Launch!

It has been a while since we've updated this blog, sorry. Please comment below if you'd like to be added to our monthly ministry update emails as well. I do have aspirations this year of being much more active on here!

We are already into the fourth week of the semester at Auckland Uni. Several encouraging things have been happening! To try and keep from overlapping too much I'll share stories via pictures here!

Here's what we've been up to...

Two weeks before the start of the year we took a group of returning students (and one American study abroad student involved with the Navs in Missouri) to Tauranga for a weekend of visioncasting, planning, and relationship building.

We had a really encouraging time with Glen, our National Director, who hosted us at his home for our meeting times.

This was the first marker that the rush at the start of the semester was about to start! Exciting times. A few days before the start of term the University put on a Fresher's day where new students get a chance to tour campus, interact with their respective faculties and meet some of the clubs available on campus. We had a great time chatting to students about faith! We gave away ice creams and a chance to win tickets to a local pro basketball game if they'd fill out a simple survey.

Coupled with Orientation Week, the first week of the semester, we interacted with around 900 students! It was an exhausting yet encouraging week!

We had several new students during our first Navs group and we have had a few more each week! It has been fun watching students build relationships; our returning students have done a fantastic job relating with new students as they've come along.

After the first week of classes had finished we went to the beach to go paddleboarding and have a BBQ! It was great; afterward, everyone came to our place for a movie!

During our weekly Nav Nights we have been taking a look at a few main themes of the Bible -- Creation, Fall, Redemption, and Destiny. Last week we discussed the now all pervasive sin of Adam and Eve and how that wreaks havoc in us and in the world. This isn't a popular topic by any means and as one student put it "it's a bit depressing". Tomorrow night we will be looking at how God has responded to this throughout history and what it means for us today. How encouraging to get to interact with genuine questions and concerns that arise from reading the overarching story of the Bible! In two weeks we will be using these themes to help us wrestle through the nitty gritty of our daily lives and see how they provide a framework to view and interact with the world around us. Kathryn and I are excited to see how God will continue to work in those times and in the students that are a part of it.