Trailer trouble and birthday party

I was writing an email to a friend of mine and realized I had a good story for the blog and I hadn’t put it up here yet.

One of our weekly ministry teams was on their way to a community to help out in the area and long after they should have been there, my supervisor received a phone call from their leader. When he hung up the phone, he turned to me and said he needed a favour. The team had a van (bus by Australian definition) pulling a trailer with some supplies for the day and the van had broken. Most of the team went on ahead without the supplies, but a few people stayed with the van and trailer. We needed to find a tow truck to get the van to a garage and I went out to get the trailer. Well, when I found then, we hooked up the trailer to the car I was driving (borrowed since mine doesn’t have a hitch) and checked the lights; only to find they didn’t work. We found the problem (blown fuse in the car) and fixed it. We tried the lights again and blew another fuse. The wiring on the trailer was not set up right for the car so there would be no way to use the signal or break lights; but we still needed to get it back home. So I started back with another car on my tail being my signal lights for me and shortly before we got back, I saw some flashing lights and found a traffic inspector who had pulled someone over. I drove past him with much apprehension and stopped at a red light just a short distance along the road. Next thing I know, the inspector is pulling up beside me at the same light. Now I had a dilemma. If he ended up behind me in the turn, he could see my signals weren’t on, and if he got in front of me, he could see the same in his mirror. So I prayed quickly that God would blind him to me for a moment (we’re allowed to pray that kind of thing right?), then I made sure I kept him beside me through the turn and then drove really slowly so he would get out of sight before I had to make another turn. It just barely worked, as I made the next turn only seconds after he was out of sight, and I was thankful to be off the road.

On another topic, I went out with a group for a friend’s birthday yesterday. Ate some good German food, had a good time, got home late and tired, and took some good pictures. Here are some highlights.




The famous landmark. I hadn't seen it in a while so I had to take a picture... We drove to a train station and took the train to this spot, then got on a ferry for the remainder of the trip. Betty, you'll be seeing this place and likely getting a tour of the building while you're visiting!




Here are some of the guys on the boat. We tried taking a picture with the background in it but it was blurry because of the dark.






After dinner, we went to another place and some of the people started dancing.








...While others watched








And on the way home, I got this great shot. I really liked the way the lights and the stars in the clear sky were reflecting off the water. It would have been romantic if...

Colour and Album Recording

Well, Colour Conference is now done. Like I thought, I would have been lucky to get 6 hours of sleep per night. Wednesday was an easy day, leaving at 7AM and being done my part around 2PM (home just before 3) while the choir stayed to practice in the evening. Thursday was 6AM to 12:00AM, Friday and Saturday were 6 to 12:30, then Sunday was “easier” again leaving home at 7:15, getting almost an hour at home between church and album recording, and then getting home just before 1AM. I spent somewhere between 14 and 17 hours per day on my feet. It’s definitely tough but knowing that almost 17,000 women were impacted at the conference and millions of people will be impacted by the album that’s coming out; it’s worth it. It felt good to sleep in as long as my body would allow this morning – waking up for the day after a long 7 hour night. Hopefully, I can get to bed earlier tonight and possibly even take a nap.

I spent most of my time at the conference doing venue control (similar to security but without the legal rights and liabilities of security people) outside the lounge where all the key speakers, pastors, and their guests went to relax – making sure that only a select few get in while the rest are turned away graciously. It’s the same thing I do for the weekend services at church. As you can well imagine, dealing with people who are known by millions around the world and keeping them free from disturbance and distraction during their breaks can be quite delicate. To make things clearer and easier to enforce, most people allowed into this area have a special pass. Yea, MOST of them – not all.

Even the best of us make mistake in this area. One person on my team asked one of the key speakers for a pass shortly after she got off stage; some of the pastors that are around the church every weekend were asked for passes; and I even had an interesting one. A young lady wanted to come into the lounge with a friend of hers. She had the appropriate pass but he did not so I explained this to her and she graciously told me it was alright for him to be there with her. This being a common line that I receive, I told her that I had orders from my leaders that meant I could not let him in. She kindly informed me that her mother was the person running the conference and the person with her was her boyfriend. Upon asking who her mother was, I realized she had a lot more pull than I do. Brian and Bobbie Houston’s daughter can take anyone she wants into any area of the building at almost any time. Oops. She was very good about it and my colleagues had a good laugh at me telling them about this. Despite this little error, I was greatly honoured when my team leader said he was going to specifically ask for me to be on his team in this position for Hillsong conference in July.

There were a few interesting experiences during the conference. One lady told me at one point “There’s too many women around here!” Excuse me, were you expecting something different at a women’s conference? I mentioned this to one of the girls on my team and she just looked at me with indifferent eyes and informed me that she had said the same thing only 5 minutes earlier.

We also had one man causing a minor disturbance outside the door so our paid security man came over to help out. This guy is a few inches taller than I am and built like a rock. He’s one of biggest men I’ve ever met but also one of the most gentle. Within 5 minutes, the man was sharing his life story on his way back to his car.

I’ll leave you with a few pictures of the event…



The conference started with a grand opening which was truly grand. I was able to catch part of it including some dancers on stage and swinging gracefully through the air above stage. A few people (including me) commented that the only thing we had ever seen that was comparable was the Olympic games opening ceremonies. Here's a shot of one part. A woman started singing in an absolutely heavenly voice and continued as her platform rose about 30 feet up and the audience joined in singing.



This is what almost 17,000 women in one place looks like. Amazing! The largest indoor facility in Sydney was filled with women focused on God!







Another team member and me at our post.









