The KZN Mid Year Conference ’09 was an awesome time of heart-rending Bible teaching, a real experience of Christian unity and great fun!  ‘Possessed by God’ was our theme this year and Sihle Mooi (Soweto Community Church) & Goodenough Mthembu (TBT Campus Director, Westville) spoke on ‘1 Corinthians 12 – 14’ and ‘The person & work of God the Holy Spirit’ respectively.

The Holy Spirit is the most misunderstood member of the Trinity – often seen as the ‘rogue’ person of the Godhead, and held responsible for anything weird or unplanned!  We spent the weekend having our view of God, the Holy Spirit stretched and corrected by God’s word and faithful bible teachers.  Many were particularly struck by what it truly means to be a Christian – and that love, not gifting us to ‘do lots of (weird) stuff’ is at the heart of the Spirit’s work.

Interactive topical sessions called ‘Electives’ were held on Sex, Bible Overview, Poverty, Beauty and The Health, Wealth & Prosperity Gospel.  These were good times of seeing God’s word applied to all kinds of areas of life and the supper queue and tables were full of chatter as students shared what they’d learnt with each other and took the discussions further!

We also ‘workshopped’ the book of Jude, grappling with the text and its meaning for our lives as we put basic bible handling tools to work in small groups.

There was a great turnout of 140 students with all 3 of our TBT campus groups (Westville, Howard College & Pietermaritzburg) well represented as well students from local KZN churches and past-students who took leave from work and travelled from all over SA and from as far as Botswana to be with us!  An astonishing 15 countries were represented – such an encouragement to see the reach of student work in KZN!  One of the highlights for many of the students and for me personally was the real sense of unity shared by everyone there.  There was one giant ‘clique’ – a genuine experience of what it means to be family and to ‘belong to one another’ as Christians.

By God’s grace, we were able to break even financially this year for which we praise God.  Students took part in the ‘Savings Scheme’, which we set up for the first time this year which helped students plan financially for MYC from February. We praise God for the generous sponsorships we received from churches and individuals as well as ‘Friends of TBT’ (a growing group of graduates and past members of TBT) and we thank God for local churches who invest in this kingdom work in money, prayer and staff.

Praise God for his goodness shown to us in Jesus, for his word through which he clearly reveals himself to us and for the provision of faithful bible-teachers, musicians, planners, administrators, leaders, givers, encouragers and welcomers – we’re grateful for everyone who used their God-given gifts to make MYC a great celebration of God’s grace to us all!

Kim Carr

Campus Director, TBT Pmb