Our "real life" group meets weekly for Bible study and monthly on mission in the streets of Auckland.
Stir
/stər/ verb
move or cause to move slightly. begin or cause to begin to be active or develop.
"the Holy Spirit stirred their hearts and they considered the ways they could lay their lives down for Christ."
Interesting things are happening. Between graphic design projects, classes and assignments, home and parenting life, and working with the worship ministry at Shore, we've been walking with several friends who are considering some practical and potentially life-changing ways to give their entire lives over to the cause of Christ. Among others, two young men in our life group and another good friend may be in the process of hearing a call on their lives toward ministry.
As you may know, since we moved to Auckland at the end of 2015 to work toward our next church plant, we sensed God asking us to wait on Him, to go to school, to support Shore Community Church, and just wait. We're not about to claim that all of our questions are being answered now, but we are beginning to feel God stirring us and those around us and we're wondering if He's up to something here. We sort of assumed that what we were waiting for was the next great church plant leader to join us in our church planting goals. How great would it be, though, if what we were waiting for was for God to move the hearts of future leaders around us - and that we weren't actually waiting at all because God had already begun the work in them and in us? One friend is currently considering leaving a lucrative corporate job and going to bible college. Another one, a professor and PhD scholar at a local university, has been devouring church planting books and is keen to explore what God might be asking of him. Whitney has been meeting with a young woman who has past church leadership experience and who may also be feeling another stirring. And another friend is studying social work with a dream of impacting as many lives as possible with the grace and compassion of Christ.
Perhaps one or all of these people will join us in church planting in the future. Perhaps not. But what we do know is that disciples are being developed right now and that is ultimately what we were called to New Zealand to cultivate. We plan to continue walking alongside each of these people individually and studying a church planting book with them and others in the near future. Please pray for God's continued leading and guidance for us, for each of the ones we've mentioned, and for the other lives around us that God intends to disrupt for His great story.
Family Update.
We soaked up the last few weeks of evening sunlight by taking the kids to one of Auckland Zoo's final late night openings one night last month. Pictured above is Whit and Finn having a look at the "Rhiner-rosser-russ" as Finn calls it. Now that we've moved our clocks back, we've lost an hour of evening light in the southern hemisphere, which means the kids are getting to bed earlier each night and waking up earlier each morning. We're also being quite social as a family these days with many play dates and visits. While it's great to see the kids (and ourselves) making so many connections, we also do our best to balance time with others, time with just our family, and "alone time."