Australia Day 7 - Ladies' Day Out

Lara and I had crumpets with golden syrup for breakfast.

Ward and I helped Phil shop for some lights for the church. No luck yet. James gave Pete (their worship leader) some guitar lessons and taught him some new guitar licks.

The ladies are spending the day together. The men are doing the same.

Tonight, I preached on worship to the congregation and conducted a worship seminar for their worship team. Lara and Donna ran Easy Worship.

Another great day with our host families. Both Stan and Cathy have taken most of this week off from work to spend time with us during our visit. Pete delayed looking for a summer job partly so he could spend more time with us, too.


There is a playground and basketball court directly behind the church. It’s not uncommon to hear teenagers out there at night breaking glass bottles on the asphalt. Boredom, I suppose. That also happens in front of Phil and Sharon’s house, across the street in the parking lot of the train station. Phil has a goal of sponsoring a skateboard contest for the local youth.

Where James and Jon Fletcher would live...

Where I would live...

Australia Day 6 - 'Roo Poo

One of the things Phil misses most about the States is having biscuits and gravy…especially from Cracker Barrel. This morning, Lara and I got up early and cooked breakfast – an authentic southern dose of sausage gravy and biscuits. Now, biscuits here refer to “cookies”. There are no frozen or canned biscuits here and no Bisquick in the stores. Sharon found an easy biscuit recipe so Lara made some easy drop biscuits and I made sausage gravy. There is no American pork sausage here, so we bought some pork mince and added salt, pepper and sage. We tried to reproduce a good ‘ole southern breakfast as best we could with the ingredients we had available. It wasn't Cracker Barrel but Phil said he really enjoyed it.

We talked Phil into staying home and getting some rest today. His back is still giving him trouble from the accident in July and this morning he woke up with a sore throat.

We met at the church at 9:00 am. Ward let us use his Vonage on his computer to call home. We got to talk to our girls for the first time since we left. Actually, we only got to talk to Bailey. We miss them so much. We also talked to Lara's mom and dad.

Our hosts then took us to Oakvale Farm and Fauna where we saw lots of native Australian animals. The highlight was getting up close and personal with the koalas and the kangaroos. We bought some feed bags and the kangaroos ate right out of our hand! Ward said he got some kangaroo poo on his shirt. We didn’t get to feed or hold the koala’s, but we did get to pet them. The park only allows that twice a day and we were grateful to be there during one of those times.

Click to watch Lara feeding a kangaroo

(Click on any photo to enlarge)

Tonja demonstrating the "Aussie Salute" (shooing away flies)

See the Joey in the pouch?
Fletcher: (L-R) Jon, Mitchell, James

Sniff, Sniff

(L-R) Stan, Kathy, Pete, Graham

Ward petting a koala

A peacock. Before...

...After

A turkey

A wallaby

An Emu

A Red Deer

A Dingo

A 6-Foot Bat

After leaving the park, we drove by some sand dunes where part of “Mad Max” was filmed.

They took us Lexi’s on the beach for lunch. Afterwards, we walked on the beach for a while and Chipper and I tried our hand at playing Cricket (similar to our baseball).

Janet said the water always reminds her of God’s love…so massive…always moving and flowing…sometimes it can get angry, but it always settles down. I thought that was an insightful observation.

Donna was blissfully happy. Her two favorite places are the ocean and Australia. Here she is enjoying both.

Ward and Tonja walking hand in hand on the beach

Jon and James walking hand in hand on the beach.
(OK, maybe not hand in hand...)

I drove again today. I’m getting very comfortable with it now.

Tonight Janet hosted a barbeque for us. She has lived in Newcastle all of her life. Most of the members of the church attended. We had sausages, salad, steamed veggies, lamb chop and steak. They are feeding us like royalty. Stan keeps us laughing. He’s always quick with a joke or a pun. (He and Joe Progar would get along swimmingly.) James and Jon are staying with Stan and Jon is picking up Stan’s joke habit. Tonja also entertained everyone with some of her classic jokes. Everyone here absolutely loves her laugh! It was another great night of fellowship. Stan told me how grateful he was for FCC’s support of Phil and Sharon because, by supporting them, we were really blessing their church. We had a good talk about church leadership.

