And I'm Back!

Oh you know...just bikin' through some rice fields...per usual

Hi everyone! Most of you probably already know that I am back from my YWAM adventures in Australia, Thailand and Cambodia.  You can read in more detail about what my team did and the ministries that we were involved with on our team blog.  Below is a little picture/video montage of my personal highlights.

My favorite part of outreach was when we worked with a ministry called SHE that reaches out to women in the sex trafficking industry and provides them with alternative options for employment

Coconut water all the time (and straight from the coconut)

Praying for the elderly in Bangkok slums

Crossing the border to Cambodia. scary...but fun

Flooding in Siem Riep, Cambodia

My 4-year old class at New Hope School in Phnom Penh, Cambodia

Adorable kids everywhere

Visiting Angkor Wat, one of the 7 wonders of the world



Me and my new boyfriend!



Mandie, Kelsie and I were invited to our friend's, Sinoun, home town out in the countryside.  It was incredible!

Tuk Tuks

Trying crazy new foods with Kelsie

Playing and teaching music

I hope you enjoyed a little taste of my trip and some of my favorite parts.  I am home now in Santa Cruz working and getting readjusted to life in the 1st world.  It is definitely harder than I expected and simple things (like navigating through Whole Foods) are much harder than I remember.  Thank you all so much for your prayers and support during my journey.  I met incredible people; God moved in huge ways; and I learned more than I could have ever imagined.

I love you all and Merry Christmas!

Wish this could have been my Christmas card

And We're Off!

I cannot believe that we are leaving tomorrow morning...ah!  First off we head to Bangkok, Thailand then down to Puket and after that we will fly over to Cambodia.  I will not be able to update this blog anymore but check out our Thaibodia Team Blog where we will be posting praise reports, prayer requests, pictures and all sorts of other fun things.

Thank you so much for your prayers and support thus far... we appreciate them so much.  Please continue to pray:
1) That we will be able to hear the direction that God is leading our team day to day
2) Unity for our team
3) Good relationships with our contacts and ministries over there
4) Good health (physically, emotionally, and spiritually) and safety
5) Traveling mercies over the next two months
6) That God will get all the glory

I will most likely be able to check my email every once in a while...and I would love to get little updates on what is going on in all of your lives.  I love you all so much...see you in November!

Love,
B

Mandy, Juliane, Steph, Kelsie, me, Andrew, Colleen, Lauren and Torrey

Baptisms and Kingdom.

Hello friends,

Well, the highlight of this week were our team's baptisms.  Five of the girls on our team felt that they wanted to be baptized to symbolize dying to their old selves and lives and continuing on in their lives with Christ.  One of my best friends, Lauren (who you have seen in like all of my pictures), asked me a while back if Lyndzie, Kelsie and I would baptize her and of course I said yes and was super stoked.  Then on Monday, Jenna approached me and asked me if I would baptize her as well.  It felt so honored to be take part in this special time of their journies with God.  We did the baptisms a little inlet in Cottontree and it was seriously one of the most beautiful days yet!

Colleen, Jenna, Steph, Cari and Lauren after getting baptized

All my goodies!

I also got two packages week which was such a blessing.  Thank you so mcuh Mom for all of the Lara Bars and a big thank you to my Santa Cruz Bible Study for the awesome care package!  When I arrived Monday morning Pattie handed me the two packages.  I did not even know who the brown paper package was from because all that the return address said was "Your Santa Cruz Family."  I was seriously sooooooooooooo exited when I opened it to find so many thoughtful notes and gifts from you all.  It seriously made my entire week and thank you for all of the thought and time you put into preparing it for me!

Last weekend, Lauren, Torrey, Steph, Lyndzie and I went to Jono and Kelsie's engagement party.  It was lovely and felt like we were back in the real world for a quick sec.  I am so excited to be at their wedding in April.  so good!

Aren't they so cute?!?!?!

