We had a great service on Sunday morning at my Church but I kinda felt that I wanted to go to the New Year's Touching Heaven Service at Hillsong in London in the afternoon too, to finish 2007 off and start 2008 having really worshipped and encountered God. I wasn't disappointed. It was an excellent 2 hours of solid worship mixed with thoughts about God's grace being sufficient for us and such an amazing gift to us. It was just superb to be able to be in a place full of lots of very different people, of different race, a mixture of cultures and, I'm sure very different theological beliefs but free to worship in our own way together putting all of those things aside. That's what I enjoyed immensely about being in Kosova, being part of a team of a mixed bunch of people all working with the same goals in mind. The Church is a body of believers, we don't all need to be the same to be united in Christ, as long as He is at the centre of everything we do. We are all different and that's what makes us unique and life so exciting.

Thinking back to the God of Justice song - I downloaded this from You Tube - it was created by Tearfund - another aid agency that seeks to help around the world. Be it Africa or Kosova - there is still so much need.

I visited my new little nephew Reuben, who was born while I was in Kosova on Sunday afternoon - he is a fine looking chap, ginger hair like his sister but not like his 2 brothers, will it stay though?!

It's lovely to just have time to be leisurely though - no rushing from place to place. I am determined not to get too busy too quickly in the new year!

Well, we finished our stint in Kosova and returned to Pristina airport to find that the plane hadn't taken off on time in the UK due to bad fog and we had a 3 hour wait ahead of us. I was worried that the plane even if it took off may not be able to land in Kosova also due to fog but several card games later, I needn't have worried. The plane came, landed, departed and landed at Gatwick all ok and we finally arrived home at 12.10am on Saturday.

As I sat on the plane, I listened to my MP3 player and this song came on - it's called God of Justice by Tim hughes and pretty much summed up the week for me. God is a God of Justice, we just need to believe that, and play our part in serving God, helping the hungry, the broken, the poor and the weak and remember that it is in God's strength that we can do all these things for His glory.

God of Justice, Saviour to all
Came to rescue the weak and the poor
Chose to serve and not be served

Fill us up and send us out
Fill us up and send us out
Fill us up and send us out Lord

On Thursday we went to one of the Roma camps in Skyvjan. We went with the local pastor there and his team who work in the camp each week, they work with the children, singing, Bible stories, games and activities etc. As soon as the minibus starts to make its way down the track out the children come, running to join in with whatever is going on. Children and adults alike all gathered in the main man's garden. He lets the people from the church use his land every week and even a room in his house if the weather is bad. Although he is a Muslim he is very happy for them to teach the children christian songs and stories from the Bible.

It was quite interesting as Thursday was the day of the Bajrami, a Muslim feast day - the equivalent really to Christmas Day here, many were dressed up in their best clothes and we had to join in with their dancing before Belinda told the children a story from the Bible acted out by others of the team. This really amazed me - I couldn't believe that we were there on their special day, teaching about God and His love and forgiveness.

Of course, we then gave out the Christmas shoeboxes to the children and yes, they tried all the usual tricks to get more than one by sending the childen away to change their clothes and come back for a second!

The main man then invited us all in to his home to have a drink of coke, which was rather welcome as it had been so cold outside.

We spent the afternoon giving out more food parcels and aid to families that Faton visits each week. This picture is of a little chap that had been previously wearing his mother's shoes!

On Tuesday we had a widow's lunch at the Smile Centre. Phil and Faton went out to collect the widows that Smile are sponsoring from the surrounding villages and brought them along to have a day where they can just chill out and relax with other ladies that they wouldn't normally meet with due to hectic lives looking after families, and tending animals etc. They all had a good time chatting, listened to a short message given by two of the Emilys and then had a lovely lunch prepared by the cooks. Just before they went home each widow was given a food parcel consisting of tea, coffee, sugar, flour, oil, biscuits, cake, tinned fruit, pasta, mashed potato, rice, soap, and washing powder. They will also be receiving a pile of wood that will be delivered straight to their doors, to enable them to keep warm and cook throughout the next few weeks.

Others of the team went out visiting families in the neighbouring villages. Some visited a slovenian village where the houses are made up of trailers and sea containers. Others visited families where the houses are made of mud and sticks. The lady that lived in one had 9 children, the eldest being 14 who herself had just had a baby. The living conditions really are desperate. We were able to give them a food parcel too and shoes, hats, blankets and jumpers for the children.

