Anticipation!

Three more full days here in Perth and then on the plane and off we go. We are having to spend a few days in Singapore due to flights and then go on to Nepal!! 
At the moment we are finishing up our last week of lectures with Kristen Williams on Fear of the Lord, all the paperwork, making sure passports and bank cards are accounted for and packing our backpacks!! 
As the anticipation of Outreach grows i find myself stressed yet exceedingly overjoyed. There is so much to do to get ready, still trusting for finances and I'm leading on my own for part of this outreach! I am so blessed to be entrusted with leading and the responsibility of discipleing my students into a closer relationship with God. Every year I love watching these young people who come encounter God and love him more!! Bottom Line, I love what I do and I can't wait to share what we are able to be apart of on outreach! 


Please be praying for us all that travel will go smoothly and safely!!

Outreach 2012 is here!

This year I'm going to Nepal and London!! During April I'll be in Katmandu with two other staff and 16 students. Then we will head to London, England and work with our Megacities Ministry for seven weeks. It's going to be an exciting 3 months with lots of new experiences!!


While in Katmandu we will be working with YWAM Nepal and a few other long term teams in villages a bit out of the city. We will be doing evangelism and open airs. We will work with their youth center, orphanage and local churches teaching and preaching. For ten days we will be in the city and at the YWAM base and then seven students and I will take a 12 hour bus ride through the hills to a village, where we will work with another YWAM Perth long term team for two weeks. I personally have never been to Asia so I can't wait to get on the ground, meet people and learn about their culture. One aspect of the culture that I am particularly excited about is the outfits that girls must wear to be culturally modest. All the girls and I will in the first few days have to be measured for our outfits and wait for them to be custom made.  Nepal is predominantly Hindu, mountainous, and should be warm while we are there. I also heard from others on base that have been there that it is beautiful, the people are amazingly hospitable and it will probably be one of my favorite places to go. Don't worry I'll bring my camera!!


After we finish up in Nepal the whole YPDTS (so all 60 of us) are going to show up in London on the same day, rearrange teams and then head out to different boroughs all over London. A ministry that is based out of YWAM Perth called Megacities is focusing on London this year and we are going to be functioning under their leadership during the 7 weeks we are in London. Throughout the last 9 weeks of the school we have been learning about London and praying for them as we prepare to 'hit the streets' in whatever way we can. Here is an excerpt from their website describing their purpose:


Megacities focus on a city of over one million people for a period of 12 months acting as a catalyst for city wide transformation. We do this through strong partnership between the local Body of Christ and international, multi-disciplined teams. Together, we work at a grassroots level to strengthen existing ministries and pioneer new works.


While in London we will be based in one borough and focus on the ministry opportunities and local churches within that area. Some teams have just gotten back from London so we might be following in their footsteps or starting something new! Here is the link to the Megacities website, check out the videos and testimonies!


http://www.ywamperth.org.au/megacities/


If you would like to partner with me in seeing the nations transformed please let me know. I need lots of prayers and I'm still trusting for finances.


Prayer Points:
->Health for the team and myself
->Gods leading
->Strength & Wisdom as I lead on my own for the first time
->Leading for the future as my two year commitment comes to an end


 I am still in need of $2,500 to go on the outreach. If you feel lead to give financially that would be a wonderful blessing. The quickest and easiest way to give is online at: 
https://www.ywamperth.org.au/007/payonline.asp
(Middle section select staff payment and the put 'Christi Hawkins YPDTS Outreach fees', and at the end make sure the 2% charge is taken into account when typing in the amount) (you will not receive a tax deductible receipt)


Please let me know how you are doing as well!


Bless you,
Christi

2012!!

I Can't believe how fast this year is going! It's already well into March!! So here is the update of recent events and the outreach plans!! 


->As a base we have moved into our new building!! God has provided an incredible building for us in East Perth! From August to December I worked on getting donations for our new properties and now we are moved in and loving our permanent home!!

->The Discipleship Training School (DTS) is moving right along we are now on week 10! The students are loving the summer, lectures and getting to know God in deeper ways. We have had epic times in worship, prayer, discussions, revelation and of course fellowship. One of our favorite new things in the cafe on base, we spend lots of time there together. (and I'm learning how to be a barista!!) Here is a picture of a car wash that we had this last weekend to raise finances for outreach. We had a blast!

