One Outreach to the Next!

Lots has happened and lots to catch everyone up on. As I am getting ready to head out for the next outreach I am reminded of Gods goodness and how much He did on first outreach that I can't help but share! My team and I had an amazing time speaking in the Aussie schools and at some incredible church services! I met so many people and God gave me the opportunity to speak life and give direction to so many students in the schools. I feel so blessed to have had the opportunity to hang out and just answer questions that the youth had for me and my YWAM team. Countless stories, many new relationships, and a bond with my team that I can't even begin to explain. I love knowing that as I spoke what God placed on my heart that hearts were moved and minds were expanding to the revelations that God was working on in their hearts. I had such an awesome experience with a young lady in particular on an Evangelism night for my team as God led me to her and as I spent time talking with her to bring to the surface brokenness she was going through. It was so mind blowing as I walked away knowing God used me to tell her just how God saw her. I loved every minute of it. God used me to speak in some of the places we went and I can't even remember some of the things I said because it was so much of God speaking through me. I went to bed each night of outreach just in awe of what God did and the impact we left in the places we were at. It was a great time. Being back at the base for the last two weeks I have completed lectures now. We finished  Missions and Spiritual Warfare week. Headed off for the next outreach for 6 weeks! I am no longer going to Papua New Guinea but will be traveling all Queensland Coast and joining the Australian outreach. For now this is where God is leading me and I am excited to see what God is going to do in the weeks ahead. Please keep myself and my team in your prayers! We are praying for the youth of Australia and to speak life and Gods truth into their generation. Can't wait to see what God is going to stir up! Hopefully I will keep everyone more updated. Thanks for reading!

Cyclone Relief

Children's church service 

Sunrise service on Easter Sunday

Team Australia! 

Off to Cairns!

Hey everyone! Just wanted to let you know we are headed off on our first outreach till April 10th to Cairns, Australia! Please keep me and my outreach team in prayer! Can't wait to update on all the stories! Thank you so much! Love you all!

Claire

He is Faithful even when we are Faithless.

Already in week 9 with 3 days left until we leave for first outreach!! Gosh this came so fast! This week we have been talking on Evangelism in lectures which is been my favorite week so far! God is giving me a passion for this and Im stoked on what he is teaching me! We are learning awesome tools on how to evangelize and just helping people meet God wherever they are at. It is so exciting. The past week I have been in constant prayer about all my finances being in, and working towards getting them all raised before first outreach. Last night was an amazing experience that is just complete revelation of Gods faithfulness! Our whole DTS had a ministry time of giving and being led to give what they all felt God was speaking them to give. In one hour our entire school needed for the last few peoples finances to raise $10,664, and God met that in that short amount of time! It was incredible and the most moving experience as God was stirring up hearts. Generosity is so contagious! God alone in that time gave me the exact amount of money for the rest of my outreach finances of $1,899.80! I was so overwhelmed with the generosity and love that God is going to provide when you are walking in His will and walking in obedience. I was speechless. My outreach team leaves on Saturday for Cairns, Australia for 3 weeks! I am really excited for this and can't wait to see what God is going to do. We will be speaking in schools, churches, youth groups, and just wherever the Spirit tells us to go. We have a lot of great ideas that we feel God has placed on our hearts for  going out and just telling people about Jesus. Please be in prayer for our team the next few weeks for safety, open opportunities, and also just for us to be obedient to what God is saying. This week has been super busy and especially for myself it has been difficult to get things done. Looking forward to just going out and doing Gods work.

I got the amazing opportunity to snorkel at the Great Barrier Reef! Awesome experience!

Camping in the Outback

Wow. What an incredible time it has been the last two weeks. SO much to talk about and so much can happen in that short amount of time. I think I need to break it down for each week. 

The first week we had lectures on Lordship and what exactly that means and looks like. This by far has probably been my favorite week and lecture. Mark Parker from New Zealand was our speaker and he was quiet the character. I learned a lot about following Jesus rather than following Christianity. I loved the comparisons he did with digging into some of the Old Testament and connecting with the New Testament. Crazy revelations! All I can really say is the Holy Spirit showed up and it was such a memorable experience. I wish I could explain in depth all that happens its just insanely ridiculous. I love every minute of it. I wish all my readers could grasp and understand the work that happens here I can’t wait to share with everyone when I go home! The second week we learned a lot about evangelism and listening to the voice of God to share with people about Christ. I personally loved learning about it! We got the opportunity to hear our leaders speak their testimonies which again was pretty sweet. I enjoyed the fresh outback air and solid walks with God daily with zero distractions. Camping consisted of camp fires, relationship bondings, a billion card games (including dutch blitz which is by far my new favorite game), worship, some rainy days, the beautiful open sky full of glorious stars, waterfalls and creeks, day hikes with my team, and just God showing up in some powerful ways. I also was baptized for the first time and it was great! One of my favorite moments on camping would be after our school watched How Great is Our God, and we all sat out by the camp fire just looking at the night sky and worshiping together while letting the entire galaxy sink in. Such a good time. It was so nice to get away. God really was showing me the past weeks what it truly looks like to offer ourselves and possessions at the cross, and give up so much to gain what He has for us. We talked about not going after the presence of God but going straight after God. It was incredible. Back at the base now and this weeks lectures are on Inductive Bible Study. So far so good! Leave for first outreach in about 10 days really excites me! We will be traveling to Cairns, Australia speaking in churches and youth groups, and speaking in schools along with anything else God leads us to. We will be speaking testimonies as well as some topics that we put together! This outreach will be three weeks long. Hopefully will have all my finances in by Friday for minor outreach as well at major outreach will be coming up a few weeks after we get back. I miss home and everyone very much! I can’t wait to share with everyone everything thats happened! Thanks for reading. Love and miss you all. Until next time... 

