TALIAH’S NEWSLETTER YWAM – PRINCIPLES IN CHILD & YOUTH MINISTRY

Hello all! It has been an exciting few months of study and outreach and I have been enjoying myself and my study. I have been going through a great time of growth and learning, and God has been moving in me in great ways. Firstly, I just want to say thank you to all of those who have been supporting me in prayer. God moves when his people pray and your prayers have had impact and made an effect in my life; so thanks.

So just to let you know a few things that I have been up to since starting this course We have had many people from all over Australia and the world come, not only to teach us but to impart their knowledge and wisdom to us. It has been truly amazing – the list is of lectures is on the right under the picture. The things that we have been learning have been really amazing, everything that I expected and more. I have been able to get so much out of what I have been learning and then put it into action again with the children and youth that I have been working with.

The Lectures: —

Apostolic Pioneering—

Child and Youth Development—

Families— Leading children and youth into prayer and worship—

Intelligences and identity—

VMTC – prayer ministry—

Destiny by Design—

Biblical worldview—

Marketing—

Planning and team dynamics—

Youth culture and generations—

Mentoring—

Schools ministry—

Faith and finances—

Schools ministry—

Bible story telling—

Youth ministry—

KK structure and values—

Families in missions/ministry—

Evangelism—

Children at risk

Each week, my fellow student and I drive over to Greenwith (Golden Grove way) to help run a Kids Club at the Salvation Army church there. It is great working there, we normally have around 12 – 15 kids attending each week. We get a chance to prepare talks and presentations to present to them, putting into practice what we are learning in our course.

A few months ago now, our team split in two, one making its way to Brisbane and the Gold Coast – evangelising to Muslims and my group travelled to Canberra and Port Augusta. It was an awesome time; we planned and ran a holiday program at Weston Creek Uniting Church in Canberra and helped out at a drop in centre in the city. I loved being able to go home and catch up with friends and family and show them some of the things that we have been learning. Having a chance to go back to my high school and share was awesome. I really enjoyed sharing at Youth Group and at church, I felt really blessed by everyone and the opportunity.

In September as a team, we all headed down to Tasmania to run two very different camps. One was called NIKO and is an outdoor adventure/survivor camp and the other was a Go Camp – also known as a Kings Kids Camp. I helped to run the Go camp and had an amazing time. The kids who attended the 4 day camp where aged from 8-16 with most of them over the age of 12. It was an awesome time to impact and impart things to the youth. I grew in amazing ways myself through this time and God really moved in me as well. We finished up our lecture phase, handing in a load of assignments, projects and essays towards the end of September. It was a great relief to finish so much work! We then began our long outreach stint with a 4 day NIKO camp for the new DTS students on our Adelaide base. It was a hard camp to help staff - picture a leadership camp crossed with Survivor and you’ll get an idea of what it was like. I got very good at saying ‘You’ll find out’, given that it is the catch phrase of NIKO. I am not allowed to tell you much more than that… hehe. It was a great time to get to know that new students and learn some more about persistence and what I am capable of.

After less than 24hrs to recover from NIKO, our team travelled to Mt Barker to help out at SAYCO (South Australia Youth Camp Out) as Vollies –Volunteers. We spent a lot of the weekend helping to set up, clean up and pack up. I got a nice tan whilst directing traffic and had a fun time helping out Uniting Technology with some audio stuff during the sessions. They had an American speaker there this year and she was really amazing and I think that the youth, and the adults got a lot out of her teaching, the dramas and the worship that was put on over the three days.

After a day of rest we joined with the combined northern churches in Elizabeth to volunteer at the Upside Down Circus - a kids and family outreach. It was an awesome time and we had thirteen hundred people through the gates over the three days. I dressed up as a clown and juggled to greet the gathering crowed waiting to enter the Ridley Reserve. There was a big top tent with lots of interesting acts and different stations with God focuses throughout. So now I am in New Zealand, working with Kings Kids group over here. We have a lot of plans and opportunities to reach out to islander kids as the base in situated in a low socio-economic area. We have already begun running an after school program for kids aged 6-12yrs twice a week and we look forward to being able to do more with the YWAM base here. Please keep me in your prayers Much love, Taliah

Praise Points – — All my finances for the course have come in and I am debt free! — Outreach so far has been so amazing — God has been moving in the team in amazing ways

Prayer Points – — Finances for the rest of my team — Health issues of team members and their families — God’s guidance on outreach — God’s guidance for after PCYM – what I should do next?