Hello lovely worldwide family, i hope you all had a blessed christmas, i am just chatting to Adam Wilson on facebook chat, he is up with baby chloe at 7am. So happy for Cat and Adam, and family.
We have moved from staying at ben and sarah and then scott and yaris for christmas into our missions leaders holiday let. its so lovely.its got one bed, kitchen/ lounge and shower room. all you need and decorated really well(they are both creative) we could happily live here! sadly its only for 4 nights. We have just got back from olive house we have been playing games with the Heather family and ben and sarah, minus ad,john and pippa who went to the church evening service at Bethel.
Lil is looking at the books they have here at the holiday let for reading, hes just said he could live here forever.
Our Christmas day was lovely, very relaxed and chilled.Sarah cooked dinner with Yaris help, it was really nice. no crackers tho. then we watched films played games and fell asleep.
We went to church this morning, Brian and Jen Johnson led worship, there was no drums so it was quite chilled.
Anyway its getting late on boxing day evening so i will sign off.
Be blessed,
Lots of love and a Merry Christmas,
Izzy xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Sunday, December 26, 2010
Thursday, December 23, 2010
I'm dreaming of a white Christmas....
Hello to all our faithful followers.
It is Christmas eve eve. We've had quite a busy time since we last blogged so I'll try update you all as
to what has been going on....We finished school last Friday, our last day ended up being a massive party with pizza and some of the revival groups doing various performances, which was all very good and impressive. A good time was had by all. It's been an amazing few months of school, beyond anything we could have imagined. Having said that, it's almost Christmas!
I (Liam) missed thursday's school day because I decided to accompany my friend Ben and his parents from Australia to Mount Shasta for some snowboarding. It was my first time snowboarding, and because I had only limited experience of skiing, I was a little apprehensive. We all got kitted out and after a hearty breakfast at Black Bear Diner (Eggs Benedict was magnificent) we headed for the slopes. Ben and I decided to get some practice so went straight to the nursery slopes so we could quickly learn the basics. After a little while, and encouraged by Ben and one of the instructors, I felt I might be able to tackle one of the easy slopes. So we boarded the chair lift, which was a challenge in itself, and headed for the top of the mountain. Everything was going smoothly, with only one or two minor falls when Ben went on ahead and left me to negotiate my own way down. Which was fine until the run forked into three. I thought we had pre-agreed to take the furthest right of the routes, so swiftly took this option. However, I don't think anyone had taken this route down the slope in a few days as the snow was fairly fresh. The minor falls begun to become quite major falls and the route increased in gradient. After trying for a little while to use my new found snowboarding skills it became apparent that this run was used to boarders much more skilled than me so I took a break and relaxed and enjoyed the view, thinking that I'd soon spot a few skiiers or boarders shooting past me. After a good ten minutes of taking in the view and enjoying God's creation, I began to worry slightly that I hadn't even seen wildlife come past my way. I got back on my board and tried to apply my skills once again.
But again, the slope got the better of me and after taking many more tumbles I decided it was best to walk, or for the most part crawl, down the remainder of the mountain. I set off in the general direction of where I thought everyone was, thinking it wouldn't be long until I stumbled upon one of the main routes down the slope. That's what I thought anyway. So I walked and crawled, walked and crawled. For ages. I thought I'd soon see a rescue helicopter flying over head so I tried to stay out the way of the trees so they could spot me. Eventually a medic skiier arrived to ask if I was ok. Phew I thought, finally they've found me but as soon as he assessed I wasn't in any medical danger he shot off again down the hill. So I went back to walking and crawling my way down. After what seemed like days I finally arrived back at the resort and civilisation, a little battered and quite a bit bruised. I decided that I was best suited to the nursery slopes so headed back there. All in all though, we had a lot of fun.
The weekend was good, it was mainly relaxed and preparing for the Heather's to come and stay and for us to move out. Sunday morning at church was great, Bill and Kris were unfortunately away so we had the priviledge of listening to Bill's eldest son Eric talk. If any of you are able to, get the podcast from the talk he did, on God and Community. It was amazing. Go and download it now, it's free.
Monday came and it was time to head down to San Francisco where we would stay with Ben and Sarah and Ben's parents for a few days but also drop Josh off at the airport to pick his family up. We were really worried about their inbound flight because of all the disruption to Heathrow, but we managed to find bits of information out about the time they would be arriving. They eventually arrived safely, via a unscheduled stop in Seattle and all made it up to Redding safely.
So we had a few days in San Francisco, which was brilliant. We haven't really had opportunity to explore the city since being here although we had heard several times how great a city it was. We did some sight seeing, of the Bay and fishermen's wharf, and had a ride on one of the trolleys. And had a good look round the shops. The vibe in the city is great and we really enjoyed the atmosphere of the place, even though we didn't see too much of it. Above are some photos from our trip.
Anyways, I've gone on for far too long. We had a really nice day today with the Heather family and I took and passed my Californian driving test! Only got a few minors, although after chatting to the instructor about how I think it's great the speed limit in a residential area is 25 compared to it being 30 in the UK, I got a minor for speeding in a residential area! Which was rather embarassing. But I'm passed and qualified now.
Really hope everyone is good and enjoying the run up to Christmas. Have a great time and we wish you all an amazing and blessed time celebrating Jesus' birthday.
Hope to hear from you all soon.
God's richest blessings,
Izzy and Liam
Luke 1:30-33:
the angel said to her, “Do not be afraid, Mary; you have found favour with God. You will conceive and give birth to a son, and you are to call him Jesus. He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High. The Lord God will give him the throne of his father David, and he will reign over Jacob’s descendants forever; his kingdom will never end.”
Thursday, December 16, 2010
Hello all our lovely friends,
We just got back from an ugly christmas sweater birthday party for our friend Scott which was fun, we played games, ate and prophesied.
This week has been good, full of parties and christmasy things. On monday we went clay pigeon shooting with Bens parents who are in town for a week. Lil was really good at it and got a lot of the clay pigeons, i thought i'd be good at it but when it came to holding the gun it was so heavy that i could only hold it for 2 shots, both were non moving targets. =(
This week at school has been fun, the talks have been really amazing, and we are just loving being around so many wonderful friends everyday. Kris Valloton did a question and answer session which was interesting... some strange questions. We love that Kris doesn't try and answer things he doesn't know the answer to, he just says he doesn't know! He is so relaxed and funny when he talks.
Last weekend the church did a 'holiday feast'. its put on for the people in Redding who live in poverty. Its amazinggggg. so much love is poured into them, around 800-1000 people were fed, given clothes, toys, love and much more.
Tomorrow is our final day of this term, then we have 2 weeks off for Christmas. We are moving out of Olive Ave to Ben and Sarahs house, then we are at Scott and Yaris for christmas eve and day. we are very excited, we even have english christmas pudding.
I have got go and finish my homework thats due tomorrow, only a little bit thankfully. It does get on top of you if you dont do some everyday. (which we mostly do)
Check y'all later
love izzy xxxxxxx
We just got back from an ugly christmas sweater birthday party for our friend Scott which was fun, we played games, ate and prophesied.
This week has been good, full of parties and christmasy things. On monday we went clay pigeon shooting with Bens parents who are in town for a week. Lil was really good at it and got a lot of the clay pigeons, i thought i'd be good at it but when it came to holding the gun it was so heavy that i could only hold it for 2 shots, both were non moving targets. =(
This week at school has been fun, the talks have been really amazing, and we are just loving being around so many wonderful friends everyday. Kris Valloton did a question and answer session which was interesting... some strange questions. We love that Kris doesn't try and answer things he doesn't know the answer to, he just says he doesn't know! He is so relaxed and funny when he talks.
Last weekend the church did a 'holiday feast'. its put on for the people in Redding who live in poverty. Its amazinggggg. so much love is poured into them, around 800-1000 people were fed, given clothes, toys, love and much more.
Tomorrow is our final day of this term, then we have 2 weeks off for Christmas. We are moving out of Olive Ave to Ben and Sarahs house, then we are at Scott and Yaris for christmas eve and day. we are very excited, we even have english christmas pudding.
I have got go and finish my homework thats due tomorrow, only a little bit thankfully. It does get on top of you if you dont do some everyday. (which we mostly do)
Check y'all later
love izzy xxxxxxx
Thursday, December 9, 2010
Hi all,
This weeks been fun so far. Tuesday was good, it was my, izzys, creative track. Theres 70 people in it. we have personal projects to do and get to choose a group project. I've applied to do this group project:
4 – Healing Art (Team Leader: Petra D & 2nd yr) We want to explore the ways that Art brings healing to others and are looking for people to research healing arts through Art therapy, gather testimonies from the healing rooms on how art is healing others, as well as our Arts activation testimonies. We want to then begin to write and explore training in Healing in the Arts which can be taken in hospitals, missions, and other places. You will become activated to explore and do healing through art as you begin to practice healing in various places.
wow.hopefully ill get it.
Theres 17 to choose from, from fashion, to culinary art to film, drama, interior design (they wanna do mini extreme makeovers underpriviledged childrens rooms).
so theres loads.
Tuesday night we had healing rooms training. on a Saturday the church open some big rooms and people from ALL over the world come to get prayer for healing. you can even skype in, they have 3 skype stations. and every week 200+ people come. its amazing. EVERY WEEK God touches people, every week deaf people from births ears pop open and they can hear, cancers fall off, blind people see, one week(they called it popcorn healing) 10 people in the rooms ears popped open all who had been deaf, just because Gods presence is so strong. crazy huh! although it become less crazy and more normal now.
oh they also have artists painting in there and dancers dancing and a band worshiping. :) cos God loves it when we create.
A man called Joaquin Evans spoke who runs the healing rooms with Chris Gore(-this is chris' website.) ...
http://www.kingdomreleasers.org/about-us.html
They talked about the healing rooms, then got us all blasted with the Holy spirit. Funfunfun.
Wednesday we had revival group in the afternoon.They led us into an encounter with God. It was interesting what different people saw. We had dinner with our friends, Scott and his wife Yari, Ben and Sarah and Alan. Then that night was housegroup, we worshiped, prayed and heard from Michael, a guy who has just got back from a mission trip to Texas with Bill Johnson (our senior pastor).He told us about the trip and a little about Bill and we had a great time praying and hanging out together.
