auckland, let alone the country! This did, however, plant a seed in our minds of something that might be.
Well, two years later, after having our fourth child, going through some rough trials and finally being obedient to the voice of God, we made our first step. We moved to Rotorua! It was a step of faith, and a step out of our comfort zone. We were leaving behind Asaua's stable job with my uncle. A job that he excelled in and was comfortable in. He was an Alternative Education teacher-something that I knew he would be good at, before anyone else did as I had sat with him through many Sunday school classes and seen him relate to these kids that not many other people (myself included) could relate to.
Our year in Rotorua was the best year of our lives. We lived off nothing for the first three months while Asaua waited for a youth organisation down there to get some funding through. He worked hard in a timber mill while I stayed home, pregnant, with our four kids who were all under the age of 8. God taught me about fear and how to overcome it. He showed me in his word that nothing would harm me that he wouldn't allow and that by being fearful would not protect me but would only be detrimental. This was the year I overcame fear. I also overcame the need to be busy all the time and really rested for a good year. But as God would have it, my mission time in Otara hadn't finished, so we moved back. We actually started a journey to applying to going to Ethiopia together as a family, but the time was not right and we turned our efforts into starting a youth organisation of our own in Otara.
This was a dream that was a long time coming as we saw the need to meet young people where they were at and not to force them to come to church to see where they were at. We took the example of Jesus, who walked the streets and sat with the sinners and showed his love to those who were unlovable. We had started a good thing. People were supportive and so were the funders. We got sooo busy, growing this thing and looking after these youth that would walk through our door, that we forgot what we had learnt in Rotorua.
There is a saying that I learnt last year that says that "it is easier for Satan to kill a seed than to destroy a harvest." Well, unfortunately, that project didn't get much further than being a seed. Fortunately, however, the seed still remains in our heart and was nurtured by another man in Otara who took us into his harvest and set our feet back on solid ground. Through him, God taught us about His grace. "Grace that restores, grace that redeems, grace that releases me to worship, grace that repairs visions and dreams, grace that releases Miracles!" Israel Houghton sings those words, and still, to this day, they bring tears to my eyes. I would never have known the extent of God's grace, until I had experienced receiving it myself. The miracle is that my family is still together and thrives after the storm. God repaired the dreams in our hearts and is now allowing me to live this dream to go to Ethiopia!!
I now work for a youth organisation called Crosspower Ministries Trust (the BEST youth organisation in New Zealand!) No bias there - whatsoever! and have had the opportunity to work with MORE awesome young kids in the low socio economic area of East Tamaki. I have also been a proud supporter of our dance crews, who this year qualified to go to the World Hiphop Champs in Las Vegas in July. I was asked to go along and thought, wow, what a great opportunity that would be for me to take my oldest son to! Jamal is almost 12 now and loves Hiphop dance. I told him to pray about it and he was excited. But then...I thought about what values I wanted to pass onto my son. He has grown a heart for Ethiopia too as we have talked about going over the years. He has talked about wanting to help those who suffer real poverty and so I had told him that when he turns 13, we would go.
Asaua and I had visited the States for our 10th anniversary, two years ago. It was amazing but at the same time, disturbing for me. In some places, you would see such affluence, while knowing that just across the border lay such poverty...even on their own city streets, lay poverty. I could take Jamal and show him how he could make it to a world stage and receive fame and fortune, but with him being at such a vulnerable age, would I rather teach him the importance of empathy and generosity. I decided not to take him to Las Vegas that night.
That week, my friend Julie from Texas, posted a poster on her Facebook site about the Mochaclub. I was intrigued once again! I had just gone through a process last year of trying to organise a trip with an American organisation who build schools in Africa. My colleague Moe and I thought that we could take a group of our youth from Otara over to show them what missions is all about. But I could never get a response from the organisation. So after spending an hour on the Mochaclub website, I emailed them to see if I would get a response to my request of taking two places on a trip to Ethiopia in July! I fell in love with this organisation because they exist to support local initiatives. They also are very transparent and have two week trips-which suit me to a tee.
To my great delight, two days later, Geoffrey emailed me back! I almost cried in my office as I read his email. So after too-ing and frow-ing about what and how and when and my kids? and with what?, I committed to going. I paid my deposit. I stepped out in faith again. I have the support of my Pastors and most of all, I have the support of my husband (well, he is the one I am leaving behind to keep the fort). So I am off! On the 19th of July-Jamal's 12th birthday. And I am inviting you to follow me on my journey. So lets go!
