So, we’ve been in Perth over 2 months, and no updates!! We really haven’t done well on blogging.
So as you probably already know, we took 4 days to drive from Brisbane to Perth, and our car was fine the whole way! Sara avoided hitting a kangaroo, and we clocked up well over 4000 Km’s. As we arrived in the Perth area, still about 20mins from home, the rain started, and it was so heavy we had to slow down to a crawl! What a welcome for us, as Sara was worried it would be really dry!
We’ve settled into the back 3 rooms of mum and dads, and recently re-arranged it to make better use of the space. We now have a “kitchen” room, with a bar fridge, lots of kitchen stuff (appliances, plates, food), and also a cupboard currently occupied with our clothes. We have our study, with both Sara and my desks, and more computer stuff than Sara likes, much more than she wants. (She’d get rid of maybe 95% of it if she could). Most of my tools are also in there, for convenience, but I’m sure Sara would rather they were outside in the garage. Still, she’s putting up with me and my “mess”. We then have our bedroom, with our double mattress on the ground and our “TV” and other random stuff atm. We are still looking for a bed for the matress, but are fine with it on the ground. At least we can’t really fall out of bed! We have a media centre (TV) in our room, hooked up to the network, so we can get all our DVD’s and Music easily, and can even have music playing and remotely control it from any computer in the house! The media centre is good for watching Scrubs before bed, and then just reaching over, hitting the power button, all without getting out of our nice warm bed! Or, if Sara really wants (seeing as I don’t enjoy it as much), we can leave the music on when we go to bed, and have it turn off automatically later when we are asleep. I don’t really enjoy music on while I’m falling asleep, but she likes it so we have it occasionally. We also have our own bathroom, which is really a mess atm, because while we’ve been rearranging the “house” the last few days, lots got shoved in there and hasn’t yet been put back in it’s new place!
Sara and I have both applied for University, at Curtin, and been accepted. We’ve accepted our offers and enrolment is the middle of July, with O-week shortly after. I’m studying Computer Science, and Sara is going to do Chemical Engineering, due to her preferred double degree not being available mid-year intake. With any luck, we may get Commonwealth and/or Curtin scholarships to assist with the cost of uni. That would be nice, because currently we scrape by on Centrelink, and my Centrelink drops down when I start studying. But, we have also both just gotten a casual job. We are working at Choice Beef Jerky, which is as the name says, a Beef Jerky place. Sara and I work in the “factory” taking the meat out of the baster, and putting it on the dehydrator racks. Hopefully we’ll get 3 hours in the evening or afternoon, most days. And because it’s a ‘factory hand’ position, we get rather decent pay. And we have a great boss, so we get cheap mince too (and sometimes some free, that’s how nice they are!)
Since getting here 2 months ago, we have become very involved with the Xult Youth Church, the Youth group that Kat and Nick started 3 years ago. We assist on the leadership team, as well as Pastoral care for the leaders. Sara has helped me immensely in setting up a website for them, which as a registered member (so any youth attending the meetings), you can get access to a forum, secure chat, and other member features. We are also in the process of writing some more code for the site, that gives leaders access to tools to assist with managing the group, including (e)mailing members, recording attendance, managing small groups, and sharing resources. There will also be a tool in there to help create the worship “playlists” for sundays.
We have also started some prison ministries with the Xult leaders in the Juvenile Detention Centres, through Learning For Life. Currently, it’s off the ground, but struggling to stay on it’s feet, so some prayer for that would be great. Also, Sara and I have been doing volunteer work at Learning For Life, mostly IT and Admin. Sara helped migrate their old website to a Content Management System, and I’ve been migrating their email to Google Apps. I have really enjoyed our volunteer days, and I’m fairly sure Sara has too.
Currently, Sara and I are babysitting for Kat and Nick, and using the time here to use their washing machine! Sara hates mum’s twin tub, and I must admit, it’s a lot less effort to use a front or top loader than a twin tub. We also have the bonus of having dinner cooked for us! This week so far, we had dinner out on Sunday night, for Kat and Nicks farewell party (from the All Saints church, as they are moving church), then Monday we had left overs from the dinner the night before, tonight we’ve had food here, and tomorrow night, we could probably still get away without cooking! Shocking, I know. Still, when it comes time to cook, I have some soft tomatoes, lots of good quality mince from work, and an electric fry pan calling out Bolognese!
Along with everything that’s happening, Uni starting, work, Xult Youth Church (which is very time consuming when you realise how much time Pastoral care takes, as well as organising camps, and being a taxi driver!), and Learning for Life volunteering, we are also hoping to organise a missions trip for a small group from Xult Youth Church. A number of leaders and youth have expressed interest, and we are hoping to plan a 4-5 week missions trip to an Asian country or 2 (i.e. where Sara did her DTS and it’s neighbor), over the summer holidays. While we will have assistance from other Xult leaders, the majority of the organising will fall to us, as does the responsibility for the trip and those who come. This is a rather large endeavor for us, but as we feel that this trip is what God has called us to, we know that he’ll make it happen if we allow him to work through us. We are still working on what our focus and goals for the trip will be, but hope to allow everyone to experience 3rd and 2nd world cultures, both rural and urban. We wish to take them to some of the most rural settlements they’ll have ever seen, as well as showing them how missions also applies in some of the most urban areas. I just know that they’ll learn heaps, and come out of it changed for life, as well as seeing God show up for them time and time again, especially in the finances department. We already have fundraising ideas, but we know that it’ll ultimately be God who brings in the finances, not us.
So, I guess that’s enough of an update for now. I’m sure to have missed things, so when we finally get around to doing another update, you’ll hear those things! For those that thought the blog was dead, you’re wrong, it’s alive, just hibernating! And now it’s awake for a forage, and back off into hibernation for winter (hopefully we’ll get regular updates happening). We are missing those we aren’t here in Perth with us, and are looking forward to the Wise’s coming and visiting (and hopefully at least one Watson), and trust us, if we had the money, we’d drive the van back over (more room than our car) with friends, and come visit everyone, and go up to Tully, and across to Darwin. We’d have heaps of fun!!
God Bless all
Keep us in your prayers, and thanks for all your prayers
Tim