November 2018
Hey everyone!
Thanks all for showing your support and wanting to hear how these past few weeks have been.
It's been almost 3 weeks since I've been back in Australia to help staff in the organization YWAM Newcastle! Time has gone by quickly and slowly at the same time. I have just started to understand my role and everyday I am becoming more comfortable and accepting of my time here.
Here at YWAM Newcastle, our weeks start on Tuesdays, and finish on Saturdays as we run a youth program for most of the afternoon, leaving Sunday and Monday as our days off. I have specifically come back to this campus to serve in the departments of hospitality and to help manage and run the café that they have here on base.
Now that I've been here for a little while, I know more of what my day to day life will look like. In the mornings I work in the café, and then in the afternoons, I help lead work duties in the hospitality department for the students who are here on DTS (Discipleship Training School). Work duties is a time where the students help serve into the base (we clean the house that everybody here on base lives in, different things each day), where they can process what happened in lectures that day with us, and where they can ask questions about God or anything. If you recall, I was in Australia back in January of 2017, and that was when I was completing my DTS. If you would like to help serve or be a part in YWAM in any way, you first have to complete a DTS, which for me, was life changing.
Now to how I really feel! It was a lot harder for me to leave then I even realized. Leading up to the time of me actually leaving Vancouver, I was just ignoring the fact that I'd be leaving for 10 months. It only hit me when I was unpacking in my room here in Newcastle that I was going to be here in Australia for a little while. The whole time leading up, and being on the plane, I treated it as a quick little vacation to see some friends, then life would resume back in Vancouver. That is not the case. I was, basically for the first time in my life, happy to be in Vancouver, which is absolutely crazy. When I first returned from Australia in August of 2017, I had no intent of staying in Vancouver as I despised it so much, and I made that very clear with anyone who came in contact with me. Now here I am saying that I absolutely loved my time there and wish I could be in the same season I was just in. God completely restored Vancouver for me in a way that I never could imagine, and I'm so thankful for that. I have a great community of friends, and great relationships with family. It's somewhere that I call home and would like to invest more into, which is something that I would never say before.
I'm not saying this so that you now think, "well then why did you even bother going back?" I'm saying this so you know my true heart. It's hard to be away for sure, but I want to put that same investment I put into Vancouver, here into Newcastle, even if it is just for a year. I miss home like crazy, but I find so much joy in that, and how God has restored that place for me.
That all being said, I have had a really great time being here so far. The transition has been tough though, as I now live in the same house with 100+ people, my girlfriend being one of them. Going from 8 months long distance to now living closeby, we've both had to learn how to manage time together, time with others, or just time to ourselves! It's been a fun and challenging process. We have been blessed in finding a church, and getting involved with them. The people there have stepped out and sought after us which is awesome, and we are just about to start going to a connect group with them. I'm also hearing God in new ways, and am learning so much about Him. I am being confronted in many ways about trust, things I believe about Him, and honestly so much more. I have it written down somewhere but its taken me like so long to write this I'm just too lazy to get up at this point and find where I've written it.
To sum it all up, as much as I miss Vancouver and the past season I went through, I have high expectations and excitement for this season. It's even been helpful for me to write this as it's brought peace about this time I'm in.
If you could please partner with me in this time and keep me in your prayers that would be awesome. Pray that I continue to find peace and a contagious joy in this season, that I continue to pursue relationships back in Vancouver, but be present here in Newcastle, and that I can get a vision and a heart for the departments that I am serving and volunteering in here. If you also feel like you would like to financially support me for a one time donation or monthly, as I am volunteering my time here, please don't hesitate to send me a message and I can help you set it up, and show you how to get a tax receipt.
Thanks again everyone! Love you all!
Chris