The funny thing is, that as that six year old, I hated living in Melbourne. Not because it was a terrible place or that I had no friends (or maybe that was the case lol), but more because I wasn't able to go home. I heard years later about this thing called agrophobia which is a fear of not being able to get back home. My mum said that there is no way I could have had this, but I think in a small way, I did. I hated the fact that I couldn't get back to our home in Glenfield, Auckland, New Zealand. I really, really wanted to go home! I saw this played out in Rotorua, when we moved there four and a half years ago with my daughter Lydia. For a few months, she kept asking to go home. When can we go home? She would cry and I could empathise with her because I had felt the same way. Fortunately, however, Rotorua was only a three hour drive away.
I share this about Melbourne, to show how far I have come. I remember even in 1995, when I first met Asaua, asking my prayer companions at St Anthony's Youth Group, to pray for me as we were planning to go to Camp Adair. The thought of going on camp, even scared me. Fear was a big thing in my life. This was one of the first things that God had to deal with, within me.
But that trip to camp was not as bad as I had imagined. In fact, it was a real awesome experience for me. One that began my search for God. I had just met Asaua and thought he was a bit of a hottie lol. But I didn't know him at all and didn't want to rush into anything. I opened my bible (something I didn't do very often at all back then) and it opened to a verse in Psalms 37:4 and it read "Seek your happiness in the Lord and He will give you your hearts desires." Asaua had become my hearts desire and so I really tried to "seek my happiness" in things that pleased God. Well, I got Asaua, and not long after that, I forgot all about that verse. Asaua and I got really heavily involved in our relationship. We went through a lot of good and bad times. It was through a series of events, that two years later we got pregnant, then married and had our first baby at 19. Even then, I had told Asaua that I had always wanted to go to Ethiopia and asked him if he would want to go one day...you know, when we get old.
While lying in bed one night in the hospital after having Jamal, I had a dream. This dream was so vivid that it felt really real. You know those dreams when you wake up and wonder if you were dreaming or if it was real? Well this dream was about me and my old next door neighbour. We were on Queen St (a place I frequented a lot as a teenager) and we jumped on a bus that was going down town. While turning a corner, this bus got sucked down a black hole and (in the dream) I knew that my life was ending. For the first time, after a lifetime of believing that if I was a good girl (whatever that means) I would go to heaven, I really questioned whether or not, I really WAS good enough! It freaked me out!
A lot had happened in the previous months- I had stopped drinking and smoking, I had given my life to this handsome young man, I had moved out of home and into our own house. I had also been visiting Asaua's brothers church and youth rallies and had heard messages from the Bible that really made me question my relationship with God. The thing that always got in the way of me developing that relationship was things I had done, things I wanted to still do and things that I already had sorted. But this dream just made me rethink all that. It made me realise that none of that mattered. So three months later, when I attended a church service at BBC Otara and heard about the woman at the well and how Jesus offered to be her friend and offered her eternal water for her soul. I went to drink from that well and accepted that living water. My soul was at rest and I wanted to tell the whole world!
We soon moved to Otara to save money by living with Asaua's parents (which didn't last long lol) and also to go to BBC (where we vowed not to go hard out like his brother). But as it happened, we fell in love with the church and really hungered to learn more about the Bible and God. So we attended pretty much almost every day. Eventually, we helped out in a lot of the activities like after school clubs - Asaua helped with the 7-8 yr olds while I helped and led the 5-6 year old club. I loved working with little kids. My mum noted that this was my Mission field. I had to agree. When Jamal was one, we bought a ten seater Ford Econovan so that we could fit all the kids in that we would pick up. We also used it to take a group of youth to Lake Pupuke on late night swims after church- my favourite place on the North Shore! Those were good times.
Anyway, one weekend at church, we were having a Missions weekend. By this time, Asaua and I were teaching the Junior High Sunday school class and, as part and parcel of leading that class, were all involved in putting together a Missions night. This was a chance for everyone to set up a room in the country of their choice and talk about what is happening in that country. Our first year, we did Italy. That was fun and I got to make Italian food! This year, however, we did Samoa. Anyway, that was beside the point. We also had twins at this stage and our family was taking it's toll on our ability to be as involved in church. A couple was visiting this particular year, who had done 15 years missionary work in Ethiopia through the 70's and then done 20 years in Kenya. I eagerly awaited their arrival and was so excited to see their slides! As soon as I got the chance, I talked to the couple and told them of my long desire to go to Ethiopia, to which they responded "God NEEDS people in Ethiopia!". This half excited me, and half scared me as it never ACTUALLY dawned on me, that it was something that I could tangibly do. So I replied, well, you would have to convince my husband of that. And she wisely suggested that we let God do the convincing...this was going to be a long feat! My husband did not even like the thought of leaving Auckland, let alone the country! This did, however, plant a seed in our minds of something that might be.