Be Blessed

Claire

The beautiful Gorge! 

Go, Go, Go

Sorry it has been awhile been super busy and on the go since coming back from an incredible camping trip! Will post details soon on the awesome experiences and how everything went! Its great to be back at base. Right now is a extreme faith building time as I am praying for the next two days for finances, and God to move mountains as my outreach finances are due. Praying for God to provide 2,500 before Friday. God is doing incredible things, and I am choosing to trust Him 100% in knowing this is His will for me, and He is SO much bigger, and can provide over abundantly more than I could ever ask for. Please send out a prayer if you get a chance to for Gods will in moving, and prayer for my outreach team as a couple of us are praying together to see the rest of our finances come in. Im so excited to share revelations and stories of proof that God is moving and showing up everywhere! Thanks to all you guys for reading and for your prayers! If your interested in helping with the rest of my finances I will post a link to where anyone can donate online on our bases website and putting my name as the recipient it will go into my outreach account! Thank you for praying for me!



Donate Online for my Australia and Papua New Guinea Outreach

Where to even begin....

Sorry it has been a little while so much has gone on and been super busy lately. I will start off with letting you all know I have the financial amount I need to raise for Papua New Guinea! I will be praying and asking God to provide for me $2,700 for my outreach amount. This is nothing for a God whose is SO faithful and bigger than any finance I need provided. I have seen God provide for so many of my fellow friends in amazing, unexpected ways here, and I have full faith in knowing that He is more than willing to provide for me as this is His will.

This week in lectures was the topic of Intimacy with God and learning in depth about the Holy Spirit. It was a crazy ride this week and I wish I could put into words all that the Holy Spirit did here. It was an experience like no other, and God was moving in incredible ways! God showed me for sure the immense power of the Holy Spirit and the power in the tongue and speaking truth out. I have learned the importance in moving in the power of the Holy Spirit, and what a genuine loving relationship God extends to all of his children looks like. I love serving a God who desires and is running to a relationship with me just as much as I am running to Him. Our speaker was Kevin Norris a YWAM leader from Kona and I loved his blunt, challenging questions that made me truly question why I believe what I believe. This week was a bit of a struggle physically as this week my outreach team and I started double hikes up Castle Hill for more training. Each week will get harder, but I embrace the challenge as I know this will equip me in the areas I need it the most.

This DTS has meant so much to me the past few weeks. It have never been so stretched, challenged, molded, and willing to constantly say Yes to God in every aspect of this exciting journey I am on. No matter what day I have at the end of it God is worth the cost and comfort, and worth giving everything up for. I will be leaving tomorrow for two weeks camping in the beautiful outback and valleys of Australia! Im am so ready for this time to just be with God and His creation. God is good ALL the time and I constantly am reminded of His character in each season I am in. Also, I love living life with these people! Making memories and lighting a flame for God with them is such a blessing. Miss home and all my wonderful families and friends! Thanks for your prayers! Be back March 4th. Can't wait to see all that God is going to do in our lectures and time camping as we will be on the topic of Lordship! I had a very Happy birthday in Aussie land, and it was definitely memorable.

My Papua New Guinea Outreach Team! 

19 years of Age :)

Time is flying!

