Blessed to be a Blessing!

it's amazing how fast you can begin a new life in a new place. we've only been in New Zealand for just over a month but because of how quickly God has integrated us it feels like it could be much longer! God's been so faithful to prepare a place for us to connect here! over the past few weeks we've been connecting more with our new church family and have really come to the understanding of us how ordained and prayed for our presence here is. all glory be to God for his marvelous works because this is not something we could've planned even if we tried. multiple people have told us that the church has been praying for a couple to come and partner with them in ministry, new friendships have been a blessing to those here feeling alone, an artist i met from the church said she's been praying to connect with a christian female photographer. all of these things were prayers entrusted to God who through his faithfulness began to stir our hearts for something new...challenging...even scary...and through these things he brought us all the way from Boston to Otaki, New Zealand, to show a group of people that he had heard them and that they were not forgotten. God is so awesome friends! God is calling all of us to be someone's answer to prayer. we are so humbled and truly in awe of how God can use a willing and surrendered life.

A few new interesting "New Zeland" facts (i have to start taking notes because i see something or hear something and think i'll remember...but i don't):

• i think i forgot to mention this when we last talked about "New Zealand" foods. other than fish-n-chips, MEAT PIES are the favorite around here! Love them! the most talked about meat pie is the "steak and cheese" pie but today i had a beef curry pie with potato in it and it was pretty great!
• Kiwi's seem to be pretty interested in what things are like in America and in President Obama. one of the men from church has even read Obama's book.
• from what i can tell, the youth here are really into hip-hop and acting/talking "gangsta" like. we saw a dance team from the church in wellington on sunday night and they were very good.
• much to my amazement there seems to be a MULLET trend here. :/ yeah...i know...i have no idea. sigh.
  

we met a couple a few weeks ago at Levin City Church and they let me come to their farm on Friday to take pictures of the baby cows! the youngest is just 10 days old and she's a cutie! *PICS COMING SOON!

i've got a few things to catch you up on but this will have to do for now. off to clean our new rental! moving in tomorrow! woot!

*don't forget to scroll down and check out 'Talk Like a Kiwi' at the bottom of our page!