Hi All,
Since the beginning of the year we’ve had a relaxing holiday and now we’re back into things in Bidwill. 2010 is shaping up to be an exciting year for us with plenty of new people and new opportunities. On some Thursday nights this year Katie and I be joining along with a ministry called WIN (Women In Need). WIN basically involves driving around streets (usually in factory areas) where sex workers look for work and stopping to chat and have a coffee and see if we can help with anything. The team we are going out with has been doing WIN for a number of years and although we’ve only been out once so far, we could tell it was something we’d like to support.

Katie has started teaching English with Sudanese women at Mamre House with the Mamre Refugee Program and she is also spending time with the Sudanese community at an English class in Mt Druitt on Saturdays. Katie has befriended a bunch of Sudanese women and their kids and even got us invited to a Sudanese wedding last weekend. At the wedding we felt privileged as we were the only white people among about 600 Sudanese. Katie spent the day before the wedding with the grooms family getting henna tattoo which is slowly fading from her hands.

I have getting involved with a Kids Club which focuses on fun and intentional discipleship on Wednesday evenings. About 40 local kids attend and it’s going to be a great way to keep building relationships with the kids and their parents. I am also going to be involved in supporting a Learning Ground program for primary aged kids. The Learning Ground is an alternative indigenous education program and the primary aged program will run on Wednesday during school hours. I’m also continuing to visit Cobham Juvenile Remand Center and it has been really great to get back in there spending time with the boys. There are quite a number from our local area in Cobham at the moment so please pray for us as we try to connect with them when they make it back to the ‘outside’. My passion for Burma is always with me and always growing. This year on the 14th of March is the Global Day of Prayer for Burma. I am organising an event in western Sydney but if anyone wants to organise a prayer event in another part of Sydney that morning that would be great.

This week our house has gone from a house of 3 to a house of 5. The first to move in was Jarrod, a Submerge student this year. He’s 26 and works part time as one of the preaching pastors at Dural Baptist Church where he’s worked full time for that past few years. The other new guest is a 14 yr old Indigenous guy who needs somewhere to stay for a while. He comes from a family of 6 kids and mum needed a bit of a break from him. He’s going to be staying at our place on weeknights and returning home (a couple of streets away) on weekends. He likes to roam the streets at night and was chased last night by a gang who wanted his fancy scooter with its pink grip tape and purple wheels. I think he outran them but hopefully he will learn the lesson that 14 yr old kids shouldn’t roam the streets late at night.

Thank God for
Katie’s involvement with the Sudanese community. Especially for being invited to a wedding and special celebrations the day before with the family of the bride.
3 new people joining our team to do the Submerge course
New opportunities this year
That we have started to feel more settled and at home

Prayer Points
For our involvement with the Women In Need (WIN) program – particularly that we’d start to form relationships with some of the women and that we’d know how to fit it into our routine as it finishes around 1am
That Katie can continue to deepen relationships with Sudanese friends
For connecting with Cobham boys both in prison and on ‘the outside’
For the kids club Matt does, especially on knowing how to do intentional discipleship stuff
Families suffering from alcoholism, domestic violence, substance abuse and addictions
We’d like to start some Bible studies and groups with locals this year
For healing in a couple of key relationships among our neighbours that are strained at the moment
Pray for Katie and I as we learn to have a healthy marriage and take care of ourselves in a pressured environment
For the young guy who is staying with us at the moment – that he can have great mentors and opportunities to grow at this critical time in his life and for his mum who is struggling to know how best to get him through the next while. Please also pray that he comes home on time because he has a habit of roaming the streets ’til the am part of the night.

At the age of 19 I was challenged by a speaker at a conference who told stories about Jesus heart for the poor and challenged his listeners, claiming, that just ‘doing church’ was not following Jesus. This resounded with me as a deep truth and as a result I threw myself into research. I read every book on social justice and how this was linked to Christian faith I could get my hands on. I then re-read the gospels in this new light. I felt like I had tapped into a beautiful and exciting revolution.

During my year at Bible College in 2008 I prayed desperate prayers aching for the opportunity to embrace the poor and throw myself into service. I had huge dreams, visions and ideas of how this would look and how I could change the world around me. Little did I know that Gods Kingdom does not roll in like a bulldozer instantly impacting and changing its surroundings, it is much more subtle, mysterious and beautiful.

