ENGAGED!! + Israel and the Elav conference, August 2009

As most of you would have heard by now, I'm engaged! To an incredible man after God's heart from England named Will Moore. We met in January 2008 in New Zealand while doing a YWAM DTS (all of you that helped financially for me to go to do that DTS - it was worth it!), and we've been in a serious relationship now for almost a year and a half. We've both been in Israel for the month of August, and on August 2nd, 2009, Will proposed to me by leading me on a treasure hunt with beautiful handmade cards and directions into the heart of the Old City of Jerusalem, leading to the roof of the Upper Room - a dome that has spectacular panoramic views of the entire city of Jerusalem. He timed for me to arrive exactly at sunset, and had a trail of roses and rose petals leading up the stairs to get to the roof where he was waiting with a guitar, and began singing a song he written for me (!) as soon as I turned the corner. He had set up the area with candles and scarves and cushions and a little table with champagne and glasses, and after he finished the song he helped me up to the top of the dome and proposed to me in the midst of the spectacular sunset over Jerusalem!

It's an exciting time, and this month has been a flurry of excitement and planning and emotions. To add to all the excitement, we soon turned our attention to helping and praying for a big worship conference called Elav (which means Unto Him in Hebrew) that our house of prayer and worship in Jerusalem, Succat Hallel, does every year that is aimed towards the youth and young adults of Israel. People of all ages and from all nations are welcome, and we have many international guests that come from all over the world, but it's been exciting that over the last 3 years that we've done this conference the attendance of Jewish and Arab Israelis has steadily gone up every year, until this year we had about 600 Israeli youth and young adults (500 Jewish Israelis, and 100 Arab Israelis) and 250 internationals and volunteers. This was an incredible time of reconciliation between Jews and Arabs, the spirit of adoption pouring out, and a new revelation of the body as one new man - Jew, Arab, and Gentile together in unity praising God.

We had amazing times of worship and teachings during this conference, with guest worship leader Matt Gilman (main singer for Misty Edwards and worship leader from IHOP in Kansas City) leading two worship sessions and Israeli and Arab worship teams leading the others, and guest speakers Heidi Baker from Iris ministries in Mozambique, Africa speaking for two sessions and Joaquin Evans (head of the Healing Rooms at Bethel Church in Reading, California) and Israeli and Arab speakers for the others. Will and I had the opportunity to lead a worship time together at the conference, singing songs we've written together and leading mainly in Hebrew. We had a lot of great feedback from people about it, that many got touched during the worship and felt like God has given us an anointing to lead worship together. It was a sweet time of intimate worship, and confirmed the calling we've both felt on our lives to lead people into a deeper relationship with Yeshua (Jesus) through leading worship together as a couple.

I also was part of an Israeli team that led the main worship session for the last night, made up of worship leaders from around the country and singing new Hebrew songs that we've written and compiled into a professionally recorded, mixed and mastered CD of 12 new Hebrew songs. One of my recent songs is on this album, and can be listened to or bought from Succat Hallel's website, www.jerusalempraise.com.

To get more information about the conference and the prayer room, feel free to go to Succat Hallel's website, above, and to see pictures of the engagement (!) and of our engagement photoshoot on my facebook page, go to these links:
(Engagement Part I)
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2031305&id=1267740110&l=51ce948ba8
Part II
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2031306&id=1267740110&l=ac8ab17083
Engagement Photoshoot
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2033314&id=1267740110&l=d9213ecfac

We've been having an awesome time here getting to see YWAM friends again and hearing stories that makes want to go back out to the nations, and having guys from Bethel church in Reading staying here, seeing healings regularly on the streets of Jerusalem!
Will and I will be flying back to England via Latvia on the 11th of this month, so if you could please pray for easy times through the infamous security checks of the Tel Aviv airport, favour with the customs officials for me to come back into the UK without a religious workers visa, and for things to go smoothly with applying for the visa to stay once back in the UK.
Thanks for your continued support, much love from Jerusalem!