Yesterday, we visited a school around 30 minutes drive away, our mission was to distribute 500 Christmas Shoeboxes that people in England had put together for the Kosovar children. Organised chaos or what! A case of too many cooks I think - still, we got it done - it took approx 3 hours. We took it in turn to speak to the children in each class through a translator and tell them that the boxes were donated by people in the Uk who wanted to share the love of Jesus with them as it is Christmas time. Again, many of the children's faces are a real picture when they receive the boxes. many of the children are so overwhelmed that they don't know what to do. They just sit there waiting for the teacher to give permission for them to open the boxes and then their whole face just lights up. Some of the children just take a look at the surface and put the lid straight back on and put the box straight into their bag or under their seat, it makes you wonder whether they think they will be taken away from them. They would obviously prefer to look at home. Again, it is a real privelege to be here and see the difference that a box of goodies we take for granted really at home can make to a young child.

There was one little lad that we gave a box to, he must have been about 9 years old. the pants that were inside could probably have fit a 16 year old - it was quite funny - he saw the funny side too!

Well, the last couple of days have been really busy and I just haven't had the time when we have had electricity to catch up with the blogging world.

The second team arrived safely on Friday afternoon at the airport but then had a horrendous journey from the airport to the Smile Centre here in Gjakove. What takes normally an hour and a half took over 6 hours. There was loads of snow and ice and accidents and traffic to contend with, they finally arrived just after 11pm instead of 5.30pm cold, tired and wondering what on earth they had let themselves in for!

On Saturday we held a Christmas party for supposedly 30-35 special needs children here at the Centre. Their Mums were coming too (maybe 15 of them) and were going to be given some much needed rest while we occupied the children, nail painting, hand massage, lunch and a gospel message etc. Despite the really bad snowy conditions we actually had 38 mums and 83 children - not even the snow kept them away. All together visitors and helpers we were about 140 people! We had only catered for 70! The place was a hive of activity, there was a soft play area, 2 craft activities, an interactive story, music and noisy area and face painting. the children and mums all had lunch and a really happy time. At the end of the afternoon the mums left with a bag of toiletries each and the children with a Bible story in Albanian and English, sweets and a bottle of bubbles. Needless to say they were all very happy and we were all exteremely tired.
A great time was had by all.

Sunday the team went to 2 different Church services and a group helped out at another lively children's club. We visited the graves at Chabrati where there was lots of people killed in the Kosovan War and had lunch in a restaurant overlooking the whole of the city. It was great to be all together as a team. Several ordered omelette, after about 45 minutes we saw the waiters taking delivery of a load of eggs - the service was somewhat slow!

These are words to a song I listened to this morning and really love.

So place within my heart a fire that burns for You
That waters cannot quench nor wash away
And let that fire blaze through all eternity
Where one day I shall see You face to face.

One thing I've noticed here in Kosova is how much the local Christians consider time to be of the essence. They may be lousy at turning up somewhere on time, but that is mainly down to circumstances that get the better of them, like a flat car battery or something but generally their knack at using every opportunity they have to speak of Christ and His salvation is amazing. Every single opportunity to speak in this way is used, none go to waste. They will introduce it into any and every conversation whenever the opportunity arises. It amazes me that they do not talk about mundane every day things as much as we do at home, they really do have Christ at the centre of their lives and talk about Him, His work, His Word, His love etc whenever possible. Even socially and in every walk of life this is so - we have so much to learn about the use of our time together and that with others we know and socialise with.

Have been struggling with electric all week - the power is very sporadic here in Gjakove.  On for two hours off for 4 etc etc.

Well, Christmas is kind of ready to happen. The tree is bought, the cards are written and the presents are wrapped. Only 2 to get and they are now down to John!

Amy and I left the Uk yesterday for our two week stint in Kosova. We met the others at Gatwick and had a great flight. Amy obviously looked a bit of a dodgy character as she was the only one from our team to get stopped and searched at the x-ray bit! After a great flight to Pristina, we were collected and travelled the hour and half to the Smile Centre in the minibus to a very warm welcome from the gap year team and Belinda. There are now 13 of us here for the next week. We are all just wanting to be of service to God in whatever way he uses really, we are all open to how He will lead us over the next few days. We went through the schedule for today which consists of the gappers doing their usual lessons that they are involved with, three from the team visiting local families with disabled children and children with special needs to give them some shoeboxes, aid, etc and others from the team attending a small village church service held in a ladies house followed by the distribution of more shoeboxes to the fatherless children that she ministers to. All in all, quite a busy day. When everyone returns we will be sorting out aid at the warehouse where the shoeboxes and aid are stored ready for tomorrow.