FWA rundown & faithfulness of the NRMA

Well - was FWA all I hyped it up to be?? I think so. I had some good conversations, somewhat limited to discussion groups, but it was all pretty fantastic just to have awesome fellowship and know that we're united more by the Spirit than by doing first year maths together!

Katay's talks on Perseverence from Romans 8 were fantastic. See Emma's explanation too for a further rundown, I don't want to repeat too much. But yeah - I was quite struck by how we are to live IN the spirit, not the flesh, by putting to death (slaughtering!) the misdeeds of the body. And also how we are to live and have our identity as children of God and stop navel gazing thinking about if we are children of God, but know that we are. So many other things that I could tell you about if I was better at taking notes, but definately learned lots of things which I pray I will be able to apply to my life and continue to live out and run the race sent before us - always striving onwards towards the goal!

And finally... as Sonia has pointed too... there was a slightly unexpected twist right at the end of FWA, which made the afternoon a little interesting. We just locked up the place, the last 3 cars were about to leave, we're all in the cars, and I go to start the car - and just get sick-car noise. I check that its in Park... it is... try again, more sick noise and not starting, try again and hit the gas a bit... still not starting... Alert the others to not leave yet... A few others try to start the car without any luck. So I call the NRMA, 90 minute wait expected...

So I call Dad and he says to move the car a few inches and give it a bit of a jiggle... I don't even pretend to understand how cars work, but it sounds a little weird, but we give it a go (something to do with the starter motor...) still no nice engine noises, just sick clanking and spluttering noises. So we waited it out - Bronni waited too, with Mick and Sonia, and so with Emma and myself we sat under a tree and had a chat and debriefed and talked about our weekend and about our discussion groups (which none of us were in the same one!) and that was really nice and beautiful I felt (thanks for waiting it out with us guys!).

Then my brother called and said the same thing happened to him a few weeks ago - and it just started like 5 mins later when he gave it another shot after giving it a good kick and shouting "start f**n thing start" - and he advised me to do the same... then reconsidered his advice and said that I might like to try praying about it instead because I'm a Christian. As I relayed my brothers phone call, Bronni did this outloud and I shouted out to God in my head. Just as I was about to get up to go try my brothers first sugguestion (without the swearing), my knight in shimmering hub-caps came around the corner (after about a 40 minute wait). Told him the story, handed him the key - he sits down and the car just starts up, and there was a roar of joy and laughter from the crowd (a kind of reception I don't think he was used to...) and I was rather embarrased that it was so simple... Though I did take comfort in the fact that the others tried to start it and couldn't. The dude advised me to get a new battery as this one was on its last legs. We got in and drove home, and I didn't turn the engine off till I was safely at home in Oatley.

And that my friends, is the end of the rather uneventful but funny story.