Shortly after moving from New Zealand and starting out with UNOH my ideals and arrogant visions were crushed by a group of kids who hang out in an alleyway and sniff paint. I remember my first day helping at the drop in centre at Springvale seeing these beautiful kids (the youngest being 12 years old) inhaling paint out of plastic bags, my heart broke. I felt weak and powerless, I tired to talk to them asking about dreams and hopes for the future but generally the response is “don’t know” or “don’t care”. As I have journeyed with some of these teenagers and heard their stories my vision has changed. I do not see tough trouble making teenagers I see children of God desperately looking for acceptance and love. In the eyes of society these kids are seen as scum but through his eyes they are precious and loved.

Over my time here I have been broken by the pain and the struggle of our brothers and sisters trapped in cycles of poverty and oppression. I have discovered there are no quick fix solutions. The call is to enter this struggle and form deep relationships in which we can share the love and light of Christ. And what a joy it is to be invited to do this, to be administers of Gods love, bearers of Hope and to play a part as Gods Kingdom unfolds into this world.

Dave Dallaston

Dave Dallaston recently returned from New Zealand to complete his apprenticeship with UNOH. He hopes to continue a similar work following some formal study after returning to Auckland later this year.

Kia Ora Friends

We came to Australia with the dream of one day returning to Aotearoa/NZ to start a UNOH Chapter in a neighbourhood struggling with poverty.

Last month the UNOH leadership team asked us to enter into a process of dialogue and discernment to start fleshing out the possibilities of starting this in 2011.

As part of this process we would like to ask you – as friends, family and supporters, to help us in this discernment. We invite people to pray, to give us words and scriptures, to help practically with raising more support and awareness, and to help us understand God’s picture for NZ. We believe that South Auckland is a good place to start, but we are open to all possibilities, and we have started to look at neighbourhoods like Mangere or Manurewa.

“Why would you want to live there?” people often ask us when we have talked about moving back to NZ. It’s a good question. Why would we, the Tims whanau (family), look seriously at moving to a neighbourhood like Manurewa or Mangere? Well here are 8 reasons why:

We take seriously Jesus’ saying in Luke 4:18 “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, for he has anointed me to bring Good News to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim that captives will be released, that the blind will see, that the oppressed will be set free.”

Both Manurewa and Mangere have high deprivation/poverty indicators (google ‘Electorate Profiles for both Mangere and Manurewa’ for details or email me – d.tims@unoh.org).

Denise feels God has called her to speak out about injustice and to support her own people, encourage a holistic approach to healing; spiritually (uniting people to Jesus); whanau (family and cultural connections); physically (meeting basic needs) and mentally (education). Both these neighbourhoods have a high proportion of Maori from Nga Puhi and Ngati Porou iwi (tribes). Denise is well connected through whakapapa (family tree) to both of these tribes.

Dave loves the challenge of entering new places, listening to God’s Spirit, waiting for whom His Spirit brings towards us and then working to bring change. Mangere and Manurewa are both places that send a chill of fear down our spines but they are also places that God’s spirit mysteriously works, and it is always life giving aligning oneself with the Spirit.

We believe that there needs to be pathways to bring reconciliation between Maori and Pakeha (European). Mangere, and especially Manurewa, may offer opportunities for us to create spaces for this to happen. Auckland is the largest urban centre in NZ, with a large Christian community. Few Christians throughout NZ are aware of the social injustice within our NZ history and even fewer have had opportunities to explore what this means from a Christian and Maori perspective. We would like to explore avenues to create sacred spaces of reconciliation and understanding.

We believe the ethos, values and formation of Urban Neighbours of Hope help create authentic communities, like villages, centred on Jesus. As part of UNOH we believe communities that are centred on Christ bring transformation and become places of “good news to the poor.”

We are both “itching” to re-connect with Aotearoa – the land of the long white cloud, our people, culture and language. We both believe God has given us special talents, gifts and callings to serve Him in communities struggling with poverty within a NZ context.

“The little or much we have is never for ourselves alone. It is to be shared. If we live for ourselves we may have much, but this will only impoverish us. It is the givers who are rich, for in their giving they invite God’s blessing and experience a fellowship with those among whom God has chosen to presence himself – the poor.” Charles Ringma (from his book ‘Seize the Day with Dietrich Bonhoeffer’). We feel we have so much that is good that we need to share it with others and that we would like to work this out in NZ as part of the missional order of UNOH.

For the next 2 weeks (ending on Sunday 11th of March) we need a BIG favour from you all: will you please pray for us and gives us any thoughts, feelings, ideas, words of knowledge, pictures, pros and cons, other options or invites, people to connect with etc that will help us to hear the Will of God in this discernment period.