Eddie (left) and Stan -- both are Elders

L-R: Chipper, Graham, Phil, Ward

During the BBQ,a beautiful double rainbow appeared.

We absolutely love they way people talk here. They have such a beautiful lilt and soothing cadence to their voice. It is both relaxed and sophisticated. They rarely pronounce “r’s” at the end of their words. Their accent is very lyrical -- almost musical. We especially love the way they pronounce Chipper's name. Down here, he's "Chippa". They way they say his name is much cooler than the way we do.

We are watching remarkably little television and, with the exception of James and Jon who have a World Phone, none of us have been able to use our cell phones since we left Los Angeles. I must admit, I’m enjoying the break from being tethered to either of those devices. Cell phones are not as prevalent here. Some people do have them but they don’t use them nearly as frequently as Americans do. It is illegal to drive here while talking on your cell phone. I wish that were true in our country.

Australia Day 5 - Tonja "Quidley Down Under"

Laundry day. Lara and Donna stayed at Phil and Sharon’s to do laundry, while Phil, Ward, Chipper, Jon, James and me went to the church. Let’s see…who’s missing from the group? Oh yeah…Tonja…or, “Quidley Down Under”, as we call her. (Quidley is her maiden name). She is staying with a family whose daughter is a beautician, so “Princess” went to get her hair colored and cut this morning. We all playfully gave her a hard time. Actually, the daughter is the one who offered.

Chipper and I conducted a training session this morning to teach Sharon Eagling and Pam Wright how to use Easy Worship. They are thrilled to have this program!

After lunch at a local seafood place, Phil and Stan (one of the elders) took us to a music store. Let me digress for a moment. Back at the seafood restaurant, one of the employees told us how much she loved our accents. That’s a first for me. No one has ever told me they liked my accent.

At the music store, we bought some new music stands and a guitar stand for the church. The Thornton church also bought some new drum heads for their kit. The clerk at the music store asked us where we were from. I told him Nashville, TN. He asked, “What’s the name of your group?” I told him we were a Flock of Seagulls tribute band but I don’t think he bought it. Kidding. Actually, we told him we were a worship band here to visit the Thornton Church of Christ for a couple of weeks. He thought that was cool. He was extremely kind to us and he offered to let me play a $6,500 Maton guitar. (Maton’s are incredible guitars – sort of the Taylor’s of Australia – played by one of my favorites, Tommy Emmanuel). Instead, I bought a $10 Maton cup holder. Probably not the kind of commission my sales guy was hoping for.

As we looked around, we found the exact same guitars in the store that we brought with us. We were so glad we bought them at home because the prices here were over double what we paid in Nashville. We paid around $500 for each instrument and the same instruments here were each over $1,000. We went back to the church and Jon changed the drum heads and tuned up the kit. I did some more work on their Easy Worship program. Jon, James, Chipper and Phil had fun playing music. Afterwards, I walked to the Eagling’s home with James and Jon. Along the way, they told me they are feeling back to normal. Jet lag is over for them. Still no change for me. It was sunny for most of the day, but a late afternoon storm came in and cooled everything down by fifteen degrees.

Kathy brought over one of the snakes her husband used to breed. It was a beautiful corn python.


Eddie, an elder here, is one of the sweetest guys you’ll ever meet. He’s near 70 and is an amazing wood worker. He makes all of the drumsticks for the church. He says he can make them cheaper than they can buy them. He’s going to make a set of sticks for Jon out of Tazmanian Oak. We each had dinner with our host families tonight. Lara, Donna and I ate with Phil and Sharon. Sharon made Corned Beef (cooked all day in the crock pot), pumpkin smashed potatoes, steamed veggies and cheese sauce. Everything was terrific! I’m looking forward to a left over Corned Beef sandwich. After dinner, we sat in the Eagling’s living room and talked and laughed for over an hour. Phil Eagling is in a lot of pain tonight. His back is still really bothering him from the accident back in July.

