Two Wonderful Weeks with the Wang Family

Meet the Wang Family... Emily, Andrew and eight-year-old Shirley.   They are solid members of Journey Church. They love God and are anxious to bring others to know and follow Him.  Not sure of the names of those 2 guys in the background. 

Emily is a homemaker and loves to have house guests. You can find her chopping and cooking or reading at any time of the day. Cooking and learning are her passions. She also volunteers at Shirley's school 2 afternoons per week.  The food has been delicious and nutritious.  She is a beautiful, warm person who cares deeply about others and prays faithfully.  She is teaching in the pre-school class at Journey once a month.

Andrew is a research Chemist currently working at Griffith University.  He is full of personality. He is a great husband and father.  He does the dishes after every meal and will not accept help from anyone.  Says he likes the feeling of accomplishment.  He has a great since of humor and is Shirley's best bud.

Shirley is in year 3 at Pacific Pines Primary School.  She  loves to read and write and would rather learn that play.  She has seen few movies and never played a video game, yet somehow she is still able to live. 

She just started learning the violin and has mastered "Mary Had A Little Lamb" and  "Hot Cross Buns"

After school every day she does lessons in Chinese and loves the challenge.  She is never bored, because there is always something to be learned.  She is a great writer and someday plans to be an author and a veterinarian. 

She likes to play with friends....

Walks to school in the rain without complaining...

Keeps a tidy room, making the bed meticulously and caring for her dirty clothes.

This is my room while I am here.  Very comfortable with artwork above the bed by, none other than Shirley!

We have had a fabulous time getting to know each other; teaching Chinese customs and western traditions.  We listen well to each other and the language barrier has been minimal.  Each day we share stories and learn more about each others backgrounds and families.  They are now part of my family and will remain so.  It is hard to believe that in such a short time my family has grown so much. I will be leaving behind some amazing people, yet taking with me the richest memories.
Thank you, Lord, for this amazing experience and these amazing people.

If Jesus Had Lived In A Rain Forest...

If Jesus had lived in a rain forest the parable of the sower found in Luke 8 would have had a different twist.  I think he would have talked about the seeds of the Strangler Fig that were placed, by birds, in the crevices near the tops of other trees. The seeds would stretch to reach the sun that would never make its way to the floor of the forest due to the lush canopy overhead.  As they grew upward they would also send down roots on the outside of the host tree until eventually they would find the rich soil they needed to sustain a long and healthy life.

But there is more to this story than survival. As the Strangler Fig sends down its roots, they actually choke the life out of the host tree.  Eventually there is no trace of the original tree and all that remains are the columns of roots, completely hollow in the center, yet strong and tall and full of life.

As I saw these trees in the rain forest here in Australia I kept thinking of the lessons to be learned from the Strangler Fig.  At first I thought about how, when allowed to find a home within our lives, sin will easily take up residency and what seems so harmless in the beginning (just a tiny seed) becomes deadly, destroying our very soul. We have all seen it happen. I am seeing it in the lives of some families that attended Journey Church in the past, but have allowed sin to dominate their lives and are now nothing more than empty people living empty lives.












From another perspective I could see something beautiful happening. Something that I want so desperately in my own life.  Something Paul talked about.  I want to die to self and the desires of the flesh. I want to realize how insignificant I truly am. I want to decrease so that Christ might increase.  I want to let go of life so that I might be transformed into a new creation.  I want people to see Jesus alive and well and not be able to see Jackie at all.  What I have to offer alone is worthless, but when I am completely enveloped in His will I am strong, capable and ready to go where He wants me to go and be who He needs me to be.

12 Days In Paradise

Waterfall flowing through the Natural Arch 

I think it has been obvious to all that my first 6 weeks in Australia have been filled with amazing sights and wonderful people.  The arrival of my hubby made it a true paradise. He rented a car and had no trouble driving with the steering wheel on the right and our lane on the left.  We traveled as far north as the southern tip of the Great Barrier Reef and enjoyed snorkeling around Lady Musgrave Island. We went into the hinterlands and enjoyed the natural arch and the waterfalls. Australia Zoo took us up close to the kangaroos and koalas (yes that is a real koala in his arms) and we visited the light house in Byron Bay in New South Wales.  

He is back home now but we have dozens of pictures and memories to last a lifetime. 

God is so Good!

The view from Best Of All Lookout of New South Wales all the way to the coast

One of many friendly kangaroos at the Australia Zoo

Snuggling a live koala at Australia Zoo

On Lady Musgrave Island, Great Barrier Reef

Waterfall somewhere near Springbrook Mt. One of several beautiful sights.

A Walk In The Garden

A week ago the pre-school class at Journey Church colored a picture of the Serpent in the Tree of Knowledge enticing Eve with the fruit.  That is always the way the picture looks, no matter the curriculum. Satan is in the tree tempting Eve to have a bite.  This morning, however, as I read Genesis 3 my mind’s eye saw a picture of a cunning creature walking and talking with Eve in the periphery of the garden; the places where Eve’s daily life would normally take her. She knew to stay away from the center of the garden where the forbidden fruit grew. Her relationship with God was strong and she had no desire to disobey Him.  The Tempter had to come to her. 

I picture Satan visiting her in the safest part of the Garden, having small talk, building a comfortable relationship, before he began to attack the good and proper thinking that God had established in her.  God had surely warned her that she must listen to His voice alone, lest she be drawn to a place of certain peril. But Satan, being the crafty one, knew he had to convince her that he was her friend; a comfortable fellow with which she could easily relax; a comrade who could be trusted.

As I work with the people of Journey Church, these new followers of Christ, I see people who love walking with God in the cool of the Garden. They are happy with the new relationship they have with Him, yet there are times in their week when they struggle to see the Tempter as evil, because he has walked with them long enough to have built a relationship with them. They readily hear his voice and easily turn to see what he is saying. They do not see the danger, because they are in the Garden where they walk with God.

 “Did God really say, ‘You must not eat from any tree in the garden’?” asks Satan.  He takes a bite of the forbidden fruit in front of her, looking alive and quite well.  “You will not die…You will be like God,” says he, as juice drips from the corner of his mouth, smiling at the sweetness of the harmless looking fruit. 

What I am observing here in Australia are common temptations that bring about the death of a beautiful and innocent relationship with God. It is the temptation of a relationship that is unwholesome, the fire of unbridled anger, the self-centered spirit that refuses to “prefer one another in love,” the lure of the bottle to settle the troubled spirit at the end of a difficult day, the call of just one more ‘need’  that interferes with much needed family time, the unforgiving attitude that keeps couples looking back to what was rather than looking forward to what can be. 

My new friends are young in their faith. They are receptive to someone holding up that x-ray machine so they can see that the beguiling temptations that lure them are, at the core, merely a crafty enemy seeking to destroy their new found faith.  They listen. They hear. They ponder the options. Sometimes they turn away from the center of the garden where the forbidden fruit grows and sometimes they slip back in and take another bite.  But now they have been told. They have tasted the sweeter fruit of walking with God in the garden of life and, for most of them there is repentance and restoration.

I guess people are much the same… no matter the hemisphere they call home.  Please continue to pray for these beautiful people who have become my dear friends. Pray that they will see that sin never pays what temptation offers.  Pray that I will lead effectively with wisdom and love.  Pray that their particular temptation will be less and less enticing and they will enjoy those quiet walks with God in the garden.