We take this process very seriously and any feedback will be collected, prayed through and discussed with other UNOH team members.

Please email or phone us with any questions or insights you would like to share

God Bless

Dave and Denise Tims
denise@unoh.org
d.tims@unoh.org

We had just begun the hectic pre-Christmas preparations. It’s an annual event; every year the UNOH team and a host of volunteers and supporters hold a big Christmas bash for people in our communities who don’t have anywhere to go over Christmas. As it can be a dark and lonely time for people without family (or with strained family relations), we hope to be able to splash a bit of hope and joy for those at the bottom of the rung. For families who struggle to provide gifts for their children, churches around Melbourne, notably Doncaster Church of Christ, donate huge quantities of Christmas presents for the children in our neighbourhoods. On the day before Christmas as we started wrapping the presents, listing the children we know in our neighbourhoods, I thought of a family we have begun to get to know over the past year, a delightful Muslim family from Darfur, Western Sudan.

Mehtab and his wife Aisha have 5 children under the age of 10. This beautiful family have stolen our hearts, often sharing their meagre resources to generously welcome us into their home. Our daughter Divya in particular is a favourite amongst the two younger children who both attend her childcare. The eldest of these children, Zahra, has an amazing story of survival, having being separated from her family in Darfur whilst fleeing from the militia. You would never guess that this sweet smile had seen such terrible things.  

After finding some presents that I thought might be appropriate for the children, Sharm and I quickly wrapped them and as I was heading over to pick up Divya from childcare, I thought I might drop them off to them on the way back. As it turned out, the whole family were home, and as Divya and I walked in with our hands laden with presents, I was once again welcomed into their humble home. The presents were wrapped in a shiny gold wrapping paper, and as I gave each of the children their gifts, they beamed back at me. But I noticed something strange, the children sat there with big grins on their faces but didn’t open the presents. ‘Oh’, I said to Mehtab, ‘I forgot, you don’t have this tradition.’ ‘No, we don’t,’ Mehtab said with a polite smile. I then showed the children what to do with these big boxes in shiny paper and began to help them tear them open. They must have thought it was an unusual custom…and when I viewed it from the outside-in, well, it is! The children seemed happy with their new toys and all pledged to share with each other. There was no sense of any toy being ‘mine’, but rather ‘ours’.

Being there for the first time anyone in this family had ever received a gift of any description was a rare treat, a gift in itself. Ever since I’ve met this family I have always felt as though I wanted to give them something, but somehow they always seem to beat me to it! Once again I felt as though they had beaten me to it, even when I came bearing gifts.

Viewing the strange custom of my Christmas tradition from the outside brought a fresh perspective to Christmas for me. I will never forget the sweet smile of Zahra as she sat holding her gold wrapped box. These children had never received a gift before, even a birthday gift, as it is not traditionally celebrated in their culture. This strange tradition of handing each other gifts hidden in wrapping paper is one of the many new customs this family will need to learn. But it got me thinking about what Christmas is beyond the gifts, the wrapping paper, the Christmas trees and all the other things that just seem to distract from this beautiful season. These things have become the wrapping paper concealing the gift that is hidden within Christmas. And so often I feel as though I am like one of these children, holding the wrapped present, grinning, but not opening it. There is a treasure beyond words, not far below the surface of the Christmas dross, a treasure that brings hope and joy to people, grinning at wrapped boxes. Every year I hear the call from within beckoning me to listen to the story with fresh ears, the story of grace, hope and justice; yet every year the shiny wrapping paper becomes the distraction. It is a season of doing, and yet the call is to be and to listen. It is in being and listening that we are able to unwrap the shiny box to reveal the gift that brings grace, hope and justice to weary hearts and minds.

Peter Blair

Dave and Denise Tims completed their orientation with UNOH in Melbourne in 2009 and are now in discernment about returning to pioneer UNOH in NZ. With education backgrounds and over 20 years of grass roots youth and community ministry behind them in New Zealand with Youth For Christ/Incedo (www.incedo.org.nz and Te Ora Hou (An Indigenous faith-based youth and community development organisation www.teorahou.org.nz), the Tims are in a great place to make a difference in an urban neighbourhood in Auckland. The Tims have a special concern for the indigenous people of NZ and want to relocate to a neighbourhood with high concentration of urban Maori. Like all invitations to start new UNOH chapters the Tims are asking for prayerful input from those who will stand with them including their 3 children in this venture. Obviously this is not a calling that be followed alone.