Australia Day 4 - "It's Like a Drug..."

We helped with Sunday morning worship. We led two songs, then sang two songs. We shared, “My Savior, My God” and Tonja sang “It Wasn’t His Child”. It was a sweet time of fellowship and worship. Such authenticity among the people here. There were 29 people in attendance, which includes the eight of us. Phil began a Christmas sermon series with a message entitled, “The Signs of Christmas”. Afterwards, we all went to Macca’s (McDonald’s) for lunch.

At this point, we have literally met everyone member of the church and I can honestly say that I love them all.

I drove again today. So far, I have a spotless driving record in the land of OZ (what the natives call Australia).

Chipper, Ward and I went back to the church after lunch to load the Easy Worship software on the church computer. The church is using Windows XP, so the software loaded easily. They were thrilled to have the new technology. The worship team rehearsed from 4:30-6:30 pm and the service started at 7:00 pm. We did a “concert”, very similar to our “Encounter’s”. Several people from the church at Charles Town came to worship with us. Lara and Donna ran the Easy Worship software for the service. Afterwards, everyone just hung out at the church and visited with one another. Phil Eagling was so encouraged to see that. Pete, Thornton’s Worship Leader, commented, “This fellowship is so sweet. I don’t want to leave. It’s like a drug”.

We stayed at church for an hour after the service, then went back to Phil and Sharon’s for Tea (the evening meal, which was much later than usual tonight due to the service). Lara and I stayed up and talked to Phil and Sharon for another hour. Christmas is a very special time for Phil. Their house is beautifully decorated for the season.

With the exception of a few homes that have exterior Christmas lights, folks here don’t seem to decorate the outside of their homes as much as Americans do. But then again, it may be a bit early for that.

James and Jon went to a local mall for their Starbuck’s fix. Kathy and Jon showed us the exotic birds he breeds. They were beautiful! Some were pale green, lavender, bright yellow, orange, etc. John also used to breed reptiles. While I was there, Kathy showed me the funnel web spider they had fished out of their pool. Then she said, “There’s probably a red back (another dangerous spider) over here by the trash cans. Let’s see if we can find one.” Then she spots a web and begins poking around it with a stick! I felt like Marlon Perkins on the old show, "Mutual of Omaha’s Wild Kingdom". “I’ll stay over here out of the way while Jim irritates the deadly spider…”

God had mercy on me. We didn’t find one.

Australia Day 3 - Cold Beer, Anyone?

I thought that might get your attention. I’ll explain in a minute. I had Vegemite today for the first time. I spread a very thin layer on toast for breakfast. Not bad. Just don’t smell it before you eat it. It smells like axle grease. I’ve been curious what it tasted like ever since I first heard the Men at Work song, “Down Under” back in the 80’s.

At 10:00 am, Phil took us all to Gloria Jean’s – the Coffee Shop where we’ll be playing next Thursday – to meet the owners and talk about the event. It is located in a shopping mall that is very similar to an American mall. In fact, if you were blindfolded and dropped inside this mall, you’d probably think you were in America. Except for the prices. I continue to be amazed at how expensive things are here.
• At a record store, a typical CD costs around $26.
• A 12-month calendar costs $25 dollars (US price: $12.99).
• 24-pack of Coke: $16.99; 24-pack of water: $9.00 (on sale)
• Petrol (gas) is $1.45 per liter. There are 4 liters per gallon, making gas nearly $6.00 per gallon.
• (1) 3 Musketeer candy bar: $3.00














Today is rehearsal day. After a good day of rest, it’s time to get busy with the business of music and worship. During the drive to the church this morning, I told Phil that the instruments we brought with us were purchased specifically to give to the Thornton Church. He and the members of the worship team were extremely grateful. Grateful to the point of tears. Donna and Lara went with a few ladies from the church to visit the town of Morpeth, the Port that started New Castle. We are sharing two “items” (special songs) in tomorrow’s worship service. After we all had lunch at Phil and Sharon’s, we headed to the church building to rehearse and prepare for tomorrow’s worship service. As we rehearsed, Phil poured each of us an ice cold, refreshing beer. Calm down……Ginger Beer is a soft drink that tastes like a peach flavored Ginger Ale (not that I’ve ever had Peach Ginger Ale, but that’s what Ginger Beer tasted like to me.)

