Week 5!

Hey! Well on Monday we found out where we are going for outreach! yeah! I am going to Africa/Asia. The countries we will be going to are Malaysia, Northern India, South Africa and Uganda. This was my first choice and as there were 17 others that had this as their first choice, I feel like God really chose this team. There are 10 of us going including 2 leaders. There are 8 girls and 2 boys! poor boys! One of the guys Carsten said, "Well, I never had sisters!". Now he will have 8! It is a really fun team and I am really excited to see where God takes us these next 5 months. Please pray that we get in touch with good contacts within each country and that God will go before us and clear the way for us. I want to take this opportunity to ask you to pray about giving to the DTS team as a whole. I am blessed in the fact that I have pretty much all the money I need. As a school however we need around 150,000 New Zealand dollars to cover our outreach phase. This is equivalant to around 85,000 USD. I know this sounds like a lot of money but God is Jehova Jirah and He had each one of us here for a reason. With God anything is possible! If you feel you cannot give financially, please pray that this money will come in. We need it in the next couple weeks in order to get our tickets. If you feel led please go to www.ywamoxford.org click on the pay online button and give automatically. Thanks!

Invisible Children

This week we have had an emphasis on children. On monday night we watched a video called invisible children talking about those children who are child soldiers in Africa where a man named Joseph Koney has been terrorizing children and families for over 20 years. It is incredible that a man can get away with terrorizing 5 different African countries for that long. Uganda, Central African Republic, Sudan, Dem Rep of Congo and another I can't think of, are terrified of this one man. Over 3,000 child soldiers are being held captive and made to do horrible things. There have been peace talks since 1991 and they all have failed. On April 25th there will be a worldwide prayer walk and sleeping outside to advicate that something has to be done. This just broke my heart to see those children carring guns. No child should have to do this. Our generation has to stand up and say NO MORE! We will not allow this! What one generation allows, another embraces! Let's stop this now! For more information go to therescue.invisiblechildren.com. please watch the video, it is heartrenching.

upper left: some of us on a scavenger hunt in Christchurch (we had to take a picture in a tree),
upper right: Outreach in Christchurch on friday night, we had people paint what they thought Hope was.
bottom left: on the pier in Christchurch
bottom right: a group of us in Akaroa last Saturday

Outreach

Well on Saturday we handed in our preferences for outreach! It is comming up fast! To make the decision I decided to fast and pray on Friday of last week. There will be six different groups; Far East Asia, South East Asia, South East Asia/Africa, Africa, Middle East and South America. My choices in order were south east asia/africa, south east asia and middle east. They should tell us within the next week where we are going. The leaders Jeremy and Will really seek God in where to place each person so I really trust their judgement. Before I left I didn't know they would be making a trip to both africa and asia. They will be going to Northern India, Indonesia/Malaysia, South Africa and Uganda. I got really excited about this trip but I also wanted to seek God's will about it. I didn't get a "You will go here!" but I still really liked the idea of going to those places. I will let you know as soon as I do. Please pray for the leaders as they make the decisions in where to send us and us as students as we prepare for outreach. God Bless!

Hello! Well I really can't believe how fast time is going! It is already the end of week 3! I pray that all of you are doing well. At this time, we are just about to leave for Akaroa which is a town about 2 hours away to do some kyaking and relaxing. I just wanted to drop a note and say that everything is good here. This week our lectures were on relationships. Relationships with God, ourselves and others. Of course including romantic relationships! Alot of it I already knew but it was presented in a different way. There are for "legs" to the table of relationships, love, honor, understanding and trust. If just one of those is broken or isn't there the table isn't steady. I am learning so much it is hard to write it all down in a blog! well I have to go but I will hopefully write another one tonight! I love you all!

