Praise God

Today Josie and I were praying together and we sang "how great is our God" and "you are welcome Holy Spirit", while she played the guitar. It was beautiful and I felt the deepest peace inside. Afterwards, she could see in the spirit that a radiant white figure had entered the room after we had been worshipping in tongues.

We prayed over Juliet's relationship with her new neighbour in Stirling, who she's been arguing with over the adjacent fence, and over her baby and my mum and my next rental property. Josie could see it in the spirit. She said it is more modern then her place and has a nice garage for my car. Dunno where it is. I am just after a ground floor, secure apartment, relatively close by to mum's house so she can visit me if she needs to, well-ventilated, with built-in cupboards, a good garage, nice landlord and neighbours ... within the next few months I suppose. I guess there's no rush anymore. I'll just take my time and look around... was thinking how nice it would be to rent off someone from church who I know, like maybe one of the older intercessors from prayer group....someone who wants a prayerful tenant.

I am so grateful for Josie, she is such a blessing to me - understands me and where i've come from, is totally in line with me in the spirit. Few people are.

HaPPy Bath Day!

Once again, I organised for the dude from Fleastoppers to come and give my sister's German Shepherds, Luc and Jassy, a delightful bath. As you can see from Luc's massive grin, he thoroughly enjoys his baths. Jassy, on the other hand, is less enthusiastic, though is still appreciative ;-) Haha

Change in scenery

The last three months have been really tough for me. Getting booted outa home by mum was tough, but living with my sister was even tougher. I think I have really gotten to know a side of Jules that I had no idea about. I never knew she worked such long hours and only really used the house to get refreshed and grab a quick meal before heading out to sleep elsewhere.... but as a consequence, her place was no neglected and dirty because of the indoor dogs and cats ... until I came along....

I have no doubt that I dramatically changed the spiritual atmosphere with the hours I spent singing in tongues every time I was cleaning. Hours and hours spent mopping, sweeping, vacuuming, sorting clothes, picking up pet poo, cleaning surfaces, doing dirty washing, sifting though boxes and boxes of rubbish, re-organsing, etc... oh what a busy three months it has been! It tires me just recalling all that I have had to do.

I think it is a miracle that Jules has finally agreed to sell the house. The biggest miracle though is the fact that after kicking me out of home, mum's heart has softened and she is no longer opposed to bible college because she believes it is the reason why I was willing to work such long hours to help Jules out. In just three months I raked up 8,000 km on the car from all the trips going back and forth! Anyway, mum now gives the credit to VLC. She also said last week that I can move back in with her and she will leave me alone to study and pray. Now that is a huge thing, especially seeing three months ago she changed all the locks in her house and told me never to return again!!!!

So last Friday, I packed up everything and moved back. The funny thing is that Josie rang me up out of the blue and told me the Lord had showed her a vision of me packing boxes and told her it was the right time for me to move. I hadn't even told her I had moved!!! God really is watching over me.

Yesterday, mum paid $635 (for four hours) to a removalist to move most of Jules' furniture to her house. The rest was moved today by Grunde to Jules' other place. Mum and I were so exhausted!!! I really feel like I have won some battles. It was a miracle convincing Jules to sell her house, a miracle getting her furniture moved, a miracle that mum is welcoming me back and that her attitude towards Bible college has changed. Jules' place is still very dirty, but at least we have the biggest obstacles out the way. Glory to God.

Tomorrow, I am getting her dogs washed again by the guy from Fleastoppers. Then the next month or so will be spent cleaning before the house is put on the market, and hopefully before I become an aunt!!! Agggghhhh, not long now.

Victorious people

I really like this piccy that Mason took of his care group at college ... clockwise from bottom left, we have Tam (who I work in the bookshop with on Sunday nights), Jo, Sunny, Andrew and Ednab.

Confessions from a child of the Most High God

My sis' baby

Last Tuesday morning, I was just leaving mum's house to drive to the highschool where Brett and I serve breaky to the kids as part of outreach for college, when mum got a frantic call from Jules. She was in immense pain and begged mum to send me to her house to take her to hospital. I sped all the way to Mindarie - it took me about 40 minutes to get there.

She was having contractions and apparently, the baby's head was nearing exit point. Anyway, she had to stay in hospital, where they did a whole lot of scans and examinations. However, the baby has decided to stay put for a little while longer and Jules was allowed to leave hospital yesterday arvo. Everything is going well for the baby. It is really healthy and of normal size.

