“I was head over heels.”

At the time, she was in her final year at Bible college in Sydney, and says, “I kept having conversations with people that I didn’t seek out about opportunities to serve God in the Territory. But the refrain I kept hearing over and over again was that people just don’t want to move to Darwin.”

Laura started thinking about her life, and over time it began to be clear that Darwin was somewhere that God wanted her to be.

Eternity caught up with Laura when she’d been in Darwin only two weeks. She describes living in the Top End as “tropical. I never understood what tropical meant until I came to Darwin. It’s not just a word to describe the conditions of life, but it’s a feeling. You can feel tropical.

But her eyes light up when she talks about how the church is growing.

“I expected to be weighed down by all there is to do here and all the difficulties that Darwin has faced. I didn’t. I felt excited. I felt thrilled that God might let me come here and partner with the work that was going on.

“I really did fall in love with Darwin when I visited and I didn’t expect to.”