Mission Aroha 2007

Chinaland

2007-05-12T19:27:00.000+12:00

Well hello again!
Here we are!!!! China......
It's been a while since u seen us on here, but here are some pics of what we've been up to around the asialand........enjoy

Wow, snow!! I know, it was a total surprise to me too! Weren't expecting that! It was awesome how we didn't fully plan much but God is our guide and set us up with interesting stuff to see all along the way. Very exciting to get to go up into some mountains. Crazy huge beautiful, dizzying. This is us at 4000m above sea level, up near Tibet somewhere. Within 2 weeks we went from 40 degrees celcius in Thailand to -10 in China.

This is a pretty normal sight in China, people will take anything on their bike, we saw washing machines, TVs, huge crazy loads of all sorts of stuff and on push-bikes too!

We visited a Lisu village up a mountain near the Myanmar border. This is Benji teaching some villagers about how to raise pigs! We also taught them wicked cool emroidery skills

This is the village we stayed in and in the distance you can see the town we walked from to get there. Super remote and a total different world to anything I have ever seen or imagined. Awesome to experience village life in China!

Francie and our Lisu Nana

Feeding time. Yeehaa potatoes!!!!!!!!

And on a different note the (frequently fed to us) chicken milkshake. Definition = a whole chicken, head, feet, guts and all shoved in a blender or in this case pummelled with a sharp knife.

Delightful Chinese quisine: how about some marinated chicken feet for a yummy treat from the dairy?

The 4 of us in the Shangri-la area. Stunning and super-hard-to-believe-it's-real scenery and crazy high mountains everywhere! Made my eyes spin.

Tiger leaping Gorge

Instructions for finding the treasure......o arrrrrr

Us after a bit of a treck down and up the side of the gorge - my body hated me for it! But was incredable. Benji got a big kick out of seeing the huge killer rapids in the river which is really famous but I forgot it's name woops.....

Snow on the way to Deqin near the Tibetan Autonomous area

At 4000m again!!! Quite the exciting day for us all

Some great Engrish skills. Love it!

A yak feasting on some noodles. Man they're cute! In this place we stayed for a while they just wander aimlessly all over the main road and anywhere most of the day. It's funny as. I never quite managed to sneak a photo of me with one, gutted. But lucky, not one of them managed to poo on me, or the laptop, yay.

Beautiful mountain view from outside our rooms!

A Happy man.

And then the 4 of us going maybe a little kookoo in the excitement of heading back to Thailand. Yeaaaaaaaaaaa!
Love you guys! Post us some nice messages ok?? Love to hear from y'all. Peace out. Miriam

Thailand

2007-03-07T21:31:00.001+13:00

Hey everyone! Welcome to the Thailand post!

................some more photos from our adventures...............

sorry they not in order i'm a little unco at this...

The team at the English camp with Natalie, a kiwi girl who joined us for around 10 days and she's a beautiful legend!!!! We couldn't have survived camp without her, plus we had lots of bonding and happy together.

Miriam's group of kiddies preparing for a play. Go shivery blue winter! Yay!

Hmmm poor boy Moon getting eaten.......

O hey how about a McRice burger for a yummy junk food treat???

Ooooooooo Tim with a thai lady standing on his behind

Awwww Tim was a total natural with the kids

Us in action!!!!!! A whole week of this..........

2 gorgeous ladies we met on the island..............o arrrr

O happy

Go Engrish!!!!

Mmmmmmmm some delightful Thai food....and sand.....this is pretty much an exception tho

Stoked about your meal there yea Benji????

Sunrise in Bangkok

Our first rain!!!!! A very exciting moment in our lives.....we almost even got a teensy bit cold, what a treat!!!!

The team with Dorothy, a beautiful Scottish lady who helped out at camp. She's an awesome translator and always in for some silly and a good giggle. Go Dorothy!!!!!

Benji and his buddy Nui at camp. What a cutey

The whole camp team!!! Check out benjis pretty flowers

*****------------------------------------------------------------------------------*****

The 1st ministry we visited was 'Nite-Lite'. They go out into the red-light districts of Bangkok and build friendships with women in prostitution. The Nite-Lite Team provides a jewellery making business for the women they meet out in the streets, to allow them an alternative to prostitution and still maintain an income. The business share's the gospel with them at work. Recently they had 10 ladies declare their faith in Jesus Christ by getting baptised a couple of weeks ago. An awesome ministry. We went out with the team on an outreach night and saw huge smiles from the women they have built relationships with. The ministry is growing very fast and expansion is on the way. Exciting stuff.