Today was really good, we had worship in school, then teachings, then we went to Shasta Lake City, where we are every thursday, just being there for the community. it rained and was cold but we stayed and hung out there with some local kids and a local man who was in the park.
Then we went back to school to get picked up and outside was a man called Kedric, there was a small crowd around him so we went over and listened to see what was happening. it was like being in a youtube clip. This guy who we found out later was only 19! was so in tune with the Holy Spirit that he was telling people their birthdays, mums name, sisters name etc. every time he was right, it was amazing, and he kept sayin 'its the same holy spirit, same God in all of us its just our mind that gets in the way, we just have to keep practising'. It was so good.
Its called words of knowledge, when God tells you something you wouldnt know, like someones birthday.
Its getting late now, and we're tired. so i'll say goodnight.
Thankyou for reading.
love izzy xxxxx
This weeks been fun so far. Tuesday was good, it was my, izzys, creative track. Theres 70 people in it. we have personal projects to do and get to choose a group project. I've applied to do this group project:
4 – Healing Art (Team Leader: Petra D & 2nd yr) We want to explore the ways that Art brings healing to others and are looking for people to research healing arts through Art therapy, gather testimonies from the healing rooms on how art is healing others, as well as our Arts activation testimonies. We want to then begin to write and explore training in Healing in the Arts which can be taken in hospitals, missions, and other places. You will become activated to explore and do healing through art as you begin to practice healing in various places.
wow.hopefully ill get it.
Theres 17 to choose from, from fashion, to culinary art to film, drama, interior design (they wanna do mini extreme makeovers underpriviledged childrens rooms).
so theres loads.
Tuesday night we had healing rooms training. on a Saturday the church open some big rooms and people from ALL over the world come to get prayer for healing. you can even skype in, they have 3 skype stations. and every week 200+ people come. its amazing. EVERY WEEK God touches people, every week deaf people from births ears pop open and they can hear, cancers fall off, blind people see, one week(they called it popcorn healing) 10 people in the rooms ears popped open all who had been deaf, just because Gods presence is so strong. crazy huh! although it become less crazy and more normal now.
oh they also have artists painting in there and dancers dancing and a band worshiping. :) cos God loves it when we create.
A man called Joaquin Evans spoke who runs the healing rooms with Chris Gore(-this is chris' website.) ...
http://www.kingdomreleasers.org/about-us.html
They talked about the healing rooms, then got us all blasted with the Holy spirit. Funfunfun.
Wednesday we had revival group in the afternoon.They led us into an encounter with God. It was interesting what different people saw. We had dinner with our friends, Scott and his wife Yari, Ben and Sarah and Alan. Then that night was housegroup, we worshiped, prayed and heard from Michael, a guy who has just got back from a mission trip to Texas with Bill Johnson (our senior pastor).He told us about the trip and a little about Bill and we had a great time praying and hanging out together.
Today was really good, we had worship in school, then teachings, then we went to Shasta Lake City, where we are every thursday, just being there for the community. it rained and was cold but we stayed and hung out there with some local kids and a local man who was in the park.
Then we went back to school to get picked up and outside was a man called Kedric, there was a small crowd around him so we went over and listened to see what was happening. it was like being in a youtube clip. This guy who we found out later was only 19! was so in tune with the Holy Spirit that he was telling people their birthdays, mums name, sisters name etc. every time he was right, it was amazing, and he kept sayin 'its the same holy spirit, same God in all of us its just our mind that gets in the way, we just have to keep practising'. It was so good.
Its called words of knowledge, when God tells you something you wouldnt know, like someones birthday.
Its getting late now, and we're tired. so i'll say goodnight.
Thankyou for reading.
love izzy xxxxx
Tuesday, November 30, 2010
Back to school....
Hey everybody!
Hope this post finds everyone well and ready for the countdown to Christmas! It's not quite started here in Redding, but people in the UK will be waking up to December 1st.
So today was our first day back at school since the Thanksgiving break. We really enjoyed having a week off, relaxing with friends, spending time with my brother who had come over from Cheddar, and having our first ever Thanksgiving! It seemed to me to be a bit like Christmas-lite, where everything seemed like Christmas but there was no presents. It was great though, and having a day to be thankful is a brilliant idea. We should all be more thankful, it's definitely encouraged me to develop a more thankful attitude to life.
So yes, today we were back school. When we arrived the atmosphere was electric. Most people seemed to enjoy their holidays but everyone missed having school. We started with a worship session led by some of the second year students. They and the session was amazing. Really awesome. I'd happily buy a CD if they made one.
We then had a special guest speak to us. Tracy Evans is a lady with some amazing stories to tell.
She currently lives in Mozambique, Africa, where she has been for almost the last 10 years, but her life has taken her all over the place. She spoke to us about stepping out over the edge (not literally) but that as we do God will catch us and give us flight. Into her message she weaved many stories of her own life that to say has been adventurous would be an understatement! One story that stood out was how she literally was shipwrecked somewhere in the Pacific ocean, so she swam to shore and made the island she landed on her home for the next year. She didn't have any clothes, food, knowledge of the language or customs or anything. But she had God.
She finished by talking about the work she does in Mozambique, where Tracy and her team are responsible for about 800 orphans. She didn't ever think she would have this many or would be doing what she is doing but she is faithful to what God brings her way and looks after any that come to her for help. She has a clear revelation of our responsibility to the poor, and after outlining it to us we were almost convinced to join her and her work in Mozambique! that was until she started talking about the snakes that live there. So don't worry parents, we won't be leaving just yet for Mozambique!
We ended the day with our first session of a new module we had all selected. Izzy had her first session with the Kingdom Creativity track, which she will follow for the rest of the year. She's incredibly excited to see how God is going to use her through her artistic and creative ability. The first session was mainly outlining the rest of the course and hearing stories of previous years efforts, which all added to Izzy's excitement. I had my first session with Joaquin Evans, which is elaborately titled Cultivating the presence and Encounters. Joaquin oversees the Healing Rooms at the church and is an incredible guy. He shared many of his stories since he first came to the church 7 years ago, which started with a missions trip to South Africa. His experiences in South Africa were really powerful and have increased ever since. The session was brilliant, a great introduction and I'm really looking forward to the other 4 sessions I'll have with Joaquin. A great thing Joaquin reminded me was that it's all about relationship with God. Joaquin has seen many incredible things over the last 10 years, many healings for example through his work with the Healing Rooms, but it's all about spending time with God and developing the relationship.
Tomorrow is Sam's last full day with us : ( Sam has been our extra housemate for the last month or so as he's been doing some work experience with Bethel Media. So tomorrow night we're having a small party for him, as well as celebrating Emma's birthday. Tomorrow promises to be another great day!
Thanks for reading, we're really blessed by people reading our blog and keeping up with what we're doing. We still need money for our missions trip in March to Ecuador, so if you feel led to give or would like to contribute that would be awesome. You can give through:
https://www.ibssm.org/?action=donate&target=missions&student_id=212223 (- for Izzy)
https://www.ibssm.org/?action=donate&target=missions&student_id=212224 (- for Liam)
Just copy the link and paste it in your web browser bar. Any problems give us a shout.
Many thanks. We love you all and if you can't give, prayer would be more appreciated.
Have a great Wednesday.
Love and Blessings
Izzy and Liam x
Hope this post finds everyone well and ready for the countdown to Christmas! It's not quite started here in Redding, but people in the UK will be waking up to December 1st.
So today was our first day back at school since the Thanksgiving break. We really enjoyed having a week off, relaxing with friends, spending time with my brother who had come over from Cheddar, and having our first ever Thanksgiving! It seemed to me to be a bit like Christmas-lite, where everything seemed like Christmas but there was no presents. It was great though, and having a day to be thankful is a brilliant idea. We should all be more thankful, it's definitely encouraged me to develop a more thankful attitude to life.
So yes, today we were back school. When we arrived the atmosphere was electric. Most people seemed to enjoy their holidays but everyone missed having school. We started with a worship session led by some of the second year students. They and the session was amazing. Really awesome. I'd happily buy a CD if they made one.
We then had a special guest speak to us. Tracy Evans is a lady with some amazing stories to tell.
She currently lives in Mozambique, Africa, where she has been for almost the last 10 years, but her life has taken her all over the place. She spoke to us about stepping out over the edge (not literally) but that as we do God will catch us and give us flight. Into her message she weaved many stories of her own life that to say has been adventurous would be an understatement! One story that stood out was how she literally was shipwrecked somewhere in the Pacific ocean, so she swam to shore and made the island she landed on her home for the next year. She didn't have any clothes, food, knowledge of the language or customs or anything. But she had God.
She finished by talking about the work she does in Mozambique, where Tracy and her team are responsible for about 800 orphans. She didn't ever think she would have this many or would be doing what she is doing but she is faithful to what God brings her way and looks after any that come to her for help. She has a clear revelation of our responsibility to the poor, and after outlining it to us we were almost convinced to join her and her work in Mozambique! that was until she started talking about the snakes that live there. So don't worry parents, we won't be leaving just yet for Mozambique!
We ended the day with our first session of a new module we had all selected. Izzy had her first session with the Kingdom Creativity track, which she will follow for the rest of the year. She's incredibly excited to see how God is going to use her through her artistic and creative ability. The first session was mainly outlining the rest of the course and hearing stories of previous years efforts, which all added to Izzy's excitement. I had my first session with Joaquin Evans, which is elaborately titled Cultivating the presence and Encounters. Joaquin oversees the Healing Rooms at the church and is an incredible guy. He shared many of his stories since he first came to the church 7 years ago, which started with a missions trip to South Africa. His experiences in South Africa were really powerful and have increased ever since. The session was brilliant, a great introduction and I'm really looking forward to the other 4 sessions I'll have with Joaquin. A great thing Joaquin reminded me was that it's all about relationship with God. Joaquin has seen many incredible things over the last 10 years, many healings for example through his work with the Healing Rooms, but it's all about spending time with God and developing the relationship.