Well, two years later, after having our fourth child, going through some rough trials and finally being obedient to the voice of God, we made our first step. We moved to Rotorua! It was a step of faith, and a step out of our comfort zone. We were leaving behind Asaua's stable job with my uncle. A job that he excelled in and was comfortable in. He was an Alternative Education teacher-something that I knew he would be good at, before anyone else did as I had sat with him through many Sunday school classes and seen him relate to these kids that not many other people (myself included) could relate to.
Our year in Rotorua was the best year of our lives. We lived off nothing for the first three months while Asaua waited for a youth organisation down there to get some funding through. He worked hard in a timber mill while I stayed home, pregnant, with our four kids who were all under the age of 8. God taught me about fear and how to overcome it. He showed me in his word that nothing would harm me that he wouldn't allow and that by being fearful would not protect me but would only be detrimental. This was the year I overcame fear. I also overcame the need to be busy all the time and really rested for a good year. But as God would have it, my mission time in Otara hadn't finished, so we moved back. We actually started a journey to applying to going to Ethiopia together as a family, but the time was not right and we turned our efforts into starting a youth organisation of our own in Otara.
This was a dream that was a long time coming as we saw the need to meet young people where they were at and not to force them to come to church to see where they were at. We took the example of Jesus, who walked the streets and sat with the sinners and showed his love to those who were unlovable. We had started a good thing. People were supportive and so were the funders. We got sooo busy, growing this thing and looking after these youth that would walk through our door, that we forgot what we had learnt in Rotorua.
There is a saying that I learnt last year that says that "it is easier for Satan to kill a seed than to destroy a harvest." Well, unfortunately, that project didn't get much further than being a seed. Fortunately, however, the seed still remains in our heart and was nurtured by another man in Otara who took us into his harvest and set our feet back on solid ground. Through him, God taught us about His grace. "Grace that restores, grace that redeems, grace that releases me to worship, grace that repairs visions and dreams, grace that releases Miracles!" Israel Houghton sings those words, and still, to this day, they bring tears to my eyes. I would never have known the extent of God's grace, until I had experienced receiving it myself. The miracle is that my family is still together and thrives after the storm. God repaired the dreams in our hearts and is now allowing me to live this dream to go to Ethiopia!!
I now work for a youth organisation called Crosspower Ministries Trust (the BEST youth organisation in New Zealand!) No bias there - whatsoever! and have had the opportunity to work with MORE awesome young kids in the low socio economic area of East Tamaki. I have also been a proud supporter of our dance crews, who this year qualified to go to the World Hiphop Champs in Las Vegas in July. I was asked to go along and thought, wow, what a great opportunity that would be for me to take my oldest son to! Jamal is almost 12 now and loves Hiphop dance. I told him to pray about it and he was excited. But then...I thought about what values I wanted to pass onto my son. He has grown a heart for Ethiopia too as we have talked about going over the years. He has talked about wanting to help those who suffer real poverty and so I had told him that when he turns 13, we would go.
Asaua and I had visited the States for our 10th anniversary, two years ago. It was amazing but at the same time, disturbing for me. In some places, you would see such affluence, while knowing that just across the border lay such poverty...even on their own city streets, lay poverty. I could take Jamal and show him how he could make it to a world stage and receive fame and fortune, but with him being at such a vulnerable age, would I rather teach him the importance of empathy and generosity. I decided not to take him to Las Vegas that night.
That week, my friend Julie from Texas, posted a poster on her Facebook site about the Mochaclub. I was intrigued once again! I had just gone through a process last year of trying to organise a trip with an American organisation who build schools in Africa. My colleague Moe and I thought that we could take a group of our youth from Otara over to show them what missions is all about. But I could never get a response from the organisation. So after spending an hour on the Mochaclub website, I emailed them to see if I would get a response to my request of taking two places on a trip to Ethiopia in July! I fell in love with this organisation because they exist to support local initiatives. They also are very transparent and have two week trips-which suit me to a tee.
To my great delight, two days later, Geoffrey emailed me back! I almost cried in my office as I read his email. So after too-ing and frow-ing about what and how and when and my kids? and with what?, I committed to going. I paid my deposit. I stepped out in faith again. I have the support of my Pastors and most of all, I have the support of my husband (well, he is the one I am leaving behind to keep the fort). So I am off! On the 19th of July-Jamal's 12th birthday. And I am inviting you to follow me on my journey. So lets go!
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