Week 8

This week, Ian Hyslop taught on Exodus and we finished the DVD lecture on Galatians 2:17-21. Here is my journal entry:
- God’s law always comes before man’s law as was exemplified in Exodus when the midwives, because they feared God, did not kill the male children of the Hebrews as Pharaoh had commanded. This shows that God uses people not because of their ability but because of their availability.
- Had Moses been confident he was in the will of God, he would not have had to look over his shoulder before murdering the Egyptian. He was seeking to please people, not God. In the same way, I have to “be still and know that He is God,” stop worrying and taking matters into my own hands and trust that God will bring about His will in His time. If I do not go God’s way and in God’s time, it is worth nothing and can only lead to failure and wandering in the desert.
- From Moses’ attempt at leadership, I can learn that all my goals need to be drowned in prayer. I need to take time to slow down and listen to what God is saying through His word, through circumstances, and through other older mature Christians. God will lead me, one step at a time. When I am in the centre of God’s will, His plan will flow.
- I can be temped to see people who seem to be burning bushes – on fire and filled with God – and be jealous of them and then resign myself to be a ‘burnt up bush,’ a heap of ashes, or just a spectator, watching others live totally for God. But I need to realize that I am what I am by the grace of God and that it is the living Christ who works in me to accomplish His will. I need to remember that I am nothing except with Christ. God is the eternal I AM, He is adequate right now! What I have is what He is: He does not give me strength, He is my strength; He does not give me victory, He is my victory.
- When I find myself in life’s deserts, God does four things: He finds me, He shields me, He cares for me, and He guides me. He does all this whether I believe Him or not. The purpose of these deserts is to humble and test me so that the true condition of my heart may be revealed.
- From Moses’ excuses to God at the burning bush, I learned that I don’t need all the answers. God will provide them when I need them. I need to stop being worried about what might happen and take comfort in what God says will happen (Romans 8:28). God uses inadequate people (like me) simply because they are willing. I may not feel qualified or adequate, but God is, and He chooses to use me.
- Even though I may have come to a place in my life where I am totally committed to do what God asks of me, there may be hidden issues or unresolved sins that God still needs to work out. I need to be receptive to His prompting and willing to allow Him to work in me.
- The valleys of life often come after the mountains. I need to learn that the only place I can turn when I enter a valley is to God. The perfect framework for God to do His work is when the situation seems impossible to human standards and the people seem inadequate to human standards. God often brings us to the end of our resources so He can then prove Himself faithful.
- It is not getting rid of sins that makes me a Christian but rather the life of Christ within me. I need to examine myself to find evidence that the Holy Spirit is within me. These evidences are that I have a hunger to know Jesus Christ better, that I have a desire to be like Christ, and that the Holy Spirit is working through me through an eagerness to be useful.
- Victory has no meaning except in battle and therefore I need to be aware that there is still a spiritual battle today. But when Christ was raised from the dead, He was victorious over every enemy that threatens to defeat me. This is the power of the Christian life. The purpose of the Christian life is to realise that every wave that threatens me over my head is still under Jesus’ feet. Though I will suffer, God is always in complete control. He gives me peace in the midst of the storm, not a quiet countryside peace because it is the storms that keep me dependent on Him. The Christian life is permanent. Just like the shadow of a bus will never squish me, the shadow of a dog will never bite me, and the shadow of a stick will never hurt me, the shadow of death will never kill me!
- The greatest struggle is not understanding God’s will, but obeying and yet when I respond in that God has His best in store for me. And it is obedience that develops the kind of faith that allowed the Israelites to pack up and leave Egypt not knowing what they would eat or where they would sleep. When I walk in obedience to God, there will be testing, but God will provide. And just like God provided manna for the Israelites in the desert, He will provide abundantly.
- From the Passover, I learnt that God the judge and God the saviour are one and the same. Salvation was and is by substitution. In the same way as the lamb’s blood could not simply be shed, it had to be appropriated by sprinkling it on the doorposts, I need to appropriate the blood of Christ. My life, which has been purchased by God, now belongs to God just as the life of each firstborn Israelite belonged to God.
- When I reach the end of my rope, God wants me to let go and trust Him because He is fighting for me. I need to not be afraid, I need to stand still, I need to watch God come through, and I need to stop talking (telling others about my problems).
- If I am not living by faith, I am living by sin (Romans 14:3). Faith is an attitude of trust in an object that allows the object to work on my behalf therefore, the evidence of my faith is not what I do for the object but what I allow the object to do for me. I can no more live the Christian life by works that I can be saved by works. Instead of trying to do things for Christ, I need to allow Christ to live through me. I need to not commit myself to doing God’s will but instead commit myself to God. Obedience without faith produces legalism and faith without obedience produces mysticism, it is only with faith and obedience that I can fly.
Character doesn’t matter half as much as trust. I can be a good person but utterly useless to God but I can be a messed up person and useful to God. I need to remember that God is not only a God of heaven above but also, and most importantly, a God of Earth below. He is active and moving now, here. I need to stop doubting the Christ is sufficient. God uses messed up people. In fact, Rahab the prostitute was in the line of David and therefore in the line of Jesus! This does not so much show the ancestry of the King but the character of the kingdom!