Denise says “my time with UNOH has taught me to believe in myself and in the gifts that God has given me. Moving to Auckland is a real step of faith, but God has always been faithful in the past, so I believe he will be in the future.”

Dave says “it’s always a challenge moving into new neighbourhoods, but I get excited when I see Jesus amongst people and when I am given the privileged to work alongside Him. My heart often breaks when I hear the stories behind the faces – stories of abuse, struggle and hardship. But often in these horrific stories there are alternative stories, often unseen, within the story; stories of survival, courage and generosity. People are amazing and I love to celebrate life with others, especially in times when we can glorify Christ.”

Would you pray and if you have a word, an image or a challenge please feel free to contact the Tims (email d.tims@unoh.org). You can sign-up to receive their prayer letter and financially support the Tims by going to www.unoh.org/donate .

A decision will be made by the end of February about the viability of this venture and the Tims would potentially relocate to Auckland in December.

Dear Friends of UNOH,

We recently invited you to consider going deeper with Christ among the urban poor by joining our Urban-Hope Initiative. This UNOH
supporter-advocacy campaign is about encouraging opportunities for each follower of Jesus to find more faithful ways to live out the
‘royal command’ of Jesus: to love God and our neighbours as ourselves in a world facing unprecedented urban poverty.

We ask you to take a moment now to respond to this invitation. To join the Urban Hope Initiative please visit our online form (or PDF) and
consider at least one response to start with. Then let us know your response by sending this to UNOH.

We would love you to share your experiences and encourage all your friends and networks to join too.

Together we can be the hands and feet of Jesus in an urbanising world and see real and lasting hope emerge before it is too late. Please
join with us to see Urban-Hope emerge.

Ash Barker, UNOH Director, and Lisa Owen, UNOH Australian
Coordinator.

Do you remember your initial reaction when you heard the UNOH story for the first time? For me it was a combination of amazement, confusion, unease and awe. Who were these people who wanted to live out the gospel and love their neighbours so literally?

During 2008 I had the opportunity to watch a small non-Christian corporate team I had worked with many times, hear the UNOH story for the first time. The group had generously offered their time and strategic and creative skills to assist UNOH, without really understanding who they were. They had signed up under the notion that UNOH was a group of “modern day monks”. They were in for a shock!

An overview of the UNOH Mission, some key facts and figures and a casual reference to the member’s vow of poverty, left them looking quite bewildered. You can forget how counter cultural UNOH’s mission is! However to ensure they gained real insight into UNOH, the meeting had been scheduled to coincide with Ash (UNOH’s international Director) being back in Melbourne from Bangkok. Having felt out of my depth, giving the overview and trying to do justice to the commitment of the UNOH team, I was relieved to handover to Ash to share personally of the UNOH calling and journey.

As if in the presence of a master story teller, the team’s eyes never left Ash as he shared some vignettes of the path the team have travelled. Stories of success were met with bright eyes and smiles, yet when the story touched on that of change and loss, there wasn’t a dry eye in the group. In that moment, in that corporate office, loving thy neighbour became something real. Personally, I was reminded again of why I support UNOH, and was sure that the corporate team would be compelled to share the UNOH stories they heard that day many times.

Inspired, the team produced some amazing work that will support UNOH for years. Yet for me, the highlight was witnessing the team members respond and commit the best of what they had to help UNOH to achieve its vision. To live in community was a step far from where they are, but in response to the vision and stories that demonstrated member commitment, they gave the best of what they had.

Sometimes I can fall into the trap of comparison. Such a dedicated and counter -cultural UNOH team, can leave me wondering if I have anything to contribute? But I remember my corporate friends, who in seeing the vision, gave the best that they had to offer. And so I commit the skills I have been given to ensure more people get to hear the UNOH story, the message of loving God and Neighbour. In 2009 it may simply be organising a morning tea for the UNOH story to be shared in my community and support to be raised. I hope you’ll join the Urban Hope Initiative and use your unique and valuable gifts to support UNOH’s vision.

Darren

Over the years Ian has been there for me personally, but also for Urban Neighbours of Hope as a community. Despite Ian’s later health concerns and vulnerabilities he, Curly and Bec would keep stretching out their arms to embrace us. Whenever we were in Adelaide we would catch up. Whether we talked through my leadership struggles, or had long fire-side chats about changing the world, or prayer, or financial support or when he enabled ministry opportunities for us, Ian has really been there for us over the years like few others.