Found myself today stopping and thinking of how fast time has flown since I have been here. How fast I have grown these relationships with these people I just met 4 weeks ago. Also pondered on how amazing God is and how incredibly faithful He is in all He has done for me with getting me to where I am right now. I wish I could put into words what I have learned and what these days here have looked like. Its indescribable the work I have seen happen here, and the answered prayers I have been able to be apart of. Last week was Clear Conscience week with the director of the base Ken Mulligan. God really spoke to me on how to love the convictions in my life. To embrace convictions and to know the true heart of God behind the convictions we feel. There is such a privilege that goes with the Holy Spirit convicting us so that we can walk in truth. This week lectures is focused on Relationships. We discussed the importance on foundations in all our relationships. No matter how many times we build up our foundation if it does not start with our relationship with God it will fall. I have already come to love this week, and know that God has so much to show me as I continue to listen. Today we added up total finances for my particular school on how much we need to raise before outreach between us all including some of our leaders. We are praying and working towards seeing God provide for $38,700. I do not know yet my personal outreach amount for Papua New Guinea. I should know by the end of the week how much I will personally need to raise. That amount is for myself included and the other students who have not yet raised our outreach finances. We are really excited to see how God will provide in many different ways as we know that He is a faithful and trusting God. If you would like to pray for this finance amount feel free to, because we are so grateful for any prayers and love to have anyone join us in praying and seeing it come in! My outreach team has started to train and prepare for Papua New Guinea by hiking up Castle Hill 3 times during the week. Before outreach we are aiming to be able to hike up the mountain twice with a missions pack to be prepared for the hiking and traveling to different villages in Papua New Guinea we will be doing. For my outreach team we have an awesome group of 5 girls and 5 guys. Hope to give more details soon about the exact locations we will be traveling through as well as the work will do. Still can't believe how fast DTS is going. I loved being here and knowing I am living in Gods will and this is exactly where He wants me right now. I was homesick for the first time really a few days ago and was in the prayer room for 24/7 prayer and God led me to this passage-

Matthew 19:28-30

God is so good and I loved dwelling on who He was and words He had for me. I love being able to share with you all what God is doing and taking you along this journey with me. Im beyond blessed. Thanks for reading.


-Claire

Cyclone Yasi

Just wanted to start off thanking everyone for all your prayers for this. We were extremely blessed with the minimum of damage from the storm. A lot of Townsville was affected by it and we have already helped over 20 different homes in the community. The base lost power, clean water, air-condtioning, and a few other resources, but we were more than prepared for the worst. We are so blessed to have only been without them for a couple of days. So much of Townsville is still without these. Being cooped up with 18 other girls in my flat was such a fun experience. Even in the midst of discomfort and humidity we had an awesome time getting to know each other on a whole other level.  We are extending our 24/7 prayer we have been doing for the next 2 weeks for another week to pray for the other towns and cities affected by Yasi. Just to clarify, everyone on the base is safe and sound. Please keep the other Queensland cities in your prayers. We still hope to continue to be used by God in any way to assist the other cities and the rest of our community.

Prayer for Discernment on my Outreach

Hey everyone! So exciting news about our Outreach locations! Wanted to let you all know what they were and ask for prayer for me and my fellow mates as we seek God for discernment as to where we should be sent to for our outreach. We have two separate outreaches during the DTS. The first outreach is where our DTS is split up in teams, and we travel around different locations in Australia speaking in schools, doing school programs (since in Australia there is freedom to speak on Christianity and Christ), evangelism, doing church services, telling people about YWAM, and doing anything that the spirit leads us to do. They are 3 week long outreaches located in the Queensland region. This outreach will be around late March to beginning of April. The second outreach is our major outreach where we either go overseas for a missions trip, or stay in the Australian area, and travel around Australia to do missions work needed here. This one will be around the time from late April till early June. Here are the options:

Minor Outreach-
1. Cairns/ Taberlands area of Queensland
2. Charters Towers Region
3. Mount Isa
4. Gladstone/ Emerald Region (where a lot of the flood damage took place)

Major Outreach
1. Papa New Guinea (most of the missions work here will require to be physically fit as we will travel to remote villages)
2. East Timor/ Darwin (this outreach will be a lot of building houses, teaching english and some labor work)
3. Papa New Guinea (same area but this outreach will be a few weeks spent traveling the coast of PNG while living of our PNG medical ship. We will get to serve on the ship, stop in ports giving out primary health care service and learning about life on the ship. We will stop at locations and work in different areas going into villages and more details to come.. )
4. Australia Outreach (this outreach we will be traveling around the coastal cities of Australia doing Ausslife Seminars which is a curriculum we are still learning about. This outreach works with a lot of youth and we are training to run these Ausslife programs in the schools.)

The minor outreach above are linked with the major ones by number. So wherever we end up going for our minor outreach we will then be with the same team for our major one. (1 is linked with 1.. exc.)

There is a lot more detail that goes with each of the outreaches so once I know where I am going to I will  learn a lot more about that outreach. We don't have final details about finances yet, but after praying about this for the rest of the week we will choose our top 3 and then go from there as to how they will be split up. I will keep it posted. Im asking for prayer as I am praying the rest of the week seeking to hear God's voice as to where His will is for me to go. Thanks for all the support and prayers. Im blessed with the support I have back home!

