Cambodia is for Christ

Now I am going to try my best to express the things I've felt and seen in my month in Cambodia but honestly I don't know how I can. So I guess I'll just go week by week and tell you about the things God showed me and the ministries we were blessed to partner with.

Week 1:

We flew into Phoenom Penn on a Thursday and we were fortunate enough to go and work with 2 different ministries on that Friday. Our team of 10 was split into 2 teams, one team went to an orphanage and the other went to a hospital. I was with the team that went to the hospital where we served by cleaning. God is so amazing, and I am so blessed to have been healed before this trip to Cambodia. In one of the rooms though there was a man who suffered with some kind of illness that made his muscles tight and contort into uncomfortable positions. He was supposed to be moved and massaged once an hour but because of the business in the atmosphere I don't know if that actually happens. With my knowledge from my fibromyalgia I knew how to massage knots in the body. I was able to sit with this an for an hour and massage the knots in his body. A tool I never thought would be useful in Cambodia let alone day 1. 

We were able to go to a Cambodian Christian Church that Sunday which was so amazing. There was so much revival and enthusiasm for The Lord and his teachings. They sang this beautiful song called Cambodia is for Christ and I wept the entire time. It was there that we started to see the revival that is happening in Cambodia.

Week 2:

This week we worked with Destiny Rescue, an organization who rescues women and children from the sex trade then empowers them and helps them by providing counseling, safe housing, education and a job to learn a new skill. With them we were able to go to Kampong Cham and visit one of their safe houses and see where some of the girls work. From their we headed to Siem Reip where we worked with another house of women. During this time it really sparked my passion of speaking identity into young women. While in Siem Reip we were able to go and prayer walk through the monkey temple as well as ankor wat. 

Monkey temple.

Ankor Wat.

Week 3:

After that travel filled week we took a 3hr bus ride up to Battambang where we would start the next 9 days with an amazing ministry. We worked with a ministry called Crossing Cambodia. There ministry was so cool, everyday at 6am they go and pick up (sometimes physically out of their beds) a group of their student who are street kids ages 3-12 and bring them to their facility. There the kids 6-12 can have showers, breakfast, and clean clothes before heading off to the school they're enrolled in just down the road. They come home for lunch and homework time then go back to school until 3pm. Their on facility they also have a preschool for the little ones where they also get to shower, eat, and get clean clothes before they start their schooling. Then at 4pm they all pile into the truck to head back to their homes. I got to go one afternoon and drop them off at their homes and it was the most heart breaking things I've ever done. You literally drop these children off at corners alone where no one comes to pick them up, or busy landmarks where they will be begging later that night. Some of the kids live in an abandoned railway station with lots of other poverty ridden families. When we went and dropped them off one of the boys who is the smallest and only 3 years old just started wandering the streets with no one to pick him up. That tore my heart to shreds and probably one of the hardest moments on this outreach.

 

During our time with Crossing Cambodia we did many random different tasks. We lead bible studies, prepared lesson plans, taught music to the older kids and teachers, and painted rooms and murals. During this 9 days I was able to teach one of the teachers ukulele so she could play for the preschoolers. Another thing I never pictured myself doing in Cambodia! My favorite memory of that time was painting a mural with a close friend for Crossings based on their theme for the year. Peace. It was so fun and beautiful to see The Lord through these tasks.

Week 4:

From Battambang we took a 6hr bus ride back too Phoenom Penn where we headed to a local village about an hour and half outside of the city for our last 9 days. There we did manual labor, taught English, lead bible studies, and one evening had a kids program. One thing that was really fun during that time is we got to have one on ones with some of the older kids who wanted to practice their English. At first there were only a couple then soon other villages heard there were white people and came to have practice their English as well. By the end there were more people wanting one on ones then we had people to give them. We were able to love on and create relationships with these amazing students. It was such a blessing being able to encourage these young people in their faith or tell them about Jesus for the first time.

It's so hard to describe my time In Cambodia because it truly was like nothing else. Cambodia is on the brink of revival and it was so amazing to see that and witness it for myself. God is so faithful.

Ready, Here we come!

These last 2.5 weeks seem like a complete blur. We attended Easterfest, tore down Easterfest, had a week and a half of lectures and now here we sending off 4 teams for outreach. 

