LEAVING KONA!

Alright, my team and I are on the way to the airport to leave for South Africa! We will be traveling for over 50 hours... Including almost a day layover in San Francisco and then a 4-hour stop in München...

Please keep our team in your prayers as we start our looooong journey!

Time to Soak in the Beautiful Island of Hawaii!

Kona Art Walk

Could there be something better than an afternoon stroll through an elaborate open-air art exhibition downtown beautiful Kona? Every second Sunday of the month, local artists exhibit their paintings, sell their handmade jewelry and play their music all over downtown and the cars have to find a different way around :)
This is also where I got my ears gaged... just kidding, they are fakes ;)
But seriously: The Art Walk is a wonderful way to indulge in the Hawaiian culture and get some early Christmas presents for your loved ones... and yourself!!

Swimming with Gille Legacy

Do you remember my friend Gille, the Nosepainter, and his wife, Sandi? Gille loves the water but it is not safe for Sandi to get him into the water all by herself -- and therefore he has not been able to get into the water for 25 years. Until two weekends ago when my friend Travis and I took Sandi and Gille to the pier, put him, carried him into the water, laid him onto a floating mat and we all swam together! It was so incredibly wonderful to see him laugh and smile and I felt so honored to be part of making one of this man's hidden dreams come true. If I may quote my dear friend Gille: "It had to take a young girl all the way from Germany to get me back into the water!"
Sometimes it's good to be stubborn, I guess ;)

Lu'au

If you ever get the chance to go to Hawaii, go to a Lu'Au! It's an amazing cultural event that combines good food, wonderful music and colorful dances in one spectacular night! I got the chance to go with all of my roommates, my dear friends Martitza and Travis and take Gille and Sandi as well - the night could not have been more awesome!! And I even learned how to make a fish out of a palm tree leaf...

Two Wheels to Get Around

Guess what -- This is my new way to get around the island:

Well... that was a joke! I love mopeds way too much and so I rented one for super-cheap together with my friend and outreach-companion Evelyne from Switzerland! Ever since, I've been able to do my morning devotions at the beach - what a great way to start the day!

Hilo Side and Mauna Kea Excursion

Our last excursion for the quarter took us first to see the waterfalls on the Hilo side of the island, swim in one of them and get completely rained out ;) Afterwards, at night, we went swimming in a warm pool right by the ocean (where the water is naturally heated up to bathtub temperature) and swam under the stars and surrounded by palm trees... REALLY late at night, we drove up to the volcano Mauna Kea where it was freezing cold and snowy!! We put on several layers and took awesome starry-sky photos and we also learned how to "paint with light."

My Wonderful Friend Sharon (from Switzerland) and I

Dancers Who Dance Upon Injustice :)

My Dance Partner Josiah and I

I'm back in my element - I am leading a dance club :) For the past weeks, I have been able to teach people here on campus how to dance, together with my awesome new dance partner Josiah. He actually already knew how to Swing Dance and he's super fast at picking up any new dance as well - I seem to always be blessed with dance partners who learn so quickly and I am endlessly thankful for that :)

Last Friday, we've hosted a big Swing Dance Fundraiser and raised money for what I like to call our 'Fishing Pole Fund': My vision is to not only go out into the mission field and only be a blessing to the people in South Africa while we are there (like giving them a fish to eat) but to teach them a skill and leave them with something that will be a continuous blessing to the people (like teaching them to fish and leaving them with a fishing pole... in our case this will be school books, disposable cameras or the like).

And you know what's especially great? Josiah is even in my outreach team so we are planning on teaching orphans in South Africa how to Swing Dance... YES, to me, this is what dancing is meant to be!!! I've finally realized that it fulfills me so much more to bring joy to others through my own dance performances or through teaching them how to dance than to "beat someone else" and win the great price in a competition...

Time is flying by...

We are in the middle of week 9 - I cannot believe it! Everyday is full of new learning experiences, work and adventures. So let me share some of my notes with you to fill you in on what I've learned about in class over the past two weeks.