Worth Living By

Im part of the fellowship of the unashamed. I have the Holy Spirt power. The die has been cast. I have stepped over the line. The decision has been made- I'm a disciple of his. I won't look back, let up, slow down, back away, or be still. My past is redeemed, my present makes sense, my future is secure. I'm finished and done with low loving, sight walking, smooth knees, colorless dreams, tamed visions, worldly talking, cheap giving, and dwarfed goals.

I no longer need pre-eminence, prosperity, position, promotions, plaudits, or popularity. I don't have to be right, first, tops, recognized, praised, regarded, or rewarded. I now live by faith, lean in his presence, walk by patience, am uplifted by prayer, and I labour with power.

My face is set, my gait is fast, my goal is heaven, my road is narrow, my way rough, my companions are few, my Guide reliable, my mission clear. I cannot be bought, compromised, detoured, lured away, turned back, deluded, or delayed. I will not flinch in the face of sacrifice, hesitate in the presence of the enemy, pander at the pool of popularity, or mender in the maze of mediocrity.

I won't give up, shut up, let up, until I have stayed up, stored up, prayed up, paid up, preached up, for the cause of Christ. I am a disciple of Jesus. I must go till he comes, give till I drop, preach till all know, and work till he stops me. And, when he comes for his own, he will have no problem recognizing me..... my banner will be clear.


-Journal entry of missionary in Africa before he was martyred

Week One

This first week being here has really been good. Today was the first day of lectures now that we are officially done with orientation. We are studying the character of God and what it looks like to really know Him. I got assigned a work duty on the base which is two hours we take time to help out with something on the base. Im working on the kitchen crew and help prepare the dinners during the week. I have to say its already something I have come to love and work with a great crew! We also run a ministry every Saturday called YouthStreet and all of the DTS students get assigned a job to work and help lead. I will be helping out with the set up of the games we run as well as participate with the teens and youth that come to hang out with us at the base. Im really excited to see what God is going to do at this ministry, and I have a heart for youth so it will be so rewarding to invest in the youth of Townsville. This morning we also had Intercession with all the schools in the base and got the opportunity to pray for all the nations, YWAM internationals, YWAM Australia, YWAM Townsville, and all of our dear families. It was such an awesome thing to be apart of and I definitely was taken out of my comfort zone with all my fellow mates. Tonight we are starting a 24/7 prayer for the next two weeks where we all take shifts for an hour each to go in the prayer room and pray for these particular areas and ministries as well as some other topics. This week has been crazy busy for just the first week, but it has already been such an awesome time to invest in. I really love how YWAM is getting us into leadership roles and helping us train to manage ministries. Apart from the crazy temperature, busy living with all these diverse group of mates, and duties assigned I have really enjoyed all that God is teaching me as I start the beginning of this firm foundation. Its so awesome to see all these different cultures gathered and there ways of worship and lifestyle. Its so eye opening. Learning what a privilege it is to really know God. Really hit home when I heard one of the leaders say "I wanna know that I know that I know God." Something that stuck with me during the days. Thanks all for keeping up with my blog. Thank you for all the prayers and encouraging words.

View is better from the top of the mountain! :) 

Getting Used to Aussie Life...

So I finally made it after many long switching of flights. Orientation is today so I will find out a lot more information as to what I will be doing during the weeks. This weather is insane. Humidity here is like no hot summer Florida day I have ever experienced. The city is so beautiful and way laid back. Stores basically choose whatever hours they want to be open or closed. Took a hike up Castle Rock which is the mountain in the center of the town this morning. Not really having trouble with jet lag, because I woke up at 5:45 with full energy to hike. I need to get used to the humidity since I made it a little over half way up. Eventually I will make it to the top. Love my flat (dorm) I am in with a great group of girls from all different countries! Really excited to start my lecture classes, and hopefully in two weeks or so find out our outreach locations! I can tell I will be very busy as the last two days we did not have any obligations, and already feel pretty occupied with stuff. Hope to keep you all updated as much as possible, and when I find out more information and explore more of Aussie I will be sure to share :) 

Castle Hill 

My Australia Postal Address

MY NAME, 

C/O Reef to Outback, 

PO Box 6221, 

Queensland 4825 

Australia

You can write letters or send me stuff! :)

New to the Blogging World

Never done a blog before so hopefully I can keep up with this. Im Claire Pratt and am about to take the opportunity to participate in Youth with A Mission (YWAM) in Townsville, Australia. If your not familiar with this YWAM, it is a movement of people who desire God and are following  his commandment to make disciples and save souls. I depart January 13th and will be there through June 10th, 2011.  I will take part in a Discipleship Training School and an outreach missions wherever I feel led to go. I can't express how excited I am! My desire is to be led by my Father and do everything in my ability to make His name known to all those who have never heard His name. Can't wait to see where this leads me and love being able to share with you all pieces of where Gods leading me and showing me how to grow in my walk. 

The beautiful city of Townsville