->Jesus has been personally teaching me about selfishness and living a life fully submitted to his purposes.Especially as my 2 year course comes to an end in July! I'm now looking into plans for the second half of 2012 and on into the net year...


->Soon the lecture phase will be over and we will be heading on Outreach! I'm going to be leading a team to Katmandu, Nepal and then the whole school will meet up in London, UK to work with our Mega Cities Ministry!! I'm very excited to go to Nepal, well Asia in general for the first time! In the next few days I'll send out a bit more information about what we will be doing and how you can be involved.


I have started a group on facebook if you'd like to join and receive updates that way. Also on facebook I am tagged in photos by others on the school so you can see more of what we are doing on a daily basis. 

Outreach!

Here is a bit about this last outreach, many of you heard about it while I was home this last July but  I will summarize the highlights for you!

 I met my team and co-leader in Iceland and we had a great time working with the base there in the capitol city of Reykjavik. The YWAMers there run a cafe with a youth center open all day for teenagers who have no place to go other than the streets where they can and often do get into trouble.  We did as much as we could with the youth from Zumba dance class lead by another outreach team, movie nights, playing music on the streets, giving art out in cafes and of course hitting the cold windy streets with free prayer signs! It was quite and adventure doing outreach in a western nation, so one day we went on a photo scavenger hunt looking for a people with purple shoes and such things, it was a great conversation starter and was definitely one of our favorite days. We also spent about a week helping a church put on a conference where we enjoyed Icelandic worship. In many western nations one of the best ways to minister is by relationship which is hard to build in 3 weeks but through the events that we held and participated in the base was able to connect with more youth and churches in the city. Iceland was a great first taste of Europe for many of us and a very friendly place to invest for part of outreach. When our time was up in Iceland we headed back to Perth.

Once back in Perth we had a couple days to wash our clothes and pack ourselves in to a van and a trailer for the next month of outreach to drive all the way up the west coast of Australia to reach the west Kimberly, a large indigenous area filled with lots of different small communities. There were eight different teams that went up so we drove as one big convoy for most of the time, stopping a few different places along the five day journey. We divided our time between two different communities called Looma and Mownjum, each were very different and had their own opportunities. Between the two communities we had two movie nights, Vacation Bible School afternoon sessions, cleaned out a house, helped at a feeding program, lead two church services, prayed for around a hundred people, and made so many friends especially between the ages of three to eighteen. We saw two people give their lives to the Lord and right now there is a team in those same locations following up.This was completely different to Iceland and even China where my team had gone before Iceland.

We quite enjoyed getting to spend a couple long weeks living in tents and taking cold showers without any internet, because there were fewer distractions from focusing on people within the community and with each other. We definitely learned a lot about laying down our comforts at the same time as looking forward to what God had for us after DTS. All of our students are on to other things at home like jobs and school, a few are even being called back to join staff.

Next I'll send an update of life in Perth!

April!

Hello Everyone!

I hope you are all having a wonderful spring; it’s just turned into autumn here that means maybe a scarf if there’s a breeze and eventually long pants.  Lectures have ended and outreach has commenced!  A lot has been happening and it’s all felt a bit like a whirlwind.  Now I’m in the eye of the storm because I know that it will only speed up again as soon as I hit Iceland!

Lectures ended on the 1^st of April and then teams left that weekend! It wrapped up pretty quick and they were off to Nepal, China, South Africa, Mozambique, and Indonesia.  All is going well, every outreach comes with it’s challenges of going in to a new country, doing full time ministry, and being with a group of people 24/7; but once the team learns how to function together it is incredible what can happen.

I’m still in Perth, due to ongoing health reasons and not finding solutions just yet.  Actually on Tuesday, during the 11^th week of the school or the 22^nd of March, our school had a prayer and giving night and a few other staff members prayed for me and trusted for healing again.  It was not the first time that they had prayed for healing, but I have not had any stabbing pain since, which has been such a relief and has allowed me to be a bit more active.  Healing?  I think so…  Even though I am not having anymore stabbing pain, the doctors would still like to run tests to figure out what the other symptoms are all about, which has been good but are starting to incur quite the medical bill.  This last Tuesday I had a laparoscopy, just to continue the elimination process of any other reasons for the pain.  It’s been quite the process but it will soon be coming to an end.

