Outreach Week #1-Byron Bay

Hello everybody and welcome to Byron Bay outreach week #1!
Well this past week our team travelled 3 hours away from Brisbane to the beautiful place of Byron Bay. Our team took off from the base on after saying goodbye to everyone on Monday June 11th and headed to Byron Bay. Once we arrived we went to the lighthouse in Byron Bay to pray about the week while Nate took his guitar and played around with it as we discussed what we felt about Byron Bay and our ministry focus for the week and the rest of outreach. We felt like families was very key in Byron Bay as it is a very hippy town and is very "if it feels good, do it" and "whats right for you is right for you but may not be right for me" type atmosphere. It's also noticeably full of homeless people and very needy people so we felt like a focus on families was good for both Byron Bay and for the rest of our outreach as families especially in places like Byron Bay have been pretty torn and is a very confused atmosphere. After a time of prayer at the lighthouse *which is Australia's most Easterly point* we went back to the house and relaxed, ate, then watched "Invisible Children". On Day 2-(June 12Th), we had a base meeting with Kevin Sickle the base director and got together and prayed about what we wanted to do and Kevin felt like we should go to Nimbin for the day and just research the history there. Now Nimbin is the drug capital of Australia, in some magazines when its rated one of the top 3 hottest pot sports in the whole world. It basically got started after hearing about Woodstock in North America and then Australia decided they wanted their own version. They came across Nimbin as a farming community as the perfect place for a huge rally. So they all set up for their first Aquarius Festival. Hippy's from all over came to Nimbin and went to this huge Festival. Later on more and more moved to Nimbin and it has been changed ever since. During one day, 3 tourist buses go to Nimbin with backpackers. It is a very well known place especially for Mardi Grass (not Grais but Grass). What happens then is they have this huge rally with weed rolling competitions etc. It is one of those towns that are really radical and pushy towards legalizing marijuana. This is also a place where the base has been wanting to have impact as it is a huge part of Byron Bay and their drug sources. So they have put on a few ministry programs there and want to get more involved, so our task was to talk to the locals about the history of Nimbin to figure out some keys to having a successful ministry there. So Kevin, and Carson (a guy who just finished his DTS in Kona Hawaii) headed off to Nimbin but on the way our van broke down so we took the highway back and walked to the base. After Nate and Kevin figured out the engine seized and got everything ready for the tow truck and came back (what a splendid beginning lol.) Then our group (minus nate), Carson, and Kevin went up to Nimbin, in their van, a hour drive from Byron. We went around and talked to some people from the art galleries and local stores in groups of 2 and learnt about the whole Aquarius Festival and their sacred Nimbin stones that the Aboriginals used to worship. It was such a weird atmosphere there, everything revolved around drugs and be happy propaganda. The whole town had one block of stores all of them sold bongs, hippy clothes, or just drugs and things to enhance drug trips. While walking through the town we were offered all sorts of things like cookies, chocolate, brownies, or just weed or Ecstasy. We were offered on average 7 times just walking on the street and in the stores. The people were totally stoned out of their mind and would just sit and ask you if you wanted any drugs. All the people were totally out of it and swearing at each other and getting into pointless fights. It was the weirdest place I have ever been in! They had a museum and let me say it was colorful. Inside it they had a big VW van with sayings all over it, and walls filled with all kinds of "spiritual" sayings and all kinds of art. They had every possible religious sayings on their; from Buddha, to Christianity it was written. A lot was about being happy and peace. There were a lot of Biblical truths yet they were twisted in with other beliefs. It was such a heavy atmosphere. Inside the museum there were people selling drugs and just totally out of their mind. The only people there who weren't out of their mind were the backpackers just travelling through. It was crazy! Even going into the town a few of us got heavy headaches and a fogginess from the spiritual heaviness in the town. It was so incredible. The store names were like "Bringabong", "Rainbow Dream", "Happy High Herbs" etc. The only normal stores were the post office and the grocery store which had sketchy characters in it as well. We spent only a couple hours in Nimbin before we left but that experience was so overwhelming that those couple of hours were enough to keep us processing what we experienced for days. I haven't even thought about all the things that I saw that day and its almost been a week! After leaving Nimbin we went back to the house to for the night. Then on Day 3-(June 13th)we woke up and met together for worship ( on Nate's computer) and prayer. Then we went to a school where Kevin teacbes a optional Scripture Class for the grade 5's. We introduced ourselves and Susan told her testimony and focused on identity. Afterwards we drove back to the base and then took off to buy lunch after talking and debriefing about the Nimbin trip with Kevin and planned a beach volleyball tournament for the next day. After we had lunch we headed to the Arts Factory (a HUGE backpacker hostel with everything possible available which can hold up for 600+ backpackers in the summer) and handed out free bread from the local bakery to the