There was quite a rush for seats for the album recording. Here's the line-up 1 1/2 hours before it started.







I was only able to get into the auditorium for a few minutes of the album recording, but here's one picture of it. My guess is between 15,000 and 16,000 people were there. I was able to hear much of what happened inside and I can tell you there are some amazing songs coming out on this album.

Colour preparation

Colour Conference is about to begin and today we were busy preparing. It feels like it’s the calm before the storm since some of us actually had half the afternoon and the whole evening off. We worked too hard this morning and got the work done quicker than expected.




We got off to an early start. Here’s my housemates at about 6:45AM. Tomorrow through Saturday we have to be on the bus by 6:00 and don’t get home till midnight.







Opps, somebody didn’t count how many people live in my community before deciding how many buses to send.







These people all had to wait for a second bus that was hastily found to transport – it was sent from a different location where they had an extra one.








That’s fine, the other one was the same as a regular city transit bus. We got the better one.






I've got a few more pictures of the prep work today but I need to get some sleep before my alarm becomes my most hated possession at 5:00 tomorrow morning. Since I only have about 6 hours per day (or night) for the next four days, I likely won't be checking this blog for comments or posting updates until it's done. Please pray for us as you think of it.

Mormons cont.

I’ve had some questions about how my meetings with the Mormons have gone. After the first meeting with the Mormons in February, I received a phone call from someone else saying that because I had moved from where I lived before Christmas, I was in someone else’s zone, and asking if I would be willing to meet with them instead. I set out the same conditions as the previously and after a few questions and about 20 minutes of talking on the phone, they agreed to meet under them. Our first meeting was at a park and when I got there, I found three people and a dog instead of the two I was expecting. I guessed because I was now meeting with two women, they may feel safer having a man with them whom they trusted. They just said they had been talking with him before our meeting and he asked if he could come along. He is a member of their church. A second thought I had was that based on our phone call, the ladies were concerned about not being able to back up their beliefs and having someone else there would help with that.

Before our next meeting, I received a call asking if we could meet in someone else’s home (I’ve not bee receptive to letting them into my home and their rules keep them from inviting anyone to theirs). I agreed to this and we met there. One interesting thing I’ve noticed is that in all of our meetings, the missionaries have not answered any of the hard questions; that’s always been done by the other person in the meeting. I found out at my last meeting with them that this man is actually one of the leaders in their church and what’s more, he’s one of the heads for this district! At this point, I’m left to wonder why we’re meeting in his home.

In our second meeting, I started by asking about something one of the missionaries had stated in our first meeting. She said that one of the reasons she didn’t accept the doctrine of the trinity was that she didn’t understand it. However, near the end of the meeting, she told me she didn’t fully understand the Bible but was learning more about it and gaining a better understanding of it. So I asked why she would accept the Bible although she didn’t understand it but reject the trinity because she didn’t understand it – using the same measure, but coming to a different conclusion. She had no response but the man whose home we were in stumbled to some sort of answer.

She later asked (very sincerely) if I could explain the trinity to her. I told her I couldn’t fully explain the trinity but I have to search the Bible and it tells me that Jesus was killed on the cross because He claimed to be God. In His days on Earth, there were hundreds, if not thousands, of gods being worshipped; and the Jews didn’t try to kill anyone because they claimed to be another god; but they wanted Jesus dead because of his claim to be God. If Jesus made the claim, either it’s true and I better believe Him, or it’s false and I can’t trust anything he says.

I also pointed out that Jehovah (“Father God” as they call Him) clearly says He is one God and there is no other; and we are to worship no other. The interesting thing here is that the Book of Mormon says to worship Jesus. So, they are told to worship both Father God and Jesus, but they are also told that Jesus is not God. So how can they obey Father God in worshipping Him only and obey the Book of Mormon in its command to worship Jesus unless Jesus is God? They had no real response for this.

Virtually all differences between Mormons and Christians hinge on the one question “Was Joseph Smith a true prophet of God?” I took a list of prophecies to our next meeting and asked them to explain the discrepancies to me. After only the third one, they realized they couldn’t explain them and had to admit that some of them appeared to be false. In the end, the missionaries took my list of prophecies so they could check into them and try to find answers for me.

Mormons regularly say to pray and ask Father God if Joseph Smith is a true prophet of God (misinterpreting James one where it says if any of us lacks wisdom we should ask God for it) and his Holy Ghost will confirm it for us by a feeling in our hearts. As we talked, I brought up the historical inaccuracy of the Book of Mormon (Another whole issue I won’t get into here except to say that the book tells of a people living at a certain time and history tells us they were not there and the place claimed was actually inhabited by a completely different people) together with the prophecy issues and some other stuff, and I stated that if I’m looking at something and everything I find goes against it, I’m not going to trust a fast beating heart and some goose bumps (two signs they have claimed); and especially when I’ve already prayed to God and asked him to show me the truth about Joseph Smith and He told me that the man is a complete fraud!

As many of you can well imagine, I’m shocked that these people keep meeting with me. From my perspective, it takes much time out of my schedule and takes much thought and prayer to be prepared; but as long as they want to keep meeting, I will do so. I’m convinced God has called me to a specific ministry of preaching “good news to the poor…and freedom for the captives.” All of Heaven rejoices for the salvation of one individual and I will do all I can for this. Although I can’t explain the reason, I have a feeling about one of the missionaries in particular questioning her beliefs and I’m praying that she will come to a true knowledge of God. As I left the last meeting, I knew there had to be seeds of doubt planted in their minds so I prayed that God will take that seed and make it grow like a weed. I also asked Him for the opportunity to bring these people to Him.