Week 7 - Speaker: John Leech; Topic: The Father Heart of God

Lu'au Fire Dancer

> In Matthew 3:16, God tells us three things about Jesus: "This is my son (1), whom I love (2) and with him I am well pleased (3)." So what can we learn from this passage about God's heart for His people?1. Know our identity, which is in Christ. (We are all sons and daughters of God.)
2. God is not ashamed of you - even when you are. (He still loves us unconditionally, even when we do things that hurt Him.)
3. Do not live FOR God's smile but FROM God's smile. (He does not love us more or less because of our actions - because perfect love never increases or decreases. However, if you truly love God and know He loves you, you will live from his smile and act out of love because you do not ever want to hurt him).

> SHYNESS IS NOT A PERSONALITY TRAIT. IT'S FEAR OF INSUFFICIENCY. 

> Spiritual teachings and Bible readings are not supposed to make you smarter (you don't want to become an obnoxious argumentative Bible thumper) but they should get you closer to your personal and intimate experience with God (regularly meeting with a friend to get to know him better). Understanding (everything) is not a requirement for believing.

> Stop complaining to God about what's wrong with you/wrong with your life and start praising Him for what's right with Him!

> Condemnation is of the destructive, conviction is constructive. Because condemnation connects your sin to your identity (you are a liar). Conviction shows that you are acting outside of your character (you have lied but it's contrary to your character).

Week 8 - Speaker: John Childers, Topic: Spiritual Authority

Geckos aren't always nice. Somehow the scene fits the topic.

> STOP COMPARING YOURSELF TO OTHERS. You will always loose the comparison game at some point (e.g. 'she is more beautiful than I am' or 'he is more popular than I am') because you are not able to be EXACTLY like somebody else. EVEN WORSE: Every time you win a round in the comparison game because your success comes out of and results in PRIDE. Over time, pride hardens your heart over time and makes God's heart cry every single time. Satan's original sin was PRIDE (believing that he would be more powerful than God). C.S. Lewis writes in his book, Mere Christianity, that a woman is not proud because she thinks she is beautiful (NOTHING wrong with that!) but because she thinks she is MORE beautiful than others. For my German readers :) Galater 6:4 "Dann wird er sich über sine guten Taten freuen können, ohne Grund zur Überheblichkeit zu haben." However, all of this leaves me with a bitter taste or at least a worry of what competitive sports are all about - comparison and being better than others. I would highly appreciate any thoughts and comments on this current struggle of mine.

Downtown Kona

> Sin is often very attractive because it brings instant gratification. Staying away from sin is most often hard because it let's you 'miss out' on the moment but it doesn't only keep your mind and soul healthy but also results into delayed gratification. => The comfort of sin is immediate and the destruction of sin is eternal.

> John 1:10 says that God has given us authority. Therefore, God will not do for us what He has already given us authority over to do ourselves. Therefore, don't sit and wait until God works out your problems for you but get up and be the change you want to see in the world :)

Farmers Market

> The good old question: Why does God allow suffering of the "good people" in His world? Try to change the "why" to "how" and ask: How can I still love You even though I do not understand all your ways?

> I had read the scripture Matthew 7:17 many times: "Likewise, every good tree bears good fruit, but a bad tree bears bad fruit." But today, for the first time, I have realized the definition of fruit: The fruit is not only the what the tree produces (like a good/bad person does good/bad work) but the fruit also carries SEEDS that will cause more trees of the same kind to grow!!

> The opposite of love? Not hate. FEAR! 1 John 4:18 says that perfect love will cast out fear. However, fear will cast out love.

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Downtown Kona

Wow. I am learning so much here and I feel changed from the inside out. Of course, I do not agree with everything that is being said in the lectures. I sometimes even wholeheartedly disagree. However, that is the reason why God has blessed us with the gift of discernment. And one message might touch one person's heart but not mine. As long as well all agree on the foundations, there is room for disagreement. And I have learned one more important lesson: it's ok to disagree, you can still love each other even if you will always have different opinions on certain things. Loving each other is the solution to the destructive power of disagreement :)