When Was the Last Time....

We have been attending a bible study on Thursday evenings and have walked away every night challenged by what we have talked about. Tonight, we talked about sharing the Lord with others. One of the things that really hit me hard was something said about Jesus' last command given to us, the Great Commission.

18 Then Jesus came to them and said, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me.¹⁹ Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, ²⁰and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.”

-Matthew 28:18-20

The leader of our bible study asked us this question, "When is the last time you made a disciple?" That's a tough question right?! Really think about it... Can you remember the last time you actually made someone a disciple?? Let me ask you another question... Can you remember the last time you shared Christ with someone who doesn't know him? I challenge you to really spend some time thinking about those questions. We don't have the option of picking and choosing which commands from the Bible we want to follow. In Matthew 28, Jesus doesn't say, "If you want to, if you can find the time, try to make disciples." NO! He says GO and because we serve a loving God, He promises us that He will be with us ALWAYS!

Sam and I talked tonight about how we have not had the opportunity to share Christ with most of you. Sure, we have shared with you what the Lord has been doing here in Australia but we haven't ever really talked with most of you about where you are with the Lord. If you can say, right now, that when you die, you know without a doubt in the world, that you will go to heaven, then praise God! But if you are hesitant, or are not sure, then I want to challenge you to ask yourself, why not. What's holding you back from giving your life over to the Lord? We would love to talk to you about this more. If you have any questions or just want to share what the Lord has done in your life, please email us at schwarze12@gmail.com.

Bible Study

Sorry that we have not been updating you lately! As we are discovering our roles more we are becoming much more busy! We have almost every night busy with Bible studies, worship practice and youth group. We are loving getting to know our new church family.

If you received our newsletter, you would've read that we were planning on starting a Bible study with the youth. Well, we had our first meeting yesterday and it went so well! We had 5 students come. We started with a few worship songs. Then, Sean and I shared a bit about our testimonies, how God has brought us here to Australia and the importance of studying God's word in our lives. We then opened it up and asked the students what it is they are needing in their walks with the Lord. They decided that a few topics they want to study are dating/purity and apologetics.

We would like to ask for your prayer as we dive into this Bible study with the youth. We want to make sure that what we are studying in relevant to their lives and what they need at this point. Pray that God would give us wisdom as we prepare these studies and that they students would be challenged and grow through it. If you have any wisdom you would like to share or material that you have used that worked well, we would welcome it greatly :)

Camp and Baptisms

We had an AWESOME time at camp with the high school students. I think it was one of the best things that we could have done to get to know the students. We went camping in a town called Townsville about 9 hours North of where we live now. Since we arrived here, we've been praying that God would show us specifically what ministries he would like us to pour into. Both Sean and I feel very strongly that God is calling us to these students. In the last few months there have been a lot of changes and our Pastor has been filling in as the Youth Pastor. Right now they have Youth Group once a week but no Bible studies for the students. Some of the girls expressed to me that they are desiring to learn more about God's word but they need someone to lead a study. After a lot of prayer, Sean and I feel that God is calling us to start a Bible study for these students. Isn't it neat that God has plans that are different than our own, but they're always better aren't they?? I never thought I'd be working with high school kids. Oh!! and if we came back in February, there wouldn't have been a need for us in this area. Isn't His timing perfect as well?

Here are all of the students at the camp. We drove to the top of a beautiful hill called Castle Hill that over looked Townsville.

Here are a few of the students from our youth group

On Sunday our church was planning on having 3 baptisms after church down at the beach. After Morning Tea, we all headed down to Cooee Bay to witness our friends making a commitment to Christ. On the way down, a new believer was talking to a man in the church and expressed that he wanted to be baptized as well. We were all so excited! They each shared their testimonies and how the Lord had brought them to where they are today. Okay, are you ready for the SUPER COOL part?!?!?! As Pastor Ron was baptizing these 4 people, 2 girls were on holiday, aka vacation, and were watching from their balcony. They turned to their dad and said that they wanted to be baptized as well. They quickly changed and ran down to the beach to talk to Pastor Ron. As everyone was getting ready to leave, our Pastor's wife called us back and told us that there were going to be 2 more baptisms!! The girls shared their testimonies and were baptized. What an awesome Sunday! God is GOOD!

These are the 4 people from our church that got baptized and our Pastor is on the far left.

Here are the 2 girls that came down to be baptized :)

Praise God because He is good!

Adjusting to Our New Home

We've almost been here 2 full weeks and it's been a blast living in a new culture. In a lot of ways Australia and America are similar, but they are different in a lot of ways as well. We are living with a South African family who immigrated here 8 years ago and they have been very helpful in teaching us things we should know about Australia. Sonja has said that our American English is more similar to South African English than Aussie English so she has helped us figure out certain words. Here are a few things that we have learned!

New words:

Jumper = A sweatshirt

Hungry Jacks = Burger King

Heaps = A lot (We had heaps of fun at youth group last night!)

Mackers = McDonald's

Torch = Flashlight

Sunnies = Sunglasses

Tea = Dinner

Cuppa = A cup of coffee or tea (ex. Want a cuppa?)

Ute = Utility vehicle (Like a truck, or anything you can put stuff in the back of)

Yonks = A long time

Other things we've experienced:

The ask if we are Canadian or American when they hear our accent

One girl said we sound like Sesame Street

It's hard to think in Celsius and Kilometers

It's difficult to see cars on the "wrong" side of the road! We'll let you know what it's like when we start driving

Things we've enjoyed trying!

