Passing on the passion

What's more exciting than being involved with impacting the lives of students? Seeing others catch a passion to do the same! In true Aussie-tall-poppy-syndrome style, I have been slammed for going onto campus and 'encouraged' not to go on there again...but I have seen students catch a glimpse of how they can impact their own campus. Job done.

Back in the Campus Groove

Last week I took my last tablet in the battle against anxiety and depression! Can I feel the difference? Yep! In a good way. This past week I have reconnected with the intense feelings of excitement I remember from over a decade ago when my passion for university ministry was first stirred up. I’m grateful that I had medical help in softening the pain of our recent season of life but it sure is good to really FEEL again! In God’s timing I’ve come off medication and been released into building great relationships with other Christians and ministries. That in itself has been a powerful experience as well as building with non-Christians on their spiritual journey.

Late last year we united a group of young people to actively pray for Deakin and connect with students. They have continued to give up their time and resources to help me out at Deakin (Ken now focuses on Melbourne Uni and I am involved at Deakin Burwood). Earlier in the year when it started getting colder, we were looking for a room to meet in and I began calling all of the chaplains on campus. Since then, the chaplaincy has been an amazing support!

Some highlights for me this year have been playing soccer with the students, providing them with home-cooked meals and freshly brewed coffee, helping with English speaking, praying alongside a hundred others for our universities, cooking for the Melbourne Uni SFC camp, giving out pancakes, making videos, getting to use my Japanese vocabulary, pastoral chats over coffee and taking a day trip along the Mornington Peninsula. Coming up is a trip to Healesville and a “Voice of Deakin” karaoke competition! Can’t wait.

The all-consuming grace

It has been almost 2 years since I last posted on this blog...a lot has happened...but those stories can wait for another day. Today I simply want to declare my thankfulness to God. I was on Deakin today, planning a video script, trying to put into words why my heart beats for the students, why I put time and energy into visiting the university every week with my 2-year-old daughter trotting along behind me...You know, it's actually a difficult question to answer, because it's almost unexplainable. The passion and determination I feel to see the universities radically transformed can only come from something outside of me. Sure, there are rational reasons why I would have chosen this path initially. But I can't explain why I continue to choose this path despite the obstacles and despite the impossibility of the task. Just by the grace of God. The all-loving, all-knowing, all-powerful, all-enabling, all-consuming grace of God.

Things too profound for me

Lord, my heart is not haughty,

Nor my eyes lofty.

Neither do I concern myself with great matters,

Nor with things too profound for me.

Surely I have calmed and quieted my soul,

Like a weaned child with his mother;

Like a weaned child is my soul within me.

O Israel, hope in the Lord

From this time forth and forever. Psalm 131 NKJV

This psalm nearly knocked me off my chair when I discovered it this morning. I am in a place at the moment where I'm being encouraged to take a break from all different sources. The problem with this has been that my heaviest burdens are in my mind - how do you take a break from yourself? For me this week began by letting go of my deep sense of spiritual responsibility for every person I have ever met. The end of the week has seen me letting go of my deep sense of responsibility for completely changing society. Big dreams? Yes. I've decided I will let God take responsibility for great matters and things too profound for me, and I will calm and quiet my soul.

What this means for campus ministry I'm unsure of but I know that if God wants to move on campus He is the one to do it. Stay tuned for what God will do when there's less of us and more of Him!

Restoration

When the Lord restored the fortunes of Zion,

we were like those who dreamed. Our mouths were filled with laughter,

our tongues with songs of joy.

Then it was said among the nations,

"The Lord has done great things for them."

The Lord has done great things for us,

and we are filled with joy.

Restore our fortunes, Lord,

like streams in the Negev.

Those who sow with tears

will reap with songs of joy.

Those who go out weeping,

carrying seed to sow,

will return with songs of joy,

carrying sheaves with them. Psalm 126 NIV

After a week of what has seemed like an endless attack of negative thoughts and emotions running wild, I was encouraged by a friend to push through in worship. My God is a great God and He does Great things! I was thinking tonight about the creative power that my King embodies and it lifted my spirit just thinking about what He could create through me. There are no limitations really! "Keep on dreaming", I felt Him say to me. So I have created another page - a page that will contain songs that flow from my devotional times. 

A faith, a love and a hope that's come into this world

We give thanks to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, praying always for you, since we heard of your faith in Christ Jesus and of your love for all the saints; because of the hope which is laid up for you in heaven, of which you heard before in the word of the truth of the gospel, which has come to you, as it has also in all the world, and is bringing forth fruit, as it is also among you since the day you heard and knew the grace of God in truth. Colossians 1:3-6 NKJV

A very good friend of mine asked me if I was a "shouter" this week. Do I let people know when I'm in need? I said I'm getting better at it. I am in need now. I really want you to pray these verses for us. I asked God on the weekend why I kept crying. He said to me that He was growing in me a deeper hunger to see His Kingdom flood this earth, to see His people rise up, link arms and be His hands and feet. He told me that He takes us into these deep places of emotional rawness to compel us with His heart for freedom and power in the lives of people. His heart is deep. Tapping into it can leave me shaky. I was shaking while playing the keys at church on Sunday. I watched my hands shaking and realised God is doing something new in me. My yearning desire is that this new thing will reverberate throughout my surroundings...This morning God encouraged me that His fruit has been amoung us since the day we heard and knew of His grace...

I've added a new link to this page - I'm slowly uploading the pages of a book that's been brewing inside of me since going through my darkest days almost four years ago now. It's called The Women of Virtue and it's a work in progress. I strongly believe that nothing with lasting impact comes without a story behind it worth telling. There is purpose in everything.