It’s funny the things that we ignore when under pressure or stressed. I unintentionally dropped the ball with my blog as I thinned out my thinking space – and then it blew out to a few months!
Thankfully for me I’m neither married nor dating and get to sort this kind of thing out early, because I can imagine under stress I’d probably make some horrible errors in that area. Something for me to think about!

What kind of stuff do you neglect when under pressure?

So the other day I gave you an update on our flyering efforts during orientation week.

Well the whole Uni Fellowship Committee have turned into Avatars with many MANY dragons. And those funny horses.

Today after our 7:30am committee meeting, we headed onto Sandy Bay campus – (first time since Monday) – to give out our info to any new student studying Arts. Arts at UTAS, and I suspect everywhere else, is large, so large in fact that they split Arts orientation days down the middle according to surname. So today as the floodgates opened and the students piled in the Committee and staff opened fire. Aaron reckons we got 90% of the students.

And they are back to do it tomorrow!

Please be praying that as students begin their year, they might be curious enough to come along to our weekly lunchtime meetings on ‘The Christian Worldview’ or our evening meetings for awesome community pump up! And please pray that they come back and become curious about Jesus and Salvation.

Around the place Luke Hansard was doing his awesomeness today as well. He’s been doing it all week, just saw him for the first time today. Good times. Pray for him too.

You should comment on Luke’s blog, he will be encouraged and maybe write another blog post.

It’s orientation week at Uni this week – no, not O-week, but orientation week. That’s the one that doesn’t (yet) include alcohol in exorbitant proportions.

So, our aim this week is to attend all compulsory first year student sessions and hand out information for University Fellowship of Christians’ weekly and monthly gatherings.

Flyering I always found scary or confronting, but there is something different to flyering a campus to flyering town, and there is something different to flyering as a graduate than as a student. All of which make it much more enjoyable and pleasant.

What has really rocked is that so far in the two sessions we’ve been to, we’ve been able to direct students toward their lecture room or give them vital information. It’s really good, and I think the students appreciate it too.

Edit: Plus Mikey is a mighty Avatar of flyering. With a dragon. He flyers whilst riding the dragon. Really bold, and that helps heaps. He even goes to speak to lecturers to see if we can come in before the lecture begins to hand out flyers. Great stuff!

Come tomorrow, I’ll officially be a housemate.
I’m moving out for the first time to live with with an awesome bunch of dudes from Wellspring..

But although they are all awesome, I’m certain it won’t be without it’s challenges.

So, as my first post in the saga of Coolabah Rd, can you give me tips on being a good housemate?

1. The main vibe of the conference was one of “We’re still working this out” – I thought that was awesome, it invited discussion, rather than dividing between those who had ‘made it’ and those who hadn’t. I wasn’t really expecting it to be any different, but it was encouraging to have this confirmed.
2. Often at conferences like this, the main speaker dudes are a bit inaccessible. This wasn’t the case at ITC, although I didn’t talk with everyone who got behind the mic, I did speak to Al and Andrew, had a chat with Tim, just generally didn’t feel ‘the divide’. Hopefully it remains that intimate. It was good.
3. We didn’t walk away with a formula, or a predetermined action plan, but instead a vision. I’m not sure how it was for the people going through assessments, but at various points during the conference there were definitely opportunities to take heed of big questions we should be asking before starting on the path of church planting.
4. A good mix of people at different points of their endeavours – it’s great to see that people who had already planted found it valuable to take part in something like In The Chute, obviously with an intention of both learning and sharing.
5. I didn’t really understand what Jim Wallace talked about on the Saturday night, a lot of the corporate and army speak that just went over my head. I wasn’t convinced it was to helpful, maybe that’s why I didn’t get it.
6. The elective sessions although excellent in content felt much like the rest of the conference itself, I’m not sure whether the organisers envisioned them to be something a bit different.
7. Would have been good to hear a bit more from Al preaching the word. In a conference like this, you can never have enough bible based encouragement
8. The final day was my favourite, where we heard some more ‘church planter in the raw’. The “Weeping Daves” as Mikey called them, they spoke of massive grace in their weaknesses and their opposition and pain. I found this the most encouraging session too. A lot of the conference I was catching myself thinking ‘How on earth will I manage to do this?’. That final session was both a comfort and a grounder reminding me that I don’t have to manage it, but God has it under control
9. The issue of pride came up a lot, along with sound biblical advice. I appreciated that as it’s a big issue for me.
10. Other ‘controversial’ issues, when raised, were treated with respect and good Biblical instruction

All in all it was fantastic. I loved every second of it (except maybe the saturday night session) and I look forward to dragging others along with me next year!

The Geneva Push isn’t a Sydney Anglican thing, nor is it just a Sydney thing. It’s for all of Australia. Tassie has a good representation actually, being 6 or 7 of us here. That being said, the place is full of Sydney people, and Moore College is a name that has probably by now been spoken by 80% of the attendees here.
I don’t find that discouraging, I think it’s encouraging. I am glad to see that Sydney evangelicalism has fired up many people for the Gospel being preached into new areas and into new contexts. But the risk is that where the ethos is very evangelical, it’s naturally going to draw in far more sydneysiders and then look very sydney. I would suggest that it’s something that TGP is going to have to wear for some time, while the network grows. I don’t think there is any way to avoid it.