After baptizing Jenna

This week our base director, Rob Henser, spoke to us on Kingdom.  It was one of the most challenging lectures we have had so far because he would throw out questions that would really make us think, such as: what really did Jesus mean when he talked about "the kingdom."  We hear so much about heaven and hell but interestingly enough, Jesus only mentions heaven and hell 8 times, while he mentionss kindom over 100 times!  This got me thinking, and I realized that I could not define what exactly kingdom is.  What I learned throughout this week is that kingdom has nothing to do with life after death- it is the now, right now!  Kingdom is about coming under the rule and reign of God and partnering with all that He is doing in our world today.  Practically kingdom is about caring for the vulnerable, reflecting God's heart, is right relationships, is generosity, is sharing Jesus, is a worldiew of values. 

We leave for outreach at 5:30am on Sunday morning.  I have not started packing a thing yet, but I am not that worried because I can't really even wear any of the clothes that I bought.  We have to dress very modestly there which means no tank tops or shorts which is basically all that I brought.  So I will be traveling lightly on the way there.  One sad thing that happened this week is that Torrey will not be coming on outreach with us, which is really sad, but I am confident that God is planning something greater for him while we are away.  Torrey is a great friend to me and I will miss him very much. 

Don't worry, there will be another post before I leave.  Thanks for checking in :-)

Aussie phrase of the week: "Are you keen on it?" = Are you ok with doing that?

Verse of the week: "He has told you, O man, what is good; and what does the Lord require of you but to do justice, and to love kindness and to walk humbly with your God?" Micah 6:8

omigosh...we are leaving so soon.

More pics of our Thaibodia team

Hello everyone!

I will probably only have one more post after this one because we leave for Thailand at 5:30am on Sunday, which is Saturday evening for most of you in the States.  The first ministry we are going to be working with is the S.H.E. ministry which spends time with women in the sex trafficking industry and provides opportunities and jobs for them outside of sex trafficking...pretty cool huh?  I seriously can't wait!

This week a guy named Neville from the Byron Bay YWAM base came to speak to us on Biblical worldview.  I loved this set of lectures.  It was really jam-packed and informational...which I really loved.  We learned about a variety of worldviews such as Hinduism, Buddhism, Atheism, Agnosticism, New Age, Islam..etc.  It was especially good for me to learn about Buddhism since it is the worldview that we will be encountering most in Thailand and Cambodia.  According to James Sire "A worldview is a commitment, a fundamental orientation of the heart, that can be expressed as a story or a set of presuppositions which we hold about the basic constitution of reality and that provides the foundation on which we live and move and have our being."

I got to hang out with my friend Solveig this week.  I love her so much!  She is from Norway and is one of my closest friends here.  She is on the other team that is heading to Thailand and India so it was really nice to hang out with her one on one before we go our seperate ways :-/.  We hung out at the beach together which was lovely because the weather has been amazing this week which is a nice change since it dumped last week.

On Friday, we had a pasta eating contest and I was the only girl that was willing to go in against the boys.  So it was me against Jason, Andrew and Luke.  I really think I might have been able to win if I had not eaten a big dinner right before.  Jason prepared for the eating contest all day by barely eating anything.  But I just could not pass up dinner because Bethany made me an amazing vegeatarian meal.  The contest was divided into two parts.  First there was a speed portion, followed by pure endurance.  I seriously failed at the speed part, but then Luke and I went head to head in the endurance portion.  I could only get through 2.5 bowls of pasta and he made it through 3...but I blame it on the fact that I had a big dinner before...or else I probably could of fully taken him down. lol

Well that's about it for now.  I love you all and miss you tons.  Thank you for praying for me and our teams.  Next week I will have a list of prayer requests.

Aussie word of the week: fair dinkum = no way!

Verse of the week: "Every word of God proves true; He is a shield to those who take refuge in Him." Proverbs 30: 5

Prayer Week

Good Day!

Our Thaibodia Team!



Soon to be Mr. an Mrs. Cunliffe..yay!

