Celebration!

Good Friday!
My first 2 weeks at Monavale are now done, and it is the beginning of the school’s 18-day break between the two school terms. The transition from ABS to monavale was a little bit awkward, considering there was about 8 of us that were really close, that jumped right into a school program with 55 strangers. Thankfully, the students at monavale were very kind and warm, and took us in as their own very quickly, but there were still some awkward moments as we desperately tried to make friends and fit in!! We arrived at the new school on a Friday afternoon, and the weekends are free at monavale, so we were basically on our own until the Monday. That Monday began ministry preparation week.. Ministry week is the last week of every term, and it is when the school is divided into 7 different teams, which scatter across the north island, affiliated and billeted with their local church. The teams get involved with different activities in the community. I was placed on an absolutely amazing team, and was the only ABS’er on my team, so I was forced to make friends immediately. We had a lot to do on ministry week, so we had lots of preparation to do, and spent every moment possible together, planning. We were stationed in Hastings New Zealand, a city that is about 4 hours south of Cambridge, the town our school is in. Hastings has a prevalent gang community, and a large Maori population. The community was as the kiwi’s would say “dodgy”. My group had to put on a boys club every afternoon for a couple of hours, for kids from the community. We also got to go into a couple public schools each day, and put on bible classes for the students there. We had to put on a half hour program for the students, and the only rules were that we could not say the words “hell”, “sin”, or “heaven”. Other than that, we were able to talk about anything, and the freedom was extremely surprising for all of us Canadians, considering the extent to which Christianity is shunned from schools in Canada! The theme that my group chose for the week was “God’s superheroes”. For boys club, we all dressed up in superhero costumes, and told the story of an old testament hero every day. We talked about Gideon, David, Daniel, and Jesus Christ. For bible in schools, we talked about how the easter story is actually a superhero story. We expressed through funny skits and games, the fact that Jesus is truly the greatest superhero of all time, because he saved everyone, not just a few people.. Jesus is the only superhero that could conquer death, and the only superhero that has no weakness at all. We concluded our program by playing a song by Hillsongs Kids called “Jesus is my Superhero”, a fun techno-song that we created actions for! The kids could easily relate to our program, and we had great feedback. When we would finish we would often be swarmed by little kids, demanding hugs, pictures and tons of autographs! It showed all of us the importance of being active in the community. If we can have hundreds of little kids looking up to us as role models, we obviously have a pretty big influence on them.. so why not use that influence that we have to spread the gospel?
We also were able to be involved in the church that we were affiliated with. The church was called Celebration Centre, and was a non-denominational church aimed at reducing traditions, and instead being guided by the Holy Spirit. My team was all billeted in groups of two's, with members of the church. I was billeted with my friend James, and we stayed with one of the elders from the church. They were a lovely couple, with an old mansion dating back to 1913. Our billets grew in their yard grapefruits, peaches, passionfruit, strawberries, purple grapes, and several other delicious fruits!

The first Sunday that we were at Celebration we were asked to do a 5 minute drama. In the drama, I was the main character named Johnny, and when I first appear on the stage I am praying, and asking God to be with me throughout the day. After I pray, and start to surf the internet, Jesus suddenly appears behind me. I am startled, and try to push him away, but when I realize that it is in fact Jesus, I discover a need to entertain him. I try to watch TV with Jesus, but realize that nothing on the television is something that I’d want Jesus to see. I make up excuses, and try to blame it on my cable provider, but fail, and turn the TV off. I then realize that my computer is still open, and I flip down my laptop realizing that the images on the computer are not something I’d want Jesus to see. I try to make up excuses, blaming the websites on pop-ups I got from an email.. I decide perhaps we should listen to music, but after listening to K$sha, Eminem and A Day to Remember, and blaming the music on my roommate, I turn off the music. I then have an epiphany, and realized that I knew one thing I’d like Jesus to do with me. I dusted off my bible, and open it up to John 14:6, and start reading “I am the way the truth and the life”, but as I read it Jesus mouths the words in the background, and I realize that he wouldn’t want to read what he already knows about.. At that moment, some friends show up, and invite me to a party. After lots of denial, I finally agree to go, and tell Jesus that he has to stay at my house for the night. I tell him that I can do it on my own, and don’t need him to come. As I walk with my friends, Jesus follows, and I push him back. I keep walking, and he follows, so again I push him back. It all happens again, and I deny him again. After denying Jesus three times, when he continues to follow, I got really angry, and threw Jesus to the ground. I picked him up, and as I “nailed” one arm to his side yelled “STAY PUT”, and then I “nailed” his second arm to the side, and yelled “I CAN DO THIS ON MY OWN.”