[I've cut some stuff from the middle here for now, cause it looks like it's gonna be addressed in the next session ]

Solo time is hard to find. A lot of the people attending seem to be extroverts and highly energetic people, maybe it’s not an issue for them, but between sessions and meal breaks there is not much time to find to spend alone in prayer or to spend time reflecting. It’s pretty intense here, and fast paced. I know that I need to take time out to digest, but feel kind of guilty about it when I do. Maybe it comes out of the drive to connect to one another, and build up those friendships in such a short time. On the flip side, I think it is good though that there isn’t a mass of dead time. If the organisers were going to err on one side or the other, keeping the pace is definitely the better of the two.

This is all rather finicky, I’m certainly having a great time here, and much effort has gone into the organisation of the conference, and it’s certainly a privilege and blessing to be able to attend and spend time with these amazing people.

Sydney public transport both rules and sucks at the same time.
They have awesome websites that are integrated across the transport mediums and will tell you the type you need to catch to your destination, and the exact times they leave, and even if they are on time for the day or not. They have clearly signed bus stops and colour coded systems so you might be able to tell at a distance what’s happening. All these things serve the local very well – but to be given such precise information comes with a false sense of security. Turn up and look at the bus colour and realise you needed to prepay a ticket, and then look at the list of places to buy a ticket and realise you don’t know where any of those places are, and when you do turn up at those places to buy a ticket and the seller can’t tell you how many sections you need to pay for, you have a problem.

Thankfully, I solved my dilemma in 15 minutes, but it did involve 4 blocks and a lot of running with a pack, as I ran from booth to booth to find information. I made it onto the bus, and thanks to iPhone and google maps, managed to get off at the right stop to head up to Collaroy centre where we’re holding the Geneva Push conference. I’ll be dropping in my first impressions later, but it’s off to day two of the conference for now.

Update: I am also officially the owner of a pair of thongs. Of the common foot wearing variety. Because of this, I am very encouraged.
Also, yesterday, amongst other things, I went to the Apple Store on George St in Sydney, to buy a new battery for my laptop, which has in the past few months come to the conclusion it no longer needs to function to any great degree, and will die unexpectantly if low on charge. I bought my battery, and literally gave the guy NO information about myself, none whatsoever, no id, no name giving, nothing, zip. 200 metres down the road, my Mobile Me (apple email) account beeps on my phone to tell me I have a new email. It was a digital receipt for what I had just bought.
I dunno how they did it, if they found my phone searching the network, mined some information about me and from there discerned my info on their system or what, but it freaked me out. go figure!

Sunday night I managed to walk into Sydney Central YHA and find myself a room, couldn’t get the cheapest one possible, unfortunately they were all booked out, so I forked out $40 for a 6 bed room, with only 4 people in it, so turned out to be really good.

I was bunking with a Belgian fellow named Ghem (“Jim”) and a French-Canadian guy, so they kept speaking French all the time, but Ghem was real pumped to work on his English as well, so we had a great chat just about his Australian experience and where he wants to go. He wants to come to Tassie to work in fruit picking or manual labour – in Belgium he was a personal trainer.
The Hostel environment is so weird – everyone there has a similar way of life, so there is a comradeship about the way people interact, but no one knows one another, and will not get to know others beyond superficial stuff unless they live in the same room. The exception is across gender lines, people will get to know others outside their room if they are of a different sex. Not surprising really..

So, I made it to Sydney, with a few hiccups. I left my glasses at home, and had to turn around to pick them up. We only got 50 metres down the road, but I managed to spill coffee on my pants in the u-turn. Nick and I, committed to the coffee cause, were driving to the airport, coffee cup in hand. It was awesome. (Don’t ask the mechanics of that, except to know that it wasn’t strictly legal) Anyway..

Mikey Lynch and I came to a realisation we were catching the same flight this morning before we left, which was wack. When we arrived, we caught the train out to Newtown and hung out with Nick and Bron, an awesome couple, really friendly and full of conversation and ideas. I finally could put a face to the names I’d been hearing! It was awesome fun hanging out with those guys, discovering the area where Moore College is, meeting Maisy their bub and visiting a well good cafe called Shenkin for lunch. Excellent coffee and food. Nick is getting tips from the main Barista dude there for coffee making, so it’s a real local. Nick and Bron are coming back to Hobart next year, and Nick is going through The Geneva Push church planting assessment. The intend to plant a church in Glenochy/Nth Suburbs. I think that’s awesome. They are awesome.

After that, I caught the train back to Central Sydney, went for a wander to re-aquaint myself with my second favourite city and now, I’m sitting in McDonalds, resting my feet, and blogging. I love Sydney.

Tomorrow I head to In the Chute, gonna rock.

..to dip my toe in the world of Church Planting.

I’ll be heading to the first Geneva Push conference, it’s called ‘In The Chute’ – I’ll give you some updates if I can, but check out Mikey’s blog as well. He’s begun writing about the coffee he’ll have BEFORE the conference.

I’m pretty keen for this, get to hear a million awesome things and get excited about church planting. The speakers are local (mainly) and varied, the conference is not too long, but I’m sure it will be intense. And I get to hang out with and meet a lot of committed Godly men and women who are pumped to get the Gospel into every dark corner of Australia. Nothing better to get me revved up for campus work next year!
Check out the Geneva Push website here.

After that I’ll be hanging out in sydney for 5 days, visiting churches and meeting people I don’t even know yet to talk about their MTS apprenticeship experiences, hopefully finding myself some decent backpacker accommodation and generally relaxing with coffee and music.

I reckon I’ll write some more of my Symphonic tone poem*, and learn some Greek, hopefully knock over a book too while I’m there.
Gonna be GREAT!

*I studied classical composition, in my final year I started something far too big to handle, based on a painting I discovered in Sydney during my second year. Now I’m on holidays, and I can return to see the painting, I’m hoping I’ll have some time and inspiration to work further on it.