Students, Soccer, and Sausages

One of the primary ways we have been spending our time is getting to know the Kiwi students that are already connected to the ministry here! Two of them are sitting on the couch between Nate and Kyle! The guy in the red sitting to the right of Ben is David. He is on staff with CO Australia. He has been helping Josh out with our trainings. He is looking to move to New Zealand and join Josh on staff here within the next year to help build the ministry.
One of the the primary ministries CO has to the campus here is to set bbqs on campus on the nights of major parties. The goal is to hand out sausages to students who have been drinking all day (literally). The thought behind it is to love on students and to connect with them. This is a picture of the line of half drunken students standing in line for sausages!
Though the sausage ministry I was able to meet a few girls that play soccer for Studholme college. Megan and I were able to go and play soccer with them on Saturday morning! We are hopeful that this will give us an opportunity to meet tons of girls! We were able to go hangout with a few of them later Saturday evening. We are praying that our relationships deepen with them quickly! From left to right Elizabeth, Claire (kiwi), Emma (kiwi), Me, Megan, and Kate (kiwi).

Some of the guys have been hanging out with a few of the first years that live in university college (a college is similar to a US dorm). Top right next to Sean is James. The guy on the right of Kyle on the front row is Duffy. James and Duffy have been spending quite a bit of time with our guys over the last few days. Pray that God would continue to deepen the relationships between these guys and our guys.
Please continue to pray for the deepening of relationships and the opportunity to make the gospel known to each of these students! Thanks a ton for your support!
Sheffey

Head colds, ministry, and the Sovereignty of God

Well, it has been an interesting two weeks and right now a couple of us have what I can only describe as the Kiwi brand of the common cold. God is good and He is providing strength and energy to see us though it. I can’t remember the last time I felt this energetic while having a cold bug. I’m typically pretty worthless when I'm sick. I’m usually the guy who crawls into a hole and hides until I’m all better, but that hasn’t been necessary. The other guys (or as we say here: “blokes”) on CCP are all really encouraging and challenging to be around and they have been God’s chosen vehicle to energize me as they spur me on to love and good deeds.

Pray with us as we pray for physical wellness. My hope is that we will all get well soon but more importantly, my prayer is that God alone would be enough. My prayer is that He would be satisfying and sustaining above all else. "Jesus minus everything equals salvation. Christ plus nothing else equals satisfaction." God will teach us great things about Himself as we rely on Him for energy and strength. Our head colds in New Zealand are nothing compared to the sacrifices made by saints world-wide. The suffering of those saints pales in comparison to the cross of Christ. Our team will be just fine.

I got the opportunity to meet some Kiwi students last week and managed to get their phone numbers so we could meet up and chat some more. The first student I really got to meet on campus while we were doing some outreach was a guy named Tom. Tom is a really funny guy. I’m hoping that we will get the chance have lunch with Tom and his friends this Friday. A first year student named Josh Cole invited me and some of the guys to come hangout with him and his friends at The Cook which is a local tavern. God opened up some doors during that time for future conversations and my ministry partner (Sean Stallings) and I hope to hangout with Josh and his friend Brian this week. I met another first year named Peter and he invited Kyle Morris and me to play rugby on Saturday with his college (dorm hall). He and his hall mate Nathan will be seeing more of us in the next week. Please pray for Kyle and me as we get ready to play rugby and connect with another dozen or so students.

In and over all of these relationships that we are building, God is Sovereign. And the Devil is powerless to stop what God wills.

-Nate X.

“In the end, the gates of hell couldn’t shut us down.” -Lecrae Moore

Footy with the Kiwis

This past week was the first week our CCP team started laboring on campus. We have met many students through sporting events, hang outs, and going to campus events. The guys on our team decided to play flag football every Friday and eat dinner at our place afterwards. Many of the people we met we invited to play flag football. The kiwi guys were really excited to have a chance to play some American football, since rugby is their main sport. Many of them watch it, and know how to play, but it is not played that often. There were around 15 students who came out to play. It was funny seeing how excited they were to play and try using their football terminology. One student on the winning team said that when they won, he felt like they won the super bowl. This is a very significant event where we can develop momentum with the ministry and build deeper relationships. The students we have been meeting are starting to turn from acquaintances to friends. We are all thankful to God for giving us favor and being able to build relationships in such ways as playing American football.
Something we have started doing is grilling up free sausages to drunk people. We did this three times this past week. By doing this we are able to show them the love of Christ by serving them and it is also a great opportunity to meet people. This has been helpful in meeting a few students and meeting up with them later. It is cool to see there responses to the act of loving kindness. It really shows how the act of serving people physically is a great avenue to serving them spiritually as well. It doesn’t make sense to people what we are doing. When they ask why, it provides a great avenue to tell them the reason we do it is because of the transforming work He has done in our lives. When thinking how Christ came to serve and give His life as a ransom for many it is so easy to ask, “Why”? It has been transforming for us to see that when true Christian service happens, it leaves the world wondering “why?” and the answer is always Christ.

Please be in prayer for us as we start to develop relationships. Developing deep relationships with trust with a few select students is huge. We do not want to spread thin and make little impacts, but we want to go deep and make life long impacts in people’s lives. So please pray for some “key guys” that we can really start pouring our life into.

Nate Dog and K-Dog