Well apparently we are in tropic rainstorm season now because one second it will be completely sunny and then the next it is pouring down rain.  It is kind of fun though and I love the rain, although I did not bring any proper rain gear.  When we get to Thailand, we arrive during the peak of monsoon season so I am sure that there is a lot more rain to come :)   Last Sunday, the one day that is didn't rain, Kelsie and Jono got engaged!  Kelsie is one of my outreach leaders, and I also know her from back in Santa Barbara.  Jono is also on staff and is from England and I know that he will make a wonderful husband.  I love both of them so much and am so excited for them!

Praying for Trisha

This week was quite different from any other ones thus far as we focused in on prayer.  Our speakers for the week were Leon and Trisha.  Leon is from New Zealand but now lives here on the Sunny Coast and is on staff with YWAM.  Trisha and her husband are the base directors of our YWAM Sunshine Coast.  They both came with only a few notes because they really wanted each moment that they spoke to be led by God...and boy was it! This was very different from some of our other lecturers and it was quite refreshing.  Leon had so much amazing insight into what our group was going through as a whole and was so passionate about prayer and praising God.  At the beginning of the week he talked with us about "harp and bowl" which is a style of prayer and worship that intertwines musical worship and prayer.  The term comes from Revelation 5:8-11 which says that the heavenly creatures "each had a harp" and "were holding golden bowls full of incense, which are the prayers of the saints."  Pretty cool huh?  One of my favorite things that Leon said was "Be expectant for God to move, but don't be expectant for God to move in the way you want Him to move."

Andrew, Jason, Mandie and I in the prayer room

At the beginning of the week, we were each assigned to a prayer group with one staff and two other students.  Then everyday, our groups were given a three-hour time slot where we would come to the church and pray in the prayer room that the staff set up.  Andrew, Mandie, Jason and I had an amazing time getting together each day to devote time to prayer.  Thursday night was absolutely amazing and I would have to say that it was the most amazing prayer time I have ever had....ever.  It was from 9pm to 12am and when we all got there, we were not really sure what we wanted to pray for.  Andrew suggested that we start out with a worship song.  From there we just kept singing and praying for the next three hours and God blessed the four or us in amazing ways.

Steph, me and Lauren

This past Saturday, our Thaibodia team went to the Eumundi markets for team bonding.  Eumundi is another part of Sunshine Coast and every weekend they have a huge farmers/craft market.  It was definitely the biggest one that I have ever seen.  I didn't buy anything, but I loved walking around and looking at all of the crafts and clothes that people had there.  I was taking mental notes of all of the things that I want to try and make when I get home.  On our way back, we stopped at this deserted house that is covered in graffiti.  Torrey brought his super nice camera (he's a photogrpaher) and we took a slough of crazy team pictures.  I am going to get them from him so that I can put more up on the blog!

Aussie phrase of the week: "getting needles" = getting shots (as in vaccinations)

The Holy Spirit

Lauren and I have a new-found obsession with street art

How's everybody doing?  Sorry that is has been a while since my last post. I have been hearing about some earthquake action at home in Santa Cruz...is everybody ok?

Last week, David Gava came to speak to us on the Holy Spirit.  He is originally from Zimbabwe, but flew here from Sweden where he now lives with his wife and two kids.  He was one of my favorite speakers so far.  He is an amazingly passionate guy and so on fire for the Lord and has so many amazing gifts from God.  One of my favorite things that he said was "Many people live and die without finding out who they are."  What I have found, especially during this DTS, is that who God says you are is who you are...sometimes figuring out who that is can take some time.  All we need to do is ask God, "Who am I?" Do you know who you are?  I find it a very intriguing question to ask ourselves and to figure out who we think we am and what defines us.  Is it our jobs, our families, our talents, our friends, our passions, our relationships with God? hmmmmmm.......

We went to The Burn again on Friday night.  I mentioned it before on one of my older posts, but The Burn is an international prayer ministry and the one here on the Sunshine Coast holds a 24-hour prayer and worship night at the end of every month.  I played violin again with Bethany, Andrew and Jono and this time we had a three hour time slot from 10pm to 1am.  It was awesome!  I haven't really had a chance to play violin since the last Burn so it was definitely super refreshing to bust it out again.  I brought my camera to take some pictures, but then my camera died when I tried to take the first picture (figures).

