Ok so you were all promised a blog and here it is...finally! The first installment.

It's very difficult to know where to start as I've done sooo much even in the short time I've been in Melbounrne. First I went to stay with Jenny Divine for a few days, basically just relaxing and recovering from jet lag, so a lot of sleeping (at weird hours might I add) was involved. Activities include going to a drive in cinema which was a fun experience, going into the city, walking along the beach at St Kilda and eating ice-cream! Yummy!

Found out that we weren't actually satying on the YWAM (Youth With A Mission) base at Surrey Hills after all but that we were going to be staying in a house (we're a pretty small team, only 6 of us). If I'm honest I was a bit disappointed when I first found out as I heard that Sunshine (the area in which we were going to be staying) is one of the roughest parts of Melbourne whereas Surrey Hills is one of the nicest!

Anyway, I arrived at the YWAM base on Monday 22nd Feb and met our leaders Fay and Willie Collins and also the girls on the team (Chloe, 17, Rach, 18, and Julie, 28). Two guys arrived the next day (both Korean, one of them is a pastor!). I found out the reason for our change of accommodation was that we were going to be doing most of our work in the Sunshine community so we had to really be situated there so we could develop relationships with the people we met - the base at Surrey Hills is about an hours drive away, so no way would we be able to do everything we're doing now if we had been staying there. The house we are in only came about last minute and was a bit of a last minute miracle from God.

Anyway, so the first week was basically orientation and got the meet the people on the Sports DTS (discipleship training school) which is running at the same time as our church-planting DTS - love everyone on the team already - everyone is so down to earth and really fun to spend time with as well as passionate about God.

We started lectures this week, the schedule is pretty intense but really great as there's lots of space for worship, prayer, ministry, building relationships and sharing Jesus with people, in a genuine, relationship-based but non-Bible bashing way. Mornings usually consist of lectures and afternoons of going out into the community developing friendships with the people we meet and being open and honest about who we are as followers of Jesus, maybe even praying for the people we meet if they are up for it. Sometimes we exchange contact details so we can continue the friendship and be able to share more of what we believe, as well as getting to know them and discovering what they believe! Today we played basketball and spend time with the local teenagers.

There is way too much to report to put into this email, other than it has been very inspiring, yet challenging so far and have learnt so much already, even in just a week! So excited to see what God is going to do in my life over the next few months! One other point to note is that we are going to be going to Indonesia and Malaysia in May til we finish in Aug. One thing which has blown me away is the fact that God has provided all the finance I need to pay the school fees - money has just flooded in - I have to say I've always been a little bit of a doubter when it comes to things like that so this has really taught me that I can totally 100% trust God after all! Good stuff!

Right, that's about it for now as I'm hungry and would quite like to eat some dinner! :D

Hope all of you lovely people are well and enjoying life back home! Thinking of u all!

Will update you soon (ish!)

Lorraine xxx

For those of you who feel able to pray, here is a list of prayer points:
- God's protection as we are in a rough area
- Energy as am very busy most of the time and get tired very quickly (although going for some down-time at the beach on the weekend - woohoo! :)
- Please also pray that the team would continue to bond and get on well - hopefully this will continue - feel so blessed so far to have such a great team