them. It is one of the most incredible backpacker hostels I have ever seen. There were all sorts of artistic sleeping arrangements from Tepee's to double decker buses made into individual sleeping containers. It also has its own Buddha Bar with live bands and fire shows and its own free fire twirling, yoga, massage, lessons every afternoon with countless activities running. We were able to talk to some backpackers and invite them to Beach Volleyball (they thought it was the weirdest thing ever that we were giving away free bread!) We then went downtown to post posters for the Beach Volleyball tournament then came back for dinner and Nate joined us again(after going to Brisbane with one of the leaders of the base to get a new van.) On Day 4-(June 14Th) We woke up and got everything ready to take over the volleyball nets, tables, speakers, tents, etc to the main beach in Byron Bay. So we set all of this up and made signs for the 1 o'clock tournament that we were putting on. Then at 1 we started it all up. We had 7 teams of 4 going and 2 courts going with a round robin. Kevin announced it over the speaker about who we were and that we just wanted to hang out and have some fun. So we started the tournament and pumped up sweet beach music and had loads of fun. We ran into a guy from Israel that we met before and random people that we have ran across while in Australia. So we all were in different teams with the backpackers and just got to have fun with them. Then later on we all got into our van and headed to the 7th Day Adventist church downtown to prepare for their Manna Heaven that they have every Thursday around 7:30ish after setting down the volleyball tournament. Manna Heaven is a big feast (feed as its called here) where they serve hundreds of homeless, backpackers and just plain locals. The pastor's wife is the one who cooks the whole meal, and its a huge meal with desert! She usually gets up at 2 a.m. to start cooking for all of the people. So the people come and wait in line and when the food all arrives the pastor usually prays and explains there's no drug dealing, smoking, or stealing on the premise and then the members of the church serve the meal. So thats what our job was. We set up tables and tablecloths as well as candles outside with chairs for the people and cut bread as well as served the meal. It was really cool to serve so many people. After serving we got to sit down with some of the people. Me and Megan sat at the only chairs available and sat with 4 guy backpackers from Belgium, Germany and France. We got to tell them about YWAM and what we were doing in Byron Bay and about them. On Day 5-(June 15th) We woke up and got ready for 10:30 where we all took off to go learn how to surf with Kevin. We went to Brokenheads (ya that's what I said for my 1st time surfing) and all tried it out in the morning. I even was able to stand a few times! Then we all met around 2:30 with Kevin and loaded up our van after we got back to the base and rid ourselves of that nasty salt water, with a BBQ and tables for a free BBQ that we were putting on. We went downtown to one of the parks and set everything and started to cook the food. A lot of people showed up, even the guy from Belgium who was at our table on at the Manna Heaven came with a friend so we were able to talk to them. Me and Corina were there with them and we had a opportunity to share a bit of our testimonies and the guy's friend from France took a Bible to read (even without us giving it to him, they were on the table with the food for free taking). Then finally on Day 6th which is Saturday we all decided that for our day off we wanted to go surfing again. So Kevin lent us his boards and so did Jean-Luc Batttista who is from France but has been in Byron Bay for a couple of the years from the base and we all went boarding at Brokenheads. After lunch we headed to the main beach where the everyone went shopping and me and Luke stayed and surfed. My motivation went down from the day before as I was so bruised by the surf board hitting me so I didn't do as well as the day before but it was fun. After the day was up we headed back to the base and for our first time watched actual t.v. (that's right)television, something you are deprived of on DTS. haha. We also cleaned the house and got everything packed up. Which brings me to now, now we are all sitting around (some in front of the t.v.) waiting to go to bed. Tomorrow we are headed 5 hours to Dalby where we will be working in the local school teaching some Religious Education classes. This past week at Byron Bay was so cool, it was awesome to get out and meet backpackers, the homeless and the regulars as well as help them out. During the week I had so many comments about how it was so nice that we just wanted to help out the people and that all of us are just so nice. At the meals the people were so thankful and so wowed by the fact that people give free meals and that our team came to Byron Bay to just have fun with people and to serve. Just going out and being apart of the meals and the beach volleyball I believe just showed people that Christians are real people who love to have fun and hang out too. It was also nice to just have a fun and hang out environment where we didn't have a agenda but just wanted to hang out and create relationships, then if the opportunity comes to just talk about life and then God. It was nice to just give people a different perspective of Christians as most people we find are very critical and have a lot of negativity towards Christians. So breaking mindsets was definitely something I feel like we accomplished in our time here. Well thank-you for your continued prayer support as we go on with our outreach. It has been a awesome time so far and I can't wait to see how the rest will turn out. Until next time, take care!
Signing out from Byron Bay,
Daneille