My new study Bible came in this week! I’m so excited! It has already proved useful in helping to prepare for my Bible study.

On Tuesday, we had our second to last day with Bible in Schools since ministries are wrapping up next week for the Kiwi summer holidays. I will miss my wonderful group of students! They are such great listeners and participators and so enthusiastic! After the Christmas break, we will be assigned to a new ministry to give us a wide variety of experiences. Our Tuesday evening classes were held outside on the grass (on a spontaneous suggestion from Ian). We sat or lay on blankets or sat on lawn chairs. It was really neat! Although it was kind of weird to have Cam writing on my foot during the lectures...
For workday, I polished all the wood on the stairwell and dusted all the light fixtures. It was really fun (as usual :P)!!! For desert on Wednesday, we got apple pie!!! Yay!! Also, after a request from the student body, we are now getting fruit much more often which is kind of exciting.

Caution, this next paragraph may be extremely random and unconprehensible.
Our student council (that is Ben and Amber) organised a wacky game during supper on Wednesday. Basically, we were each given a task that we had to do during the entire meal but we weren’t allowed to tell anyone else what our task was. I had to stand up and clap each time someone poured themselves a glass of water. There were others like, each time Isabelle laughed, Jordan had to pass Dale a napkin. Each time someone passed Dale a napkin, Patti had to throw salt at Bryan. Each time someone threw salt at Bryan, He had to get up and say “Would you like some pepper with that Mrs. Epp?” Another one was that each time a staff member got up, Cara had to put vegetables in their water. Whenever Michael do the chicken dance, Ben had to get up and run around the table yelling “I can fly!” Michael had to do the chicken dance whenever Jonas sang “J and J awesome fitness club.” Jonas had to sing the fitness club theme song whenever anyone clapped (once Joel caught on, he would clap super often). And Dale had to get up and go around the table playing duck, duck goose whenever Joel got up and said “How was workday Joseph?”. Joel would say this whenever Sheryl gave a teaspoon to Dale. Sheryl gave a teaspoon to Dale whenever Amber said “Funny joke guys, funny joke!” Amber said that whenever Jordan gave a high five to anyone. Jordan gave a high five to any of the staff whenever they used a knife. This made for a really noisy, funny meal with lots of laughter and running around.

Last Saturday, I had booked a car online and they were supposed to e-mail us the confirmation within 24 hours. Unfortunately, I must have typed in the e-mail address wrong because we never got the e-mail and when we called on Wednesday, they said they had no cars available. After calling another rental place and finding out that we couldn’t drive unless we were over 21 yrs old, we were starting to freak out that we would not be able to make it to Akaroa (and our hostels were already booked!). But God provided a car! When Hanna found out that we still didn’t have a car, she told us that this past Sunday a lady at church had offered to lend her car to any students who needed it. It was so cool how God worked everything out!

Thursday, after a really good class form Ian and a very thought provoking DVD lecture from Charles Price, we all headed out for travel weekend. One group headed for Queens town for bungee jumping, luge rides and shopping (the bungee jumping didn’t happen though because of bad weather), Adam headed for Mount Cook, Michael left for Christchurch, and I headed with a group for Akaroa. In my group were Cam, Cara, Bryan, Jordan, Colin, Robert, and Stephen (Bryan’s friend). I bought all my groceries before hand which turned out to be a good idea and al lot cheaper than buying stuff in Akaroa. Basically, I had Pb & J sandwiches for lunches and suppers and I had left over porridge from the crossing for breakfast.

