These past couple of weeks have been really good and slowly slowly things are getting back to a more normal pace of life (honeymoon is officially over!). Here’s our latest news…

PARTY IN SICILY
Last week Giovanni and I took a 12 hour train journey to Giovanni’s home in Sicily. We were there just three days to have our final wedding party at Giovanni’s home church. There were over 100 people there, about 40 from Giovanni’s church, 30 from different churches around Scily and about 30 non-christians made up of family and school friends. We had a great time, we watched some of the DVD from the wedding, shared our stories and future plans with people,sang a hymn together, took part in some silly games courtesy of Giovanni’s kind friends, as well hearing a message from the Bible.
The message was about having Christ as the focal point in a marriage and how true love can not be shown, experienced, or understood without knowing Christ. It was such a clear message; pray that people’s lives would be changed by the amazing love of Christ as our lives have been changed.
After the party we went for an ice-cream with some of the young people it was really nice to catch up with them again; some of them have even offered to support us. We were really touched by their commitment to us and also excited to see Italians willing to give money to God’s work. As we’ve said before many Italians don’t think about tithing let alone supporting full-time workers so its great to see God changing His people here in Italy.
Please pray also for Giovanni’s family. While we were there things were quite difficult and tense at home. Pray that the Lord would be in their minds, hearts, actions, and words as they live with each other

CHURCH
We are now starting to realise a bit more of what our ministry will look like here in Siena. Over this past week Giovanni preached in the mid-week meeting, we cleaned the church after there was a huge leak from the apartment above, met with some of the students to plan for GBU, started designing publicity for future GBU events, Kate (GBU worker in Perugia) came to stay one night, took part in the prayer meeting, youth group, and just generally spent time with different people from the church.
Sunday’s service was good too, we were introduced officially to the church and then all went to the elders house for lunch. Every Sunday after church everyone is welcome for lunch there, its really lovely to spend time together outside of church meetings. There were about 23 people there this Sunday and Giovanni and I had opportunities to speak to the different young people/students. The guys then went to play football while I went jogging with the elder’s wife. We had a good chat about the church and things to do this year. The elder and his wife have really opened up their family and life to the church we look forward to helping them.

UPCOMING EVENTS

* GBU BIBLE STUDY and BOOK TABLE start again the first week of October. Giovanni will be writing the Bible studies. We will be going through the whole Bible book by book. Pray for Giovanni as he prepares the studies.
* NEW EVENTS-This term will see the trial of a language exchange and an open discussion group to try and reach students with the Gospel. Pray that students would come and that Christian students from the church would get involved in helping.
* GBU WELCOME NIGHT 17th October-an event for new students. We are going to search for a location tomorrow so please pray for that.
* FLYERING-as well as the book table Giovanni and I are planning to be in the university everyday flyering for GBU as well as doing questionnaires with the students.
* LETTERS OF INVITATION-we also plan to make and distribute some hand-made invitations to the villages around were we live, and in town inviting people to the church. We hope to involve the young people in the making and distributing of these letters. Pray for the organisation of this and wilingness of people to help, we’ll let you know when we start distributing
* TEENAGERS-there’s already a good youth group in the church (age 17+) but there is no work amongst secondary school kids. One of the young people has a burden to start a work amongst young people and has asked Giovanni and I to help start something. We are going to use this next month to pray, plan, organise, and publicise so please pray for this new ministry in the church.
* 9.37-At present Giovanni is continuing to co-ordinate this national youth project keeping in touch with the different members and helpers and is trying to get invitations from churches around Italy to present the project. We are also organising 9.37’s first national Conference (May time) and a missions trip to Moldova please pray especially for these two events as we really need God’s help and wisdom in organising them.

That’s all for now!! There’s lots of things going on but we pray that in the midst of ideas, events and meetings, and our weaknesses that nothing would take away from how great God is, praise be to Him! Keep praying

Siamo in Italia!! We're in Italy!! Its been 2 weeks since we first step back onto Italian soil and we are starting to get settled. We have so much to praise God for already...

• MISSIONS CONFERENCE-As you now as soon as we got back to Italy we went off to a big Christian conference here in Italy. We collected our new car from Perugia (the car in itself was a blessing from God as a believer in Peruia sold it to us for a reduced price), picked up a student and a missionary on the way, and drove up to Rimini. There were over 300 people there (about 1/3 were foreign missionaries). It was great to see so many people at a conference which challenged all of us to live a missionary life, a life totally surrendered to God's service. Giovanni and I also had a little table with information about 9.37 (national youth project which Giovanni's co-ordinating). The conference was a great chance to speak to young people about stepping out for Christ and also to meet leaders of churches form all across Italy. Giovanni also had 5 minutes in one of the main sessions to share about this praject. Pray people might be moved not necessarily to join the project but to take on the biblical challenge of Matthew 9.37.

• HOUSE-After the huge blessing of having a 2000 Euro discount off the yearly total of the rent we didnt know what to expect of the house itself, well, its absolutely gorgeous. We were so shocked when we arrived nearly crying with joy. In the house itself is all we need and we haven't had to buy anything new, there's everything cutlery, pans, teapot, bed linen etc. We've already had our first guests (a family from my home church), we shared some very precious moments with them at our house, in Church, and Siena, and thank God for their support to us. So be assured there is place if anyone wants to come and see us and the church/student work here in Siena.

• CHURCH- We have already spent quite a bit of time with the elder and his family and some fo the young people in the church which has been just great. They have all been very welcoming. Letizia the elder's wife came ladened with a food bundle including tea bags for our first few days here in Siena and has already had us round for dinner. Sunday morning we were in church for the first time and felt really at home there. We were really encouraged to see how every member of the church was involved in the service especially the young people. Keep praying for our relationships with the people in the church especially the young people/students with whom we'll be working.

Thanks for all the messges and e-mails we've had already, sorry we haven't replied. We're currently sitting in an Internet point in town and dont have internet at home.

Please continue praying for these different things and for these first steps in Siena as we look at what we can do for the Gospel here. We're off to Sicily wednesday night for a few days for our final wedding party at Giovanni's home church so please pray that we would have a good time with family and friends especially as we'll be sharing with them about what we'll be doing here in Siena.

Thanks guys.

We'll leave you with some photos of us in our new home/church..