Friday, 30 December 2011

Christmas outreach!















Photo left Yolgnu women and children at Garthalala, photo right people at Birany Birany!

Over the Christmas period the evangelism team Yolngu for Jesus planned a few outreach trips to the homelands, but due to the ex-tropical cyclone Grant we couldn't go untill Thursday.
Initially there would have been an overnight stay, but instead we did an afternoon trip where I took the team to 2 homelands! Because the people didn't expect us to come, it came a bit as a surprise so soon after the cyclone had passed through.
The first homeland we visited was Birany Birany (pronounced Brang Brang) I had to work hard to get landed, first I did a so called runway inspection at 200 feet. Then when I wanted to put the plane on the ground the wind blew me completely off the centerline and I had to go around for a second attempt, which succeeded!
Afterwards Eunice told me she was praying that we could land at Birany Birany because it is her homeland and the people needed to hear the Message about Jesus!
The people you see on the photo was all that was left, the rest were visiting other homelands or went to town.
We would all share our personal testimony about how we celebrated Christmas before we were Christians and the difference after we became Christians.
The Yolgnu people are very open to the Gospel and especially when the 2 Yolgnu ladies Eunice and Faye began to talk in their language they were all very excited and they began to share some miracle stories. One man was taken by a crocodile and another man from his village, named Andrew, rescued him. The man told us he is thankful to God everyday for his life.
Andrew promised Aron to make him a fishing-spear, which indicated that he was really fond of him being around. Kevin also a member of our team, preached the Word to them and told them about how Jesus was born into this world to save them so that they can have eternal life if they put their faith and trust in Him! Because there were 6 men from the village, Kevin warned them about the consequences of the ceremonies the Yolngu have, which are done only by the men!
Our next homeland was Garthalala and also over there were only a few women and children around, almost all the men had gone out. Aron shared some candies with them and also we shared our testimonies. The lady we met at the village is into discipling the children and is strongly related to the Yirrkala church. She told us that she was praying against the cyclone in the name of Jesus for several days! Eunice and Faye shared in Yolngu and Kevin was leading in worship with the guitar! The children were a bit shy but loosened up after we gave them some presents. Tiina Higham our MAF homeschool support teacher received those from her home-church in Finland!
Please pray for more Yolgnu people like Eunice and Faye to participate in evangelising over Arnhemland, they speak the language which opens up so many doors. But they themselves need to be discipelled first. Also that God will open up some funding for outreaches like that to take place more frequently, the next trips we are planning are at Easter, but Yolgnu for Jesus would like to do more in between. Pray for Kevin and Gerard and encourage them to keep going on with this great call to evangelise and disciple among the Yolgnu!

Friday, 23 December 2011

Christmas greetings



For us a Child is born,

to us a Son is given.

And He will be called:

Wonderful Counsellor

Mighty God,

Everlasting Father,

Prince of Peace,

Emmanuel, Jesus.


We want to thank everyone for their support and prayers for this year!

We Wish you a Merry Christmas and a blessed 2012!


Lots of love from Eric & Adriana Naomi, Aron, Hannah, Lois and Ruben Koch

Thursday, 15 December 2011

Last weekend, we had to take away the swimmingpool, because it isn't proper fenced. We find it really hard to deal with the rules and regulation as they are made out of fear,we think.But what do you do? listen and obey. And so it's sad to see this efecting the children and the Yolnu children, as they had already lots of fun together.

Eric is into the flying now, and is enjoying it. On Tuesday he had to fly some people from centrelink around and so he had to wait for a few hours in every place. As he had to wait he walked into every village and prayed and met some people with interesting talks.

