Youth and Gladiators

This term with the Pebbles and Rockies (grades 1-6) at church we have been learning about the armour of God in Ephesians 6. Each week the kids were learning so much which was displayed in their recall when answering Lyles questions. Here's an example:

Lyle: why do soldiers wear helmets?"

Ezra (10yrs):"so we are protected from the fiery darts that Satan throws at us"

Lyle: . . . (moving on to ask a younger child who hopefully would respond more simply) This last

Friday we had our last meeting for the term (we're quite excited for our Friday nights over the next 3 weeks!!) and we made the armour of God that we've been learning about. I must say, I have SO much admiration for teachers! We (I) made paper mache helmets, which, due to 2 days of freezing weather and rain I needed to dry in the oven. We started with hair dryers, but it wasn't effective enough.

In the midst of blowing up balloons, Steve (our parrot) was a little jumpy. At one point he flew off his perch, only to land beak-first on the floor and break it (his beak not the floor)! THANKFULLY it was only about a millimetre so it didn't stop him from eating and he was absolutely fine. I did take him to the vet the next day and the vet cut it off and Steve's fine. However, in the same afternoon, one of the balloons (on which the paper mache helmet's were being made) popped! Steve FREAKED, he jumped/fell off his perch, landed in the middle of the balloons, (keep in mind that a blown up balloon is the same size as an African Grey parrot...) and with wings lifted high was squawking madly at all the evil balloons...now if he's ever making too much noise and we feel irritated with him, we blow up a balloon and he 'growls' then remains silent. It's quite hilarious.

SO back to Friday evening. Lyle rented some Roman armour and the kids were so impressed. I have to admit he did look quite similar to Gladiators actors.

Yes, that is a brush on his helmet...

Colouring the breastplates of righteousness

Ezra and Harley Rose posing in almost all their gear

Wearing the complete armour of God
(that's tin foil on their feet for shoes)

Baby photos

This is our little peanut upside down. This was our 9 week scan. it was SO exciting to hear the heartbeat.

My first belly shot! not a lot happening I know!
It was taken Thursday, August 7


Friday, August 29


This was last Saturday, September 6
(I have to admit I ate a big meal, so I'm sure that part of it is food and part is baby) :)

Hillcrest Baptist Church Camp 2008!

We went to El Olam (about 45 mins away...in the cold direction, which ever that is) to our annual church camp this weekend. It was delightfully refreshing. Lyle and I borrowed a tent (much to the frown of Vicky, for making his pregnant wife camp in a tent when there were dorms a-plenty!! (thanks for the support, Vix!) Below is the view from the campsite, it was very beautiful!


Mike Abendroth was our speaker. He studied at TMS so we (mostly being myself, Lyle, Clint and Kim) were SUPER excited to have a speaker who we had some connections with! He was very dynamic and gave some excellent talks. We did a race through, Ecclesiates, Ephesians and Hebrews (my FAVOURITE book of all time) and they were a fantastic overview of the power of God's word. Lyle does the CD ministry and usually there are about 8-10 orders for CD's of Clint's sermons. From camp, there were 75!! So I won't be seeing much of Lyle this week!

Mike in action

Mike is blurry in this picture . . .because he tends to move . . .a lot!

Vicky and I led music, which I really love doing. It is such a blessing to be up the front listening to the congregation worshiping the Lord. It was fun to have a good sing too, I'm usually doing piano (we used guitars on camp) and I can't seem to coordinate singing and piano-ing just yet!

Myself with Kim and Noah. Kim and I are due to have our babies at the same time!
I love this pic because it's proof that Noah likes me, but honestly, he's such an awesome kid he likes everyone!

Some of our gorgeous youth girls, Jamie, Laurie (sisters, as if you couldn't already tell) and Angelica.
Jake lost a tooth on the trampoline
Then he lost two! (but I think he pulled hard on the second one for the money!)

In other news . . .

We're going to be a daddy and mummy!

Baby Wetherston is expected at the end of February 2009.

Debate is still open as to whether it will play for the Wallabies or Springboks . . .

Cornerstone Retreat

This past weekend we went away to the Draakensberg for our Cornerstone (young adults) retreat. We have a short term missions team (STM) out from Grace Community Church at the moment and they came along to keep things lively. We also had some of the young adults from Joel James' church in Pretoria, and some folk from Hope Valley join us. It was such a blessing to have our little group expanded by some more brothers and sisters who love the Lord.

Trevor Peacock (he was the STM leader and is studying at TMS) gave us some awesome messages. I was really blessed with his talks on Ephesians 6, the warfare we're in and the armour of God. I don't think I've ever heard a sermon on it (well, not since I heard it in Sunday school) and it was really refreshing to be reminded of how well we are equipped by the Lord to live in today's world and fight the enemy at every turn.

myself with Michelle and Jill

We stayed at a Scripture Union campsite called Glenhaven. It was so beautiful, but the temperature went down to -8 (celsius) overnight!!

During our free time we played some 'bonding' games!

most of which seemed to leave us in hysterics

catching Michelle was easy, she's only short :)

Andrew on the other hand, all 6 feet and 10 inches of him,
proved to be a little more challenging

The farmer on the other side of the river was doing some burning.It was amazing to see the hillside go up in about 2 minutes.

We did some archery

(Lyle and I were better at posing that hitting the targets)

I don't think we discovered any amazing hidden talent, but it was a lot of fun
(you can see the hillside in the background still burning a few hours later)

Some inside games were just plain confusing to me...

(I still don't know how the cards stick on peoples heads...)

Group photo!