Tomorrow is Sam's last full day with us : ( Sam has been our extra housemate for the last month or so as he's been doing some work experience with Bethel Media. So tomorrow night we're having a small party for him, as well as celebrating Emma's birthday. Tomorrow promises to be another great day!
Thanks for reading, we're really blessed by people reading our blog and keeping up with what we're doing. We still need money for our missions trip in March to Ecuador, so if you feel led to give or would like to contribute that would be awesome. You can give through:
https://www.ibssm.org/?action=donate&target=missions&student_id=212223 (- for Izzy)
https://www.ibssm.org/?action=donate&target=missions&student_id=212224 (- for Liam)
Just copy the link and paste it in your web browser bar. Any problems give us a shout.
Many thanks. We love you all and if you can't give, prayer would be more appreciated.
Have a great Wednesday.
Love and Blessings
Izzy and Liam x
Saturday, November 27, 2010
Hi all,
HAPPY THANKSGIVING!
So, Dan has left us, lil just dropped him at the airport and is now home and watching college football chatting to Adam. Dans flights delayed so he is waiting at Sacramento airport. Sorry Dan! :( We have loved having you stay with us, and hope you enjoyed your time here.
Thursday was Thanksgiving. We went to our home groups house and had wonderful food and company, and then the boys went outside and had a game of american football on the road, with us girls trying and failing to cheerlead. We went back in the house and the games started, which always end up being prophesying over each other. One game was putting someone in the middle blingfolded, and someone is picked to go and stand in front of them, the blindfolded person has to ask the Holy Spirit what he is saying to that person, and say what ever comes to mind, amazing results, everyone was spot on, and even could tell who it was who was standing infront of them!!
Yesterday it was 'Black Friday' which is a bit like boxing day sales. people camp overnight outside the bigger stores waiting for them to open at 3am for the 80% off sales, as they day goes on the % gets less.
Today we are catching up on homework and relaxing, its raining outside. :( Then tonight we are going to a friends house whose having a christmas party so we are looking forward to that.
Hope you all had a lovely day.
love izzy xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
HAPPY THANKSGIVING!
So, Dan has left us, lil just dropped him at the airport and is now home and watching college football chatting to Adam. Dans flights delayed so he is waiting at Sacramento airport. Sorry Dan! :( We have loved having you stay with us, and hope you enjoyed your time here.
Thursday was Thanksgiving. We went to our home groups house and had wonderful food and company, and then the boys went outside and had a game of american football on the road, with us girls trying and failing to cheerlead. We went back in the house and the games started, which always end up being prophesying over each other. One game was putting someone in the middle blingfolded, and someone is picked to go and stand in front of them, the blindfolded person has to ask the Holy Spirit what he is saying to that person, and say what ever comes to mind, amazing results, everyone was spot on, and even could tell who it was who was standing infront of them!!
Yesterday it was 'Black Friday' which is a bit like boxing day sales. people camp overnight outside the bigger stores waiting for them to open at 3am for the 80% off sales, as they day goes on the % gets less.
Today we are catching up on homework and relaxing, its raining outside. :( Then tonight we are going to a friends house whose having a christmas party so we are looking forward to that.
Hope you all had a lovely day.
love izzy xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Wednesday, November 24, 2010
Monday, November 22, 2010
Thanksgiving week...
Hello to all our readers, whoever you are. We love you!
Today has been Monday November 22nd. I've spent it mostly on the road as my brother Dan is here to visit! Had to travel down to Sacramento to pick him up which was nice to be able to travel outside of Redding for a change. And I am now in love with cruise control! I've always been a bit sceptical up until now, but after travelling south on the incredibly straight I-5 it has won me over. It was a joy. Ben, our Aussie friend, accompanied me on the trip, many thanks for coming mate! It was Bonza!
So Dan is here until Saturday. He's been in Kansas since last week making a bit of a pilgrimage to watch his favourite American Football team play. His team won at the weekend which was good. We're excited he's here to see a bit of our American life and to finally have some home cooked food after almost a weeks worth of fast food! Don't worry Mum, we'll make sure he eats properly.
Izzy has had an eventful day today, she had a bunch of girlfriends round. They have been making Christmas cards all day (I was gutted I missed out!) and everyone seemed to enjoy themselves. They've all made some amazing cards, maybe some of you will receive one this Christmas.
Due to it being Thanksgiving this Thursday, we have the week off of school. Last week was Relationships week. We both got a lot out of it, especially the sessions for married couples, we picked up some really great tips on things like communication, which will no doubt come in handy over the years. We're looking forward to implementing some of the new skills we've picked up. The Thanksgiving break also meant we finally got to go to Bethel Church for a Sunday morning service! After being here for almost 3 months we hadn't ever been to the proper church building for a Sunday morning due to the rotation we've been assigned to. So this past Sunday we walked up to the church and found some seats in the sanctuary part of the church building. It was great, properly felt like a proper church service, rather than the services filled with students every sunday morning. We sat next to and chatted to 'normal' Reddingites for the first time!
The service was brilliant, worship was amazing and Bill was on fire as usual. Listen to this weeks podcast of the sermon if you get chance. It was great to feel part of a regular congregation again.
We spent the rest of our Sunday mainly relaxing, but went to the cinema late last night to watch a film called 'the next three days' with Russell Crowe. It was a pretty decent watch, but really intense, especially late at night. We headed to Walmart after the film finished, both thinking we were being followed by the police and needed to be quick and get out asap! So if you do decide to watch the film, don't do it really late at night.
The new Jesus Culture album came out today, so we've been listening to that. It's another good'un from them. Get it if you can, think it comes out worldwide tomorrow (Tuesday). We're hoping to head to one of the mountians this week sometime, as it's been snowing recently and it's due to get heavier. Hopefully be able to do some sledging. I think they call it sledding over here though.
We had our first meeting with the group we're going to Ecuador in March with this week. They're all amazing, a couple of other Brits which is exciting. Really excited about what we'll be getting up to; prison ministry, street kids ministry, maternity hospital ministry for starters. It's going to be epic! As a team we're linking up with the Toledo's who are heroes of the justice world. Jennifer in particular has been likened to Heidi Baker and here's a link to a page where you can download her testimony and other talks she has done. It'll rock your world!
http://www.heburnsforme.com/Jennifer_Toledo.html
Anyway, Dan is trying to sleep now in the room next to me, he's still suffering a little from jetlag, bless him. So I better go.
Hope everyone is good. Do keep us updated with whats going on.
Lot's of love
Lil and Izzy x
Today has been Monday November 22nd. I've spent it mostly on the road as my brother Dan is here to visit! Had to travel down to Sacramento to pick him up which was nice to be able to travel outside of Redding for a change. And I am now in love with cruise control! I've always been a bit sceptical up until now, but after travelling south on the incredibly straight I-5 it has won me over. It was a joy. Ben, our Aussie friend, accompanied me on the trip, many thanks for coming mate! It was Bonza!
So Dan is here until Saturday. He's been in Kansas since last week making a bit of a pilgrimage to watch his favourite American Football team play. His team won at the weekend which was good. We're excited he's here to see a bit of our American life and to finally have some home cooked food after almost a weeks worth of fast food! Don't worry Mum, we'll make sure he eats properly.
Izzy has had an eventful day today, she had a bunch of girlfriends round. They have been making Christmas cards all day (I was gutted I missed out!) and everyone seemed to enjoy themselves. They've all made some amazing cards, maybe some of you will receive one this Christmas.
Due to it being Thanksgiving this Thursday, we have the week off of school. Last week was Relationships week. We both got a lot out of it, especially the sessions for married couples, we picked up some really great tips on things like communication, which will no doubt come in handy over the years. We're looking forward to implementing some of the new skills we've picked up. The Thanksgiving break also meant we finally got to go to Bethel Church for a Sunday morning service! After being here for almost 3 months we hadn't ever been to the proper church building for a Sunday morning due to the rotation we've been assigned to. So this past Sunday we walked up to the church and found some seats in the sanctuary part of the church building. It was great, properly felt like a proper church service, rather than the services filled with students every sunday morning. We sat next to and chatted to 'normal' Reddingites for the first time!
The service was brilliant, worship was amazing and Bill was on fire as usual. Listen to this weeks podcast of the sermon if you get chance. It was great to feel part of a regular congregation again.
We spent the rest of our Sunday mainly relaxing, but went to the cinema late last night to watch a film called 'the next three days' with Russell Crowe. It was a pretty decent watch, but really intense, especially late at night. We headed to Walmart after the film finished, both thinking we were being followed by the police and needed to be quick and get out asap! So if you do decide to watch the film, don't do it really late at night.
The new Jesus Culture album came out today, so we've been listening to that. It's another good'un from them. Get it if you can, think it comes out worldwide tomorrow (Tuesday). We're hoping to head to one of the mountians this week sometime, as it's been snowing recently and it's due to get heavier. Hopefully be able to do some sledging. I think they call it sledding over here though.
We had our first meeting with the group we're going to Ecuador in March with this week. They're all amazing, a couple of other Brits which is exciting. Really excited about what we'll be getting up to; prison ministry, street kids ministry, maternity hospital ministry for starters. It's going to be epic! As a team we're linking up with the Toledo's who are heroes of the justice world. Jennifer in particular has been likened to Heidi Baker and here's a link to a page where you can download her testimony and other talks she has done. It'll rock your world!
http://www.heburnsforme.com/Jennifer_Toledo.html
Anyway, Dan is trying to sleep now in the room next to me, he's still suffering a little from jetlag, bless him. So I better go.
Hope everyone is good. Do keep us updated with whats going on.
Lot's of love
Lil and Izzy x
Thursday, November 18, 2010
Hello Lovely people!! what a week. there so much to tell you all. im just gunna babble and say it all, sorry if it doesnt make sense,
its relationship week, which has been incredible, the singles get workshops, and so do the marrieds, its been amazing. a couple who run 'love after marriage' workshops all over the country are taking it. weve been out everynight this week, haveing so much fun. housegroup last night was incredible, it was a pre thanksgiving and there was so much FOOD, and so much glory, there was a lotta 1sts that night. haha.