But not only for us. For Ian kept seeing and connecting with the people we are trying to live with and serve for Christ’s sake. Living in Klong Toey slum, Bangkok since 2002 has made it harder to see Ian, but that hasn’t stopped his compassion flowing through us. For example, a few years ago a tiny 6 year old girl named Em was being excluded from starting main-stream schooling because she had Down Syndrome. Though very bright, such is the stigma of disability-as-kharma-for-bad deeds, no schools would take her. Some school administrators even thought Em would pass Down Syndrome onto other students. After many attempts with different schools, Anji and Em’s mum finally found a school that would take Em and also her older brother ‘It’. This was a Christian school and they would provide a 2 for 1 scholarship deal, but it was still far more money than the family could afford by themselves. We had been seeking Ian and Curly’s advice all through this saga and without fuss they helped provide the needed financial support to make this opportunity happen for Em. This school term Em will finish primary school, and though she nearly died last year because of a vulnerable immunity system and living in a slum, is as a bright and gorses young woman who now speaks English well too. It’s hard not to compare Em with another young neighbourhood girl named Nong Lek who also had Down Syndrome. She died from starvation and in her own diarrhea in January because she couldn’t get the help she needed in time. Almost certainly Em would not be alive today too if it were not for the Cowlett’s love and support. This kind of compassionate difference that Ian’s life made and keeps on making in the lives of so many like Em was not done for show. I know he may not have even wanted this kind of story known, but it is a concrete demonstration of the kind of person Ian was. One who spent his life doing whatever was in his power to do to help others through Christ.  I’m sure that only when we see eternity will see the size and scope Ian’s life’s impact.

If the parable for the sheep and the goats found in Matthew 25:31 is true, then to get into heaven we need a testimony of reference from the hungry, sick, naked and the imprisoned. Did we care for Jesus disguised in these ‘least of these’ or not? Even knowing Ian in just a small way, I’m sure heaven is now full of a loud and continuing symphony from such testimonies from all walks of life. This is not about trying to ‘make enough merit’ to earn heaven, but so experiencing the love God, appreciating the sacrifice of Christ for us, that it is evidenced by the way we give our life back to God in return and connect with those vulnerable ones on God’s heart. As we sing in the old hymn  ‘Love so amazing, so Devine, it demands our soul, our life, our all’.  Like few people I know Ian deeply experienced Jesus’ love, understood what Jesus was trying to do, believed what Jesus believed and joined his life in Christ to see a more just world emerge. 

Mark Riesson had warned me of Ian’s tragic stroke on Thursday, but I was on a motor-bike taxi with my son Aiden when Kim Thoday called me with the final news. I must admit I smiled between sobbing tears, knowing of Ian’s love of motor-bikes and finding out this way. Though the 75 cc Honda postie-bike was probably not exactly what Ian would have had in mind as a real bike, a deep emotion welled up in me and continues as I try to write this note. Being here in Bangkok and away from Oz it is still impossible for me to imagine that the world lost Ian Corlett last week. To miss being with you all at this special time to say good-bye is also difficult.  I guess this might hit me when I visit Adelaide in August and our regular catch-up time doesn’t happen. Though I do feel distressed right now and will certainly miss Ian more as the years unfold until we meet again in the next life, I do have a spooky feeling like he is still cheering us all on. He is part of that ‘great crowd of witnesses’ the book of Hebrews talks about and I’m sure he’s cheering us all on like he would the Bull-dogs. [Just quietly if the week-end is anything to go by, with the Bull-dogs new heavenly cheering, you wouldn’t bet against them winning the premiership would you?] 

 Please know our hearts and prayers go out to Curly and Bec and all the kids at this time. I can’t imagine what it is like you for, but I do know that the Jesus who suffered and defeated death is close by you now.  

 Brother Ian, I and the world will miss you terribly; we love you so very much, and are so grateful for your thoughtful and compassionate life. If ‘faith, hope and love’ are the only things that truly ‘remain’ after we’re gone from this earth, know your faith, hope and love will continue to light up our lives. And know this comrade… we will continue the fight to see that the kingdom comes more fully here on earth as in heaven. Amen.     

John 7 
 
Grace: That we would obey Jesus and His teachings 
Commentary: Ch 10 – “Come to me” cries Jesus.  
Drawn into the Mystery of Jesus through the Gospel of John, pg 132

John 6:1-71 
  
Grace: That we would respond with justice and compassion to the needs around us 
Commentary: Ch 9 – Food for life.  
Drawn into the Mystery of Jesus through the Gospel of John, pg 115