The Holy Spirit spoke to me on the way home, saying it will live. Mum also said the Holy Spirit spoke to her and said everything about it will be fine, no health complications. Jules also had a dream in which she saw the little baby at about six months old, holding out its arms towards her. Real sweet.

Praise God for the miracle.... here it is ;-)

Exquisite treasure ditched

This is a beautiful vase that Julz threw in her mini-skip bin. I cannot believe the stuff she throws away!!! I rescued it, but unfortunately, in the reckless ditching process, she cracked the bottom of it. It still functions ok cos the interior is lined with metal and the engraving surrounds the metal...just such a shame. It shatters me to see so much money wasted. One day when she is right with God, the abundance of money that flows through her hands will be used more wisely.

Clean animals ;-)

Today after college, I organised for a dude from the Fleastoppers Dogwash franchise to come and clean Julz' two German Shepherds. It cost $34 for both dogs and it took about 50 minutes to wash Luc and about 30 minutes to do Jassy. Luc's took longer cos he's a long-haired shepherd and had large clumps of dirt matted in his hair that needed to be cut off and remnants of diarhoea that needed to be scraped off him (ewwww). The guy did such a great job and bonded with the dogs immediately. I was so impressed by his high quality service. I'll definitely be calling him again. Praise God! The dogs absolutely loved the attention and service and smell like roses now. Luc's hair is so fluffy and clean that it sticks out horizontally about two inches ;-) hehe

Progress report

Jules is now 31 weeks pregnant and everything is going really well. Another scan today confirmed that. Dr Margo Norman, her obstetrician, said the baby looks like it will be average size, which apparently is 3.4 kg. At this stage, it weighs about 2kg.... how exciting!!! The scan still shows a girl.

Jules is very healthy, despite working really long hours. She is going to work right up to delivery point - I suppose she is in one of the few professions where that is possible, being a doctor and being surrounded by doctors. Any other profession would have me worried.

She has finally agreed she will sell her house in Mindarie, losing the burden of the associated mortgage. That will be a a huge weight off all of our shoulders. Most of my spare time has been spent cleanign her place. Yesterday, I found two dead mice in her garage. Sooooooooooooooooo disgusting. Brett, from college, said he'll come and throw them in the bin for me. What really frustrated me is after seeing those two dead mice, I turned around to see a third one squashed under a lid of a container ... however, it turned out to be a fake white mouse Jules had bought her for cat to play with. Urrrggghhhh

The Annointing Breaks the Yoke

This morning in prayer group, Ps Judy asked me to "sing [my] song" during the time that we were praying over the nations ...well, in particular, we were praying over the nation of Burma. She has never asked me to do that before. So, in obedience, I started to sing in tongues (talk about nerve-racking!!!). After about ten minutes I stopped. Then she told me in front of everyone (Chris, Josie, Hilda, Henry and Mary) that while I was singing, the Lord showed her a vision. She said she saw my feet dancing and then the Lord Himself came to dance with me. As we were dancing, many children came towards us. They were children who had suffered much and been robbed of their childhood. As I sang, the annointing broke the oppression over them, they were filled with joy and then, they also started to dance with us.

That brought tears to my eyes, because I reflected on my own hard childhood, years of living in an abusive, violent home, watching acts of cruelty carried out in front of me. Many years ago, an American prophet sang over me and he said that the enemy had stolen many things from me, that I had been robbed of my childhood, but that God would restore what the enemy had stolen from me and my future years would be blessed. Ps Judy said that the song the Lord has given me is for the nations, that I need to sing over them and the annointing will set them free. Wow, now that's pretty special.

I am reminded of this song we sing in Chapel sometimes that goes:

I have a mountain-moving, yoke-destroying, powerful annointing,
The Spirit of the risen God dwells in my heart,
Greater is He that is in me, then he that is in the world,
I am an overcomer,
By His Spirit, His blood and His Word

This is a link to Mason's blogggggggggg ;-) Go bro!

College Assessments

So far, I have handed in the first three assignments already ...am on a roll, but I have to be because my sister's baby is due around exam time - agggghhhh

What's in your wardrobe?

This is what I found in Julz' walk-in-wardrobe .... ewwwwwwwwwww

Today's devotion

This is today's evening devotion from the Sword Searcher program.

