MC Bap Notices 1 year anniversary

Thank you God

Heyah guys!

Its been a wee while since I’ve updated. A bit under a month! But seeing as all my students are on holiday I thought I would take this time and opportunity to reconnect with you guys my Supporters
Being honest to you guys out of the 5 S’s we have to the S of Supporters is one of the ones I struggle with the most. I think it really comes down to my organisational skill such as time management and really sitting down and communicating with you guys what’s been going on!

I do thank God for all of you that do read this and do continue to pray for me as I do Student Ministry In Auckland Uni. I do feel incredibly blessed that there are there are people who do get behind what I do on campus and are supportive in the journey of seeing me grow for Christ as I do some of his work. Please do continue to pray for me and for gods will and good news to reach the heart of students on campus

So in my last blog I mentioned a student approaching me to understand more of the bible with her. Well to follow up let me introduce her toy you guys. Her names Rachel!  We have been going through the Gospel of mark together. It’s been a really exciting period especially for me seeing her struggle and wrestle with some of the bigger picture understanding of who Jesus is and coming back to me with more questions. Its been a delight to work with her but our meetings have become less regular as it is now exam period so just pray that she continues to seek and search and that God will continue to revel himself to her.

I have also been privilege to help lead an impact group at OCF – essentially a small group. We have been going through the book of Ephesians at the pace of roughly 1 chapter per week. It has been really good seeing students grow and challenge themselves with it. It was also great to have feedback for students saying that’s the first time the’ve finished or read Ephesians.  Over the First Semester my co leader has been Rachel G. – Different Rachel yet for the next semester she has decided to step down for a bit. I thank god for her assistance and what she has done so far and pray that god continues to grow her and shape her to be a stronger leader for him. Next semester Ive had a student who is interested in stepping up to take on this leadership role. Let me introduce to you David Toh. I thank god for his willingness to step up, grow and challenge himself in his walk with god and in leading others with the growth of leadership.

All semester I’ve also been participating in a dance class every Thursday nights. Before I left for Minty 2 I was fortunate enough to have my first experience on stage as a dancer. It was exhilarating, brilliant and oh so much fun! If you do want to see the footage it is on youtube under :hopskotch musicality showcase. It was a joy to dance with many other students / people with such a great passion and enthusiasm for Dance. Really encouraged me to grow and to seek god in how I can honour him more and worship him more in this area.

I’ve also had been away at Minty 2 down in Hamner Springs. Oh what a joy it was for me to finally set foot on the south island. While I was there I had the joy of waking up to cold crisp air with the other minterns and staff. I was also fortunate enough to enjoy the pleasures of the hot pools there during our free time period. While we were there we looked at the Pslams and I learnt a new way of doing a quest time with god which was rather interesting. I was also challenged by Andy as to how I speak of the gospel and what scripture says about the gospel. Was challenging and I think it will be a continual thing to clearly try explain the gospel without distorting it from what it truly is. It wa also a great time of reflection and encouragement as we shared stories as to what god has been doing in our campuses and how and what we wanted to do in our minternship year.

I’ve also been privileged enough to be able to travel to Australia. As playing an role in church I’m part of the Video Notices Team. I was fortunate enough to have a friend to pay for half my fair to Australia so I could go film church notices for our one year anniversary. It was such a brilliant experience as we went ot Sydney. There we encounter many people with so much hospitality I was short for words. (they gave us a place to stay and even went out of their way to give us their car). I was also privilege to go to Hillsong Church while I was there. Something that God said to me about the experience is that this is still only a small part of the world and the Gospel has reached here but what about the rest of the world. This is something I am still praying about.

Personal story
Well just another thing encouraging id thought id share. I have a friend whom I’ve been friends with for about 10 years now. We’ve been thought a lot of highs and lows in our friendship and he’s been someone ive been praying for sine ive become a Christian. After 1.5 years of praying for him God has finally given me an opportunity and a gate way for me to help revel god to him in his heart. He had contacted me asking me about receiving a bible and wanting to know more about what I believe in order to better himself. Please pray that god will use me effectively to reach our to my dear friend Michael H.

Please pray for
Rachel – continual seeking of God and understanding of who Jesus is
Michael H – For God to revel himself to him, and to challenge this way of living in what he’s living for.
David – For god to help guide him in his step up to leadership
Finance – handle my money better and more wisely and for gods provision in finance
My study – Encouragement to sit down and Continue with my study and get back to my reading plan.
The other minterns /staff – as they continue to do gods work on campus that hearts be changed and Jesus revealed

Thankful for
David wanting to step up just as Rachel wanted to step down for leadership
Trip and experience to Australia and seeing god’s creation over the Ditch
The beauty of The south Island (Mainland apparently) and all it had to offer
Reflection time During Minty2 and the changes that I see in myself and the encouragement ive seen the gospel working in other places
Support so far that I have been receiving and that people do wanna get behind this Journey with me.
The gift and opportunity to dance and perform on stage

Minty Update!

