Stephanie Berthon is a missionary currently residing in Knock, Ireland. This is an update of her recent NET experience.
Hi Everyone!
It has already been almost 4 months since I said goodbye to all of you, packed my little (yeah right) suitcase and hopped on a plane to Ireland. I miss you all so much, I have been praying lots for you and I think an update is in order!
Where to begin… well I guess we can start by explaining a little bit about my NET team and how we came to be! We spent one month training in Knock, Ireland. Knock is actually home to a Marian Shrine and it was such a blessing to visit my first Marian Shrine and to have had access to the Shrine basically any day I wanted to walk down! In the middle of training, teams were announced. I was called up to be on the road team and all I remember thinking was “Jesus, you are crazy I’m NOT cut out for this!” Luckily, I was wrong and Jesus was (obviously) right. My team is nothing short of crazy but somehow that makes us perfect together. At the moment I have 3 sisters on my team and 4 brothers. We are 5 Canadians, 2 Americans and 1 Irish lad, all from different places in our lives. I’m learning a lot about community life, sharing and coping with not having any alone time–ever. Although a lot of that sounds difficult (and I will admit, it isn’t easy), I love it and Jesus has blessed me with more patience than I ever thought I had and so much love for my team that I’ve been doing really well! I love being on the road team. We run Encounter Days (retreats) almost every day of the week. It is such a blessing to wake up every morning (even if it is 5:45 am) and know that my “job” is to tell other people about Jesus and what He’s done in my life.
We hit the road in the middle of September, putting on Encounter Days for different age groups of students from one end of the country to another. We’ve had all sorts of retreats: one with about fifteen eighteen-year-old guys to a few Encounter Days for over 150 grade seven girls (that one was a little scary for some of my brothers!) Some Encounter Days are easy and just fly by while others are a little bit harder for us, with a couple of challenges throughout our day. Easy or hard, every Encounter Day leaves us with at least one glory story and always a few reminders as to how much Jesus needs us to be here.
I hope everything in Winnipeg is going well! I’m sure there is lots of snow by now, it’s probably getting chilly and Christmas preparations are in full swing for many families. Here in Ireland, the temperature has certainly been dropping, and we just got hit with our first bout of snow! The Irish people aren’t really used to snow; one of the brothers on my team (the one from Dublin) was actually worried to drive today because it had snowed! The Canadians are all doing fine with it, we feel a little closer to home actually! We are currently in Dublin until the middle of December and I have to say, they really go all out with their Christmas decorations! It isn’t even December yet and already the streets are lined with strings of lights and festive wreaths. The shopping centers are decorated head to toe with Christmas villages for Santa and snowflakes and twinkling lights. Already my team has been invited to take part in a caroling service being put on by a local parish and we are looking forward to helping the priest of the parish in which we are staying, Fr. Seamus, decorate his massive Christmas tree. We had a gingerbread house building competition today (unfortunately I think the guys won…), it was really fun and we bought a mini Christmas tree so our team is really getting into the Christmas spirit!
We have only 7 retreats left until our December retreat and then we’ll get a few weeks off to relax and enjoy Christmas. Some of my teammates are going home to visit their families. My sister Morgan and I are actually going to Turkey because her aunt lives there and had invited her and I to spend Christmas with her, I am really looking forward to spending Christmas in warm weather but I will admit, it will be so different and I will really miss being in Winnipeg.
I want to finish off by thanking everyone for their prayers for my team and I and also a special thank you to all those who have been supporting NET this year, as it is our first year of being an independent ministry (we are no longer affiliated with NET Ministries of Canada). I have certainly seen why your support is so needed for my team and for our ministry, and I am so thankful for every bit of it. If there is anyone who feels like they would also like to support NET Ministries of Ireland please feel free to contact me by email. Any donation would be extremely helpful to us this year.
Thanks so much for listening to my little update and, once again, please keep us in your prayers! Also, feel free to email me and send me updates about life in Winnipeg, I’d love to hear for you! Merry Christmas to everyone and many blessings in the New Year!
In Christ,
Stephanie Berthon
