International Rallies
After NZ Rally was established, other international rallies started with fantastic turnouts.
Australia Rallies
In 1967, prompted by an enquiry by John West, an interest developed in the Rally movement and Mr Pat Paterson of Sydney, who was visiting Perth, was invited to share with us the benefits of this work. Arising from this a local Committee was established in October, 1967, with Miss Jean Lewis as the first Secretary.
The possibilities of this work caught the imagination of many, and Rallies were established in several Assemblies - Balga, Bedford, Hamilton Hill, Tuart Hill, Wilson and Kurrawang. Things developed quickly and in May, 1968, Tuart Hill had their first Rally Sunday with 175 children and parents attending. The first Annual Sports Day was held at C.Y.C. at Lake Cooloongup in 1969.
To everybody's surprise these sports were won by Kurrawang both for marching and sports. The secret was, of course, that as the Aboriginal children at Kurrawang lived in close proximity to each other, it was easy to get them together for practice with their enthusiastic leaders. Their natural athletic abilities also aided them tremendously.
Northern Ireland Rallies
Rallies have been running in Northern Ireland for over 50 years. There are Rallies in Bangor, Newtownards, Finaghy, Armagh and Crescent Church.
Indian Rallies
India’s Girls Camp
480 girls turned up to go to camp! Phew! Also the temperatures were 106-108F degrees – Phew!! This is what Colleen Redit wrote: “It was the largest number we have ever had. It was impossible to sit everyone in the chapel. We had to quickly divide the camp into 2 sections. All those under 13 years of age we separated and sent them as a Junior camp to the upstairs hall. All those 14 and above became the senior camp which we held downstairs in the chapel. We combined only for sports and after dinner activities. We also had different meal times, and instead of it being a problem it actually worked very well. Praise the Lord.
From the beginning of our camp until the end, we had no sickness, no problems and all behaved properly.” “The Lord did exceedingly and abundantly above anything we expected. In all the devotions, we had girls accept Jesus Christ as their personal Saviour. More than 150 came to know the Lord. There were also many who had backslidden who recommitted their lives. On Friday evening around 65 girls surrendered their lives for Missionary Service. This was very serious and all those who did this really meant deeply their commitment.”
On Friday night they had a Testimony meeting. It lasted from 9:30pm until 1:30am. 163 girls got up one after another, to share how the Lord had worked in their lives.
India Boy’s Camp
We had over 300 come to our Boys Camp along with a wonderful team of our men staff and some of our ladies. We had 27 from the Tsunami village and one of them participated in the Sermonette competition. It was such an encouragement to me to see 6 to 8 of the new men staff so capably involved in the Camp, and to see the confidence and Spiritual growth of our Speakers. Colleen Redit writes, “When I spoke on Friday evening, 80 boys came forward to receive salvation and 15 for dedication of their lives. Previously 33 had accepted the Lord Jesus as their Saviour. On Saturday morning, three-quarters of the boys came forward for prayer, and it was wonderful to see all our staff praying for each one individually.” At the testimony meeting on Friday night, 80 gave a testimony. As we counselled many of the boys, we found that so many of them had many problems in their lives and hailed from very unhappy backgrounds. Just listening to them broke our hearts.The Leader’s had a Bible study in the mornings. Colleen spoke on different aspects of leadership, which was a blessing to everyone. They have specially emphasised to all their staff who counselled boys, that they should keep in touch with them and follow up with them very carefully so they continue to grow in their faith. The Lord really blessed the Camp ministry in May (Both the Boy’s & Girls camps). What rejoicing there will be in Heaven, and what an encouragement to all the Leaders.