Today we went out in our groups to different communities. so our group went to Shasta Lake City. I(izzy, incase you hadnt guessed) was a little scared. but it ended up being the best experience. we just went around talking to people we met in the center by the skate park and chatted to the skaters and met the folk who live near, and pray for healing. AMAZING. some kids who thought they were so cool ended up getting healed of pain in a broken collar bone. my friend prophesied over these 2 teens, and one started crying because the words were so accurate. she said ' i see you writing' and the girl was like woahhhh thats my dream, i work in the school paper, and loads more stuff, just that half hour with those 2 girls has probably changed thier lives forever. their destinys were called out. my friend told them what God was saying to them, the teens were so excited and are gunna start coming to the church we are at. Then the group all chatted and there were so many stories just from 2 hours of chatting to people of how God touched their lives.
ahh i gotta do my home work, its due tomorrow.
Dan, lils bro, he is visiting for thanksgiving so will be in redding on monday!! til sat, hes been travelling around watching american football games.
i have so much more to tell just i gotta go do my homework.
oh, had a art evening tonight, the 2nd years put it on. was AMAZING. like heaven, people showing their art, healing art on walls (which people look at and God heals them just from looking at a painting, crazy huh! and writing stands and photography and some performances, a rapper, who was OUTSTANDING. a singer, break dancer. who says christianity was boring, its the most exciting thing EVER. haha. its makes my heart race with excitment what God is going to do in me. yeyyyyyyy
So everyone, be blessed and have a lovely day.
love izzy (a beloved daughter of the most high) YES! com'on! :)
its relationship week, which has been incredible, the singles get workshops, and so do the marrieds, its been amazing. a couple who run 'love after marriage' workshops all over the country are taking it. weve been out everynight this week, haveing so much fun. housegroup last night was incredible, it was a pre thanksgiving and there was so much FOOD, and so much glory, there was a lotta 1sts that night. haha.
Today we went out in our groups to different communities. so our group went to Shasta Lake City. I(izzy, incase you hadnt guessed) was a little scared. but it ended up being the best experience. we just went around talking to people we met in the center by the skate park and chatted to the skaters and met the folk who live near, and pray for healing. AMAZING. some kids who thought they were so cool ended up getting healed of pain in a broken collar bone. my friend prophesied over these 2 teens, and one started crying because the words were so accurate. she said ' i see you writing' and the girl was like woahhhh thats my dream, i work in the school paper, and loads more stuff, just that half hour with those 2 girls has probably changed thier lives forever. their destinys were called out. my friend told them what God was saying to them, the teens were so excited and are gunna start coming to the church we are at. Then the group all chatted and there were so many stories just from 2 hours of chatting to people of how God touched their lives.
ahh i gotta do my home work, its due tomorrow.
Dan, lils bro, he is visiting for thanksgiving so will be in redding on monday!! til sat, hes been travelling around watching american football games.
i have so much more to tell just i gotta go do my homework.
oh, had a art evening tonight, the 2nd years put it on. was AMAZING. like heaven, people showing their art, healing art on walls (which people look at and God heals them just from looking at a painting, crazy huh! and writing stands and photography and some performances, a rapper, who was OUTSTANDING. a singer, break dancer. who says christianity was boring, its the most exciting thing EVER. haha. its makes my heart race with excitment what God is going to do in me. yeyyyyyyy
So everyone, be blessed and have a lovely day.
love izzy (a beloved daughter of the most high) YES! com'on! :)
Thursday, November 11, 2010
Hello all,
Izzy here, just wanted to let you all see the track i have signed up to do. There is only a certain number of places so please pray i will get in.
Kingdom Creativity Arts Track
We have a burning passion to equip and empower others in the Arts (art, photography, film, drama and theatre, music, and writing) and leave a legacy that infiltrates every level of society. Our desire is to raise up a company of prophetic art champions who can change history in their art form by partnering together with the Holy Spirit, peers, and mentors in the Arts field. We will be working on individual and group projects which center around each person’s specific arts preferences as well as releasing Bethel’s Kingdom healing and prophetic models through the Arts. Lastly, our desire is to partner personal dreams with projects which launch people into their personal destiny as well as advance the Kingdom in global transformation. A couple of projects we want to invest in are a Prophetic Art Testimony Card line and a film project for BSSM, & Missions Week film compilation- just to name a few!!! Let’s start an Arts Revolution of REVIVAL!I have been outside playing with the kids on the lawn and made chocolate cake this morning, although it isnt as nice as i wanted it to be:(. My parents sent me a parcel this week, it was some lovely slippers from accessorize. i love them, they are so warm!
Tonight we are going to our friends Scott and Yaris for a games night, their aparentment is tiny but lovely, so it will be cozy and warm.
Trying to get on with homework, which is due tomorrow! Going to starbucks in a bit to meet up with our friend Dave from Romford. hes a sweetie.
Check y'all later innit (thats for scott)
love you all
izzi xxxxxx
ps. keep praying for money for us.
A break from homework...
Hello everybody!
Hope everyone is well and having a great Veteran's Day! We have a day off today, because of it being Veteran's Day. It's very strange having a whole day off in America, whereas in the UK we have a minute or two's silence. But obviously it's a brilliant idea and a great way of honouring the men and women who have served/given their life for us all.
So today the idea is to get as much homework done as possible. It's going pretty slowly....illustrated by the fact I'm writing this blog post. But progress is progress nonetheless.
It's really cold here today. Autumn is establishing itself now, the sun is shining brightly in the sky but the temperature is really low compared to the warmth we've previously been blessed with. As a result I've been contemplating getting the thermals out of the drawer. Will keep you updated...
Yesterday was an amazing day. We've said that quite a lot recently about various days which shows what a blessing it is to be here and just that we're having an absolutely awesome time. We had Kris Vallotton speaking to us about identity, and he was on fire. A lot of what he said will take some time to fully digest but here's just a sample:
'you can tell the size of a man by what it takes to discourage him'
'you can let your stances shape you, or you can let your circumstances shape you'
'we shouldn't do for the devil what he can't do for himself' - the devil only has as much power as we give him. So don't give him power! We're saints, died to sin but alive in Christ. We no longer have to strive or perform to earn God's love.
It was so good. So encouraging. If you get a chance, or even if you don't get a chance make one! have a listen. It's available for free for a short time at:
http://www.ibethel.tv/watch/901/bssm-kris-vallotton/2010/11/10
After a while I think you might have to pay a little bit of money but it's worth it.
We then had housegroup in the evening which was brilliant. We had a great time worshipping, prophesying over each other and fellowshipping together. We booked ourselves in with some people from our housegroup for our first ever Thanksgiving Dinner, really looking forward to that.
Anyway, should get back to some homework.
Enjoy the rest of your day and week everyone.
Take care and God bless you all richly
Lil and Izzy x
Hope everyone is well and having a great Veteran's Day! We have a day off today, because of it being Veteran's Day. It's very strange having a whole day off in America, whereas in the UK we have a minute or two's silence. But obviously it's a brilliant idea and a great way of honouring the men and women who have served/given their life for us all.
So today the idea is to get as much homework done as possible. It's going pretty slowly....illustrated by the fact I'm writing this blog post. But progress is progress nonetheless.
It's really cold here today. Autumn is establishing itself now, the sun is shining brightly in the sky but the temperature is really low compared to the warmth we've previously been blessed with. As a result I've been contemplating getting the thermals out of the drawer. Will keep you updated...
Yesterday was an amazing day. We've said that quite a lot recently about various days which shows what a blessing it is to be here and just that we're having an absolutely awesome time. We had Kris Vallotton speaking to us about identity, and he was on fire. A lot of what he said will take some time to fully digest but here's just a sample:
'you can tell the size of a man by what it takes to discourage him'
'you can let your stances shape you, or you can let your circumstances shape you'
'we shouldn't do for the devil what he can't do for himself' - the devil only has as much power as we give him. So don't give him power! We're saints, died to sin but alive in Christ. We no longer have to strive or perform to earn God's love.
It was so good. So encouraging. If you get a chance, or even if you don't get a chance make one! have a listen. It's available for free for a short time at:
http://www.ibethel.tv/watch/901/bssm-kris-vallotton/2010/11/10
After a while I think you might have to pay a little bit of money but it's worth it.
We then had housegroup in the evening which was brilliant. We had a great time worshipping, prophesying over each other and fellowshipping together. We booked ourselves in with some people from our housegroup for our first ever Thanksgiving Dinner, really looking forward to that.
Anyway, should get back to some homework.
Enjoy the rest of your day and week everyone.
Take care and God bless you all richly
Lil and Izzy x
Friday, November 5, 2010
Good evening y'all!
As you can see we've picked up a little bit of the local lingo. We're still having an amazing time out here in California. I'll try and remember what we've been up to since we last post....
We had a very long weekend last weekend. Bethel Church hosted a Leader's conference for, you've guessed it, Church Leaders, from all over the place, which ran Monday til Wednesday. As they were using a lot of the church facilities it meant we had a few days off. The weather picked up as well so we had a really good few days. the idea beforehand was to catch up and get on top of homework but as the sun came out we all decided to take advantage and get up to various activities while we still could. So our weekend consisted of mainly hanging out with some good friends of ours and playing football.
Tuesday was a great day. Izzy had some girls round and they had a baking and Disney day. Everyone seemed to enjoy themselves. Meanwhile, I decided to take advantage of America's slightly different laws concerning gun use and having never fired a gun in my life went out with some people to fire my first shots! The whole idea was completely alien to me but fascinating all the same. So we went to a nearby hillside where man made driving ranges seem to have been created. We all took turns having a go at shooting some clay pigeons, and after shooting the second one thrown I thought I was a natural, a James Bond in the making. I then proceeded to miss the next 30 or so, meaning Daniel Craig is safe in his job for now, even if I do have the right physique for it. But Ben, my Aussie friend and me had a great time, firing our first ever gun. We paid for it slightly, with bruising to our shoulders the next day but it was worth it. I felt very American. Thanks to Marty Reid for organising it all, and the two Chelsea's and lot's of the Tesauro family for accommodating us!