This is some of the jewellery they produce and export all over the world.

We had a couple of days rest/retreat on an island, south of Bangkok, by the name of 'Koh Samet'.

We found these 2 hansom guys from New Zealand on the boat while we were heading there.......................yeah

An island retreat is not complete without a fire dance!!!!

Yep, it was horrible.

One of the days, the missionary's of Bangkok gathered for a meeting at the OMF Base. Our job was to look after their kids for the day. We had a ball of a time.....laxing out, drawing Pokemon, watching a couple of movies, awesome. KOFFING go!!!!!!

I ripped out a couple of Ben Folds & Keith Green songs on this Yamaha Upright.......had to be done.

These are the families of missionary's currently serving under OMF in Bangkok. 7 fam's in all. They come from all over the world: Germany, Australia, Canada & Singapore.

A Thai dancer.......

This Thai lady is playing an instrument I have never seen before, it's like taking all the key's, hammer's and board's off a piano, shrinking it, lying it down, then getting 2 dowel sticks, and glueing 2 piano hammer's to them, then hitting the strings randomly. Yes, I'm ignorant. :P

We visited a disabled orphanage in our travels. It was amazing. We had a great time with the kids, singing & playing, shining as much of Jesus as poss, into their lives. This particular disabled orphanage is run by a Christian organisation called CCD. They took us to the government run disabled orphanage also which a lot of CCD staff volunteer at. Very sad to see so many kids abandoned, but awesome seeing so many trying to help all these kids out. It's a tough job. We had a half-day there and we were stuffed by the end of it.

Miriam with one of the little kippa's.

This photo was taken just before we left. Awesome team there, they have lots of dreams and visions to expand this ministry also.

We visited a primary school with one of the missionary's we were staying with (Kim & Mary Robertson). We assisted Kim in teaching a bit of English to groups of kids as well as an English song called 'Children' produced by the great 'Tom Green'. You can see the lyrics written up on the chalk board and the ratings on how well each group of students sung it. :D

Here's Benji showing a few of the boys a good pose to impress the girls with.

They had some talent up their sleeves also, so they sung us some songs too. It was a SING-OFF! (Then David Bowie walked in........''''''let's sing''''''') The guy in green danced for us while the others sung....double-threat guy.

Happy times. Nice group photo of a couple of the classes that we spend time with. You can also see Kim on the left there wearing a yellow T-Shirt just above my guitar case. They love having photos. :)

- To be continued.............

South Korea

2007-02-23T20:06:00.000+13:00

Hi some more action from the team, a bit from our last nigth at SMS, the airport and more of South Korea. TOYS!!

Happy.

Chilling at ferry terminal Picton.

Darren and the team, at River Valley, Darren and River Valley we love you, thanks for the sweet deal and a great time on the water.

Frances with Miriam and her Excel mates.

My Old Man is one of my best mates, I love you Dad!!!

Happy.

The girls at Snow Planet, our final outing before take off.

The Boys at Snow Planet. Boys and their "TOYS!!!"

I love my Mum too!!! The last time we saw the crew at the airport.

The plane, I watched Twister and Jumanji.

Us getting ripped off at Bangkok airport.

This young lady's pretty keen on Tim, we all love her, it's Michelle our awesome local guide, she has helped us out big time. She's the first one to make it onto our non-kiwi friends of Mission Aroha, Hall of Fame.

Another great hook up this family let us have free accommodation in a mint apartment right in town, thank you Lord and thank you to these guys too.

Us with all our gear boarding the sub way, the sub way is very user friendly.

This church is at a grave yard for missionaries, it's pretty inspiring to walk through the grave yard and see all the peole that gave their lives to plant the seed of the gospel in this land.

It's kind of weird they wrap up a lot of their trees to keep them warm. Yeah?

This is a replica Palace, when the Japanese invaded they burnt the original one down and built a big government building in its place. When the Koreans kicked the Japanese out they tore down the new building and built this replica of the old Palace.

Happy.

This is the apartment of the Korean Pastor, Pastor Paik who has helped tremendously with the organisation of our stay in South Korea. The little red lights are crosses on top of churches.

A scabby looking, deep fried egg, food can be interesting.

Korean beef, beautiful, that's more like it!!!

The brown brick building is Yoido Full Gospel Church, the biggest church in the world. They have 833,000 members, they grow at a rate of around 100 a day!!! Being around these people really inspires you to dream bigger, to dream the impossible.