I told you in my previous e-mail that the team that I’m co-leading is going to China, Iceland and far up north in Australia.  Well, they are in China at this very moment! Which is so exciting, but I felt, as did my doctor, that it would be better for me to rest for the first month of outreach and meet my team in Iceland.  So, on the 28^th of April, I’ll fly up to Iceland a few days earlier than my team to set things up and get things ready for my team to join soon after.  For the last two weeks I’ve been here in Perth working on setting up the Australian portion of our outreach and getting in communication with churches and schools.  It’s been so fun and interesting getting to know a few more Aussie’s from all up and down the west coast.

So, these last two weeks I’ve been sleeping soooo much, I’ve never been this tired in my life!  It’s been so good to be able to rest and take it a bit slower.  I’ve been finishing up an odd job or two, getting things ready for our teams to go up to Northern Australia in June and answering emails of people who are interested in doing the Young People Discipleship Training School (YPDTS) next year.  It has been a good time filled with e-mails, doctor visits and making new friends on base with people I usually don’t get a lot of time to hang out with.

A few things that you can be praying for:

-I want to be able to give 100% to my team, so that my health improves in the next week.

-The two financial mountains sitting in front of me doctor bills and a plane ticket to go home this July/August.

-For my team, as they are doing a lot of traveling and they have to be careful for security reasons.

If you would like to partner with me financially, the easiest way to do that is to send a check with my name attached to:

ECC

3600 S. 9th Street


Lafayette, IN 47909

Please let me know how you are and if there is anything that I can be praying for you.

Love,

Christi

March Time!

 Hello Friends and Family,

Sometimes it’s hard to believe that I’ve been here for eight months already.  It’s flown by so fast it seems, but then again lots has been happening. Most recently I found out where I’m going to be leading a team too, started organizing fundraisers with the school and soaking in the DTS (Discipleship Training School) lectures for a second time.

I’m going to be co-leading a team with Glory, a girl on our school staff who has been around for about a year and a half and is staffing this school for the second time. We are going to start by taking our team of five guys and four girls to China for a month. I never thought that I’d be going to China so soon if at all, I’m so pumped to see what is going to happen up there. From there we are heading over to Iceland that isn’t super close but we’ll get there. A newer base there is starting with a coffee shop and running a DTS right in the heart of Rekyvik. After a chilly month on the island of ice we will come back to Perth wash our clothes, have a good meal with friends and then pack ourselves up in buses and drive all across Western Australia to work in Indigenous communities and/or running seminars in high schools. So as you can see we are doing three continents in three months, this is because as a base we feel called to support ministries in Europe, to reconnect with the locations that we have been to before in Africa and Asia, while also feeling a strong call to our own home here in Australia.

So generally outreach costs a bit for the traveling, food, and accommodation, especially this year with going to three continents in three months. As a school we have already started fundraising, here in the city there is a children’s triathlon that we work at every year, and we are having car washes on the weekends all over the city. Also we are all doing lots of individual fundraising by e-mailing and blogging about what is happening here in Perth. For my team the cost of the entire three months per person will be right around $5,900. So far I have $1,200 set aside for this, but I’m still in need of $4, 800.  All of our outreach fees are due by Mar. 16^th just two weeks before we head off to China! The other day I was praying about how in the world this is all going to come in and then someone pointed out that if 48 people gave $100 it would all come in no problem. So I felt to ask you if you could pray about whether you are able to be one of those 48? If you are able to support me in any capacity that would be a great help and encouragement!

During this last week, week 8 the lectures were all about putting God as Lord in our lives. This week our speaker pointed out that we don’t make Christ Lord he already is… This week areas in my life where I am still giving God full control have definitely come up. In particular the mind set that life is divided up into “sacred” and “secular”. By this I mean holding one job, object or thing in a higher regard than another. Ezra and Nehemiah are great examples of having different skills but both are needed and are of great value. For me learning this and applying it to my life means whatever it is that God calls me to throughout my life and whatever skills that he gives me whether they are “secular” or “sacred” realizing that they are just as holy or important as any thing else that he could ask of me. So now being submitted to hearing Gods heart on things and agreeing with what he’s saying is what I’m challenged with.

