After saying good-bye to our camp brothers and sisters in Christ and especially our friends from Calvary and Faith Baptist Churches, Ben and his group headed down to Wangaratta to check in at our caravan park and Missionary Zacharias and his group (Dr. Cirone, Josh, and Karina) headed back to Melbourne city. During Saturday evening from 6:00-9:00 pm, Team “Ben” had a great time ministering to the teen/young adult group at Rose City Baptist Church (in Benalla) as well as to Pastor and Mrs. Honeychurch. While this took place, Team “Zacharias” spent about 8 hours driving the Calvary Baptist young adults back home and returned to the caravan park around 10:30 pm without incident (driving in the rural parts of Australia after dark is quite dangerous due to kangaroos and other wildlife). One neat blessing is that Monique (one of the campers from Wodonga) was able to stay overnight at our caravan park as the girls had extra room.
During their time at Rose City Baptist Church after eating dinner together, the team shared their testimonies, provided special music, and played some games. A good time was had by all as it was great spending some additional quality time with the Rose City Baptist Church young adult group after our camp. Once Team Zacharias returned to the caravan park, we all went out driving into the country so that we could stargaze into the dark winter sky.
On Sunday morning, we again had the opportunity to minister to Rose City Baptist Church where we not only shared a couple of testimonies (Karina and Josh), special music, and a little about our 2023 summer missions trip, but Chris had the opportunity to preach reminding us from Ephesians 6 about the importance of our Christian armor. (Insert: It has been so great having Ben Jackey traveling with us as he not only led the singing this Sunday morning, but has greatly helped us in our singing endeavors. He will surely be missed as the team has grown to love and appreciate him!) After the morning service, we had a wonderful church lunch, wonderful fellowship, and a special musical item of How Great Thou Art sung by three lovely little girls. We so much appreciated Rose City Baptist Church and the many years of friendship we’ve had with Pastor and Mrs. Honeychurch.
After lunch, we headed across the country roads for 2 hours toward Bendigo where we had the opportunity to minister to Golden City Baptist Church and Pastor Allan Mitchell. It was a blessing meeting Pastor Mitchell and his young adults at camp as we were thankful for the opportunity to sing special music, share a testimony, and have Missionary Zacharias preach. After the service, they had a lovely supper planned for us and as you can see, it was quite delightful. While driving across the country side from Benalla to Bendigo, the team was treated to a field of kangaroos, many fields of sheep, and beautiful silo art in Colbinabbin. After leaving Bendigo around 8:00 pm, we headed back to the Melbourne Airport area so that we would be ready to fly out on Monday morning to catch our flight to Sydney. Overall, it was a busy week as we had many opportunities to serve and see our team use their gifts and talents for the glory of God.
One prayer request that the team would appreciate is that due to the intensity of our first week ministries (along with the consistent cold and rainy weather), several on the team have been under the weather (btw–that’s not good to say in Australia, but you know what we mean!) and could use some extra prayers for extra strength. Nonetheless, we claim what Paul said in Galatians 6:9, “And let us not be weary in well doing: for in due season we shall reap, if we faint not.” Amen, and Amen!
With Much Appreciation,
Team Australia