So we were back to school yesterday, Thursday. It was exciting to be back after having so many days off. The highlight of the day was undoubtedly Pastor Bill talking to us. He was amazing. He spoke a lot about the renewing of the mind, and how it comes through intimacy with God rather than just us memorising Scripture or just believing good things. He was very open, sharing some of his experiences and encounters he has had with God, which was very inspiring but also very challenging. One memorable line was:
'Your experience should equal your confession'
Which is very challenging. But awesome too! Come on!
Thursday night we were invited to the very lovely Lynda's house. Lynda is a lady in our revival group who is like our mum while we're here. She has taken it upon herself to invite everyone from our revival group over for dinner at some point. So Thursday was the couple's night. Lynda, along with her sister, Trina, and housemate Katherine, were amazing hosts, and the Sampsons, Pridmores and Rossiters had a brilliant time. Thanks ladies!
Today we had some Bible teaching from Dann Farrelly, followed by a time of worship and finished off with some time in our small groups. A great finish to a great week.
We really hope everyone back home in Somerset is well and being blessed. Please do keep in touch with us, we love to hear whats going in.
We're recently found out we'll be heading to Ecuador in March for our missions trip which is really exciting. We'll be part of a team of 28 and our trip will involve exciting things like getting involved in a maternity hospital impoverished families, helping to deliver clothes and food to the needy, ministering in youth prisons and feeding malnourished children to name a few things. We're really excited about it. We have to raise some money for the trip so if you feel like you'd like to help us out please get in touch.
Thanks for taking the time to read our blog we really appreciate it. Hope everyone is well.
Lot's of love and blessings from Redding.
Liam and Izzy x
P.S. Sorry about the formatting!
Thursday, October 28, 2010
Hello everyone!
Welcome to another blog post! We're so happy you're reading and interested in what we're up to here in California. We love you!
Just wanted to give a quick update of what's been happening the last few days. Since the weekend we've packed in a fair amount of things.
We were back to school on Tuesday after the weekend off. We have a new addition to the house for a few weeks, Josh, Em and Ad's friend Sam, who is here doing some work experience for the design team at Bethel Church. It's awesome to have him here, he's been in Australia for most of 2010 working for YWAM. He's currently working on the ibethel.tv website so look out for a new design on there.
This week in school we have been doing some recording for the new Bethel Live album which will be out in January sometime. We've been recording to various songs so when it comes out you'll have to listen out for us! I always knew my beautiful voice would be on record someday!
On Wednesday Kris Vallotton came in and did a Q&A session and sex and purity. It was awesome to hear some of his insights and advice, all stuff that is never discussed in church but definitely should be. If you get a chance read his book, titled Purity, highly recommend it. We also got 2 packages from home, one with Galaxy chocolate in and one with a new laptop charger. Both are invaluable to us! Izzy is loving having Galaxy, and even though I didn't eat much chocolate at home I've been missing english chocolate so the taste of Galaxy was much appreciated.
Today was a good day. It started off with more recording for the new album, followed by a staff speaker who today was a guy named Chris Cruz. He is a 2nd year Pastor and he was amazing. He was talking about the outreach projects we're all doing and he was focused on the story in Mark 2 where Jesus heals the paralysed man. His point was that our faith creates a platform for people to experience Jesus. We get to be the people in the story who were so desperate for the paralysed man to meet Jesus they made an opening in the roof to get him in the meeting. Another point was the blessings of God that we have received were not supposed to isolate us from the world, but so often the church shuts itself off.
So with that teaching ringing in our ears we headed off to our respective outreach projects. Izzy and myself are on a team focused on a little town just outside Redding called Shasta Lake City. So we met with the team and spent a bit of time getting to know each other before the coming weeks where we head over to the town to meet people. It was so encouraging to hear people's stories, strengths, weaknesses and dreams and realise we'll be playing a part with them over the next 8 months in seeing them and ourselves grow and impact Shasta Lake City. We discussed a few ideas on what we think and some of the events we would like to put on. We're really excited to see what God is going to do in Shasta Lake this year and how He's going to use us there!
I think tomorrow we have some more recording and some other amazing, life transforming stuff followed by a very long weekend. We have no school Tuesday or Wednesday as they have a church leaders conference so we get time off. Looking forward to relaxing and catching up a little bit on homework. Although the weather has really dropped recently. It is SO COLD. Like UK cold. It was only a week and a half or so ago that we were sunbathing and now I'm thinking of getting the thermals out! It's crazy.
Overall though we're good and still loving it here. Hope everyone back home is good, we'd love to hear from people, about what they're up to, whats going on etc. Thank you to everyone for your love, prayers, best wishes etc. We hope Phil and Heather Wright have an amazing holiday!
Bless you all and love you loads
Izzy and Lil x
1 John 3:1
'How great is the love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God! And that is what we we are!'
Welcome to another blog post! We're so happy you're reading and interested in what we're up to here in California. We love you!
Just wanted to give a quick update of what's been happening the last few days. Since the weekend we've packed in a fair amount of things.
We were back to school on Tuesday after the weekend off. We have a new addition to the house for a few weeks, Josh, Em and Ad's friend Sam, who is here doing some work experience for the design team at Bethel Church. It's awesome to have him here, he's been in Australia for most of 2010 working for YWAM. He's currently working on the ibethel.tv website so look out for a new design on there.
This week in school we have been doing some recording for the new Bethel Live album which will be out in January sometime. We've been recording to various songs so when it comes out you'll have to listen out for us! I always knew my beautiful voice would be on record someday!
On Wednesday Kris Vallotton came in and did a Q&A session and sex and purity. It was awesome to hear some of his insights and advice, all stuff that is never discussed in church but definitely should be. If you get a chance read his book, titled Purity, highly recommend it. We also got 2 packages from home, one with Galaxy chocolate in and one with a new laptop charger. Both are invaluable to us! Izzy is loving having Galaxy, and even though I didn't eat much chocolate at home I've been missing english chocolate so the taste of Galaxy was much appreciated.
Today was a good day. It started off with more recording for the new album, followed by a staff speaker who today was a guy named Chris Cruz. He is a 2nd year Pastor and he was amazing. He was talking about the outreach projects we're all doing and he was focused on the story in Mark 2 where Jesus heals the paralysed man. His point was that our faith creates a platform for people to experience Jesus. We get to be the people in the story who were so desperate for the paralysed man to meet Jesus they made an opening in the roof to get him in the meeting. Another point was the blessings of God that we have received were not supposed to isolate us from the world, but so often the church shuts itself off.
So with that teaching ringing in our ears we headed off to our respective outreach projects. Izzy and myself are on a team focused on a little town just outside Redding called Shasta Lake City. So we met with the team and spent a bit of time getting to know each other before the coming weeks where we head over to the town to meet people. It was so encouraging to hear people's stories, strengths, weaknesses and dreams and realise we'll be playing a part with them over the next 8 months in seeing them and ourselves grow and impact Shasta Lake City. We discussed a few ideas on what we think and some of the events we would like to put on. We're really excited to see what God is going to do in Shasta Lake this year and how He's going to use us there!
I think tomorrow we have some more recording and some other amazing, life transforming stuff followed by a very long weekend. We have no school Tuesday or Wednesday as they have a church leaders conference so we get time off. Looking forward to relaxing and catching up a little bit on homework. Although the weather has really dropped recently. It is SO COLD. Like UK cold. It was only a week and a half or so ago that we were sunbathing and now I'm thinking of getting the thermals out! It's crazy.
Overall though we're good and still loving it here. Hope everyone back home is good, we'd love to hear from people, about what they're up to, whats going on etc. Thank you to everyone for your love, prayers, best wishes etc. We hope Phil and Heather Wright have an amazing holiday!
Bless you all and love you loads
Izzy and Lil x
1 John 3:1
'How great is the love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God! And that is what we we are!'
Saturday, October 23, 2010
Sorry its been a little while since our last blog. We have been really busy getting all our homework done and handed in.Its Saturday today so we have time to rest.
So, to update you a little bit, last week we had Che Ahn speak to us at school. He spoke mostly about money, about how God has asked them to sacrifice a lot, but then he has rewarded them with much. The church building that they have bought was 4 million dollars, and the Lord provided it all, when they thought they wouldnt make it, having only 3 mill, on the last day a business man rang and said i want to pay the rest whatever it is. so he gave 1.2 mill!!! The building is amazing and because its near LA, Hollywood and big secular conferences and performances often come and ask to hire it. They have to sign a contract, and on that contract it says they can use the building but Che Ahn or another pastor has to preach the gospel 1st. So he has got to minister to HUGE people, like Beyonce, he prophesied over her!
Over the weekend we had to go to the doctors for izzy so we missed church. we were in there for so long waiting, and it cost $94 just to see a doctor! so we got some antibiotics and izzy is feeling better now.
We had another good week of school. Had Chris Overstreet, the outreach pastor at Bethel (He was in Bath last week doing some stuff with Bath city Church) on thursday, which was really good. He just spoke about love, and the secret place, and all the miracles etc all come out of intimacy with God. Favourite Chris O. quote was 'a lot of people have watches, but not many people have time'. After they started to pray for bad backs and necks, and lots of people were getting healed.
We also had Danny Silk this week, he showed us his wedding video. Bill, kris and danny were all there looking soooo young, Bil and Beni sang during the ceremony and it was really good! Bill had black big hair with a big 'tache and glasses. he looked SO funny. You couldn't tell it was him at all.
Anyway Danny spoke about covenant relationships. it was real good.
Last night we went out to our friday night service. izzy was real tired and not really worshiping, the band were good though. at the end everyone was praying for more of God, for his glory/rain to come down. So they started a rain tunnel... izzy went through twice. WHAT A NIGHT! sooo good. although izzys brain hurt from her head shaking so much, a friend of ours was shaking violently, God was shaking off fear and other issues, it was intense, shes gunna ache today!!
After church we went to in and out burger. a very popular fast food place, and most of our revival group had the same idea, so we sat around chatting there for a while, then went home to bed at 12am.
Good times.
its raining today and all yesterday. tonight we are going out to some friends for dinner with another couple. looking forward to it, Sarah's an amazing cook!
Our car has a very bare tire on, so we have to go buy some today.:(
love you all, thanks for reading.