We will also be doing an evening of worship Sunday night at the church, similar to our “Encounter’s” at FCC. Most of the songs that are very familiar to us will be brand new to the folks at Thornton, so tomorrow night may be more like a concert. During the performances of the play, the church has bought cold soft drinks and water to those in attendance. Tonight (the last night of the play), Franklin Christian Church is providing the soft drinks at no cost to them, just to try and bless them a little bit.

The flies here are relentless. I’ve never seen so many. In fact, they call the act of shooing flies away from your face the “Australian wave”.

While at Janet's house this evening, we saw a kookaburra bird. I couldn't get that annoying Barney song out of my head...

I haven’t seen many headlines here, but I was sad to learn that one of my childhood heroes, Evel Knievel, passed away recently. I had read that he became a Christian before he died.

Just a few random observations:
• Everyone here drives on the wrong side of the road!! (Well, it’s only wrong if you’re used to driving in the U.S.)
• The restrooms here are referred to as “toilets”. Even the public signs say so.
• The Yield signs on the highway say, “Give Way”. I like that.
• When kids back talk their parents, it’s called “back chat”
• They don’t have many Mexican restaurants here. Sharon misses them.
• The cost of living is much higher here.
• At the grocery store, the cart return is called the “trolley return”
• Chinese take out is called Chinese “take away”
• Any sandwich is called a burger. A fish sandwich is a fish burger. A chicken sandwich is called a chicken burger.
• Tax is already included in the price of everything. When you see a price tag, that’s exactly what you pay for an item.
• It’s unusual to see Christmas trees up in homes during summer weather. This must be what Christmas is like in southern California.
• There are no pennies in Australian currency. Chipper loves that!
• To conserve energy, everyone here unplugs most appliances when not in use.
• There is no tipping here. You only tip your server or waitress if you get really, really, really outstanding service.
• The toilets here have two buttons for two flushing options. I’ll try to be delicate, here. If it’s a mild visit to the toilet, you give it a half flush. If it involves paper work, you give it the “full flush”.
• Several of the folks I’ve talked to are very discouraged about the recent election here in Australia. The Labor Party (equivalent of the Democrats in the U.S.) were voted into power. The last time that happened, home mortgages here soared to…(are you ready for this?)…17-20%! The “liberals” here are what we would consider conservatives in the States; the “conservatives” here are what we would consider “liberals”.

I drove in Australia for the first time today. Phil asked me to drive his car to his house from the church (a whopping total of four blocks). I was nervous and I had the added stress of having Lara, Donna, Ward and Tonja in the car with me. Obviously, driving on the opposite side of the road was completely foreign to me. Every time I went for my turn signal, I turned on the windshield wipers. Everyone else in the car got a big kick out it. Ward laughed so hard, I’m pretty sure he…well, let’s just say he would have benefited from wearing some Depends.

One final note. As you may already know, spiders are not my favorite thing (see my 100 things post). Noah could just as well left them off the ark, if you ask me. But I suppose God has His reasons. Anyway…I was a bit nervous about the spiders they have here in Australia – particularly the ones that can kill you….specifically, the Funnel Web spider. The Funnel Web is common in eastern Australia (where we’re staying) and more venomous than the Brown Recluse spider we have in Tennessee. A bite from a funnel web can cause serious illness and even death, if no anti-venom is available. Bites are most prevalent during summer. (I watch way too many animal documentaries on Animal Planet.) It is now the beginning of summer in Australia. Accidental encounters usually occur with male funnel webs in ground-level dwellings on concrete slabs. Did I mention that Phil and Sharon’s home is situated on ground level surrounded by concrete slabs?