On the bus ride to Christchurch, Michael was trying to explain to the lady beside him what a dear look like (she had never seen one before). Jordan tried to help by stating “It’s like a big dog with antlers.” Every one cracked up (even some people three rows down!).

Driving to and from Akaroa was interesting. The road was super windy and narrow and steep and there are no guardrails and Stephen likes to drive fast. We took the bus to Christchurch and then we drove two cars the rest of the way to Akaroa (praise God for providing a car!). We got lost trying to find the hostel and ended up driving up this super steep, one lane road to a dead end. We weren’t sure if we were supposed to hike up to the hostel. We had to take a break at the end of the road though because the borrowed car was smoking so we had to let is cool. On our way back down (which was almost as scary as the way up), we stopped at a resort to get directions and almost hit the resident peacock. Finally, we found the hostel (it turned out that I was right when I suggested which way we should go :P). It is the highest hostel in New Zealand and is located on the side of the volcano looking out towards Otanerito bay (or long bay). It was a really nice place and we had the whole place to ourselves! The girls’ room was nicknamed the ‘hobbit’ room because you can’t stand up straight in it and the door was only about shoulder height. It was really cool! The view from the hostel was amazing!

On Friday morning, after sleeping in (yay!) we watched a storm literally roll in over the ocean. It was moving so fast! We stood outside and watched it until it was over us and behind us. It hailed for most of the morning. Some of the gang headed into town for some exploring while some of us stayed behind just to relax. In the afternoon, once the sun came out, we went for a drive intending to go for a hike. We decided to explore and turned down a road into a beautiful lush valley. The one lane, gravel road – once again, twisting and turning wildly around cliffs on one side with a steep drop off on the other side and without a guardrail – led down to a private property. Once we got permission from the people there, we drove through a field down to an aqua blue bay boarded by huge cliffs. We all took off our shoes and ran around on the warm sand, collected shells, and climbed the smaller of the cliffs. From the top of the cliff, we could see seals swimming around in the water. And the boys got way too close to a seal on the beach: it started hissing at them! I even found a complete Paua shell! Afterwards, we drove down to long bay valley and went on a tramp to a beautiful waterfall. It was really steep but we got some really nice views.

Friday night, we watched LOTR. It was sooooooo funny listening to everyone make fun of it! The best was laughing at Legolas running, stopping to make a random comment, then starting to run again. Once it was pointed out to me, it was quite comical. The funniest quote was when Golum says to Sam "Stupid, fat hobbit!"

On Saturday morning, we all woke up at 5am and drove out to the farthest point and watched the sun rise over the ocean. It was beautiful!!! And it was rather cold :P. Afterwards, most of us went back to bed.

At 10:30, we headed into Akaroa for some sea kayaking. The owner of the hostel gave us a deal on the kayaks! We had three double kayaks and two singles. We went out from the bay all the way to the peninsula and part of the way around. Once we came around the peak of the peninsula, we were paddling against the wind. I was so glad that we had all rented wet suits! They were really tight and restricting but they really kept us warm. We paddled through pretty choppy waves. It was tough but so much fun! We stopped at a “beach” and climbed on the rocks to a cave like thing. The waves were hitting the back and making thundering noises, it was really cool! On the beach, you could hear the pebbles tumbling with each wave. Stephen (whom I was sharing kayak with) and I also got out to climb in another rock formation. We think we saw penguins but we weren’t sure. We also saw a jelly fish swimming right beside out kayak! The rock formations were really cool since it was all volcanic. We stopped and talked to some guys who were scuba diving for Paua shells. On our way back to Akaroa, we stopped at the same beach for lunch. A couple of us kayaked to a dock and Jordan and Stephen went swimming and did flips off the dock.

For supper, the owners of the hostel provided a barbeque (for an extra fee). I didn’t have any but they let me try some Paua meat. It was very strange.

On Sunday, we had to wake up early because we had to be out of the hostel by 7am so that we could be in Christchurch in time to catch our bus. Unfortunately, there was a mix-up when booking the bus and our ticked was booked for next Sunday. Stephen offered to drive us back to Geraldine. When we got back, we had to wash off the car we borrowed since it was super muddy from driving on dirt roads and through fields.