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
So, to update you a little bit, last week we had Che Ahn speak to us at school. He spoke mostly about money, about how God has asked them to sacrifice a lot, but then he has rewarded them with much. The church building that they have bought was 4 million dollars, and the Lord provided it all, when they thought they wouldnt make it, having only 3 mill, on the last day a business man rang and said i want to pay the rest whatever it is. so he gave 1.2 mill!!! The building is amazing and because its near LA, Hollywood and big secular conferences and performances often come and ask to hire it. They have to sign a contract, and on that contract it says they can use the building but Che Ahn or another pastor has to preach the gospel 1st. So he has got to minister to HUGE people, like Beyonce, he prophesied over her!
Over the weekend we had to go to the doctors for izzy so we missed church. we were in there for so long waiting, and it cost $94 just to see a doctor! so we got some antibiotics and izzy is feeling better now.
We had another good week of school. Had Chris Overstreet, the outreach pastor at Bethel (He was in Bath last week doing some stuff with Bath city Church) on thursday, which was really good. He just spoke about love, and the secret place, and all the miracles etc all come out of intimacy with God. Favourite Chris O. quote was 'a lot of people have watches, but not many people have time'. After they started to pray for bad backs and necks, and lots of people were getting healed.
We also had Danny Silk this week, he showed us his wedding video. Bill, kris and danny were all there looking soooo young, Bil and Beni sang during the ceremony and it was really good! Bill had black big hair with a big 'tache and glasses. he looked SO funny. You couldn't tell it was him at all.
Anyway Danny spoke about covenant relationships. it was real good.
Last night we went out to our friday night service. izzy was real tired and not really worshiping, the band were good though. at the end everyone was praying for more of God, for his glory/rain to come down. So they started a rain tunnel... izzy went through twice. WHAT A NIGHT! sooo good. although izzys brain hurt from her head shaking so much, a friend of ours was shaking violently, God was shaking off fear and other issues, it was intense, shes gunna ache today!!
After church we went to in and out burger. a very popular fast food place, and most of our revival group had the same idea, so we sat around chatting there for a while, then went home to bed at 12am.
Good times.
its raining today and all yesterday. tonight we are going out to some friends for dinner with another couple. looking forward to it, Sarah's an amazing cook!
Our car has a very bare tire on, so we have to go buy some today.:(
love you all, thanks for reading.
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Sunday, October 10, 2010
End of another week...
Hi everyone back home in the UK. Greetings from Redding, California.
Just wanted to give you all an update of some of the things we've been up to this week and some of the teachings.
After being away on retreat last week, it was a little bit tough to get back into the routine of going to school again. We had the added pressure of Kris Vallotton teaching all this week on basic training for the prophetic, something which normally takes longer than one week, so we had a lot to squeeze in this week. However, it was great, really amazing.
All week Kris covered a manual aptly named 'Basic Training for the Prophetic Ministry', where he would teach for an hour or two and then get us to put into practice what he had been teaching about. Which was a little scary, we often had to grab someone we didn't know and either name something about them that we felt God was telling us or call out a prophesy over them that we felt the Holy Spirit was telling us. We all had mixed results! But we all feel more comfortable doing it and practice does make perfect. One of their big things here is that faith is spelt R-I-S-K, so although it's often scary, we wont learn or progress without doing it. Some of Kris' insights on the prophetic were awesome. He's been in ministry over 30 years so some of his stories are just amazing. And it's so encouraging and exciting to hear his vision for it and where he wants it to go, especially at Bethel. Prophecy has been misused or misunderstood in the church for so long and he wants to cultivate a prophetic culture which is both accountable and edifying.
One of the big things that struck me this week was when Kris was talking about why Jesus often spoke in parables and seemed to conceal or hide the truth. He said that in the modern world, and I guess throughout history, knowledge has meant power. So Jesus would often conceal the truth from the prominent members of society or powerful people, and leave it for the humble and hungry to search out.
Proverbs 25:2 says
'It is the glory of God to conceal a matter,
But the glory of kings is to search out a matter.'
And once we've been saved we're now kings in the Kingdom, so it's up to us to stay humble (not thinking lowly of ourselves, but thinking highly of our God) and be hungry enough to search out the wisdom of God. God doesn't hide things from us, He hides things for us. It was just another priceless lesson in how the kingdom works, which is often contrary to how the world works.
We also started our activation this past week. Izzy and me are doing the Community Activation which involves us going to a local town just up the road called Shasta City, and basically seeing what we can do each week. We're just going to show up and see what God has for us to do, whether it's hang out in a coffee shop chatting to locals or something a bit more practical. We're in a group of about 12 and the others seem great. Should be fun. We also chose our missions trips choices. The whole month of March is designated as missions month and as part of the school course we are required to go on a trip. They range from a trip to a local church down the road for 2 or 3 days, to 2 weeks in Africa with Iris Ministries. There's about 40 or 50 trips to choose from all over the world and we had to select 5 that we wanted to be on and they'll most probably put us on one of those 5 trips, depending on numbers. So we chose which trips we liked and we'll see where we'll be going soon I think. It was hard to narrow it down to 5 trips because there's a lot of amazing trips, but hopefully we'll be able to afford where they select for us.
Weather-wise the week started off quite mild (Think it got to as low as 25 degrees centigrade!!-chilly!) but towards the end of the week it's gotten back up into the early 30's which has been nice. The forecast for this week as far as we can tell seems to be early to mid 30s again which will be nice. Especially as our friends have a pool!! They are also amazing at baking and this week gave us a container full of banana and chocolate chip muffins which were amazing. If they're reading this then thanks very much guys! We also watched a film last night called Furious Love. It's absolutely amazing, if you've watched and liked Finger of God then definitely get yourself a copy of Furious Love, you'll be changed.
This coming week will be an interesting one, we have a bit of homework to catch up on, but also at the end of the week is a conference so we wont have any school. On Wednesday we have Che Ahn coming to talk to us which should be very interesting. Che leads a church in Southern California which by all accounts is amazing and he's written a few well received books. Should be insightful and inspiring.
Anyway, hope everyone is good back home and things are going well. Please do write to us and let us know whats been happening and whats going on, anything we can pray for etc.
We really do love it here, we feel it's absolutely the right place for us at this time, so thank you so much for everyone who has been involved in making it possible.
We pray God's rich blessing on you and hope you all have a great week.
God bless
Izzy and Lil x
Proverbs 25:2
It is the glory of God to conceal a matter,
But the glory of kings is to search out a matter.
Just wanted to give you all an update of some of the things we've been up to this week and some of the teachings.
After being away on retreat last week, it was a little bit tough to get back into the routine of going to school again. We had the added pressure of Kris Vallotton teaching all this week on basic training for the prophetic, something which normally takes longer than one week, so we had a lot to squeeze in this week. However, it was great, really amazing.
All week Kris covered a manual aptly named 'Basic Training for the Prophetic Ministry', where he would teach for an hour or two and then get us to put into practice what he had been teaching about. Which was a little scary, we often had to grab someone we didn't know and either name something about them that we felt God was telling us or call out a prophesy over them that we felt the Holy Spirit was telling us. We all had mixed results! But we all feel more comfortable doing it and practice does make perfect. One of their big things here is that faith is spelt R-I-S-K, so although it's often scary, we wont learn or progress without doing it. Some of Kris' insights on the prophetic were awesome. He's been in ministry over 30 years so some of his stories are just amazing. And it's so encouraging and exciting to hear his vision for it and where he wants it to go, especially at Bethel. Prophecy has been misused or misunderstood in the church for so long and he wants to cultivate a prophetic culture which is both accountable and edifying.
One of the big things that struck me this week was when Kris was talking about why Jesus often spoke in parables and seemed to conceal or hide the truth. He said that in the modern world, and I guess throughout history, knowledge has meant power. So Jesus would often conceal the truth from the prominent members of society or powerful people, and leave it for the humble and hungry to search out.
Proverbs 25:2 says
'It is the glory of God to conceal a matter,
But the glory of kings is to search out a matter.'
And once we've been saved we're now kings in the Kingdom, so it's up to us to stay humble (not thinking lowly of ourselves, but thinking highly of our God) and be hungry enough to search out the wisdom of God. God doesn't hide things from us, He hides things for us. It was just another priceless lesson in how the kingdom works, which is often contrary to how the world works.
We also started our activation this past week. Izzy and me are doing the Community Activation which involves us going to a local town just up the road called Shasta City, and basically seeing what we can do each week. We're just going to show up and see what God has for us to do, whether it's hang out in a coffee shop chatting to locals or something a bit more practical. We're in a group of about 12 and the others seem great. Should be fun. We also chose our missions trips choices. The whole month of March is designated as missions month and as part of the school course we are required to go on a trip. They range from a trip to a local church down the road for 2 or 3 days, to 2 weeks in Africa with Iris Ministries. There's about 40 or 50 trips to choose from all over the world and we had to select 5 that we wanted to be on and they'll most probably put us on one of those 5 trips, depending on numbers. So we chose which trips we liked and we'll see where we'll be going soon I think. It was hard to narrow it down to 5 trips because there's a lot of amazing trips, but hopefully we'll be able to afford where they select for us.
Weather-wise the week started off quite mild (Think it got to as low as 25 degrees centigrade!!-chilly!) but towards the end of the week it's gotten back up into the early 30's which has been nice. The forecast for this week as far as we can tell seems to be early to mid 30s again which will be nice. Especially as our friends have a pool!! They are also amazing at baking and this week gave us a container full of banana and chocolate chip muffins which were amazing. If they're reading this then thanks very much guys! We also watched a film last night called Furious Love. It's absolutely amazing, if you've watched and liked Finger of God then definitely get yourself a copy of Furious Love, you'll be changed.
This coming week will be an interesting one, we have a bit of homework to catch up on, but also at the end of the week is a conference so we wont have any school. On Wednesday we have Che Ahn coming to talk to us which should be very interesting. Che leads a church in Southern California which by all accounts is amazing and he's written a few well received books. Should be insightful and inspiring.
Anyway, hope everyone is good back home and things are going well. Please do write to us and let us know whats been happening and whats going on, anything we can pray for etc.