Ps 46:1

"A very present help." --Psalm 46:1

Covenant blessings are not meant to be looked at only, but to be appropriated. Even our Lord Jesus is given to us for our present use. Believer, thou dost not make use of Christ as thou oughtest to do. When thou art in trouble, why dost thou not tell Him all thy grief? Has He not a sympathizing heart, and can He not comfort and relieve thee? No, thou art going about to all thy friends, save thy best Friend, and telling thy tale everywhere except into the bosom of thy Lord. Art thou burdened with this day's sins? Here is a fountain filled with blood: use it, saint, use it. Has a sense of guilt returned upon thee? The pardoning grace of Jesus may be proved again and again. Come to Him at once for cleansing. Dost thou deplore thy weakness? He is thy strength: why not lean upon Him? Dost thou feel naked? Come hither, soul; put on the robe of Jesus' righteousness. Stand not looking at it, but wear it. Strip off thine own righteousness, and thine own fears too: put on the fair white linen, for it was meant to wear. Dost thou feel thyself sick? Pull the night-bell of prayer, and call up the Beloved Physician! He will give the cordial that will revive thee. Thou art poor, but then thou hast "a kinsman, a mighty man of wealth." What! wilt thou not go to Him, and ask Him to give thee of His abundance, when He has given thee this promise, that thou shalt be joint heir with Him, and has made over all that He is and all that He has to be thine? There is nothing Christ dislikes more than for His people to make a show-thing of Him, and not to use Him. He loves to be employed by us. The more burdens we put on His shoulders, the more precious will He be to us.

"Let us be simple with Him, then, Not backward, stiff, or cold, As though our Bethlehem could be What Sinai was of old."

Sword Searcher

I am sooooooooo stoked. One of my kewl brothers from college, Mason, has got me hooked on SwordSearcher, which is an awesome program that enables you to dig deeply into the Bible and gain new insight into what the Scriptures are saying. There are different translations of the Bible, commentaries from a variety of authors with different perspectives, all sorts of really interesting articles to read and there's even a collection of very enlightening images stored in the database.... I've pasted in two that I particularly like.

I also found a link to daily devotions. Today's one really hit me hard - it must have been for me. Funny thing is, it appears to be written in a really old fashioned style of writing ... not sure if you can change it. I'm still trying to get my head around the wealth of information and how to use all the little icons and drop-down menus and things ;-) Praise God!!!

Sparky likes to study

...well ok, not really. He just likes to eat my notes ;-)

Spiritual relatives

This is a piccy of Josie and I. Josie is like a spiritual mother to me, a real gift from God. When I first met her at a prophetic prayer conference, she told me that God told her I was meant to be at Bible college. I was not in the slightest bit interested back then. She told me she prayed for me every day after she met me, and then God spoke to me personally and told me to go. Fancy that ;-)

This is a silly poem Josie gave me ;-)

When God gave out brains, I thought He said train and I missed mine. When He gave out looks, I thought He said books and I didn't have any. When He gave out noses, I thought He said roses, so I ordered a big one. When He gave out legs, I thought He said kegs, so I ordered two big fat ones. When He gave out ears, I thought He said beers, so I ordered two long ones. When He gave out chins, I thought He said gins, so I ordered a double. Boy am I a mess!
[Ardywon Marton]

Call of God

One of my lecturers, Ps Eunice, told us today that she has walked with God since she was four years old... and now some 65 years later, she is still going strong, having never departed from doing His will. Pretty amazing. It helps that she was born into a precious home with loving, spirit-filled devout Christian parents who prayed for her every day! That's what my children will be like ;-)

Anyway, what was really interesting is that she said that during her life, because she had the gift of administration (i.e. she was great at organising things), many people tried to get her to fulfill jobs requiring this gift. Seems fair enough, I mean, she was good at them and enjoyed organising things. But her point being, that although God has given each one of us certain gifts, it doesn't mean that jobs requring the use of those gifts 100% of our time is what God wants us to do. In fact she said that some people miss their calling because they get caught up in doing minor things they are good at, rather than the major thing they are meant to be doing with their lives.

There are actually three different types of gifts mentioned in the Bible:
- firstly, the nine manifestation gifts referred to in 1 Corinthians 12
(i.e. words of wisdom, words of knowledge, discernment of spirits, prophecy, tongues, interpretation of tongues, faith, healing and miracles);
- secondly, the five-fold ministry gifts referred to in Ephesians 4:11
(i.e. teachers, prophets, apostles, evangelists and pastors); and
- thirdly, the motivational gifts referred to in Romans 12:6-8
(i.e. prophecy, ministry, teaching, exhortation, giving, administration and mercy).