This is prayer mountain, 6 miles from the border of North and South Korea, when we got there, these soldiers were just passing through. It's compulsory for all males to do two years military service. Their neighbours North Korea aren't generally very friendly.

A slightly better view of prayer mountain, check out the busses. If you were wondering how could Yoido Full Gospel grow so big, here's why. They have at least 3,000 people praying here a day. There are way more busses and cars that you can't see in these photos, these people are hungry for God, and this is just one of many prayer mountains in South Korea. Also a pleasant graveyard in the foreground.

Again there's way more cars and busses you can't see, hey, we can set up a prayer mountain in New Zealand, oh yeah, most of those busses are packed full of people with even the aisles full of people standing, what a massive commitment to prayer, no wonder this year is the celebration for a 100 years of revival.

And when they pray they go hard!!! They also have prayer services in just about every church, morning, noon and evening, the 5am prayer service is alive fiery and packed out, like 70 plus people.

Prayer Dog.

Beautiful! Heaps of frosts goin on, we've had frosts everyday. It was -3 degrees celsius when we flew into Seoul.

Choose one. Making you better feeling.

Hear this, this is a message for the church, for us all, "Prayer creates a deep rooted unsatiable desire for evangelism." That's my quote. So as well as quality and quantity prayer, they do a lot of evangelism in many ways. This is us with the main church we've been hanging out with, they go down town at 10am and 3pm just about every day for evangelism. 40% of this nation are practicing Christians and it's on the rise.

That's it from me for a bit, we've had incredible internet hook ups in South Korea- broad band everywhere, don't know what the rest of the trip will be like, fly out of here on Monday the 26th. Love you guys, p.s we've been praying heaps too!!! We're getting more and more hungry for God and it's great.

Hey there everyone!!!! Miriam here.............................. here are some lovely photos from our first few days in South Korea.......

Frances eating rice and red bean cake...YUM. A special Chinese new year treat given to us by a lady at church. The food they feed us is definately interesting.

We spotted this dog on our first night in Seoul. So cute! but strange....it could walk on it's hind legs. The dogs here are all pretty and small and nice hehehe

Our first dinner in Korea. Steak Pizza!!!! We ordered it thinking it had steak on it but it turned out that the base was made of steak. And by steak I think they mean giant over processed meat pattie. Tasted fine.

Traditional Korean dinner with some of our new friends.... Kenneth + Elizabeth - Americans who have been looking after us... what a Godsend!!!! They are taking us out somewhere tomorrow and also on saturday are going to arrange for us to visit the north Korea border and the Seoul tower... exciting!!!! And Michelle our Korean friend. She's gorgeous and has been showing us around the city a lot and teaching us what we need to know like how to use the subway system yeehaa!!

The four of us at Yoido full gospel church yesterday. The largest church in the world they have 800,000 people and actully see the power of God for real working through them. Was really overwhelming for me but gave me a lot to think about and a lot to aim towards..... On Wednesday we are going to a village of theirs which has people praying constantly so I think we will stay the night and see how it all works and pray like all day and all night or something?! Can't wait to observe the Christians in action!

Random yes. I took this photo at a subway station....I think its instructions incase of a terrorist gassing attack, you have to shove a bag over your head and it filters the air??? I found it pretty funny ya

There are tonnes of weird English things everywhere that don't make perfect sense!! This is the name of a really expensive looking restaurant in Seoul.

Ahhhh one of my favourite things about Korea. Beds don't seem to exist but its ok because the floors are heated!!!! Best invention ever cos its really freezing outside and we just come home to our apartment and sleep on the floor on top of a duvet. So incredibly comforting and cosy and I love it.

God has hooked us up amazingly with accommodation and people to look after us!!! We arrived having no idea where we would be staying, but some people had arranged for us to stay in an apartment which normally gets used by missionaries. Its in an expensive part of town and is really comfy, although chairs don't exist here either much to Benji and Tims dismay!!! Arrr.

This photo was also on our first night in Korea, we went for a little wander in our neighbourhood and discovered that there seems to be a church on almost every block here. I'm not exaggerating!!!! You can really tell that God is here in this country in such a massiver way than in New Zealand. The streets feel safe at night and everyone is really friendly. I don't know but the atmosphere is just happy and calm and peaceful......... hard to exprain

Ok guys thats it from me for now..... love you all to pieces!!!!

