What I am doing here in Northern Ireland

For anyone who doesn't know what I do here weekly, here is a brief view into my life as an intern.  

Here in Northern Ireland I am working under the missions pastor of the Causeway Coast Vineyard, so my weeks are generally spent in the church offices. It is amazing everything that the church staff and pastors do behind the scenes that doesn't get seen by the normal church goer. So during the day I am in the offices (9am - 5pm) and then I go home usually for a bit of reading and then dinner and then I shoot on to the next thing. 2 nights out of the week I go to a home group. One of them is a youth small group that I am leading with someone else from the church, and the other is a young adult group where I am learning, receiving, and being challenged in my walk with God. At the moment I am also doing a class on tuesday nights called the Father heart of God, where I am learning about God as my father, my daddy. It is such an amazing course where I am going back to the root of many hurts and problems in my life and having God come in and heal those places. My mondays are my day off from work, but on those days things have to be done around the house. Grocery shopping, cleaning the house, laundry, and a bit of down time. Usually mondays are my day where I jump on my computer and get in contact with people at home. (like right now) :-D

God blessed me immensely when I came here by opening a door for me to travel with one of the staff members here from the church (Mark). He started something here in Coleraine (the city in Northern Ireland where the church is) called Healing on the Streets. Healing on the streets is just a simple model for healing where churches can get outside of the building and offer healing and hope to a lost and needy world. Through this ministry, God has opened doors for Mark to go to other churches all over europe and teach them the Healing on the Streets model. I have been his traveling companion since october last year and I have been so blessed to be able to go places with him. By being around Mark and just doing normal life with him, I am learning more than I have ever learned in my life. It has been an amazing experience and the best is yet to come.  For many of my weekends I am away, but out of the past 4 weekends I have been home for 3 of them.  So all in all, I am a pretty busy guy all day all week long.  It is a rare occasion where I get a chance to relax and take some time off, but it is definitely the best time of my life.

I hope you enjoyed a look into the life of Ben.  Crazy, full, but because God has been in the center of it the whole time.... it has all been worth while.  

Places I am going!

Here are a list of places that I am going. Please pray for me on these trips that God will keep me safe, that he will bless me, and that I will not miss any of His leadings on these trips. And as I meet people please pray that God will place more wisdom in me, that He will humble my heart, and that He would expand my character so that I might be loving and encouraging to everyone I meet in every situation.

February 20 - 22 Bichester, England. Healing on the Streets with Mark.

February 27 - March 2 Edinburgh, Scotland. I will be going to Gemma's parent's church!!!!! Healing on the streets with Mark.

March 6 - 8 Aylesbury, England. Healing on the Streets with Mark.

March 13 - 15 Glasgow, Scotland. Healing on the Streets with Mark.

March 21 - 28 Morocco. Trip with Sydney and Ricky Wright (the missions pastor) to morocco to meet underground missionaries and pastors who are evangelizing in a muslim dominated society where it is illegal to be christian.

April 17 - 18 Newcastle, England. Healing on the Streets with Mark.

April 24 - 26 Colchester, England. Healing on the Streets with Mark.

May 1 - 3 Birmingham, England. Healing on the Streets with Mark.

May 8 - 9 Canterbury, England. Healing on the Streets with Mark.

May 15 - 17 Stevenage, England. Healing on the Streets with Mark.

May 19 - 31 South Africa missions trip. Sydney and I will be leading a missions trip to south africa for 11 days.

The past month!

Its crazy to think of all the things that I have done in the past month. January of 2009 is already gone, and it seems like it had just began. I had a more of a relaxed schedule this past month than normal. I had 3 weekends home which was really nice. But 2 weekends I went on trips with Mark and another I went back to Newcastle, england to visit some friends. My trips with Mark are always amazing and eventful. I wish I could truly describe the excitement and the atmosphere of what it is like being around mark and learning from him. He is an amazing guy who's heart is so humble. In January I went with Mark to Stanmore and Plymouth, england. Both of the trips went great and I saw God touch a lot of people. I had so much fun on the plymouth trip chatting with teenagers and inviting them to come and take a seat for prayer. It was amazing watching the routiest and craziest teenager become totally calm and tranquil as they sat in the chair and received prayer and were told that God loved them. I remember being amongst a group of boys when one of their friends who just got prayer came from the chair to rejoin the group. She had gotten prayer for her back and all her friends immediately asked her how she was doing. She said that all the pain in her back was gone. She was all smiles and kept on telling her friends over and over that she felt a lot better. She then made the hilarious comment that she was thinking about going all religious. Haha!

In Newcastle, I met two of my friends I had made on my first trip with Mark Marx for Healing on the Streets. Over the weekend I spent every minute with them and every second I was there I was learning things. These guys were both radically saved and came from rough and extremely hard backgrounds. Both of them had amazing stories and amazing a huge passion and fire for God. Just spending a weekend with them I was challenged and stretched in my thinking and faith. I walked away from Newcastle with so many stories, it would be too hard to tell you just one of them. So to sum it all up, in Newcastle God did amazing things and my friends taught me inadvertently about living a passionate sold out life for christ. It was flippin awesome!

Since coming home, I have also finally settled into a home group. It was hard for me deciding on where to go and which home group to choose, but I finally chose one and I know that it is the family that I need here. The people in the house group are an amazing bunch of new and old christians and we have a lot of fun journeying our walk in christ together. Thank you Jesus!

As a small group and just as friends getting together to have some fun, we have all gone to the movies, thrown a surprise party, and watched a rugby match.

For any of you who have never seen a game of rugby... you are sorely missing out. It is the most amazing sport ever invented. I am definitely going to join a league when I get home. We watched the 6 Nations rugby match on sunday where it was Ireland vs Italy. The game was played in Rome, so the nerves were blaring and we were all a bit on edge. But as the fighting Irish always do, we kicked some italian ass and won 35-17!!!!! I love rugby.

Thank you god for putting me here

Thank you God for letting me be a part of your story.  Thank you for letting me be a part of what you are doing here.  Thank you for this church and all the people here.  As I look around at all the leaders and all the amazing people you have here, God my heart is moved to tears of joy.  Thank you for putting me here Jesus.  A teenager from California living in Northern Ireland I am.  What an adventure!!!  What a blessing!  What a time of learning and change!  Thank you for what you have included me to do here in Northern ireland and abroad.  Greater things are yet to come. Greater things are still to be done here.  I am so happy to be home, to be back at church.  Thank you for what you are going to do this year.  The best is yet to come.

(this is what I wrote in my journal the first sunday I was back since going home to california for christmas)