The first week of
outreach is complete! It’s hard to even begin to describe how incredible this
week was and how much God moved through our team. To make it easier for both
myself and friends reading this, I’ll try to go day by day and give you a
highlight or two!
On Friday, our team of
8 (Fearless leader Kathryn, Katie, Josie, Manuela, Emma, Savannah, Haley, and
myself—and Jessica will join soon!) left for Sydney early that morning after
saying bittersweet goodbyes to a few friends at the base. From the beginning,
God spoke to our team that we would be a team of joy and laughter. After so
many obstacles we’ve overcome, we were certain that those two things would be
the glue for our team. To give you a bit of background, we were originally
supposed to go to Amsterdam for a week before Latvia/Moldova, but because of
the price of plane tickets, we weren’t able to. After we crossed that
disappointment, we found out that our team leader, Talea, wouldn’t be joining
us due to health reasons. When we found out, we were all pretty upset, but
after taking some time to process and pray, we felt privileged in a way (even
though it sounds strange) that the enemy would be trying to throw so many
impediments in our way because he obviously felt threatened by our team’s ability
to serve Christ well. Anyways, after lots of walking and searching, we found
the house we were going to be staying at for the week. When we walked in, we
were instantly charmed! It’s a beautiful and quaint house that we lovingly
named Martha. We rested for just a bit then we headed off to the grocery store
to buy heaps of groceries for the week. My friend Manuela and I are in charge
of food for this outreach, which includes meal planning, grocery shopping, and
cooking. It’s been fun thus far :)) Not much happened the rest of the day, but
throughout the day we continued to pray for joy and laughter and God definitely
blessed us with it!
We woke up refreshed
and excited Saturday morning for the day, and we spent time in prayer,
intercession, and worship, asking God what He wanted us to do that day. We all
felt like we were supposed to go to Bondi beach to pray, worship, and talk to
people. While we were there, we worshipped as a group on a staircase and while
we were, people would give us strange looks and smiles, but we could just feel
that we were impacting the beach just by singing psalms, hymns, and spiritual
songs to God! My highlight of the day was being able to talk to this little
Egyptian man named Antonio. Manuela and I started talking to him and he just
shared with us his culture and heritage and how much he loved God and it was
really amazing. We got to pray for him and were encouraged my him praying for
us in return. We got his address and told him we’d send him a picture of our
team for him to have. That day, God really showed up and blessed me with a
great conversation after feeling defeated and that I hadn’t impacted anyone
yet. God is a God who keeps His promises!
On Sunday morning we
woke up to go the church, and we were excited to see what God had in store for
us that day. We went to church, and Manuela and Katie shared their testimonies
in front of the church, and one of the testimonies lead people to tears. It was
incredible. My highlight of that day was when we were in the market place that
afternoon walking around and blessing people with flowers, and Emma and I came
across a beautiful woman sitting down on a bench and we felt led to give a
flower to her. Emma started the conversation and while she was telling her that
we wanted her to know God loved her and that she was beautiful, her face was
really perplexed. She then told us that she didn’t know much English and that
she was French (so automatically I was drawn to her because I love Euros). So I repeated what Emma said and she
just lit up and smiled so brightly. I told her “bonjour” and she replied with
“merci!” It was a beautiful moment for me. God is a God who loves to show His
children He loves them!
We woke up Monday
morning feeling encouraged for the day and ready for God to move! We prayed,
interceded, and worshipped just like we do every morning and earnestly asked
God what He wanted us to do. He told us to go to King’s Cross (which is the red
light district of Sydney) and pray and minister to people. I was especially
excited to go. Once we got there and split up into partners and started
praying, most of the team got a strange feeling come over them. It turns out we
were on the opposite side of the street we were supposed to be at, but
nonetheless, we were already starting to feel the spiritual attacks coming on
us. I personally felt like I was just walking around in a dream, like I wasn’t
in the real world. It was a strange feeling and I don’t even think I could
explain it to you if I was staring at you in the face. Katie and I were walking
and praying and suddenly we came across a super sus place called “The Tunnel
Club”. It was in an alley way and was painted black and had signs that said “24
hour security” and “guest list entry only” and I saw up above barred windows
with tattered curtains in them. We were pretty sure that it was a brothel as
well, and as soon as I saw the windows, I envisioned a bedroom with a girl
trapped in there against her own will, in her own living hell. We prayed for
that and walked around the corner and all the sudden it was bam bam bam! All of
these night clubs, adult stores, strip clubs, and shady stores. We were shocked
at it and felt sick to our stomaches. We were praying more than ever, and we
saw multiple prostitutes walk by, some more obvious than others. We saw one of
the more obvious ones in a risqué bra and track pants, with eccentric makeup on
and trashy hair. We automatically felt like we were supposed to talk to her but
we didn’t know how. Anyway, we ended up talking to her and we heard her story,
her heartbreaking story, and we asked if we could pray for her, and at first
she said no, but then something broke in her spirit and she complied. So Katie
layed hands on her and prayed for her, and she started sobbing. We then said
goodbye, and she gave Katie a sweet hug, and when I went in for a hug, I felt
like to give her a kiss on the cheek, and she did the same. I had a kiss mark
on my cheek and I didn’t ever want to take it off. I felt like I kissed Jesus
that day. She was beautiful and I will always remember Xena. That day changed
my life. God is a God who loves the unlovable.
