Signs, signs everywhere...I have been going through a series entitled "Road signs in the Bible". We looked at the "one way" sign where Jesus says that He is the only way to the Father. Then we looked at the "do not enter" sign where we talked about dealing with and resisting temptation. We looked at the "detour ahead" sign where we talked about times in our life when we seem to go down a different path than what we planned. This week, I will try to encourage everyone to stay on the path and run the race to completion with the "no U-turn" message. I plan my series topics well in advance and never really know what to expect when I start writing them. This series took a surprising twist and has focused much on the life of Joseph (from the OT). How he was able to handle the temptation from Potiphar's wife and then all of the detours that he faced and yet was able to still trust in his God. My life is much different than his but I think I have gained more from this series than many of my congregation. It's funny how God does that sometimes. I have heard of preaching to the choir, but what do you call it when the the preacher is preaching to the preacher... hmm!

Things are going well at the moment and we are beginning to feel the coolness of the nights as summer has officially ended. Today is our day to relax and it will be spent cleaning our house (it is easier said than done with two small kids) and spending time together at home. School goes back tomorrow for term 2 and so things will seem to be "normal" again.

The past week has been the first week of School Holidays here in Australia. It is hard to believe that term one is already over. As quickly as term one has flown so has Kids Club and Youth Group. We had our Kids Club Awards night for Term 1. All the children who attended to get their sashes had perfect attendance! Isn't that unbelievable! It excites me to know that they have so much fun being there that they come every week. I and the children have learned so many cool lessons about the fruit of the Spirit, about being Strong and Courageous about our faith, and about sharing our faith. The children sang three songs for their parents and we really did have a good time rewarding them for their work and effort. We also had one student, Thereza memorize the books of the NT and earned a Hands On Bible. (The Bible challenge is one we ran last year, and have promised that we will keep it running for the time being because our kids need Bibles in their hands that they can take home and be reading with their families!)
Term One is also always slow on attendance and we graduated 5 children to youth group. However, we have already had three families contact us and say they would like their children to participate during Term 2. So, I look forward to the next term! Please pray that people in the community would learn of Kids Club. And, that we would be overwhelmed with Children. For Once I have extra teachers! As I pray, please pray with me that next term we would have 4 children for every teacher,(20!)