Thank you so much for reading up on what has been happening in my life recently. If you would like to support me you can send a check with my name attached to:

Evangelical Covenant Church (ECC)

 3600 S. 9th Street
Lafayette, IN,  U.S.A.

Please let me know if you would like prayer for anything or if you have any questions.

Bless you,

Christi

Hello Everyone!

Recently I was thinking about how many of you might not be sure exactly what a Discipleship Training School (DTS) is, so let me tell you a little bit more about DTS’s at YWAM Perth. Below is some of the information that we send to potential students and a bit about what I'm doing as well…

DTS is a 6-month school – the first 3 months are spent here in Perth and then the second 3 months is the Outreach Phase.  The first 3 months of the school is the Lecture Phase.  Each week we have a different teacher speaking on a different topic including the Character of God, Repentance and Forgiveness, Relationships, Father Heart of God, Missions and Evangelism.  The focus of DTS is on Christian character and living and the structure of the school reflects this.  There is some weekly written work but we gear the school more towards personal application and response rather than on just acquiring knowledge.  The daily schedule includes morning exercise, morning chores, intercession or worship, teaching, eating, work duties (2 hours per day – in the kitchen or on the property or in the office – part of our live-learn approach to training), more eating and then different activities every night including lectures, small groups, evangelism time etc.  Sounds pretty intense…. And it is…  YWAM is all a live-learn approach so the classroom isn’t the only learning environment… but its all of it – living, eating, working together. 

I staff the Young Peoples Discipleship Training School (YPDTS) focuses on equipping and mobilizing young people into missions. It all happens with a whole lot of energy, which comes from a large group of 17-25 year olds gathered together from all over the world to seek and follow Jesus into the nations! God has huge dreams for this generation and we want to see them encounter God personally and be able to present Him clearly to the nations.  It’s high energy, dynamic, and adventurous…

Week 5 of the DTS just finished, and we looked at relationships a pretty interesting topic for young people. We didn’t just look at romantic relationships though; we were created for a relationship with God and others in all different contexts. Now is the challenging part of taking what we’ve learned to God and asking him how we apply what we’ve learned to our lives. Next week we are going to be looking at Evangelism!

And then there’s the Outreach Phase.  We head out in teams for 3 months to make God known in the nations of the earth.  Its about getting out there and finding opportunities to be involved in evangelism and discipleship.  This could include all kinds of strategies – working in churches, community development, construction, orphanage work, photography, art, personal evangelism, youth groups, out on the streets in huge overflowing cities, hiking into remote villages, music, dance , prayer and worship… anything at all that in some way will communicate Jesus to people. 

Outreach for the 2011 YPDTS will involve options in Asia, Africa, Europe and Australia.  As a base we have a vision called 97 Nations, which aims to send teams into every nation in Asia and Africa.  This vision was running over the last few years and now we are sending teams to reconnect with the contacts we have made in these nations.  YWAM Perth also has a vision to support YWAM ministries in Europe as well as assist in pioneering bases in this region.  Finally, teams may involve a component of focused youth ministry in regional Australian towns in partnership with our youth ministry on base.  I will be co-leading a team with Glory a Californian girl that has just spent 6 months in Mexico leading outreach teams and connecting teams with churches. In April we will head out to China working with different contacts, then in May we will move on to Iceland and work with a newer YWAM base right in the center of Reykjavik. For the last month of outreach we will be back in Western Australia running seminars in high schools.

Prayer points:


-For personal health as I’m having trouble with ovarian cysts that are causing lots of pain and are keeping me from being able to participate in all the school events. This has been going on for over a year but have been getting steadily worse over the past few months. 
-For the students to continue to engage in lectures and respond to what God is saying to them.

-For financial provision for doctor bills and fast approaching outreach!

Thank you for reading, let me know if there is anything that I can pray for you about!
Christi


Just a couple pics, My lovely sister came to visit over Christmas!!

This is a picture of Christmas Morning :)