Anyway…enough background. As mentioned earlier, Ward and Tonja are staying with Cathy and John, next door to us. Cathy and John have a swimming pool. When we arrived for rehearsal, Ward and Tonja said…”Rob, guess what John found in his pool yesterday? A funnel web spider!” My teeth went numb at the news. Just knowing those evil blood suckers are lurking just a few feet from my bedroom makes me unsteady. Sleep will not come easy tonight. Pray for me…

Australia Day 2 - "And the Award Goes to...Chipper Farley!"

Phil deliberately planned today to be very low key, to give our bodies a chance to acclimate to our new time zone. We went to New Castle to see a bit of the town.

After lunch at a food court with Phil and Sharon, Pete and Cathy (members of the worship team), we walked across the street to see the harbor. It rained this afternoon. Phil took us to one of his favorite coffee shops --Gloria Jean’s (sort of the Starbuck’s of Australia). Lara and I bought a couple of Australia Christmas ornaments from a department store to take home.

Still no noticeable effects of jet lag on me. I feel pretty much like normal. Chipper does too. James and Jon are tired. So are Lara and Donna.

Tonight, we attended the play presented by the church. It was an original musical written, produced and directed by Phil Barker, a member of the church. Practically every member of the church was involved in some way. It was so encouraging to see the church pull together for a common cause. In a church this size (35-40 people), there is no room for pew sitters. Everyone has to pitch in. It was well attended and everyone had a great time.


One of the actors was sick, so Chipper agreed to fill in as “Vladimir”. He had a small part and actually sang a song as part of a male trio. He did a great job! Unfortunately, none of us had a camera with us because we were planning on taking photos the next night, so we don't have a photo of Chipper. The need for Chipper to fill in popped up at the last minute.

After the play, Janet, took us for a spin to see some “Crissey lights”.

We’re learning lots of new phrases.

Most of Australia is experiencing a record drought. Every place, that is, except for Newcastle. They have have plenty of rainfall and have experienced no water shortages whatsoever.

There are some really good things happening here:

• The people are very friendly
• Their approach is not an “in your face” kind of an approach. They prefer to employ a more personal, one-on-one approach by building relationships with people.
• Pete, the worship leader, is a great guy with a very teachable spirit.
• They make the most of what they have.
• They work together.
• The people are very sincere.

Australia Day 1 - 10,000 Miles

It’s our first day in Australia -- the land that gave us Mel Gibson, AC/DC, Russell Crowe, Nicole Kidman, Olivia Newton-John, and, of course, The Wiggles. We were scheduled to arrive in Sydney at 8:00 am local time but, due to heavy air traffic, we had to circle above the airport and we touched down at 8:30 am to sunny skies and 80 degree weather. After we went through customs and exchanged our currency at the airport, James and Jon added minutes to their world phone so they could keep in touch with their families. We were greeted by Stan and Pam Wright, Phil Barker and his sons, Isaac and Jacob, and Pete, the worship leader...all members of the church. They explained that Phil Eagling could not pick us up because just the night before, he had to take his wife, Sharon, to the hospital. She had damaged her shoulder when opening a door at their house. Just one of those freak household accidents. She spent most of the night at the emergency room, but they didn’t keep her overnight. She has some muscular damage in her shoulder and her right arm is in a sling.

We began the two hour drive north and arrived in New Castle around 12:00 noon. Our first stop was Phil and Sharon’s home, where we all gathered and began our visit with a time of prayer. We had traveled over 10,000 miles in 20 hours. Even though some of us were sleepy, they recommended that we not sleep until that evening. So…James and Jon took a two hour nap! I have experienced very little jet lag. Maybe I’m just energized by finally being here. Phil says it may catch up with me on the return trip home. Phil and Sharon were grateful for the supplies we brought…especially the Tylenol PM. The Australian government won’t allow anything with a sleep aid in it to be sold here. Yet, you can pack it in a bag and declare it at customs. Go figure. They have socialized medicine here and sometimes, it can take months for them to have what would be an ordinary and common procedure in the United States. They like to have Tylenol PM on hand for those occasions when they need help managing pain until the doctor can perform the needed procedure.