Journal Entries

2007-02-23T20:05:00.000+13:00

21st May 07........
I have a dream. I dream to be the woman God created me to be. Pure, free, beautiful, honest, courageous, strong, gentle, vulnerable, real, broken.

August ’06…
I’ve been in tears for days. I don’t know what’s going on...
I am hiding me, stifling me, I am doing it for myself so I won’t be vulnerable, so no-one can hurt me, they will punch me, kick me down, they will wreck what’s beautiful if they see me, if they see what’s ugly of me they will reject me. I want to conform, but don’t. Long to be beautiful, a free spirit with no shoes and pretty dresses. Able to help others heal, embrace my brokenness, make it ok to be broken, a screw up with a head full of mess of chaos. Want to know Jesus, know my own heart and Jesus’ heart. To be vulnerable to the world, soft but with steel innards made of Jesus Christ and his grace. Unswaying, broken more and more, exposed and revealed to myself and to everyone. To scream that it is ok to be sick and in need of a doctor. Healed and conscious of my healing. Able to guide others to God to be rescued, fixed, smashed and put back together.

March ’07…
I woke up feeling like rubbish. As soon as I was looked in the eye I broke and cried. I sobbed for hours, cried myself to sleep, woke up and cried more. I truly had no idea why I was crying or what was happening. Later I stumbled on a chance which, if I would be brave enough to take hold of it, could allow me to learn why my tears exist and examine my very soul.

So I dived in and began a journey of following my tears upstream into the headwaters of me. I began to discover…

There is a little girl in a white dress with barefeet trapped inside me. She has been shut down, stifled, buried, hidden, lost for years. Layers of sin, shame, guilt, fear, rejection and lies have bound her and shut her away from the world. She has forgotten how to speak. She cannot break through the walls that have been put up around her and have grown weathered and tough. She longs to be free, to be out in the open, to be able to run and dance. To be free to express who she is, her beauty, who she was originally created to be. To be released from the things that have hidden her – things meant to protect but in reality have kept her from living life. She cannot speak, so she cries. She cries because she is desperate for me to hear. Some days she screams, she is worn out from living in this suffocated heart. I have heard her cry many times. I have heard her and felt her pain but didn’t understand what she meant. If I ever saw a glimpse of her I didn’t want her to be shown because it would be too difficult and too risky. I didn’t want to hear her crying because it would be painful and hard to understand. She has been crying for so long to remind me that she is still in me; she hasn’t disappeared despite the layers hiding her. She is real, she is beautiful, and if she were set free she would blossom, to live a life of passion and adventure walking hand in hand with Jesus.
Today I stumbled across a place where the little girl became distraught and I could not suppress her. I was faced with a challenge. A challenge to be brave enough to dig up and expose the things which have trapped her. I rose to the challenge and I dared to unlock the first door on the inside of the broken, tormented heart which surrounds the little girl. I reached in and unlocked the door on the innermost wall enclosing her.
More layers of walls and doors remain to be faced, unlocked, smashed down and melted, but this first one is open and the girl inside is free to explore. Restoration is on its way. She is a step closer to pure, holy, beautiful freedom today.

Some words from God…

“The spirit of the sovereign Lord is upon me, because the Lord has appointed me to bring good news to the poor. He has sent me to comfort the brokenhearted and to announce that captives will be released and prisoners will be freed. He has sent me to tell those who mourn that the time of the Lord’s favour has come, and with it, the day of God’s anger against their enemies. To all who mourn in Israel, he will give beauty for ashes, joy instead of mourning, praise instead of despair. For the Lord has planted them like strong and graceful oaks for his own glory…Instead of shame and dishonour, you will inherit a double portion of prosperity and everlasting joy…I am overwhelmed with joy in the Lord my God! For he has dressed me with the clothing of salvation and draped me in a robe of righteousness. I am like a bride with her jewels.” Isaiah 61:1-3,7,10

“The winter is past, and the rain is over and gone. The flowers are springing up, and the time of singing birds has come, even the cooing of turtledoves. The fig trees are budding, and the grapevines are in blossom. How delicious they smell! Yes, spring is here! Arise, my beloved, my fair one, and come away.” Song of songs 2:11-13

“And you can’t take credit for this; it is a gift from God. Salvation is not a reward for the good things we have done, so none of us can boast about it.” Ephesians 2:8+9

~Then the time came when the risk it took
To remain tight in a bud was more painful
Than the risk it took to blossom~

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The day we left New Zealand.

Time to Fly!!! 15.02.07

It has come to pass. Over two and a half years have passed since it's conception, but this day, this long awaited day has finally come to pass. I don't believe that any of us have truly, truly come to grasp the significance of this day.