We really do love it here, we feel it's absolutely the right place for us at this time, so thank you so much for everyone who has been involved in making it possible.
We pray God's rich blessing on you and hope you all have a great week.
God bless
Izzy and Lil x
Proverbs 25:2
It is the glory of God to conceal a matter,
But the glory of kings is to search out a matter.
Sunday, October 3, 2010
*Click on photos to make them Bigger
Evening all, its getting cooler now, the temp has dropped by about 10 degrees. its was pretty cloudy today which was annoying.
Yesterday we arranged with 4 friends to go to a local cliff jumping place with an amazing water fall. So we all arranged met at church, we got there and there was about 4 cars worth in all going. word had got out that we were going so there was about 15 of us in the end which was lovely. We got there, scrambled down a path and along the river a bit and came to an amazing clear pool with a huge waterfall going into it. we spent about a couple of hours there, people jumped in from the cliff at the top. it really didnt look that high when looking from the groud. Lil went straight up and jumped off, he is scared of heights, but this year he said hes breaking off fears. others went up and jumped off while i was taking photos. The water was freezing. you couldnt swim in it cos you cant stay under, it was icy cold.
So people started leaving to go to some nearby hot springs, and then i decided i needed to jump, i dont know what i was thinking, i just thought i would regret it if i didnt, so me and ben climbed up the side of the cliff, which is steep and slippery. Got to the top and looked down. it was SOOO high. i turned round and said to ben i'll climb back down, but he said the only way down is to jump. it took me ages to work up the courage, i had to go to the river and splash cold water on myslef to get used to the water before i could jump. then i did it, mainly because it was so hard to climb back. if it were easier i wouldnt have jumped!! everyone cheered and said they were proud which was nice, but i was just grumply cos it hurt and i was cold.
we then couldnt find the hot springs, because they were futher than we thought. so we went home, aching all over, with a painful ear.
today-sunday im still aching, but mostly glad i jumped, but it was a once in a lifetime thing!
We went to church this morning, its lovely knowing people now, rather than walking into a big room not knowing any one. the worship was all holy spirit led and really peaceful and nice. then Kris vallotton spoke.
WOW what a talk. i wish everyone everwhere couldve heard it. he spoke on the kingdom at 1st.
points-
we come to church to get equipped , deployed.
Apostles transform cultures.
Jesus said he'll build the church and we should extend the kingdon. but we try and build the church and wonder who's extending the kindom.
All of the church is in the kindom, but not all of the kindom is in the church.
gathering people is not synonamous with transforming cultures.
You can tell how close you are to the palace by how you respond to injustice- Moses in egypt.
we are the answers to peoples problems/prayers.
- he went on to speak about abortion.....WOW. Try and listen to the podcast, or subscribe to ibethel tv. which you can get through the website.
tonight ive been sitting out with the kids from the block for a little bit and lils been catching up on his reading. Finshed 'The happy intercessor' by beni johnson. amazing book, worth a read, very insightful into prayer, if you get bored in prayer, or want to learn about breakthrough in prayer.
i have my hour prayer slot in 20 mins in which think i might do some painting.(beni talks about art in prayer in her book)
love you all. Blessings xxxxxxxxxx
Thursday, September 30, 2010
Where do i start...ok the retreat, we went to Chico on tuesday afternoon. Arrived at this amazing site, it was originally a hotel built in the 1920s, apparently film stars used to go and stay there. They have built little cabins around the hotel which me and lil stayed in. the unmarrieds had to stay in the hotel(girls) and in some shed outside and servants quarters (boys). We had dinner then went to the meeting. The area near the meeting place was smelly cos theres a hot spring near by with sulpher in it, but its wasnt too bad. The water also had a strange sulpher taste!The area was beautiful though with big cliff things around us, and waterfalls a short hike away.The meeting was really good, they had prophetic artists painting at the front and the speaker was good, some interns were asked to speak what the holy spirit was asking them to, so some spoke, one sang, some danced. and we had a good time of worship. On the way into each meeting the 2nd years had to do a fire tunnel, so to get into our meeting the 1st yrs had to go through it, so the meetings were quite drunken, esp the 2nd years. a few people got healed, back problems etc.
Wednesday, we queued for breakfast, women all went 1st (culture of honour) then men, which was nice because we all talked to new people each meal time.
We then split into revival groups and played an ice breaker, then split into smaller groups and shared about ourselves, our vision and calling, families etc and prayed for each other, after that we all stood in a circle and played prophetic duck duck goose, so someone in the middle and everyone calling out words for them. then the half the class stood facing the other half and we moved round in a cicle and the outside had to prophecy over the inside. only 4 words per person. they called it popcorn prophecy. We got some good words, nothing major, i got peace, beauty, kiwi fruit!?! i really cant remember any of mine or lils really.Lil said a word from God to someone that had been a huge thing over their life, and their name actually meant the word.Lil is learning to hear the voice of God so accuratly!! We then had to switch, and i just couldnt do it. so i told Crystal our group pastor and she got everyone in the middle who found it hard and they all prayed for us. Then we all prayed for crystal because she was preaching that night, and i had a picture God had given me for her. i told her after (whilst crying, always happens dont know why) and she said it was spot on for her, so yey God. I definatly work in pictures NOT words!
We had lunch then went to the pool, and swam and played etc. was fun. Then had dinner and met more lovely people. then the evening meeting!!!
It was a gooooood night, Crystals preach was amazing. about intimacy with God and fire. you cant have the fire without the intimacy or youll burn out. it was about grace, and just resting in his grace, because we cant do it on our own striving. we shouldnt be striving, Jesus died to give us LIFE, his yolk is easy and burden light. Then Crystals interns each gave a word. they called some people up from the 1st yrs who God had highlighted to them, and said they saw amazing futures for them. And for our year group, one intern had the word simplicity. Just keep it simple, keep our eyes on jesus and it will be simple.
After we had a time of worship, then a fire tunnel.
i was feeling quite tired and not really excited. then i went over to sit with my friends, one of them started massaging my and sarahs back, when she was done, i was already feeling whacked(with Holy spirits presence), so we all queued to go through the fire tunnel and i was out of it completely. could hardly walk i was laughing and falling. so FUN. people where on the floor after and my friend was just leaning on a wall with her face squashed up against it, eyes shut, there was so much of God presence there, there was nothing else to do but slouch or lie or laugh.
The band stopped playing, they put dance music on, we cleared away the chairs, turned off the main lights, and just danced for Jesus. everyone was going for it, not worried about what anyone thinks, just dancing in complete freedom. People got healed that night.
So after TRYING to walk sensibly back to the cabin we went up to the lobby of the hotel and lots from our revival group was there, we played games and talked (some still drunk)(and some playing ultiamte ninja) til 1 in the morning.a good night was had by all.
Next morning, out at 8 for breafast, then packing, photos and home.
Good times!!
This evening me and lil went out to our new friends Ben and Sarah, newly weds from sydney AUS. then we all went out for a thai meal which was lovely. They have a pool and hot tub, so we will be making use of that in the near future, and we have been invited to stay with them after school finishes near the beach in australia.:)
This evening lil and ad have gone out to the pray house at the church to pray for an hour, we each do an hour a week at a set time so they will have 24hr prayer going on all over the city.
Tomorrow we are going into school for about 3-4 hours to make a journal, then each person gets prophesied over by 2nd yrs, Josh and Em have gone to retreat now thurs-sat and they had there journal making day on tues, and said their prophesies were amazingly accurate and emotional.so im looking foward to ours!!
love you all. thankyou for reading. xxxxxxxx
Sunday, September 26, 2010
Evening UK. its 6pm here in sunny california, and has been a very hot day. 37C/99F.
The weekend started off very well with a party at the lake.It was our revival group party there was about 50 of us up at brandy creek lake. we had a bbq and sat and chatted in the shade. izzy went for a swim with her new friends Dave(from romford,uk) and Heidi(from illinois). it was a great day.
In the evening Ad, lil and izzy went to a mexican which is just up the road as Josh and em were out at their party. It was a really nice place and the staff were friendly, we enjoyed being called amigos. The food hmmm ...we didnt really enjoy it. there was so much melted cheese on everything! and it tasted like it had been microwaved. I dont think we will visiting again for a while.
Today we went to church, had a good time of worship, then Bill johnson spoke. Literally everytime he says something people say 'wow', even though we have heard that bit of the bible before he has new revelations for us.
Today he talked aboutTransformation. But 1st he told us about some healing that have happened. In the healing rooms they have started praying for people over skype, and have seen lots of healings.Also someone from the church bought her grandad to the healing rooms, he had lung cancer. NOT ANYMORE! when he got home he went to the doctors and they are so amazed that they are doing tests to see if from him they can find a cure for lung cancer, because people just dont get better that quick. People were calling out in the meeting, 'i know the cure!!'
Anyway back to transformation,here's a few quotes from his sermon-
he said God thinks different from us,
the renewed mind considers a miracle logical.Beni johnson transformation was the biggest hed ever seen, she went to toronto church a lamb, and came home a lion.
I am dead to sin, and dead people cant sin.
faith in christ, thats what transforms the mind,
handleing problems- in every problem is a seed of breakthrough, it depends on how you handle the problem.
rejoice with trembling, if u want joy, you might have to rejoice to get it.
the moment you prayed a scary prayer, the lord put the seed in motion (eg. i wanna see the dead raised)
when you give to the poor, you lend to God-Proverbs 19v17- God has really good interest rates!
You should all subscribe to ibethel.tv!!or at the very least download the bethel podcasts.
izzy and lil have got an evening in tonight so we are just going to relax and catch up on some reading. we have retreat this week,going to Chico to a YWAM house to hang out and get to know everyone better, so wont update this until we get back, so maybe friday.
Have a blessed week everyone.
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
ps. in the pic of lil, he isnt holding anything, its a post behind him.
Tuesday, September 21, 2010
hi all, we so appreciate you reading this by the way, and love you all. you guys are amazing, Come on! (new americanism church saying, after a good word)
On saturday izzy and emma let the boys do the shopping in walmart, which took a long time, and then came home and cooked for us and lovely meal of sweet and sour chicken with rice, it was even garnished! They all put shirts on aswell. it was so sweet.The juice you see in the above photos was called hawaiian punch, the boys thought they needed to water it down and it ended up being completely undrinkable. yuck!