The Wallabies were playing the Boks on the saturday... unfortunately we didn't have a TV. we did however find a radio station...but it was in Afrikaans....so my only hints of how we were doing consisted of the boys frowning, the commentators saying the Aussie players names, and the cheer in the background on the broadcast....all I have to say is

"Aussie Aussie Aussie, oi oi oi!!!" :)

(and to say THANK YOU Samma for my wallabies scarf, it went down a treat!!)

Photo's from our US trip

RESOLVED

Rachel (Mixon who we stayed with) and myself

CJ Mahaney

Rick Holland Steve Lawson

The Speakers who blessed us so much!

CJ Mahaney, Steve Lawson, Rick Holland, John MacArthur, John Piper, Randy Alcorn

The Stage (yes, it felt a little like a rock concert)

LAKE TAHOE
The view!

View from the mountain "Heavenly"

I love that you can see snow in the background and it's summer!

Lyle with his cousins Tyler and Kristy

Michael and Lyle outside the Mixons apartment

(they saw a Shelby parked out the front and couldn't resist posing!)

LONDON

(our impromtu day trip on the way home)

Mark, our tour guide

(and friend of Lyle's from highschool)

Big Ben at 12:00

Westminster Abbey (My favourite)

Buckingham Palace

(the flag is up, so the Queen was home!)

Home again, home again

We're home again! Our trip to the States was an amazing blessing! We arrived home last wednesday (and yes, it's taken us about this long to recover from jetlag!)

The Resolved conference was amazing. The theme was Heaven and Hell. The Lord was so gracious to change my perspective and help me understand more His sovereign control of His world. I often over the years, have battled with understanding God being loving and kind, yet allowing the existence of Hell. I think in my finite compassion I have created my own justice mentality, and as much as I have accepted that God does send people to Hell, I don't like it. Listening to John Piper one evening at the conference the Lord helped me understand more clearly the reality of Hell echoing God's grace. If there was no reality of Hell, and no understanding of our being so utterly deserving of it, then we would not understand the amazing, overwhelming, indescribable power of His grace in our lives to not let us go to there! He has lovingly chosen me to be a light unto the world and an undeserving object of His mercy and grace. It really is inconceivable, and draws my heart to praise Him for His goodness to me.

We were also blessed to go to Lake Tahoe, to visit Lyle's Aunt and her fiance who live there. I also met Tyler and Kristy, Lyle's cousins. After Tahoe we went back to LA and spent more time with Michael and Rachel who graciously hosted us for our time over there.

Donovan Drew is Kerry's brother (Kerry is at HBC) and he also went to high school with Lyle. He was married on the 22nd of June and we were so thankful to be present! The photo below are all the South Africans (well, minus Kim and myself I suppose...lets say all the HBCers) who were over in the USA for Resolved and this was taken at Don and Heather's wedding. It was such a blessing for Lyle and I - our first wedding after our own. It was special to be reminded of our marriage relationship, and a convicting reminder of where we're failing too!!

All in all we had a fantastic trip and are very thankful for the Lord's provision in allowing us to go. I'll post more pictures up soon (we're having a few little computer issues right now!)

And life goes on...

We don't have too much to report from our little home lately.

This week has finally given us something exciting to share! We went to Johannesburg for 3 days for the Shepherds Conference. It was awesome!! Jerry Wragg and Ken Ramey were speakers, they both went to The Master's Seminary in LA where Lyle is planning to study. It was so encouraging for me to see Lyle's excitement as he heard these men talk. I was able to catch up with my friend Michelle who was an RA for me about 12 years ago when I was at college! It was a sweet time of fellowship with old friends and new and we are so thankful that we had the opportunity to go. As far as Jo'burg goes, I do not understand how anyone lives there! it's SO cold. Like, SO cold. I'm sure it was all of 14 degrees...then the sun went behind the clouds!!

Monday week (the 9th) we're going to be flying to LA to head to Palm Springs for the Resolved conference. We're going to hear Piper, MacArthur, CJ Mahaney, Rick Holland, Steve Lawson and Randy Alcorn (I think that's all). Lyle was telling the foundation kids this evening (the teenagers) that we are going and said "We'll be hearing some of the best preachers in the world, I mean it, the BEST preachers in the world". Needless to say we are very excited.

After June we'll have the short term missions team come over from the USA (Grace Community) and we will go on retreat with them. Then in August we have church camp...
I love retreats and camps. It's so great to get out of the typical routine of our weeks, enjoy round the clock fellowship, hear awesome teaching and be generally encouraged by the renewed sense of God's powerful work in His world. I'm seeing already the blessings of being in ministry. These retreats and camps are a particular highlight of that. :)

Birthday Weekend

Last weekend we went away for four days for our birthdays! It was my 30th on the 3rd and Lyle will be 26 on the 12th. We went to Ithala (pronounced ee-taa-lah), a game reserve that is about 5 hours north and inland a little. It was truly awesome to see God’s amazing creation.

Now, game reserves are great…

BUTT…

All the animals seem to want to run away from you! However, we did end up getting some great photos as the days went on. Action shots of animals are difficult when they’re eating and cleaning themselves, but I did my best and these are some “action shots”

an Impala cleaning itself

I was loving the borrowed lens from a mate of Lyle’s too. It was amazing to see some animals just wandering up the road towards you, almost knowing their job was to pose for the tourists!

A little rock dassie
(pronounced dussie - it's an Afrikaans thing)

Kudu
(they make 'biltong'/jerky out of these guys!)

Warthog!! this is the real life Pumba!
Ugly as anything, but still weirdly cute.
When they run their tails stick straight up in the air!






FINALLY on the last day we saw some Rhino,
I was VERY excited!