On Thursday, the kids and I went to the MAF hangar to pick up some letters and parcels. We stood outside to see the planes coming and going. We said to each other: that would be so awesome if daddy was here or fly in...we had just fun watching as one of the pilots came to us and asked what we were looking for...daddy...the pilot thought that dad was washing the plane. So we drove up to the Layna hangar to have a look out there. I parked the car and there Eric was...we were so happy to see him...and he was too! We had morningtea together, it wasn't busy with flying. After having a nice time together, we decided to go on to Nhulunbuy for a swim. So Eric waved us goodbye while I tried to turn the car forwards a little bit then backwards, but as I turn we heard a big bang...what was that?? I had hit a 10 cm iron pole, sticking out of the ground and so the tire had popped...O no...we both hadn't seen this iron pole! But no worries, it went all so smoothly, Richard, another MAF pilot came to see what had happened. So Eric took the spare tire and they started fixing it...pfff with a little sweat it was quickly fixed and we could go again.

Sunday, 11 December 2011

Party time

And finally: Lois her 4th birthday! She was looking forward to it already for a long time. She enjoyed the whole day. But at the end she was so tired that she asked herself if she could go to bed.

And eindelijk was het dan Lois haar verjaardag. Wat heeft ze hier naar toe geleefd! Ze heeft de hele dag enorm genoten
maar aan het eind van de dag, vroeg ze zelf of ze naar bed mocht gaan, zo moe was ze.







































































































































As every year we celabrate our Dutch Sinterklaas on the 5th of December. This year we did it a little bit later, on the 10th. together with the Paas and Giles family. We had so much fun.And of course with the little gingernut cookies. Aron and Naomi were dressed as Black Piet.

En ook dit jaar was Sint ons niet vergeten. Het was wel wat later, maarja hij moest natuurlijk helemaal van Nederland naar hier toe vliegen.Samen met de familie Paas en Giles hebben we een gezellige Sinterklaas avond gehad. Naomi en Aron verkleed als zwarte Piet. en niet te vergeten de overheerlijke pepernoten. Christie Giles had van haar familie in Nederland een heel pakket met lekkers gehad, wat ze met ons allen had gedeeld. mmmm.





On Sunday we had church on the beach which was great! It seems easier for the Yolnu people to come down to the beachchurch than to the churchbuilding. Praise God, one man gave his heart to the Lord!

Zondag hadden we kerk bij het strand. Echt geweldig. De opkomst was beduidend hoger dan in het kerkgebouw. Prijs de Heer, 1 man gaf zijn hart aan de Heer!






























Naomi is so confident in cutting Lois hair, I wasn't as a lot of her curls are gone


Naomi heeft Lois haar haar geknipt. Ze wil kapster worden, het zelfvertrouwen heeft ze al, nu nog de kneepjes van het vak. Ik was er niet zo zeker van, want de meeste krullen zijn er nu af.




On Sunday evening we had our first Christmas dinner with all the MAF staff in Arnhemland. Soo many kids!


Op Zondag zijn we naar ons eerste MAF dinner geweest waar alle MAF werkers van Arnhemland elkaar konden ontmoeten. Er waren zoveel MAF kinderen!





















































Naomi's birthday party
having a masterchef baking competition with a compliment that the girls have to start a own cafe in Yirrkala named the Shed:)


Naomi's verjaardagsfeestje met een masterchef bakwedstrijd. Met als compliment dat ze een cafeetje moet open hier in Yirrkala: "Eetcafe de Schuur":)


















Wednesday, 7 December 2011

ERIC SOLO WITH LAYNHA AVIATION

After a busy couple of weeks in ICUS (in command under supervision) flying and a full "check to line" day on the 7th of December, Eric has now gone solo to fly over Arnhem-land! We really praise God for this moment and also appreciate all you guys who have been praying!
The challenge is now to face all sorts of decisions alone in regard to loading the planes, passengers and last but not least, the weather! Within the coming months the wet season will start which will involve a lot of flying around thunderstorms!
God has called us to do this work for Him and for spreading the gospel by means of the aircraft.
At the moment Eric needs all his concentration on the flying, but the time will come that he can also be reaching the Yolgnu with the love of Christ!