Easterfest was amazing. I got to see some of my closest friends perform originals as well as see Switchfoot rock the main stage. It was so cool to see people from all over the world come together and celebrate Jesus. Everywhere you looked people were praying, prophesying, and just loving on one another. It was beautiful and I feel so blessed to be apart of the process.

I can't believe I leave for Cambodia in 2 days. I'm so excited to be able to love on the people in that country. Here's our good looking team:

Please continue to pray for strength, energy, and opportunities for my team as we head out to spread Gods love!

Easterfest!!

This week we started set up for EASTERFEST! Woo!!! It was so fun and filled with so many different kinds of jobs. We set up tents, built stages, spread sand, put up fences. It was so fun, and really brings the crew together. 

One thing I never in a million years I never thought I'd be doing in Australia is sewing! For the last week I've been sewing oversized pillows to sit on for one of the concert venues. Here's a picture of just a small amount of the pillows Sierra and I have sewn. 

On Saturday Team Cambodia got together and went out to lunch and coffee together. We leave in 24 days. Look at how cute we are!

Love you all, thank you for support!

Spiritual Warfare and Gods provision

This last few weeks have been unreal. Gods provision truly came in in a way I can't even explain, like I'm still processing.

We started last week with lectures on spiritual warfare. We had a pastor from a local church come talk who has started a ministry regularding spiritual warfare. It was super interesting hearing his stories of things he's encountered and how real evil spirits are. 

That Friday we did a really cool thing as a school. Written on a board in front of us was a list of peoples named and the $ amount due still for school fees and outreach. Over $37,000 dollars was needed, $3,300 of that was myself. What we did was for an hour we played worship music and just worshipped God as a school for an hour. During that time if God placed it on your heart to give to someone on the board you wrote down their name and amount on a piece of paper and put it in a pot. As the pot was filled a leader would go and change the numbers on the board of fees in front of us. In one hour we raised over $27,000!!!! 3 of my fellow classmates came forward and made me FULLY FUNDED!! I am fully funded!! GOD IS SO GOOD!!! I am so so so blessed by everyone supporting me financially and emotionally back home and here on this base. I can't even express to you how much I LOVE these people here.

This week we had an amazing musician from New Zealand come and speak with us about what it's like doing music as missions. Strahan Coleman (seriously look him up!) is not only a talented musicianary but also an amazing teacher.

Here are some of the things I learned:

- The parts that we don't love about ourselves, God made and He loves.

- Spiritual Gifts aren't for you they're for others

-Just like seeds need water to grow, we need the Holy Spirit to grow

- Emotional fragility is our best tool in writing songs

- Who you are is the greatest tool in music

So this week I forgot to take pictures... So here's these!!

This is where I love writing songs. 

This is my friend Austin! My YWAM family is the best ❤️

Evangelism, koalas, relationships oh my!

Guys, boy oh boy has it been a cool couple of weeks!

Last week our lecture topic was evangelism. Something that is so out of my comfort zone. It was cool to learn more about what evangelism means and how it is apart of our everyday life. 

On that Friday we went into town as a school to evangelize over the city and the place where Easterfest ( Australia's Biggest Christian Music Festival ) is going to be held. My friend Tyler and I headed out to a local park to spread joy and love, I would be lieing if I said I wasn't freakibg out a little. But it was fun! We played with some kids and prayed over the land and it was so fun. Then we met a really nice guy named Tom he was on his lunch break from work and we asked if we could pray for him. Turns out he is also a Christian and was going to go with his friends to evangelize over the city like we were over the weekend. We encouraged him and prayed with him and he gave me his contact information. When I got home I emailed him and encouraged him. He emailed me back and told me how he'd been asking God to pop up in his everyday life, and that we were an answer to his prayers. So cool!

Then we went to dreamworld and the beach as a school for a field trip! The beach was so warm and beautiful! At dreamworld I got to hold a koala, his name was Lincoln, AND I got to feed a kangaroo!! I almost cried. 

This week was on relationships. We started the week with family relationships, then friendships, spouces, and your relationship with God. Just bein honest it was a big week an I'm still processing a lot of it.

Last night we had family night and did a scavenger hunt and had a baby bonfire together as a community. So fun and I love all these people very much. 