This is Milo and Instant Coffee...Milo is a drink that is good for kids because it has a lot of vitamins and minerals. You can drink it hot or cold and with water or milk. We have it about twice a day. It kind of reminds us of Hot Chocolate. The coffee is different here. It is instant coffee. You heat up water in a kettle and then put 1 scoop of the coffee into the water. It was very strange at first but we've learned to like it. They don't have flavors like we do.

These are Tim Tams aka Sean's new favorite treat! They come in all different flavors. We like dark chocolate and dark chocolate mint. They are like chocolate wafers and the mint ones remind us of thin mints! Delicious!

We went on a 4-5 mile walk today and took pictures of Yeppoon for you to see. Here are a few pictures of where we live:

This is a river that pours into the ocean. When the tide goes out there is hardly any water, but when it comes the water is all the way up to the boats. It fluctuates 9 m a day which is 29.5 ft!!

The yellow arrow shows where we live.

We are leaving tomorrow for a week long camping trip with the high school youth group. Please pray for us as we are on our trip and we look forward to telling you about it when we get back next Friday!

The Body of Christ

Just as a body, though one, has many parts, but all its many parts form one body, so it is with Christ. For we were all baptized by one Spirit so as to form one body...

-1 Corinthians 12:12-13

We have only been here for just under a week, yet it has been amazing to experience the body of Christ through our new church family. We have been blessed over and over again by the people in our church. We have already talked a little about the couple that we are living with. We have no idea what we would have done this first week without them! They are just one of the many people who have showed us what it means to be the body of Christ. Another example came from a couple that we met on Friday. After we met them, they felt God showing them a way to serve Him by letting us have one of their cars for the two years that we are here. Not only that but they want to take care of the insurance on the car as well!! We were absolutely blown away by their generosity and when we thanked them, all he could say was that the thanks belonged only to God for the blessings that He gives us in this life by being obedient to Him.

Praise God for his many blessings. We are looking forward to spending more time with our new church family and learning from them.

We made it!

Hello from Australia!! Yes, we have finally made it here :) We've now been here for 4 full days and have loved every second of it. Right now we are just hanging out on the couch and watching Australian Rules Football (AFL) to relax from the craziness of the last few days. We'll fill you in on the last few days!

Tuesday:

Our Pastor and another man from the church picked us up from the airport and brought us to Yeppoon. We stopped by the church real quick to meet a few people, then they took us to our

new home. We got to meet the couple that we will be living with for the next 2 years. They are so friendly! The house that we live in is 2 stories. The couple lives upstairs and we live downstairs. They have 2 very cute dogs that we get to help take care of :) We have been so

blessed by their generosity and we are enjoying getting to know them. Later that night, a bible

study group met for dinner and we got to chat with them for a bit before we headed down to bed early because we were SO tired.

Wednesday: We slept in a bit and then went shopping with Sonja, the woman that we're living with. She showed us where the grocery store is and all of the places that we need to know. We had lunch at this coffee/sandwich shop. They drink lots of tea and coffee!!! We also discovered that their idea of iced coffee is very different than ours. Theirs has ice cream in it. It was a very delicious surprise :)

Thursday:

Our Pastor and his wife took us on a drive around the area and showed us some of their favorite

places. Sadly, I forgot my camera! Once we get a car, we will have to go exploring and take pictures of some of the beautiful places that we saw! Later that night we went to their house for dinner and got to know their son. We played a game of Mexican train to finish off the night. We really enjoyed getting to know them and we are looking forward to serving with them during the next 2 years.

Friday:

We spent the whole day at the church. The day started with talking to Pastor Ron about what

we'll be doing for the next couple years. We are very excited about what the Lord has in store

for us. There are a lot of very talented musicians at the church and Sean is really looking forward to meeting all of them! We will share more about what we're doing as we sort that out more in the next few weeks. On Friday afternoons they have XLR8 which is for kids between preparatory school and year 7 (aka kindergarten and 7th grade). It's kind of like youth group for younger kids. Sean and I helped out and really enjoyed spending time with the kids. They were so well behaved and a lot of fun! After that, there was youth group for the older students. It started out with a BBQ, followed by devotions and then Gladiator Games. It was adults vs. the kids. I brought my camera to take pictures for you all, but lost it and didn't find it until the end of youth group :( It was a lot of fun though. I think my favorite game was sock wrestling. We both have rug burn though!

Saturday:

This morning our Pastor's son invited us to go out into the bush and take pictures with a group of photographers. It was beautiful! I'm so glad that we went. Here are a few pictures from the morning. I hope you enjoy.

Thank you so much for your prayers. We are truly enjoying our time here and are excited to jump in and start serving!

2 Week Recap

So much has happened in the last 2 weeks!! Let's recap!

1. Received our nomination

2. 2 hours later we got our visa!!!!

3. The next day we bought plane tickets

4. Changed banks

5. Cancelled house services and switched insurance

6. Packed our entire house

7. Had lots of quality friends and family time

8. Mama Rodick came to help pack

9. We packed our house onto a Budget truck

10. Said good-bye to friends and family in Indiana

11. Drove to New Jersey

12. Unpacked the truck and moved it into Mama and Papa Rodick's basement

13. Spent some quality time with Mama and Papa Rodick

There are 3 things left on the to do list:

1. Have our last slice of delicious New Jersey pizza

2. Repack and downsize everything we need into 4 bags and 2 carry-ons

3. Say good-bye and get on the plane!!!!

It's been a good 2 weeks :) Thanks for all of your prayers. We'll talk to you again from Australia! Here are a few pictures from the last few weeks!

The Schwarze family at our good-bye party

Our friends that came to our good-bye party

This is everything we want to bring...now we have to figure out what we need and can bring.

Our truck!

Sean and Papa Rodick moving our furniture into the basement. The stairs were too hard to get down, so they took the furniture down the rock wall. Here they are taking a break!