Prayer Request

Hey everyone, 

I just wanted to write a quick post to ask for some prayers. The illness that delayed my arrival here about a month ago is continuing to be a problem. Although it seemed to be getting better for a little while, it has come back with a vengeance. I also have been sick with some sort of stomach bug for the last couple of days, which has coincided with the increasing symptoms of this infection. I'm wondering if the two might be connected somehow. Some of my symptoms are starting to be very strange. I have an appointment with a highly recommended doctor next week. Prayers that he'll have the answers to get me back on the right track would be greatly appreciated! 

On the other hand, Colour Conference was amazing! I'm so thankful I was well enough to attend the first conference on Wednesday and Thursday. I'll definitely be writing a post about it soon.

Thank you all so much! 

Time is flying!

I can't believe I'm saying this already, but it has been almost a month since I arrived in Cape Town. Time is flying! This should mean that I only have five months left here, however, I'm very happy to say that I'll probably be extending my stay for an additional three months. There are are still some things I'm trying to figure out, and this isn't 100 percent official quite yet, but I'll likely be staying through December instead of September! The thought of staying here for a total of nine months makes me incredibly excited! I would appreciate prayers that, if it is in God's plans for me to stay, things will all fall into place. :) I'll keep you all updated!

I realized I haven't talked much about what I have been up to at work. One of my biggest tasks has been planning an overall communications strategy for the Foundation. I finished a rough draft of that this week, and the hope is that it will be presented to both the board of the Foundation and to the main Hillsong team in Sydney, Australia, within the next couple of weeks. Having such important tasks to work on right off the bat has been both challenging and exciting! Developing a social media content strategy, a monthly newsletter and re-designing the website are other high-priority items that I'll be paying more attention to after the overall plan is in place. 

In addition to working on those things in the office, I've also been going out and helping with some of the many projects that the Foundation has started around the city in various communities and townships. For example, they run children's programs in several primary schools. Although the kids were on holiday break this last week, we still went out to one of the communities and played a version of "The Amazing Race" that we called "The Amazing Grace" with the kids. I was in charge of one of the game stations. It was so much fun! To the right is a photo of some of our team that was out there. I'm so blessed to be working with such amazing people.

This week also has been busy with preparations for the 2015 Colour Conference! Colour is an women's conference that Hillsong holds every year. It was started in Sydney and now runs in four of the Hillsong locations - Sydney, Cape Town, London and Kiev. New York is going to be added soon as well! There are two back-to-back conferences here in Cape Town. One is this Wednesday and Thursday and the other is on Friday and Saturday. I'll be attending the first conference and serving at the second. Around 10,000 women total will be in attendance! I have heard nothing but incredible things and absolutely cannot wait! I got chills the first time I watched the promotional video. You can watch it here. If you're interested, you can also check out the Colour website!

Tomorrow is Family Sunday in church! We're celebrating the one-year anniversary of Family+1, which is a program started by the Hillsong Africa Foundation that provides opportunities for people to open their homes to children for temporary care or adoption. Here's a link to the program's website if you're interested in learning more about it. To help both celebrate and promote the program, there will be a Family+1 desk at church where families can stop by and get a fun Polaroid photo taken between services. I've been assigned to be in charge of the camera and take the photos! I'm pretty excited. It'll be fun to get a little change from what I usually do on Sundays. It should be a great day! 

I hope you all have a wonderful Sunday. Thanks, everyone! :)

Happy Easter!

Hey everyone!
I hope you all have had a wonderful Easter weekend!! I can't even explain how special it has been to be able to spend Good Friday and Easter here at Hillsong where my relationship with Christ first began exactly two years go. 

Although it isn't something we should ever get used to, it is always great to be reminded of the incredible sacrifice Christ made for us - to save us, to set us free - so that we could live and walk relationship with Him. Pastor Phil shared this statement during his message: 

"Because of Jesus. You have nothing to prove and everything to live for."  

Do you ever find yourself trying so hard to prove something - to yourself, to others, to God? I do. For me, it comes back the aspect of thinking that I have to be "good enough" that I still struggle with sometimes. It's something that God is constantly working on in me. Just a few days ago, I was out for lunch with a couple of friends and one of them asked me to pray before the meal. I honestly can't remember another time that I have unexpectedly been asked to pray out loud in front of a group of people before. Instead of giving that moment to God, I found myself being so worried about what they were going to think of my prayer. Even while I was praying, I was thinking, "Oh, this sounds terrible. They're probably going to judge me for this." 

My tendency to worry about and over-think everything is such a frustrating part of my personality. It never does anyone any good and only causes more stress. Philippians 4:6 is a verse that I have been focusing on for the last couple of weeks - "Don't worry about anything; instead, pray about everything." 

We don't need to prove anything. We don't need to worry. We just need to rest in Him, walk with Him and let Him take the lead from there. 

Hillsong recently released a beautiful song that tells the story of Jesus. We've been singing it a lot at church over the last couple of weeks. The photo above captures a few of the lyrics. Listen to it here!

Our evening services last night were reserved for baptisms. One of my great friends who also interns in HAF, Norbert, was baptized. It was so amazing to be able to see him take that step in his faith! I absolutely love this photo I was able to capture of him right after he was baptized. Around 200 people total were baptized, and it was such an exciting and encouraging night!

Norbert's roommate, Phil, has also become a really great friend. I should just go ahead and introduce both of them now because I'll likely be mentioning them both a lot as the months go on. Phil is from Ireland and he is also an intern at church. Having friends to walk along this journey with was something I had been praying about a lot before I came here. God sure has answered those prayers!!! 

I also want to quickly mention that I was able to visit the Semester at Sea ship, the MV Explorer, while it was here in Cape Town last week! I hadn't seen the ship since we debarked in Spain two years ago, and it was so surreal being able to step foot on it again. It brought back so many memories and emotions. The photos on the left are just a few of the many I took as I got to take a "tour" of the ship. Although it is sad that this is the last semester that they will be using this ship, I'm so glad that they were able to find a way to keep the program going strong! 

If any of you are interested in reading about my time on Semester at Sea or watching my voyage video, you can do so here: sp13voyagearoundtheworld.blogspot.com

Things here are continuing to go better than I could have expected, and I can't wait to see what God has in store in the coming months!!