Friday, 2 December 2011

sowing seeds and on Gods timing they will grow...

We went to kidsclub and picked up some yolnukids in the car!! Tonight they heard the story of Christmas . There were around 30 boys and 30 girls and responding again to the Good news! On the way home there was a woman laying on the side of the road and waved to us. I stopped the car full of children and opened the window. The woman was in a lot of pain because she had fallen and asked if I could drive her to hospital.Naomi complained: do we need to help again, we have already a lot of children with us. But I said: I can't leave this woman here. So I stepped out of the car and immediately called for help from a nearby house. A woman came but was gone quickly as she didn't know this woman. Than I sat beside her and started praying, which she really liked. Than another car stopped which was one of our Maf family that also came from kidsclub. He had a phone with him to call the ambulance. I decided to bring the Yolnu kids home and come back to sit with her and wait. Because the ambulance had to come from Nhulunbuy. The woman asked for sigarettes for the pain. Again we offered to pray for her, we hold hands and prayed together The woman became really calm. We hugged each other and she thanked us. She was so glad we prayed with her. She started telling what had happened. A month ago she had a car accident and went into hospital. She said she was dead and came to life when her family were praying over her. God had saved her life! When we went home, Naomi said that she was glad we had stopped and helped this woman.

A lot of children especially boys responding to the Gospel and accepting Jesus in their hearts, Praise God!
But prayers are needed.The last weeks a lot of children are leaving after kidsclub and going over to the Oval(soccerfield) in Yirrkala and do petrolsniffing. Also the children we took with us, they dissapeared. This is very sad. Pray that the seeds that are sowed at kidsclub will grow on Gods time.

It's not easy...but we know God is in control and we count on our blessings!


The new "casino"in Yirrkala just behind our garden...last thursday at 7 am when I came home from my daily walk our Yolnu family had already gathered around for gambeling, I stopped to see what they were doing but didn't feel really welcome, they went on till late night...

to see this happening so close the whole day makes you sad and makes us wonder what to do...call out to God who is in control over everything.


Also Yirrkala has got a new swimmingpool and not behind our garden but in our garden:)We had to wait five weeks for this before it arrived! But it was worthwhile waiting. It's not that it cools you really down, because of the heat, the water temperature is still around 34 degrees. Eric and I decided to use it as a spa in the evening. These are just moments we enjoy.








Another moment we enjoyed after a big day flying and a busy cleaning day for me, having a meal just the two of us, little ones in bed and the older watching a movie.



















Lois and Ruben helping with the dishes

















Last week we welcomed the Paas family from Holland at Gove Airport. They come to serve for MAF aswell. Arjan and Aartje have got 2 girls, Rachel and Tamar , nearly 4 and 2 and expecting a baby soon(Christmas).They live 3 houses down from us. Its so special that we just can communicate in our own language.
















After a really hot day we went to Shady Beach at 5pm. It was low tide and so there were some rockpools where the kids could swim in. And where the crocodiles not wanted to come.













The kids enjoying the first tropical rain. Catching the rain in a glas, wow that fills up quickly!













Eric, ready to go flying. It's not easy for him but he knows that God is in control. He is still doing ICUS flying(under supervision). Today he came home at 7.30 pm! real flying time:5.5 hours!





























This week we have helped another Maf homeschooling family a couple of times, as they are leaving soon to Melbourne. We will gonna mis them although we just know each other, but it was so good to have each other. We will be left alone as homeschoolers as there are not many homeschooling families around. It's so different than back in New-Zealand. Here it feels even more going against the flow.I know for sure God layed it on my heart, so I believe He has got plan for it all.


( But hope that is seen is no hope at all. who hopes for what he already has? But if we hope for what we do not yet have, we wait for patiently. Rom. 8:24,25)


At the moment we're slowing down with schoolwork and focus on the Jesse Tree. Advent, a time of waiting...