The crowd then went silent, and as I walked out of the auditorium with my friends, I turned to the silent crowd and said “don’t act like you’ve never done this before.” A quiet chatter arose throughout the building as scattered opinions were expressed, and it was evident that everyone was challenged in some way, and given something to think about. After the skit I went on to tell a public testimony of how God has worked in my life, and brought me across the world to study His word, and I gave a brief message to connect my life with the character that I portrayed in the skit. I talked about the fact that even if you take 10,000 steps away from God, He is still always one step behind you. The truth is, that God does have perfect standards for us, and he desires us to flee from all sin, but we are human, and are already sinners. We all fall short of the glory of God, yet He loves us still. Through Christ we are made new with God, and can find purity through the cross. Regardless of the music we have listened to, the TV shows we’ve watched, or the addictions we’ve fed, God loves us. We’re all imperfect and have all tried to go it without acknowledging the presence of God in our lives, but denial doesn’t replace existence, and God is still there with us, one step back.. Waiting for us to choose Him, once again.
One night at our billets, James and I got into a deep discussion with our billets about a topic that we had often discussed with other students at monavale, and that is discussing the purpose of prayer. We talked about the role that faith has to do with prayer, and whether or not righteousness is required for effective prayer. At around 1:00am, after talking for many hours, we called it a night. It was a really cool night of bonding, as James and I talked with our billets as adults, and realized that although there may have been a large age gap between us, we still had the same questions, and were able to have a serious conversation about things that we as Christians so often take for granted without truly understanding. Later that week, we were encouraged to attend our billets small group, and we were asked to have something prepared to say. I was really nervous about this, and frantically tried to prepare something. When we asked our billets what we should talk about they told us to ask the same questions we had asked a few nights before. We did, and with about 12 other adults, and 2 other Capernwray students had an amazing night, with a lot of wisdom shared. Usually, the care group runs from 7-8:30.. But on this occasion we were there until 11:30.. Which is apparently record length! It was fantastic to feel like we contributed to the evening, and were able to challenge some mature believers about a topic as commonly practiced as prayer!
The last Saturday, our group went into Napier.. A larger community that is right along the ocean, and did street evangelism for a day. Street evangelism is an aspect of Christianity that I had always looked down on, and never really valued. I thought it was desperate and artificial, and something that I would never want anything to do with. Before we hit the streets, we were given an hour of debriefing, and in that time our leader put evangelism into terms that changed the way I looked at it. He asked us what we would do if we knew that a bomb was going to blow up in downtown Napier, and we knew it was going to happen. We all agreed that we would yell at everyone, telling them to get out, so that they would be saved and avoid death. He then asked, why we wouldn’t do the same thing to try and save people from eternal when we know that danger comes to those who don’t get out of it’s way. After our hour long debriefing/time of worship, we went out in pairs and hit the streets. I snatched the leader to be my partner, and in a couple of hours we were able to share the gospel to about 30 people. We only had success, and it was an experience I’ll never forget, and an experience I will hopefully be able to relive by doing more street evangelism in the future.
The next day was the last day of our ministry week, and we went to Celebration church in the morning. We performed a few minutes of our bible in schools routine for the congregation, and made them do the actions to Jesus Is Our Superhero, and then a few of the students told testimonies. The pastor then called the elders up to pray for our team and send us off, back to school.. But the prayer time went long and ended up taking up the whole service!! It was amazing having the church elders pray individually over us, and deliver words of prophecy to us. I was told many things that all fit in perfectly with the things that I have been thinking about and contemplating, and it was truly a God moment hearing His spirit being spoken through the people of this church. The week in Hastings was truly a week of exposure, as we were exposed to many new aspects of Christianity, but it was also a week of revelation as I realized heaps about myself, and about what I believe. I was very excited to go back to monavale and share with my friends about the experiences that I had, and after church we made the 4 hour drive back to school.
That week was a short week, that was filled with lectures and lots of story telling.. and now it’s over, and I write to you. We are on a two week break, and myself and 5 friends are about to embark on a 12 day South Pacific Cruise, which should be amazing! I’m looking forward to having a nice, relaxing vacation, and soaking up as much sun as possible! Updates soon to come :)
-Z