Mission Trip to Sydney, Australia
I am excited to report that our recent mission trip to Sydney, Australia was a huge success, thanks to the Lord’s mighty provision.
It had challenging beginnings, which tested our faith…
One of the flights from Dallas to Los Angeles was delayed, and most of the orchestra members missed the flight to Sydney. We were told that everyone would be on a flight two days later, which would cause us to cancel four of our six events.
The next morning we discovered that no flights were secured. It could be as many as four days before we departed Los Angeles, causing us to cancel our trip altogether. After all of God’s provision for this trip over the previous two years, would He now allow it to just unravel?
We fell to our knees and begged the Lord for His favor in this situation for the sake of the lost that we would encounter and for His glory. We found comfort in the remembrance of His faithfulness up this point, and we knew that His will would ultimately be done.
A senior level employee for the airline happened to be filling in for the day due to so many workers being on vacation, and the floor manager assigned her to our team. She had access that no one else had, and by that afternoon we were all assigned to various flights departing that evening! God’s faithfulness exceeded our expectations. Amazingly, none of our events would have to be cancelled.
The next challenge that we faced was finding people to attend our evangelistic-oriented concert at the Sydney Opera House. We asked members of our partner churches to invite unsaved friends and family members who might not step foot in a church, but would enjoy hearing a symphony orchestra from the United States. Our team members passed out thousands of invitations as we played in ensembles throughout the city.
We had no idea if anyone would attend. We asked for the Lord to bring those that He wanted to hear our message of Good News and left the turnout in His hands.
To our amazement, approximately 2,000 people came to the Sydney Opera House event. As in our other venues earlier in the week, we played symphonic arrangements of hymns, read Scripture and had members of the orchestra share their Faith Stories. A pastor from one of our partner churches offered a 20-minute message, tying in Faith Stories of the orchestra members with his own.
The pastor concluded the evening with an invitation. People all across the hall raised their hands to pray to receive Christ as Lord and Savior! What a joy it was to have a part in the Lord’s work in reaping such a plentiful harvest.
Will you prayerfully consider supporting this outreach, so that a presentation honoring our God can happen . . . again and again?
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