Not only is this day the culmination of daring to dream, prayer, planning, intense work, the stirring of the Holy Spirit and the hand of God in motion. This is the beginnings of a move of God, such as we cannot conceive, this day that lies before us has been flowing from the mouths of the prophets for decades, God is coming! God is coming! God is coming!

So, so often the journey to the fruition of a dream is just as important as the fruition of the dream itself.

The journey to where I now stand would have been impossible without an impossible dream, and this dream would not be coming to pass if it were not for the God of the impossible.

Along this road of dreams I have been truly transformed, I have discovered God more than I've ever known before, radically, dramatically, mightily encountered God! God himself the creator of the heavens and the earth and all that is in them. I have heard his voice and in faith have obeyed regardless of the consequence. By faith I walked as Daniel into the lions den, and by God's faithfulness I rode those lions right out of the lions den.

I give all glory and honour to my Holy, Holy, Holy God! With all that I am I worship my God my creator, for his breathtaking faithfulness. For his Holiness, his love, his power and again his faithfulness, for his grace and mercy and exceeding goodness and greatness. All glory and honour to my King!!!

Again my God has whispered into my soul, he said to me "This day, stake your claim on the future!!!" What will I ask for? I will ask for this whole world, this whole world for Jesus. I will proclaim the greatness of my God in all the earth!!!

Benji

Walk Like Enoch Walked

23.03.07

In South Korea there has been a mighty revival, when missionaries first came to this land, they were martyred. But by their blood the seed of faith was sown into this land. This nation is now 40% christian.I have been to the biggest church in the world. I have been to the Yoido Full Gospel Prayer Mountain, where at least 3,000 people come to pray a day. What is so fantastic about that?

The fantastic thing is that I have seen a visionary, actually more than a visionary a revolutionary in action. Doctor Pastor David Yonggi Cho is but one man, but he has been able to stir the hearts of hundreds of thousands, the hearts of millions!!! One man. Just one man, but he has shaped world history. He has lived the impossible, he has known God and he has made God known. He has sought the heart of God passionately, he is like Enoch, who walked with God. He spends at least three hours in prayer a day. But he is not alone, his people have layed hands on the batten also, together as a people they pursue God. The active Body of Christ in South Korea is 40% of the total population and still they cry out to God for revival. To be filled more and more with the Holy Spirit.

Never underestimate the power of one!!! So often the multitudes are just waiting for one, for one to rise up, to model a new way, to lead them. In our nation, who will rise up?
Will we stumble, will we falter? I stand challenged in the face of such an example, will I dare to model a new way? Would you dare to model a new way? Will we dare to stir the multitudes? Call them to a life they have never known? Will we dare to dream that our people, the people of dry bones can be resurrected, covered with flesh and sinew and filled with the breath of life? If we will dare to dream this, that our people can be brought to life in Christ, resurrected by the Gospel of Jesus Christ, if we will dare to dream this, our God can make it so.

With all that I am I will dream, I will dream that my people, the dry bones can become a vast army that takes the Gospel of Jesus Christ to all nations!!!

I will model a hunger for God that will shake a nation. I will pursue the heart of God relentlessly, in my life time I will know God and make him known!!! My consequence will be eternal. I will rise up, even now I cry out to this nation, rise up!!! I challenge you!!! I challenge this nation to seek the heart of God as we have never known before, to cry out to God , that he would rent the heavens and come down!!!

To pray, to cry out, to howl and wail, to scream, weep, fast and seek the heart of God until he comes and transforms us so mightily, that we might be used to transform our nation.

2 Chronicles 7:14

"if my people who are called by my name will humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then will I hear from heaven and will forgive their sins and will heal their land."

Come with me on this journey toward an impossible dream, lay hold of the batten with me, dream with me, walk with me and work with me. Join me as I pray, cry, howl and wail. Join me as I scream and weep and fast and seek the heart of God until he comes!!! Join me as I walk by faith, hearing the voice of God and obeying, regardless of consequence.

We can do this, just as South Korea has been transformed. This is a long journey, I give my life to this dream. Come with me!!! I challenge you to join me, sacrifice your whole life to this dream, the dream of our nation, our nation of dry bones becoming a vast army, taking the Gospel of Jesus Christ to all nations. Like Enoch let's walk with God. I cry out, "Come with me!!!"

Benji

Yoido Full Gospel, the biggest church in the world, 833,000 members, growing at a rate of around 100 a day!!!