The next day we felt
to go back to King’s Cross. But before, we decided to worship in the market
place a bit. While we were worshipping, we were approached by a homeless
looking man named Tom, and we got to have a really amazing conversation with
him about life and eternity and God. We got to pray for him and when we did, he
was crying. It’s amazing to see how much God works when we ask for people to
talk to. We then headed off to King’s Cross. When we got there, the atmosphere
was a lot heavier than the day before. There were a few fights breaking out
between prostitutes over drug deals and things, and a few of the girls were
approached and mistaken as prostitutes, and a lot of us were rejected by people
we tried to talk to. I was to give away my water bottle to a pot dealer which
was really sweet. But besides that, we were all feeling pretty defeated. When
we were getting ready to head out, Emma and Manuela walk up with a really thin
and ragged looking woman whose legs looked like they hadn’t been shaven for
months and had missing teeth. We
started chatting with her, and for some reason, God spoke to me about giving
away my purity ring to her. I was shocked and I was like, “heck no, God. That’s
weird. I want that ring. It’s special”. But I asked her what sort of jewelry
she liked and she said rings. I told God, “ok, God, I got it”. So at the end of
our conversation, I gave her my ring and it fit perfectly on her finger. It was
amazing. I was moved so much by that and I think I was blessed more by Anita than I blessed her. God is a
generous God who loves for people to be the same.
The following day we
woke up feeling really heavy and defeated and when we went to worship in the
market place, we felt a lot of spiritual attacks. We came back to the house
early and shared our hearts and prayed for each other. After that, we went out
to pick up trash and talk to people. For me, I wasn’t able to talk to anyone,
but it was a good day of letting God ministering to me. God is a God who wants
to refresh his children.
On our last day of
ministry, today, we felt to go to King’s Cross one last time and give a backpack full of toiletries, clothes,
encouraging words, and food to Anita. Although that was really sweet to be able
to bless her with, there was one other incident that stood out to me more than
that. As we were worshipping on a corner in King’s Cross, a transvestite came
and sat down a few feet away from us. While we were singing, he started getting
angry and tried to throw newspaper at us (which obviously wouldn’t work haha).
Before he did that, Manu and I felt like we were supposed to go talk to him.
After that happened, though, I felt really scared. He started walking over to
us, and I just started praying for God’s protection and an invisible force
field around us. He walked up and asked us if we were Christians and we said
yes, and then he said, “me too!” really enthusiastically and gave Emma a high
five. He then asked us to sing Amazing Grace for him, so we did. Then after
that, he asked us to sing Father Abraham. Though strange, we did, and we
thoroughly enjoyed it. Manu and I went over and talked to him, and we had a
very interesting conversation. I can’t really explain it, but I’m pretty sure
he had a demon inside of him. He knew about Jesus and some scripture, but he
kept saying that he was a black angel and dabbled in black magic. It was also
like he was on drugs, but I truly think it was a dark spirit inside of him. We
didn’t really get to pray for him or share the gospel with him, but I think
that just talking with him made an impact, because we were “normal people” actually
enjoying talking to him. God is a god who honours His children.
Overall, this week has been incredible. It’s only the
first week and we’re not even in Europe yet! God wants to do so many amazing
teams in and through our team and I can’t wait to see what He has in store for
us. Keep praying for our team and we look forward to updating you more! J xoxo,
Laura.
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