Week 2

Hello everyone! Things are going very well here! This week in class we are learning how to be like Jesus. Now I thought, "oh that's easy, just follow His example!". True, but it is so much more than that. It is reflecting who Jesus is and understanding how He related to people. I believe I have mentioned before that on friday nights we go into Christchurch for outreach. I have always associated the word "evangelism" with standing on the street corners and shouting for people to repent. So as a result I never really liked that word. When I heard we would be going into Christchurch and doing "evangelism" I got scared. I am an introvert, I can't just go up to people and ask them if I can tell them about God! This week our speaker has been really pressing the point that evangelism is all about befriending people and taking an interest. It is not about how many people I can bring to Christ it is about relationships. I was making more of it than it is. It can be as simple as having a bunch of sidewalk chalk and drawing in the town square and getting to know people. The thing I have asked myself is how Jesus would approach people. He would come in just loving people and just take and intrest and let them talk. He wouldn't come in with an agenda of getting them to follow Him. He just loved them. That is my goal tomorrow night. Just love people.

1st week down

Well today I have officially been here for a week. It is amazing how fast time flies! The first week of DTS has been both challenging and fun. There are 29 girls and 14 guys in my DTS and 11 staff. Most of the YWAMers are from America which is a little disapointing because I wanted to be with some other cultures! Oh well. We do have some people from Canada, Korea, Ireland, Netherlands, New Zealand, and Fiji. It has been interesting learning other people's stories and how they got here. We have finally got into a routine. Just to give you an idea, our days on the base go something like this: 7am wake up/breakfest, 7:30-8:15 devotions, 8:15- 8:50 work duties (mine is to clean our free box area and organize the library), 8:50-1pm class, 1pm- 3pm lunch and free time, 3pm- 5:30 is another class period, small groups or community work day; 6pm dinner, 7pm- 10pm is either free time or an activity and 10:30 lights out. On fridays we go into Christchurch (the closest big city) and do outreach in the evening. The weekends are pretty much free to do what we want and various activties are offered. That is our week in a nutshell. It has been a little hard for me to get up in the mornings after working nights for so long! Our classroom times have been filled with learning about worship, intercession, inductive bible study, hearing God's voice and evagelism. I have learned so much and this is only the first week! Please pray for me that I will step out in faith and not in fear especially as we do more evangelism. Joshua 1:9 "Be strong and Courageous...for the Lord your God is with you." has become my theme verse for these next 6 months. God Bless!

Intercessory prayer

Today my whole image of prayer was shattered. In a good way. Our lesson this morning was on intercessory prayer. Now, I always believed in prayer and the power of it but I didn't really understand the meaning of intercessory prayer. It is incredible to think that in some ways God's hands are tied until we pray. God is still sovereign but He chooses to interact with us and require action on our part in behalf of others. In other words to "Stand in the Gap" between that hurting person and God to ask for healing, mercy, or even to stand in the way of Satan and protect others. Wow! It is so amazing that we have the power to help change someones circumstances just through prayer. We also have to make sure what we are asking for is what God wants to do. Sorry if this sounds confusing as I have learned most of this myself just today but it made me realize the incredible value of those of you that are praying for me. I appreciate this so much! I would ask that some of you become prayer warriors and lift this school, the students and me up as I go on this journey. Please let me know if you would be willing to do this. I feel as though we are going to be doing some pretty heavy spiritual battleing and this school and I will need all the prayers we can get! Thanks in advance!

I have arrived!

Kia Ora (Mauri for Hello) Well I just wanted to let all of you know that I have officially arrived at the YWAM base. As of Sunday we are officially started our course! I have already met some amazing people! The staff is really great and the students are eager! These first couple days have consisted of getting to know you activites, rules and orientation. I am living in an actual "house" that is about a block away from the YWAM base. There are 16 girls and 4 staff living here. I am living with 6 other girls in my room. 4 of them are 20 and younger! It is amazing how old 25 can seem. I think it is because I have been working for a while and I am at a different stage in life. But you can learn lots from youth also. DTS scheduales specific time in the day to have devotions. That has been amazing these last couple days, just to be with God and bask in His presence. I am so excited to see what He has in store for me in the next 3 months! I will probably blog every other day or so. I would write more but it is time for supper or tea as the New Zealanders call it. Cheers!