I would like to ask for prayer for financing. I still have money I need to raise before outreach (45 days). Our God is faithful, and I know he will provide in His timing and not my own but it never hurts to have others covering it in prayer along with me.

http://www.youcaring.com/mission-trip-fundraiser/support-christa-s-ywam-adventure/196566

Or message me to learn how to donate through New Hope Church.

Holy Spirit Come

As we continue through the weeks of lecture each one continues to work in everyone's life. This week has really blown my mind, but I think I say that every week.

Monday we had the honor of having an amazing organization, Destiny Rescue, come and talk to us about the amazing things they are doing in Thailand and Cambodia. This organization is amazing. They go and they rescue children out if the sex trade and take them to a safe home where they gain counseling, education, and most important Jesus. We will be working with this organization for a chunk of our trip in Cambodia. Since 2011 they have rescued more than 1,000+ children and are looking to have rescued more than 100,000 children by 2020. I am so excited to be partnering with this organization to continue to fight for and with these children. As a team of 11, we are filled with people from 7 different nationalities! Woo!

  Here's a picture of team Cambodia:

The rest of the weeks lectures were focused on the Holy Spirit. It's not often you get someone so on fire about the Holy Spirit like our speaker Kristen is. He taught us so much about listening to the Holy Spirit but also into more depth on spiritual gifts. That was my favorite part of the week, being able to dive in and learn more about the spiritual gifts in detail. I feel much more confident now in my spiritual gifts now that I understand them, or know that this is not something just in my mind.

This weekend we're all taking it easy here on base as we wait for a storm to pass over. Its a good time to relax and recoup before we head into evangelism this coming week.

Outreach, Prayer, and Healings

This is the start of week 3 here in the beautiful land of Australia. 

Here's a summary of week 2:  

We had the privilege of another wonderful speaker, Gwendi, talking about Biblical World View. She showed us all of the different ways that the bible is supported through ancient artifacts, how to ask questions and find answers in the bible, and overall how to fall more in love with the bible. On the last day of lectures we were able to pray for Gwendi as a class, turns out she also has chronic pain. We were able to talk after class and say what things help us with our pain. It's always such a nice feeling to be able to talk with someone who just gets it. What it feels like, the frustrations, and the limitations. Since coming to Australia my pain has been expenentially worse than at home and that has been really hard for me to adapt too. Also, I'm going to CAMBODIA FOR OUTREACH!! #cambrodia

Okay so today is Wednesday here in Australia and God is so good! Monday I got a chance to sit down with this weeks new speaker and asks her a bunch of questions. She is a huge believer in healings and that is something I have never experienced or seen and is not really talked about that often. Yesterday (Tuesday), we had a time of worship. We are worshipping when one of our head leaders (Landon) comes on the mic and says he really feels like there needs to be healing in this place and for those in pain to raise their hands. Probably a handful of us raised our hands and the leaders and students came around us and started praying for us. What I didn't realize is that healings were happening all around me. One kid dislocated his shoulder the night before and as they prayed he took off the sling and raised his arms above his head.  While they're praying for me my body feels like a thermometer, the pain going down through my spine to my hips and feet. When it reached my hips everything below it started to feel like cement. It was a pain like I'd never felt before. After this I went outside with my outreach leader and just cried because the pain was so unbearably high and she told me Jesus really did want to heal my fibromyalgia but he also wanted to heal my heart. 

After that we went into our first lecture of the day. As I sat there trying to focus, all I could think about was my pain and how high it was getting, like my body was being filled back up with pain. When we broke for Morning Tea (yes that's a thing) Landon came outside with me and we prayed again. This time we prayed over my feet in particular and just like that the pain was full force an it felt like it was trying to burst out of my feet. Landon and I are both telling the pain to leave and just like that NO PAIN. Shock and tears rolled in and we just hugged and thanked God over and over. After I was able to go in front of the school and proclaim HEALING! What?! Yes. Not a dry eye in the place we rejoiced and praised God for this gift. Guys, I HAVE NO FIBROMYALGIA!!! God is good.

Last night I went for a full blown run with no pain. I am in such awe of god and his glory. This is a picture!

I am still raising support if you feel called to helping with my schooling and my mission to Cambodia!!

https://www.youcaring.com/mission-trip-fundraiser/support-christa-s-ywam-adventure/196566