Wow guys sorry it’s been so long since I’ve updated
just been so busy and wrapped up in Minty

First of all I would like to thank God for the work he’s doing on campus and in the lives of people. Its amazing seeing changes in people!
Secondly thank you all for getting behind me in my mission work on campus. It’s encouraging for me that people care about what I do and want to get behind me and the other staff team in TSCF to make changes in the lives of students. GO BODY OF CHRIST!

So what’s been happening?
I can’t quite remember what has happened since I’ve last posted so I’ll try do the last month or tow

well the student group I’m working with OVERSEAS CHRISTIAN FELLOWSHIP had a camp called strengthen in ngawahia last month. Was awesome to see 70 + people there hanging out and bonding.
We got up to some crazy games such as fly chicken fly - this consists of a raw chicken as a ball in a similar game of netball except one person on your team is the hoop.
We had Pastor James Lai from Lighthouse Christian Fellowship from north Auckland stay with us over the camp. He spoke on the Armour of God from Ephesians 6.
One of the high lights of camp was the 3rd day. Pastor James Lai was praying over people and anointing them with water from the Jordan River. It was an amazing experience as you saw students around you break down and let Jesus break down some of r the walls on the inside.
Overall the camp went really well as the title suggested strengthen; the people who came were more united as a body and a group for Christ :)

I’ve also had the privileged to lead the impact group training session. Impact group is small groups created in OCF and we are going through the book of Ephesians as a bible study. I managed to lead theses leaders in understanding more about Ephesians 3 and in Pauls prayer for the students to make Christ feel more at home in their hearts.

Study for me has been rather hard but enjoyable. Lately I’ve been diving more and more into the wisdom that is of Wayne Grudem. Last month I had done an assignment on the trinity. If you guys want to see it feels free to ask me about it. Rather interested that not once is the word trinity mentioned in the bible! J
Lately I’ve been struggling with god’s sovereignty as Grudem advocates a case for Calvinism. After wrestling about it for a few weeks I’ve come to the conclusion that neither is right of wrong. I was reminded of this in 1 Corinthians 1 :12 when it says ¹²What I mean is this: One of you says, "I follow Paul"; another, "I follow Apollo’s"; another, "I follow Cephas^a]">[a]"; still another, "I follow Christ."
I came to realise the more I try find out more about arminianism and Calvinism the more I’m drawing away from Jesus. I’m a follower of Jesus! J Also realised that theologians have been arguing about this for centuries so I don’t think a lil intern will find the answer to it.

Lately I’ve been seeing students wanting to step up to leadership! What a blessing it is for us to have such a vast amount of willing people who want to do more to help spread the word and glorify Christ! This really showed in the leaders training day as we staff modelled what it was like to be a hospitable group to students coming int. we had the attendance of 6 groups at the leaders training with potential leaders! Ben spoke from the book of Philippians and what it means to be gospel shaped and gospel centred. He also challenged us to share the gospel in 160 characters. Can you do it?

Lately I’ve been working with a student who’s really been seeking who god is. It’s been amazing seeing them wrestle with who Jesus is as they ask more questions about him and find out more about him. This person came to me not really knowing much about god, just that he answers prayers and had been reading passage from Psalms, Ephesians and even Romans but not really understanding what they were reading. I am now trying to get them to stick to reading the gospel of Mark. The shortest gospel in the bible to help give them some understanding of who Jesus is and I’m also texting them some questions to think about as we go through it together. J

Thank god for

· The stepping up of leaders and people

· My financial provision and support so far

· Students wanting to make a change

· The strengthen camp as it ran smoothly

· The effectiveness and the impact of leaders training day

Please pray for

· Students to change themselves as they wrestle with what it means to be gospel centred and shaped

· Minty 2 in 2 weeks away

· The OCF committee as they try make change and find replacements for the next AGM

· God to continue to shape and change lives on campus

Sorry it was such a rushed update will try update after minty 2 properly
thank you all for your support
god bless

Duncan

Minty Update for Feb to march!

Hey guys

wow it’s been a while since I’ve blogged or updated as to how Minty is going for me
so when I last left off I was worried about MINTY 1.
Well how was it you ask?

Minty 1Minty 1 was awesome. Started of minty at welly with just some bonding time with the other Minterns for breakfast talking about practical jokes and illegal number plates! We then later on proceeded to the kaptiti coast of Ruamati, 10 mins from paraparaumu shopping centre at this awesome as Bach! At the Bach while we were staying there for the 5 days it consisted of the 4 Minterns and Andy Shudal, Tim Hodge and Gina Wong. There were also other staff workers and ex Minterns that appeared throughout the week. While at minty 1 it definitely helped prepare me for the things to come for this year with scripture and study. I got loaded up with a pile of books including Wayne Grudem which is massively thick! We looked at topics such as leading bible studies, our faith at the workplace, working with students, and our supervision and support raising and lastly out study.But wait! That’s not all! I got to spend some irreplaceable time with the Minterns for this year. They include Phil Luey, Peta Maria Harris and Nathan Paton. Man these guys were awesome. There was a lot of back yard cricket and beach time. The water was beautiful land warm. There were also days where Kapiti Island looked like it just disappeared completely. One of the most memorable moments was the first night when we walked along the beach at night. The sand light up and glowed beneath us. It was due to us standing on micro organisms and them releasing something which made the sand glow. An amazing experience I Also managed to teach some of the Mintern how to break dance or just pull of the baby freeze!