Ali and I 

On Saturday, a group of us went over to a family's house to help them with some painting.  The father is dying from cancer pretty quickly and so the family needs to get their house ready to sell.  Their kids are part of YWAM and that is how we had the connection.  It was a lot of work and it was pouring outside the whole time...but all in all it was really fun...and I got to eat an obscene amount of tea sandwiches :-)

I haven't shown you all very many pictures of the house that I live in or the girls that I live with.  Here's one for you to get a better sense.  Sorry that this post is coming so late...I should be posting soon again about the happening for this past week.  Thanks for checking in!

Lauren, Solveig, Steph, Cari, Mandie and Lyndzie in our living room

Juliane and Solveig baking some blueberry muffins in our kitchen

Change of Pace in Byron Bay

This is my Thaibodia (Cambodia and Thailand) team.  Aren't they a lovely group of people?

From Left: Mandy, Steph, Torrey, Colleen, Lauren, me, Juliane

Byron Bay's shipwreck

Unfortunately for all of you...and for me too..I have been horrible at taking pictures.  These few pictures that I have from Byron Bay are not even from my camera, they are from Lyndzie's. Sorry about that, I will try to be more committed to working on my photography skills.  This week, we traveled three hours south out of Queensland and into the state of New South Wales (NSW).  We arrived in Byron Bay on Monday morning and we set up our stuff at a church just outside of the downtown area.  We went into the town, which kind of reminds me of a smaller version of Santa Cruz.

Byron Bay has a YWAM base as well and their base director, Kevin, spoke to us on the topic of evangelism.  He had such a fresh perspective and he encouraged us with personal stories as well as heaps of scripture.  One of my favorite things that he said was, "Often times, that which the world calls good is actually evil and that which is called evil is actually good."  We see this all over the world, especially in places like China, however it happens on a personal level as well.  My favorite part of the week was that we had a couple of local outreaches in Byron Bay.  On Tuesday and Friday, we hosted a free BBQ in a local park.  So many people asked why we were giving away free food and why we were visiting Byron Bay.  Our response was that we were there to share God's love with the community, which often opened up into further discussion about spiritual things. 

We go everywhere in this thing

On Friday night, I got into an amazing conversation with this 22 year old guy named Dylan.  We talked all about what he believed in and what I believed in and he was so genuinely interested in who Jesus is and what a relationship with God is like. He asked me so many questions about my faith and at the end of our conversation he asked for me to pray with him.  Then he prayed to devote his life to Christ.  When people hear the word "evangelism" they often think that it is just another word for Christians pushing their beliefs on others.  That is not what it is for me.  For me, it is talking with people about spiritual things and trusting God with wherever He takes it from there.  In this case, Dylan decided on his own to devote his life to following Christ.  It was so exciting and I agree with Kevin when he says "There is not a single message in the world that brings as much fullness as the Gospel."

The lighthouse

Throughout the week, we went into downtown and I swear I tried every coffee shop they had (Twisted Sista, Utopia, Why Not...must I go on?).  I just remembered that I did take some of my own pictures in Byron, but they were all of food, like the biggest muffin I have ever had, or cappuccinos..why do I like to take pictures of food so much?  One morning we went up and prayed at the lighthouse, which as you can see is absolutely breath-taking.  If you walk down a path from the lighthouse, you can stand at the most easternly point of Australia.  I woke up early on a few mornings to go surf and watch the sunrise before lectures.  Sunrises are so cool here, because unlike in CA, the sun rises over the ocean.  It is nice to be back in Sunshine Coast and to be in a real bed again.  I just bought my first flight this morning for our trip from here to Bangkok...so stoked!

Aussie word of the week: busting = needing to go to the bathroom super super badly

Verse of the week: "For God, who said, 'Let light shine out of darkness,' has shone in our hearts to give the light of knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ." 2 Cor 4:6