At 69 years old, Ps Eunice is deeply content and satisfied because she discovered (many years ago) that God's purpose for her life was for her to be a teacher of the Word of God, rather than being an administrative assistant or some other role that uses the gift of administration. She said her gifts of being able to organise things well, among others, have definitely come in handy, but if she had put all her attention to doing those tasks, she would have missed the ultimate purpose God had for her.

Wow, I wonder what God's purpose is for me. I was really inspired - imagine getting to that age and knowing you have lived a life in accordance with God's soverign plan.

Holidays almost gone

Well today is my last day of holidays. So far i have spent almost every day doing work around Julz' house. I have:

• - cleaned out her kitchen pantry (which included ditching pungent dried anchovies, which had almost become powder form because they were so old, spider-infested oolong tea, moth-filled flour and oats and all kinds of seeds and removing cockroach and insect carcasses, etc... ewwwww);
  
• - shampooed the carpets in her house upstairs (included four of the five bedrooms and the corridors) and cleaned her staircase carpet by hand.... after which i had such a bad allergic reaction from all the pet hair, that i spent about half a day recovering;
  
• - sorted out all her clothes, washed them, dried them, categorised them (jackets, dresses, skirts, trousers, shirts, underwear - all in different locations), hung them up and paired about 200 socks with their respective partners (there are still about 50 socks without a mate!). She had piles and piles of dirty and clean clothes mixed together at the bottom of five built-in wardrobes, not to mention in garbage bags in the laundry, in wash baskets in her bedroom, loose all around the house and in the garage! - i even found dirty underwear stuffed into the bookshelves and lounge room furniture!;


• - swept, vacuumed and mopped all the hard floors downstairs - which unfortunately are constantly being dirtied each day predominantly by her dogs, who swim, then dig holes, then bring their mudied selves inside;


• - re-arranged the rooms upstairs where her two indoor cats live, including emptying tray after tray of cat litter into the garden - apparently makes great soil conditioner;


• - employed a friend, Brett, from college to help me clean up her backyard. Together, we picked up dog poo, raked rocks, pulled out weeds, pulled the vines off her shed, mowed and wipper-snipped the lawns and threw the grass cuttings in the peripheral garden beds! - it took us three hours; and


• - moved a few car loads of boxes from her house to mum's house, about an hour away.... to clear some space in her wardrobes.
  

So yeah, it has been a very busy time for me. Pretty satisfying seeing the end results, especially the garden. I felt really depressed looking at the garden each day - it was such an eyesore previously with over a foot-high long grass and waist-high weeds, and the stench of dog poo (over a year's worth from two dogs) just hit you when you walked near the back door.

I was so grateful to have Brett helping me. He said picking up dog poo was nothing compared to some of his previous work experience, which included working as Funeral Director. In that role, he apparently had to collect dead bodies, counsel the families and arrange the funeral. He said one time, he was called to a house where an old lady had died in the shower and the water had been running for two weeks over her until she was found. Her body literally fell apart as he picked it up. In other cases, he has had to retrieve decomposing bodies, some of which were children. What a horrible job. Back then he took drugs just to get over the images he saw. I guess there is always work available, you just need to have a strong stomach or drugs.

Anyway, after we finished the garden, there was so much joy in Julz' dogs' faces. They ran around and around playing games. It was so lovely to see them. What a transformation.

There is still heaps to do - many of the walls in her house are really brown because the dogs have pushed themselves up against them when they've been all muddy, and the windows all need washing, having not been cleaned probably since she moved into the house! The garage is an absolute shocker with all sorts of creepy crawleys in the dark corners (that's my next big project, but i've run out of time). There's also a lot of garbage to throw out, but Julz needs to be there to decide what to ditch, cos she's gets a bit cranky when i throw away stuff..... I also want to organise one of those professional mobile dog washers to come by and bathe the dogs. No matter how much i try and clean them, the bath water is always black.

Man, i am a good sister to her. One day she'll really appreciate all the stuff i do. At this stage, she has been very unwell because she is preggers and working very long hours, so hasn't really been able to comprehend what i've done.