Once I’ve gotten back it was just 3 weeks of orientation ahead of me.I did a first few days at MIT where they had a really good orientation. All the students came out to their quad and just chilled while watching the performances. It gave a good opportunity to give out flyers and interact with some people.

After the first week I managed to get away for a few days with the OCF leaders or committee to get to know them hang with them and find out more about OCF. Was just a day trip but was awesome as time away.

The next two weeks I was placed at Auckland Uni. First week was called Pre O week and I felt that it was really awesome. It started with 9.30 starts I think and finished roughly around 2 each day. There were days where it rained and where we felt discouraged but we ploughed on. I remember meeting certain people such as an atheist just looking for a general chat and some girls doing nursing. I found that week rather encouraging because although there want so many people there a lot of the people stopped to see what you were about. We were also shorted staffed a bit for the stand because OCF had decided to commit to running a lantern festival stall which was that weekend so they were all busy away prepping for that.

The next week after lantern fest there was an abundance of helpers which was awesome as to see. I felt really encouraged to see lots of people there wanting to help. I even had a chance to make new friends with the stalls next to us. I was especially encouraged by the KYCF group. Man those students are on fire for their group. I constantly saw them reaching out to someone, talking in their own native tongue and got tones of sign ups.

That weds we had the welcome party and boy there was a bunch of people there. I think someone counted at least 75 new students there which are encouraging to see. On the night we had praise and worship from KYCF members leading the band, and then Jeff and Jane explain about TSCF and have the president’s talk about their groups. Afterwards it was a mix and mingles time with food and drinks. We ended up going through 50 pizzas. Man Demolished!

That Friday was OCF’s first Friday meeting for the year. There were plenty of new faces and was just a great time to hang out and to get to know everybody. We played a few ice breaker games led by Juin and Chester. Extremely funny as we got into 4 groups and got to know everyone’s name by calling out another persons name in our group before we got hit by the person in the middle with some rolled up paper. Also had a game or Chinese whispers mixed with charades. Extremely funny. All in all most of us had a great time and went to food alley after for further bonding over food. YUM!

Then over last week and a bit there’s been a few events going on. One was has science disproved god and Christianity on trial. They were both really good to attend to and great to see so many students and members of the general public just interested about god and their disciplines and how it can affect their jobs and friends. I also managed to have my first one on one with a guy called warren.  awesome guy and told me the tragic story of the 2004 tsunami floods in shirlanka how it happened right before his eyes. Hope I get to see more of him though out the semester as he is very busy with his mechanical engineering degree at AUT.

Recently ive just been studying hard through Grudem and the bible, however have been falling behind on my bible study reading plan each day but I’m hoping I can catch up on my next day off. Also been encouraging diving and looking into Ephesians as I’m leading a bible study group or impact group on Tuesdays with Rachel Guo for OCF. It’s an interesting experience as I’ve never lead such a big group before.

Thank god for:
The awesome out reach that has happened so far
The commitment of students wanting to share god’s word
The time and the words spoken through scripture during my minty training
The opportunity to be able to lead bible study and get more involved with student Ministry.

Please pray for:
the willingness and burning desire to catch up on my bible readings and through Grudem
Knowledge and understanding of my studies
The students signed up for the new groups to feel at home and be committed to the groups and impacted in their student lives
The wisdom for leading bible study groups.

Anyways I better go and catch up on reading. Chow!

Minty 1

Wow fast is approaching the time where i will go out into the deep south of the north island. In Raumati is where Us the new minterns will be prepped and be placed ready to go onto our new homes for the year. New Home being our new campus's we'll be working on with our legs wobbling and sweaty palms as we talk to new and old students and encourage them to grow in Christ with us via scripture! BETTER GET THE HAND SANITIZER READY. (My new home is Auckland Uni's OCF , COME VISIT!!!!)

While in Raumati well be encouraged and diving deeper into gods word. hopefully not just diving but submerged and engulfed and overwhelmed by it i hope.

So far my biggest worries of this year is to raise support and funds. ive worked out i need about 3800 to get by this year which includes all my cost for travel and conferences that i have to attend to. My second biggest worry is prepping for the bible study that will take place at Minty 1. I have been Blessed with John 7 which i dont quite understand myself yet am leading others into INCLUDING STAFF!!

Its funny however, with all my worries i think i know in my heart ill be alright woo!! praise Jesus.

Tester

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