Golden Family

Just wanted to say how much I love the Golden Family!!
Many years ago in 1992 when I was just a wee little farm girl, I moved to the 'big smoke' Auckland to begin my life as a preschool teacher. What I didn't know was that God was setting me up to hijack my life for missions...but that is another story.

In Takapuna I started this YWAM early childhood teacher training school and my leaders were this young American couple; Brian and Ruth Golden. I say young but I did not realise how young they were until a few years later when I was the same age and thought back to all the responsibility they had...but at the time I was 17 so anyone over 21 was old...er in my eyes. This couple quickly grew with the arrival of Mahealani a month into the school. Over the next three years Jevon and Austin can along as well.....we had great fun being Aunties, but I was especially close to Mahea.
We were an interesting bunch of students who grew very close after three years of living and working together; and there was always the Golden Family who guided us on our journey.

Now after many years in Hawaii they are moving to the awesome half of the world...closer to the best country in the world...NZ, that's right they are moving to that other country beside NZ.

YIPPEE for them!

May God bless you all HUGELY in your move and settling in to a new country and work and friends.

Love you lots

Funny

Funny sign which I got from my friends blogsite; so sorry do not know where it comes from!

Happy Birthday to Me!!!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO ME!

Wow 33 years old...I tell you...Jesus was sooooo young, I keep imagining a 50-60 year old man, but he was only 30 years old when starting his ministry!!! If you are not 30 yet and that still seems really old, trust me its not!

Finland

After the great week in Bulgaria I headed to the South of Finland for the first time. Flew into Helsinki then up to Kuopio to be with the YWAM Finland DTS staff. This is the first DTS staff training they had ever had so it was a privilege to be there! We had a week together and I gave teaching on public speaking, cross-cultural teams, UofN and YWAM, small groups, one-on-ones, learning styles, outreaches and foundational values (which means nothing much to anyone who has not been in YWAM). Oh it was fun and I enjoyed it a lot. I also feel a lot more in touch with what YWAM is doing in Finland with the dreams and vision they have of seeing Finns going into all the world to preach the gospel!!

It is so exciting to see the doors open for me to be able to teach. Now I will go to the south of Norway to teach public speaking at a DTS in Skien in October, then teaching a week here in Borgen.

Otherwise right at this moment I am going many things in preparation for the future; trip to Rwanda and South Africa; trip HOME!!!; starting the school in Sweden; promotion things for Borgen etc.

Please keep praying that my final months in Borgen will go well…I am struggling at the moment with the DTS starting and I do not know where I fit anymore. Need to read my teaching material again about my identity being in God NOT in what I do!

I am now signed up in Facebook so see if you can find me!

Bulgaria and More

Hello all who are faithfully checking my blog wondering when on earth I am going to update it!

It has been a busy three weeks but now I am back in Borgen for a few weeks.
I have been confirming the discovery that I LOVE to teach and apparently I am not bad at it either! So here is the low down for the last couple of weeks;

Started by helping run the DTS staff training for YWAM Norway with Janne. That was good to connect with people and meet the new staff as well. Difficult to know what to teach in a short time thought.

Started getting sick….but then I was OK! Thanks for your prayers!

Headed to Bulgaria where I was met in Sofia airport by Ani (a YWAMer) and stayed at her house that night. It was very very nice to have someone there and I did not have to get stressed by negotiating taxi’s etc. The next day I caught the bus to Plovdiv (2nd biggest city) where Bodil met me and we took a second bus to Hissar. Bodil is a Norwegian missionary who we pray for at the Borgen base. I did not know her really so it was good to see her in her ‘home’ setting.

I taught at the DTS on the topic of “Identity in Christ” and it went really well. It was my first time teaching this topic and first time teaching for a whole week so I was not sure how it was going to turn out. In the end it was great and all timed out well. Learnt what things I need to improve on as well so that was good.
The school had 7 students, two couples and 3 singles, all but one coming from Bulgaria. Christina from America was married to a Bulgarian and spoke and looked Bulgarian anyways! Then there were 5 staff and another visiting to sit in on the teaching. They were great fun to be with and were open to God and the teaching…what more can I ask!!

It was hot when I was there…one day it was over 40 degrees C. But surprisingly it did not bother me so much (and me and heat do not go together!). I rested in the afternoon and then we went out walking in the evening….with what seemed like everyone else in town! Hissar is known for its mineral spring water so that draws a lot of visitors from all over Bulgaria and Turkey. There were two fountains that you could take water from, it was hot water so people would bring their bottles to fill up for later (or drink straight away). A couple of times I went to the swimming pool……ohhh so nice and refreshing!

Here are some photos to look at….the rest of my photos are on my flickr photo site.

Svetlana, Georgi and Georgi!

They (well not the boy) were students on my first DTS here in Norway (2003/2004)

I went to a Gypsy youth group to speak...I really LOVED it a lot the people do not have much but there was a lot of joy and enthusiam!

Here is Eriin and Nasko and family; and Karen knows them!

Where I stayed on the top floor. The DTS was in another house down the road.

Nearly all the DTS staff and student! So great to be with you guys!

Oh the fresh fruit and vegatables were divine!!!

Found Yoda's dog, I have