The Mission Aroha team at Yoido Full Gospel. Would you like to be a member of this chruch? Well it'll cost you, not money but a committment to Jesus, that's right there is a cost for membership, you don't just sign something, you have to make a committment to pray for at least an hour a day and read five chapters from the Bible a day. Oh and when it comes to tithing they give 10% of their gross income, pretty much every single one of them. Huge cost of membership and the outcome? Amazing results, a nation transformed, impossible dreams are dreamed and those impossible dreams come to pass.

Prayer Mountain.

Prayer Mountain, it's not even a weekend or a busy day, these people are addicted to prayer.

24.02.07

Dear diary,

I really, really, really love Becky Abbott.

Benji

Team Building

2007-02-07T16:47:00.001+13:00

It was fun.

Benji the pirate eating a super sausage in Hokitika

Girlies swimming at Mossburn pool

Benji and his lake

The four of us at the very beginning of our journey - at Geraldine

Miliam in one of the rare moments of actually standing while moving on a snowboard at snowplanet in Auckey

O arrrrr Auckland International Airport

The team and sneaky Donny

Rafting the Rangitikei

Fish face

Mission Aroha 2007

2006-11-14T09:56:00.000+13:00

Our world, this world we live in, is consumed by tragedies, unspeakable tragedies, climatic expressions of chain reactions of evil. I just watched a documentary on Myanmar, previously known as Burma, in, which a distraught man shared that the Burmese army had burned his children alive.

As you read this, a genocide is unfolding, in our day in Darfur. 500 New Zealanders reach a place of such desperation and hopelessness each year that they take their lives. We know. We’ve heard about tragedy after tragedy. Crime statistics are on the rise, murder, rape, abuse. Families in our nation, we as a nation are facing moral bankruptcy. We have become a nation of the abused and broken hearted.

In the midst of this, would you dare to dream with me? In the face of evil, in the midst of darkness, would you dream with me?

I dream an impossible dream. The dream of prophets, of fools, the dream of crazy men and revolutionaries. If you dream with me you will be laughed at, misunderstood, you may give your life to a dream whose fruition you never live to see. I see the day that God comes for this nation. I see the day when the Bride of Christ in this nation is so holy and so hungry for the presence of God, that God can’t help but come. Like a flood, like a thunderstorm, like a hurricane, a tsunami, like wild fire. With love and power and vision as we have never imagined, thought possible or ever dared to dream. I see the day when God transforms this nation, redeeming the abused and healing the broken hearted, by the millions. Dream with me.

In beginning the adventure toward the fruition of this impossible dream, I have discovered that so often the journey’s we take in pursuit of our dreams are just as important as the fruition of the dreams themselves. A transformation takes place in us as we walk the road of our dreams, the greater the dream, the greater the transformation. Mission Aroha is both, a dream and a journey. In the two and a half years I have walked toward the coming to pass of this vision, I have transformed exponentially. In the short term, Mission Aroha is the pinnacle of my personal dreams that have come to pass, in the long term, Mission Aroha is a journey that is shaping me, forging me for the days that lie before us. Mission Aroha is a dream inside a dream. It is the day of small beginnings, an opening chapter, in one of the epics of our time. Dream with me.

This journey that we as a team are undertaking, over five months will take us to places where this impossible dream has become a reality, it will take us to places of great darkness. We will find ourselves in places, which are like an oasis of love, light, truth and life in the midst of a dessert of hate, darkness, lies and death. We go because there is hope. The message that we bare, the gospel of Jesus Christ is the hope of this world. The gospel of Jesus Christ is the hope of this world, and it is the hope for our nation, for our people, for New Zealand, for Aotearoa. We go baring the gospel of Jesus Christ to this world and to our nation, dreaming of and believing in the impossible, that God can transform an entire nation, redeeming the abused and healing the broken hearted, by the millions. Dream with me!!!

I have been humbled, blessed, made speechless and felt so loved that it has been hard to sleep by the support and generosity that I myself, and our team have received. The encouraging words, the hospitality, the financial support, the prayer and above all the aroha and friendship that have been lavished upon us, have brought us this far and made this outrageous dream, our reality. I want to express a deep thankfulness to you all, from the very depths of who I am. I thank the living God, the creator of the heavens, the earth, the seas and all that is in them, for his amazing holiness, love, faithfulness and power. All glory and honour to our Holy God.

God Bless and Love Always,
Benji Alexander.
ICAC Manapouri