Today was back to school after the weekend and monday off, and what a day to start with! worship then pastor bill spoke. Awesome, hes like a fountain of facebook status'. After our break Mark Brookes, chief overseer and all round legend, spoke, 'Whos Your Daddy' was the name of his talk, all about love and the fathers heart for us. Then we had a time of soaking and Mark spoke over us and broke off some lies that we've held on to. 'i renounce the lie that i am not good enough....'etc. Picked up a new book today, '30 days to understand the bible'.
We then came home had dinner on the decking, then started on our reading and book reviews.(which seem to be taking forever) its now 10.25pm and we are still struggling on.
Bill quotes of the day:
Your greatest victories in minitsry are won before the situation ever presents itself.
You want a miracle? train your mind on the things of God.
Romans 8, 'Carnal mind can not be subject to the law of God.'
Thursday, September 16, 2010
End of day 3 in the BSSM house....
Hi everyone. Or anyone. Whoever is reading. We've now finished our first 3 days of school. 1 more to go and then it's the weekend. School so far has been great, mainly had introduction sessions to what the school stands for and it's core values and things like that. Also had an orientation session for international students on Wednesday morning which was helpful but annoying in that we found out we would all have to take a driving lesson if we intend to drive while we're here. For ages we've been reading the law on driving and thinking of how we can get around it and how our circumstances don't qualify us as residents, but basically we do because we're here for the next 9 months. And even if we do find a little loophole that means that technically we aren't residents, we don't want to take the chance and get pulled over and try and reason with the Highway Patrol. They carry guns here!
Schools been good. Very interesting. In a lot of ways it'll be good when we fully get in the routine and start to pick our own routes but it's been good to hear about the core values of the school which have contributed to the way they do church and have resulted in many of the successes they see. Yesterday (Wednesday) Lil was ill so missed much of the afternoon session. He's feeling better today though and we all had the priviledge of listening to Bill Johnson this afternoon. He came in at 3.15 and only thought he would be with us for a little time but there was nothing scheduled until school ended at 5.30! so we got to listen to him for almost 2 hours. Some of the stuff he was speaking on was absolutely mind blowing. He started talking on giving and then ended on Mark 8, via some revelation on culture and honour and atmosphere and testimony. Some amazing stuff. Enough to last 9 months alone! But that was just one afternoon. They're big on having a culture of honour here, so Lil, Josh and Adam are having to learn quickly to open doors and be courteous!
The afternoon ended with some of the 3rd year interns and Revival Group Leaders standing on the stage and calling out prophesies they felt for certain people they picked out from the crowd. Some of them were so amazing, some big stuff being declared and very exciting. For example, an intern pointed out a young man and said he saw revival plastered over every area of his life. Another one was a young lady who one of the Revival group pastors sang a song about restoration over, which was incredibly powerful.
Anyways, it's still boiling hot here. Like absolutely boiling. It's a good job most indoor places have air conditioning. The heat is sometimes unbearable, especially for Lil's pale English rose skin! But apparently it'll cool down soon as we move towards October. One of the hardest things we're finding is you can't just pop downs the shops or to the high street, everything's so far apart! No wonder Americans drive everywhere.
We've got final school day of the week tomorrow and then a prayer and praise night in the evening, so hopefully that'll be fun. Hope everyone back home is good and God is blessing you guys richly.
Love
Lil and Izzy x
Schools been good. Very interesting. In a lot of ways it'll be good when we fully get in the routine and start to pick our own routes but it's been good to hear about the core values of the school which have contributed to the way they do church and have resulted in many of the successes they see. Yesterday (Wednesday) Lil was ill so missed much of the afternoon session. He's feeling better today though and we all had the priviledge of listening to Bill Johnson this afternoon. He came in at 3.15 and only thought he would be with us for a little time but there was nothing scheduled until school ended at 5.30! so we got to listen to him for almost 2 hours. Some of the stuff he was speaking on was absolutely mind blowing. He started talking on giving and then ended on Mark 8, via some revelation on culture and honour and atmosphere and testimony. Some amazing stuff. Enough to last 9 months alone! But that was just one afternoon. They're big on having a culture of honour here, so Lil, Josh and Adam are having to learn quickly to open doors and be courteous!
The afternoon ended with some of the 3rd year interns and Revival Group Leaders standing on the stage and calling out prophesies they felt for certain people they picked out from the crowd. Some of them were so amazing, some big stuff being declared and very exciting. For example, an intern pointed out a young man and said he saw revival plastered over every area of his life. Another one was a young lady who one of the Revival group pastors sang a song about restoration over, which was incredibly powerful.
Anyways, it's still boiling hot here. Like absolutely boiling. It's a good job most indoor places have air conditioning. The heat is sometimes unbearable, especially for Lil's pale English rose skin! But apparently it'll cool down soon as we move towards October. One of the hardest things we're finding is you can't just pop downs the shops or to the high street, everything's so far apart! No wonder Americans drive everywhere.
We've got final school day of the week tomorrow and then a prayer and praise night in the evening, so hopefully that'll be fun. Hope everyone back home is good and God is blessing you guys richly.
Love
Lil and Izzy x
Monday, September 13, 2010
Last night we went to this restaurant called cool hand lukes and our waiter was a Bethel guy called josh, which we found out whilst chatting to him. he said he felt drawn to us and said he felt like we were all quite big players in our home churches and that they will miss us but not to worry about them because Gods got his hand on them, and then after the meal (which was huuuge) josh asked him to pray for us, so we went outside, because the waiters have been asked by the boss not to pray for people in the shop, and josh prayed for each of us individually. What he said over each of us was so accurate, the holy spirit really spoke to him and he really spoke deep into our lives, especially over lil. It was so exciting.
Registration day! we got to Bethel at about 9.30 and there was a massive queue outside, so we joined up and got talking to a few people in the international line. Met some people from the uk and a canadian girl who is in izzy and lils revival group (a group of about 70 1st yrs). We met our revival group leaders and registered, got our name badges and photo taken. we were given a folder with information in and all our notes we need to this year, also our 1st reading book which is called world aflame by rick joyner. I have started reading it and it is already very exciting, and makes me more excited about the upcoming year.
After registration we went to starbucks and sat outside, then we headed home to sort our our folder and look through the work we have got to do this year. after reading each book we have to write a book report about it. we also have to read chapters of the bible each day, so our homework will be a couple of hours a night.
We went for lunch to Chipotle, which sells yummy burritos and tacos. whilst in the queue Ad, Em, and Josh met a man called Jerry who over heard them talking and offered to buy them lunch, they asked what he does and it turned out he was the manager of Jesus Culture, the band that tours the world doing youth conferences. wow. what a job.
We have just sat down for dinner on the decking outside as its so hot inside. someone who we talked to earlier said it doesn't really get cold in the winter and autumn doesn't really happen as it stays warm until beginning of nov, then starts getting cold for winter and by feb its getting warm again which is nice.
Tomorrow we might go and look at a car then school starts at 12.45 so we are looking forward to that. our schedules look exciting, we get taught by Bill Johnson on a tues and Kris Vallotton on a wed and we have worship 3 days a week. outreach stuff starts in about 6-7 weeks. we go on retreat in 2 weeks in our revival groups, not sure where yet, but looking forward to it.
Registration day! we got to Bethel at about 9.30 and there was a massive queue outside, so we joined up and got talking to a few people in the international line. Met some people from the uk and a canadian girl who is in izzy and lils revival group (a group of about 70 1st yrs). We met our revival group leaders and registered, got our name badges and photo taken. we were given a folder with information in and all our notes we need to this year, also our 1st reading book which is called world aflame by rick joyner. I have started reading it and it is already very exciting, and makes me more excited about the upcoming year.
After registration we went to starbucks and sat outside, then we headed home to sort our our folder and look through the work we have got to do this year. after reading each book we have to write a book report about it. we also have to read chapters of the bible each day, so our homework will be a couple of hours a night.
We went for lunch to Chipotle, which sells yummy burritos and tacos. whilst in the queue Ad, Em, and Josh met a man called Jerry who over heard them talking and offered to buy them lunch, they asked what he does and it turned out he was the manager of Jesus Culture, the band that tours the world doing youth conferences. wow. what a job.
We have just sat down for dinner on the decking outside as its so hot inside. someone who we talked to earlier said it doesn't really get cold in the winter and autumn doesn't really happen as it stays warm until beginning of nov, then starts getting cold for winter and by feb its getting warm again which is nice.
Tomorrow we might go and look at a car then school starts at 12.45 so we are looking forward to that. our schedules look exciting, we get taught by Bill Johnson on a tues and Kris Vallotton on a wed and we have worship 3 days a week. outreach stuff starts in about 6-7 weeks. we go on retreat in 2 weeks in our revival groups, not sure where yet, but looking forward to it.
Saturday, September 11, 2010
Since arriving we have been generally getting to know the area we live in, last night we went out to a coffee shop opening and had some coffee, and listen to some live music, then we went to see Bethel Church, we drove up at about 10 o clock, theres a conference there this weekend so we didnt go in but the building is huge. its on a hill overlooking the city. We were asked by the school not to go to church this sunday because with the students and the conference on there would be too many thousands of people there, so we will have a sunday off. the only one probably for the next 9 months.
Today we woke up early and headed to Whiskeytown, it has a amazing mountainus national Park with lakes in. We were able to swim in one of the lakes called brandy creek swim lake. It was beautiful. there was a man made beach next to it, so we relaxed and played catch and went for a swim.
We went for lunch at Subway, there was a couple behind us, they asked lil straight away if we were going to school(as in Bethel) they had done the 1st yr last year, and were staying around this year to go to the church i think. Everywhere we go (like at the mall today) people ask 'so u guys at School?' then they say 'we go to Bethel too' haha.
We are home now just reading and relaxing, Lil, Ads and Em have gone to starbucks, which is
about a mile away. i think they will get good business from us while we are here!!
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