When Joan was young and lived at home with her parents she attended a stiff traditional church where there wasn’t a lot of joy.  Joan went to church as the ‘family representative’.  Morning prayer, communion, youth Bible study, a lot about the Old Testament but not much talk about Jesus.  Joan felt like something was missing and went looking around the different churches for something more alive and spiritual.

Being touched by the Holy Spirit is a very personal thing.  A friend said to me “one day it’s going to happen to you.”  But I said, “there was no way I’m going to go out with the Holy Spirit” (laying on the floor, slain by the Holy Spirit).


Then one day at church Pastor Sirus was asking the following questions, do you know the Holy Spirit?  Have you ever been touched by the Holy Spirit?  If you come up the front you can be filled with the Holy Spirit.  “I was glad for other people to be filled with the Holy Spirit, but I was not so sure about it for myself.”  Joan hesitantly decided to go forward and Pastor Sirus asked for her hands, “Can you feel anything Joan?”  Next thing Joan remembers is waking up on the floor of the church two and a half hours later, Pastor Sirus was quoting scriptures, and most people had left church.  “I felt so good, I had had the best sleep ever, and I didn’t need my walking stick any more.  I was on a real high.”

I was born into a Christian family in Papua New Guinea.  My parents were missionaries at the time but we had to come home to New Zealand because my mum and I had malaria.  At the age of four I went to church in Kaeo and listened to a man in Sunday School who read 1 John 1:9 which says, “If we confess our sins He is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness.”  I also heard how Christ died for the things that we had done wrong.  Because it made sense I talked to my mum but it went no further until I went to stay with a friend and went to his church and saw the same guy with the same message and at this stage became a Christian.

Isaiah 43:1-2 has also been given to me by different people at the right time.  “Fear not for I have redeemed you.  I have called you by name and you are mine.  When you pass through the waters I will be with you, and the rivers will not overwhelm you, when you pass through the fire you will not be burned.  The hard trials that come against you will not hurt you – For you are precious to me and I love you.”  God doesn’t say that we won’t go through trials, but he does promise to go through them with us.

In March 2014, I went to Oakura and spent 3 nights at Manna Healing Centre.  Prior to being able to commit to time away from my everyday responsibilities we had a cancer scare with my Mum that engulfed each and every day of an entire month with uncertainty and apprehension.  It was a testing time and my biggest challenge yet.

For those of you I do not know very personally, I’d like to share some of my background with you to illustrate how powerfully God has worked in my life as of late:

At 43 years of age I had a question that I needed answering. Was Jesus for real or a load of rubbish? So I began to go to church, to look, to listen, to hear, and I was taken with the warmth and acceptance shown to me. The words of Scripture came to be very meaningful. So in 1987 I gave my heart to the Lord and right up to this present day that passion and urgency continues. To reach out to others who are lost, as I was. How important it is to continually look for opportunities to share my faith. Very often we won’t see any fruit but we have a call to sow the seed of our faith. John 16:8, tells us the Holy Spirit convicts the world of sin and righteousness. 

The Lord has blessed me with a passion for Israel and the Jewish people. This has resulted in me going to Israel on four occasions. First as a tourist with Prayer for Israel, then later as a volunteer for two months in 2002, where I helped shift a ministry to a new location, with a new vision. During this time meeting and mixing with believers from many countries, this little glimpse showed the faithfulness of God in re-gathering his people to Israel, from around the world. 

Perhaps the greatest fulfilment in my life as a believer has been to help fulfil Jeremiah 16:16, where God will send fishermen to regather His people. I was a volunteer under the umbrella of Ebenezer Operation Exodus. Part of our work with Ebenezer was to continue to build and strengthen our relationship with the Jewish agency. 

Vernon was born in 1937 in Cape Town, South Africa and was the youngest of five children. Vernon’s parents came to know the Lord in 1919 at an Apostolic Church in Cape Town and were baptized there a year later. Vernon can remember giving his heart to the Lord at the age of six and was baptized in 1951.

Vernon grew up in Cape Town during the war years, and has memories of food rations, blackout blinds for the night time and gun batteries dotted around the coast in case South Africa was invaded. Vernon was a mischievous boy and little has changed! In fact, he can often be seen hanging around the church entrance way, (especially when he’s on welcoming) with a naughty twinkle in his eye and ready with one of his quick witted jokes! He chuckled as he recounted how as a child, around Guy Fawkes, he and some friends would beg people for money to buy crackers to light and blow up. For greater effect, they used to tie several together, place them under an empty tin on the ground, light them and watch the explosion blow the tin sky high!

By Inge Smythe

Matthew and I were born and raised in Harare, Zimbabwe. I grew up in the Catholic Church in Harare, and when I was sixteen, a friend of mine convinced me to go with her to the local Anglican Church and this is where I met Matthew.

In the thirteen-and-a-half years that we have been together, we got married, had three children, have lived in 3 different countries and have moved eleven times-it will be twelve when we move into our own house next month- so life certainly has not been uneventful! In fact, at times, it feels as though we have been living in a tornado.

“The sun shall no longer be your light by day,
Nor for brightness shall the moon give light to you;
But the Lord will be to you an everlasting light,
And your God your glory.
Your sun shall no longer go down,
Nor shall your moon withdraw itself;
For the Lord will be your everlasting light,
And the days of your mourning shall be ended.”
Isaiah 60:19-20

When May first came to Hawera Baptist church, she explained that she was from Taranaki, but spent many years away in Auckland.  She spoke with passion about her Maori cultural heritage and her desire to share this knowledge with others.

As May began to settle into our church and into her life back in Hawera, my husband Matthew & I decided to ask her if she would like to become part of the new Home group that we were starting. May was very keen to come along and learn more about what she believed in and to fellowship with other people at the church.