Australia Day

Yesterday was Australia Day (January 26). Daniel, Kris, and I hosted a BBQ for our neighbors. And just as Daniel suspected, not a single one was Australian. We asked them all to bring a dish from their home country so we could celebrate the multi-ethnic culture here. We had twelve join us, ranging in origin from central America to Africa, to central Asia to east Asia...and America and Australia. I made a very American dish - my mom's cheesy potato casserole. Very fatty, and very delicious.

Everyone who had come said they had wished for a long time that there would be a sense of community within our complex, but nothing had been organized, so they were thankful that we reached out to them. Pray that these relationships would continue to develop into strong and open relationships, and that God's love would become evident to them not just in our loving actions toward them, but in Truth that we profess to them.

In the evening we headed to the city...to Southbank. Southbank is a park on the south side of the river, just across from downtown. They have created a manmade beach for people to swim in, and have bbq pits, and even a ferris wheel. We joined thousands of others to watch the Australia Day fireworks celebration display over the river. Here are some photos from the night:

South bank beach at night overlooking the city

 

Ferris wheel at southbank

Here's the view of the city from where we watched the fireworks..

Here are some fireworks...oooooohhhhh...aaahhhhhhh.

And some more.

And here's me after...smiling...because I like fireworks, and other types of explosions (that's probably why I like watching Mythbusters). And because downtown Brisbane is gorgeous at night! As you can tell from my photo.

Well that's good for now. More to come later.

Travel Advertures

Today is January 16, 2010. We (Emily and I) arrived in Brisbane on the 14 after two "exciting" adventures:

Adventure #1. We flew Minneapolis to Chicago to San Fransisco to Sydney to Brisbane. (I don't recommend that, try doing Minneapolis to LAX to Brisy if you can). We boarded the flight in Chicago right on time but were nervous as we knew that our layover in San Fran was just an hour long (not much for getting on the big international flight in a different terminal).

As we sat on the plane an announcement came over the speaker, "This is your captain speaking. It looks like we are going to have to sit on the tarmac for a few minutes before taking off."  A few minutes turned into about 75 minutes. There went our layover time! We were able to make up about 30 minutes flying time so that we landed in San Fran just 15 minutes before our flight to Sydney.

Before landing the pilot asked everyone to stay seated who wasn't flying to Sydney...Praise the Lord for that! So Emily and I and 7 others grabbed our stuff and hauled ourselves into the terminal. Picture us with 3 young families and an elderly couple sprinting with our luggage through the halls of San Fran Int. It was lovely. Although it didn't seem lovely as I realized that the other 8 were depending on me to make it to the gate first and make sure they held the flight. After a solid 15 minutes of sprinting (carrying my bags and wearing loafers) I made it to the gate just as they were preparing to shut the doors. They held the flight for the other passengers and we took off just 5 minutes after the scheduled flight time. Praise the Lord. It did feel a bit like a had a collapsed lung, but graciously the Lord provided that in the midst of the fully booked 747, the one passenger that was a no-show was the seat next to us. So we were able to have an isle on one side and a empty seat on the other. I love my God :)

Adventure #2. Flying from San Fran to Sydney is scheduled to take approximately 14.5 hours. When you're planning on a flight lasting that long, you become so mentally prepared for that timing, that if it goes any longer, the day is entirely ruined...agree? Perhaps you can see where I going with this one. As we watched our location move along the Pacific Ocean on the digital map in between movies we became more and more excited to finally arrive at our destination. At one point I noticed that our little airplane was about half way between Brisbane and Sydney and had only about 90 minutes till landing (Brisy is north of Sydney by about 12 hours by car.) So I nudged Emily to take a look.

But as soon as she did she asked why our plane was headed north west. I looked back up and said, "must be a glitch." But no sooner had I said that then, "This is your captain speaking. Looks like there are high winds over Sydney and we're not comfortable with the amount of fuel we have in case we need to circle over the city a few times. So we're going to take a detour back to Brisbane and refuel. Then we'll be back on course."

That gave me just a flicker of hope that we could get off early and skip our 4th flight entirely! This was a false hope. United does not connect to Brisbane (ever) so they were only allowed to fuel up, we were not allowed to leave the plane, and we still had to fly to Sydney. See the irony? It gets a little better. The delay took just long enough that by the time we reached Sydney, we had actually missed our flight back to Brisbane.

Fortunately, there are flights between Sydney and Brisy multiple times a day and we hit the next flight. So even though we spent nearly 17 hours on one airplane, the day was good. We made it unharmed (with all our luggage) to Brisbane in just a short 30 hours of travel.

I have already had the famous meat pies, fresh mangoes, and grilled meat on the barbie. Tonight we go to a Cricket match.

Prayer:
Nate received his FBI background check and his visa is being processed. Pray that he receives it within a week (that would indeed be a miracle, but our God is Lord over bureaucracies right?)
Pray also for Amanda's support. She is over 70% now, but cannot fly out until at least 90%.
Pray for Nexus, the Aussie all staff conference. It starts Monday. Pray that God would use it to prepare the staff for another year of ministry across this dark country.

May God bless you and give you peace.

The Team

Here's the Aussie team from 2009. Amanda is the first girl on the left. She will be returning with us!

This is all the new STINTers to Australia, and one to New Zealand

This is me, Emily, and Nate. Along with Amanda from the first picture, this is my team!

This is Kris. Kris will be the first ICS (International Campus Staff) at Griffith University. So he won't technically be on my STINT team, but we'll be doing ministry together with him. Praise the Lord! He STINTed in Brisbane before and is now long term staff. He will be very important to our ministry.

Need Prayer

Situation with Nate: One of the millions of requirements for obtaining a 2 year visa to Australia is submitting an FBI background check. For some reason, Nate is still waiting for his. He cannot send in his visa application until he receives this. There are also no expediting processes for Aussie visas, thus Nate's will take the probable time of about 5 weeks. So even if he sent in his application today, he would still not get his visa until the end of January. So we're tossing up a prayer for a miracle. Pray that he gets his FBI background check immediately, and that once he sends in his visa application, he would receive it back within a week. YES, that would certainly be a miracle.

Situation with Amanda: Amanda just got home from Australia a few weeks ago and is still re-raising her financial support. She has her visa, but cannot come until she finishes her support. Please pray that the Lord would encourage the majority of her supporters from last year to continue giving this year, and that she would also find other new supporters to pick up what finances remain.

Pray for Alex, (the Student Life student president) as he begins to plan events with me from a world apart. Pray that the Christians would be given a boldness the likes of which they have never known to share the good news of Jesus all around their campus, their city, and where ever God may take them. Pray that our travel goes smoothly and safely.

May God grant you grace and peace,
Ben