The photo to the right is Phil and Sharon's house.

The people of the church are unbelievably kind and very gracious hosts.
• Lara and I are staying with Phil and Sharon
• James and Jon are staying with Stan Wright (an elder) and his wife, Pam. Stan was born in England and he used to serve in the Australian army.
• Ward and Tonja are staying with Kathy and John (next door to us)
• Donna is staying with Janet and her daughters, Karen and Rebecca
• Chipper is staying with Eddie (another elder) and his wife, Moya. Eddie has been in this area since the mid-70’s and he's been an elder here for a long time. He’s a great wood worker and he's done a lot of work on the church.He built the stage, their sound room and a storage room.

We’ve already met several members of the church and the worship team, including:
• Pete – the volunteer worship leader. A great guy in his mid-20's. Pete has done this for over three years.
• Mitchell – Bass player
• Mitch – drummer
• Phil Barker and his sons, Isaac and Jacob. Phil drove us from the airport. He wrote and produced the original play the church is doing.
• Graham and his three children, James, Tiffany and Tameira. They actually lived in Franklin for part of last year and attended FCC while they were there.

They had an authentic Australian dinner tonight to welcome us. Meat pie (with tomato sauce), sausage rolls, salad, vanilla slice, slice, lamington and custard tart. Water and various soft drinks. After dinner, Phil asked us to do a couple of songs. None of us had brought our instruments with us to the church (because it wasn’t part of the original plan), so we went to our host homes to get them. Once back at the church, we then had to tune them from the ground up (still completely de-tuned from the flight). We shared 2 songs: “Lord, I Lift Your Name On High” and “Here I Am to Worship”.

Everyone on the team is extremely tired. Right now, it’s 4:00 am our time back at home as I write this. The church is decorated for the play. They have so little, yet they have done so much.

This has been a tough year for Phil on a personal level. He may not want us to come back. j/k. Every time we schedule something, someone in his family gets hurt. Back in July, he was in an accident that required we reschedule our trip. And now...just the night before we arrive, Sharon sustained the injury to her right shoulder. Overall, Phil said they have enjoyed more blessing that heartache. What an amazing outlook!

Savannah is learning to play the guitar. Her guitar instructor comes to their house once a week for lessons. Like most American children her age, she enjoys watching Disney Channel – especially Hannah Montana, Suite Life of Zach and Cody and Kim Possible.

I'm a goober. I put together an entire file for Tim Park that I was supposed to leave on my desk for him. It contained all of our emergency contact information. Like a doofus, I ended up bringing it with me. Thankfully, I had a copy of it on my computer so I emailed the info to him tonight.

so, what the heck do you do all day?

i'm asked this question (or some form of it) on a semi-regular basis. when people ask that, what they're really wondering is..."afterall, how long can it take to pick out a few songs"? ouch. actually, it would only take a few short minutes to string together a few random songs. thankfully, that's not what I do. sure, selecting music is certainly part of my job responsibilities, but there is much more to my day.

let's see....over the years, i've acquired some mad computer golf skills....i've learned to nap sitting up.... i surf the net....stay caught up on episodes of 'the office' on nbc.com....

kidding. in reality, my day is no different than most other pastors. let's expand it to a typical work week. granted, there is an "ebb and flow" to my ministry, with some seasons being busier than others, but during an average week, I...

• pray over and plan the next few weeks of services (lots of details here alone)
  
• look through hundreds (often literally thousands) of songs
  
• listen for new worship songs
• read, study, pray
• stay caught up on email
  
• communicate with this weekend's team
• put together the 'tech sheet' for the service (lots of details here, too)
• chart new songs as needed
  
• put together the charts the band will need for the weekend service
• prepare for sunday morning's rehearsal
  
• visit and pray with folks in the hospital
• attend meeting(s)
• deal with administrative issues
• shepherd members of the worship ministry
• practice guitar
• allow for unexpected "interruptions" to my day
• do my best to meet the needs of the people God puts in my path
  
• identify and audition potential new members of the worship team

to name a few. as you can see, i have no trouble staying busy.