Hello!
So it is officially hot in Perth!
Days and days in the high 30’s and low 40’s, plus humidity.
Pretty much all the time is hot, and because of the humidity, you feel sticky and moist all the time.
Like someone has just sprayed your arms, legs, face with a mist of water. Nice, eh?
In the afternoons I sometimes take a quick cold shower just to get a freshly-jumped-in-the-lake type of refreshing feeling, and I kid you not: the cold water is hot. Last Sunday I took a “cold shower” and the water felt like it was coming from a kettle! I have never experienced that before!
I’ve experienced the opposite many times on a cold Winnipeg winter’s day, where all the hot water’s run out and I end up rinsing the conditioner in my hair with what feels like little ice droplets.
But here, I don’t even consider turning on the hot tap because the cold water is at best lukewarm. Understandably, though. Seriously, how are they supposed to refrigerate their cold water tanks?
In any case, it is still refreshing, because I get to be un-sticky for a moment. I try not even to towel dry my hair because I know that as soon as I stand in a ray of Australian sunshine with a gentle, hot breeze, I’ll be dry in a matter of moments.
Two weekends ago, I got to go down to a thrift store and I found this cute blue sundress at a bargain price! In the midst of the stagnant heat I was totally satisfied. I sat on my top bunk, with my little sewing kit, replacing the elastic, changing the buttons, and I couldn’t have been happier.
Many things have happened since my last post!
This past week was filled with outreach destinations, baking birthday cakes, and living like slum people.
This is a ginger-cinnamon double-layer cake that I made for Astrid's birthday, a Danish girl in our group. She is so precious!
I kind of became the birthday-hospitality person for Compassion DTS. I organized all the special things that go into making the people feel loved on their birthday. I love doing that anyway, so it was pure joy to make cards, bake cakes, and decorate the birthday tables.
This is Claudio from Angola, Africa. He is very happy and grateful for his birthday table and his birthday cake. We tell him to smile for pictures, but still he doesn’t do it. He is very happy, anyway!
Anyways, MOST RECENTLY...
let's talk about Outreach:
After waiting and praying in anticipation for days, we were finally told the outreach options on Monday night.
The days before, I was really trying to prepare my heart to immediately submit the options to God. To not even let my mind get its way in there and start to think/rationalize about them too much. I really wanted to give ear ONLY to what the Spirit is saying.
Okay, so first off:
we are ALL going as a GROUP to.....
NEPAL!!
for 47 days! Kathmandu mostly!
Isn't that amazing! Wow, I honestly had no idea of the countries.
Nepal, what a special place!
Grampa Norm’s old stomping grounds! For those of you who aren’t Merkeleys: my Grampa who was a surgeon in Canada, volunteered his services for at least 20 years doing life-changing surgeries for the people of Nepal and other Asian countries.
So I am blown away with gratefulness that I get to walk where Grampa walked, see the sights that he saw, all the pictures and stories of Kathmandu he’s told, will become something I can touch and experience with my own eyes.... wow!
Then,
for 30 days,
we had three options, and she wrote them one by one on the board.
I closed my eyes,
“Jesus, wherever you want me.”
China, Thailand, Sri Lanka
When she wrote Sri Lanka, my jaw dropped with a smile on my face and I felt a solid drop of a YES in my spirit.
I really don't know much about the place but that it's that little island off of the Indian peninsula.
She described the other countries a little bit of what we’d be doing, and still Sri Lanka was resounding inside of me.
So, I felt quite immediately a strong pull in one direction.
We had one day and one night to ask God where He wanted us to go.
I took the next day to continue to pray into it, we were not allowed to talk to anyone on the base about it, which I think is a great idea. That way you have no influence of wanting to go where your friends are going.
As I prayed about it, I still felt strongly towards Sri Lanka.
Then as the day went on, I started to think that everyone would choose that one! Because it was making such a solid reaction in me, I was wondering if everyone was feeling that way. And I started to think that I should choose something else because probably this was the one that everyone wanted. (Isn’t that ridiculous!?)
But God brought the scripture to me where Peter is walking on water.
Matt 14: 28- 33. Peter has his eyes fixed on Jesus and he has walked out of the boat and obeying Jesus' command to "Come!". Then he gets distracted from everything around him, the wind, the waves, and starts to get scared and sink.
I really feel like that this is the word of the Lord for me: to not become concerned with what I think the "other people's" decisions will be, (and honestly, how did I even know what other people are being led towards???) and just go with what I believed to be God in this situation.
So the following day I submitted my destination, and waited in faith until the teams were confirmed.
It was a few days wait, but the leaders finally announced the groups on the weekend and wow was it a special moment! Praise God!
This weekend, we were on Slum Survivor, where we lived in a ”simulation slum environment”: we had to make our own shacks out of wooden pallettes, sheet metal and a tarp, and cardboard for the floor. We had two meals a day (rice and lentils) and had to fetch our own water. We were only allowed to bring the clothes we had on, and a sleeping bag, toothbrush, and bar of soap. (No deodorant, lotion, hairbrush, pyjamas, pillow, flip flops, shampoo, makeup, cameras, iPods, etc). Sorry, I don't have any pictures from the weekend...we couldn't bring our cameras.
It was great!
We spent two nights like this and got to experience some of the depravity that 1/6 of the world lives in.
The two meals a day I could handle, the one set of clothes, and not showering for the weekend, but what really made it feel like poverty was the sleeping on a piece of cardboard. The first night was pretty brutal, I probably woke up about 10-15 times, shifting after it felt like my hip bones and shoulders were getting bruises. But Praise God, as soon as morning came and I could “walk it off”, all the soreness left.
The next day was even better; everyone was getting more into it, and more comfortable with the fact that they were haggard. It was a bonding experience, and I found it hilarious to discover people’s “true” personalities when pushed to the limits and deprived of life’s luxuries.
I loved how we didn’t have anything to entertain us but ourselves.
We made soccer balls out of newspaper, plastic bags, and string, and had intense soccer games (we have some fiery soccer players!). The winners got a plum to eat.
In the morning before our first meal, we were all standing around and some of the guys invented a riveting “throw the ball in the bucket” game, which consisted of exactly that. But it was so fun! There was so much hype! Everyone wanted to try!
Filip, one of our leaders from Denmark, captured the essence of the moment when he stated (in his Danish-honest way),
“It is only the competition that drives us.”
We all stood around and watched him with anticipation as the homemade ball hit the rim of the bucket. Comments erupt from the peanut gallery.
It was not about the game, but about being with each other.
That night, as the wind tugged at my matted hair and we stood together with rolled up dusty pants and sandy bare feet, we were told the outreach teams. I was overwhelmed with the goodness of God. I couldn’t have orchestrated a better group to be with. It is so cool how God directs us, all eight of us had personally heard God to choose Sri Lanka, obeyed, and this is the result! Yay!
Starry constellations filled the navy sky above us, and we each giddily told the way that God had brought us to our decision, and ended up praying with each other in excitement of the things to come!
The second night on the cardboard was not so bad!
This is my bunk-mate Mary.
She's from the Channel Islands of the UK. She is the sweetest little peach you've ever seen!
She's from the island called Jersey, but with her accent it sounds like she's saying "Jazzy".
We're going to Sri Lanka together!!!!
Hello!
My life as an adventure with Jesus makes my heart beat fast and I get butterflies in my stomach... Jesus’ love thrills my heart to no end and I desire to live in complete surrender to His voice. Joy has been something that has been called over my life ever since becoming a Christian and I believe He is using me to sow seeds of peace and hope along every path God leads me on.
