Down to Work!

Although we've been employed since we arrived much of the 'work' of the first couple of weeks was finding out what was going on in the way of youth and children's work as well as meeting the people who were running it and lots of other members of the church. On October 3rd. we were officially commissioned as youth and children's licensed lay ministers within the Parish. A couple of the other churches in the parish had their service at St. John's that day so there were lots of people to welcome us, including lots of children who made us cards and signed a large balloon!
Since then we've began planning a 'Light Night' (a halloween alternative) which will involve making lanterns, food, games, songs etc. - a bit like the children's club we helped lead in Sheffield. We've put out a general plea for glass jars for the lanterns and it's great because there are lots of jam makers in the congregations who have, literally, cupboards full of jars - hallelujah!
We had breakfast with other youth workers in the area so got to find out some of the things other youth groups are doing as well as making connections with people in a similar boat! Our first youth gathering was last night and it was a positive experience! We'll continue to meet on Fridays and we'll be around in the week after school too. We're looking forward to getting to know them better and it will take some getting used to for them as they haven't had youth stuff for a while.
We also went to Christchurch prison. The lady who leads the work in the prisons is 93 years old and reminds us of Mother Theresa. She is absolutely amazing! She is so full of love that the men in the prison can't help but warm to her. She has been visiting the prisons for 25 years and she's seen God transform the hardest hearts and messiest lives - it was very humbling and inspiring and a real privilege to visit with her.
The parish secretary is on holiday for 2 weeks so Natalie has been covering in the office - mostly routine telephone enquires and emails though somebody did want to know whether there would be any room for her in her parent's burial plot so that took some interesting research!

As well as the hard work we did manage to squeeze in a rugby match at the Jade stadium in Christchurch; Canterbury (we even had to go in their colours of black and red!) beat Northland 68:17 so that was good though not a thrilling match as you can imagine with a score like that!
And summer looked like it had arrived earlier in the week so a trip to the beach was in order. It seems it was only teasing, however, as snow is forecast tomorrow...