Week 12 of DTS - Anticipations

Well, I think this is going to be the last email for awhile. This was the last full week of the lecture phase of DTS. This week we watched Dean Sherman videos on Spiritual Warfare. The videos were good, but after 3 hours I would become restless. We watched about 3 hours of the videos a day. I would write more about this, but I don't have my notebook with me.

This week my mind has been full of anticipations. Anticipations for Christmas, spending time with family, giving gifts, and even receiving gifts for my outreach in about 2 1/2 weeks, and many other things like - sleeping in my own bed, taking showers in a private bathroom, having my own room, and my own privacy. :o) Oh, the things that we take for granted and then once we don't have it - we realize how much we missed it. I am wondering how I am going to do in another country for almost 3 months. I know I can do it, but as I said in my 1st email... I am spoiled. I have so many things - that so many don't. I believe that God is going to do many things while I am away in the Caribbean on outreach and that is another thing that I am anticipating. I am so excited for outreach for many reasons. But the #1 reason why I am excited about outreach is because of what God is going to to through me for other people. I just pray that I will not be shy or afraid of stepping out of my comfort zone.

God has really been working in my life this week. I am learning how to humble myself and also I am seeing how God is answering even my littlest prayers. Also, I am learning just how faithful God really is, and how to obey him when He speaks to me. This week I have felt really close to God and I love that feeling. God is so AWESOME! I love God! :o) God is also telling me that I need to use the gift that he has blessed me with - my voice. So now I am just asking God what He wants me to do and how He wants me to use my voice for Him.

Well, I think that is about it. I know this is short, but I really don't have much else to say. I am really excited about going home for a week and also for outreach.

Merry Christmas and I hope you have a Happy New Year.

May God bless you this Holiday season and keep you all safe and healthy.

P.S. I will be home on December 20th - December 27th. Then on the 27th I will be going back to Wisconsin until January 1, 2007 where I will be then flying to the Caribbean.

Week 10 & 11 of DTS - Relationships & Destiny

I apologize for being late on week 10. Last week we learned about Relationships with Gayle Keeproth (one of the directors in YWAM). And this week (week 11) we learned about Destiny by D.E.S.I.G.N with Gwen Berquist.

Before I start talking about the things I've learned within the last 2 weeks, let me just say that I had a great time at home for Thanksgiving. When I 1st got home I spoke in my church about the things that God has been doing in my life. I was surprised to find out that my pastor had highlighted points in my emails that I send out. And so, he took things that I wrote and gave me like a "pop quiz". It was funny. :o) Then on Thanksgiving Day - I went over to my brothers to see my new niece, Faith. She is so beautiful and precious. Then on Saturday I celebrated Thanksgiving at my parents house. Then on Sunday I went to church, then out to eat and then back to Wisconsin. I was one of the 1st people back. Also Sunday morning my aunt and uncle from New Mexico took the horses (Sunny and Little Joe) to go live with them in Albuquerque. On Friday my mom and I rode the horses for the last time in Illinois. It was kinda a bitter sweet moment for me. But I know that things will be good for them in New Mexico and I am also glad that I know who they are going to and the next time that I go to visit my relatives then I can ride the horses again. I had a busy time while I was home and I wasn't able to see all of the people that I wanted to see, so I cannot wait until I come home for Christmas to be able to see those people.

OK, now back to what I've recently learned. Well the week of Relationships, I basically learned more about myself and about other people. We took a couple personality tests which showed that I am easily influenced. Some things that I do are things that I was trained to do as a child - which shows that I am a "good team player", says Gayle. But those things that I was trained to do are not natural for me to do. For example: I like to plan things out because it gives other people time to prepare, but naturally I like to do things spontaneously. It was also good to learn more about other people in the class and see the similarities and differences in each other.

Over the weekend I went to Acquire the Fire in Madison as a volunteers. It was a good experience and I was able to give time to God to help serve other Christians and also to see teens lives changed. One thing I almost forgot to mention was that on Sunday a lady, Jan, who did a DTS in the summer came here to the Training Center. Jan and her 3 children are coming with us on outreach. She has 2 daughters and one son: Amanda is 15, Shelby is 14, and Jake is 13. They bring so much life to our little group. Also after Christmas we will be getting one more girl, Tisha, that did her DTS in the summer.

Then this week (week 11) our guest speaker was Gwen Berquist who taught us on her own material called, Destiny by D.E.S.I.G.N. - each letter in the word design meant something. ( D - Dream, E - Experiences, S - Soul print, I - Identity, G - Gifts, N - Network.) Her teachings were really good. I learned more about what I would like to do after DTS. I also learned about more about my gifts which I found very interesting. On Thursday Gwen encouraged me to pick out a worship song that I felt God was laying on my heart. Then she told me to sing it in front of everyone. I was apprehensive at first, but I knew that she wasn't going to let me get away with not singing. So I sang and it wasn't as bad as I thought it would be. Then on Friday during worship I did the same thing without Gwen telling/encouraging me to do it. It was cool how she encouraged me to get out of my comfort zone and sing more ... not for other people, but for God. :o)

We only have 1 more full week of teachings left. I cannot believe that so much time has passed. I leave for Christmas on December 20th and then come back on the 27th. Then on January 1st we leave for ... are you ready ... Trinidad, Dominican Republic, and Haiti. We will be in both of those places for about 3 weeks. We will be ministering to prostitutes, orphanages, and street kids. We will be coming back to Wisconsin on February 27, 2007 and we will be going to local places sharing our testimonies and about our outreach. Then I will be home in the beginning of March of 2007. I do not yet know if I will have access to the Internet and I also do not know if I will have time.

Week 8 & 9 of DTS - Breaking Down Walls

Because of Thanksgiving, I have included Week 9 along with Week 8. Last week our speakers were Barbara and Roy Sandiford and they taught on The Divine Plumbline. To sum it up, it is about tearing down walls in your heart and in your life. I openly admit that I have walls in my life, and that sometimes I make walls to protect myself from getting hurt. So it was hard for me this week to tear down those walls, because those walls were built on the foundation of either "pride" or "unbelief". We did not read the book Walls of My Heart by Dr. Bruce Thompson, but I highly recommend it because our teachings were based off of that book. Right now I am in the process of reading Walls of My Heart. We learned about our personalities and also about what controls us: our mind, emotions, or our will (meaning our attitude that leads to our actions). Barbara and Roy were the only guest speakers who gave us homework. One of the assignments was to write a letter to God and then continue to write a letter of response from God; however we could not stop and correct it - we just had to keep going. It was really good. I was surprised to hear how deep we all were going. I was also surprised that what I had to write was so long. And we had to read our letters in class, which I was not looking forward to, but after I was finished I realized that it wasn't that bad after all. This week was definitely a week of healing for all of us. And it also helped us grow closer together and open up more to one another. :o)

This week ... Week 9, Michael Leeson (our leader) taught us on topic of The Christian Life. I feel like this short week of teaching is going to be for me like going back to basics. Most of the teachings week after week are pretty intense, and with Michael's teachings are more laid back, yet still worth paying attention to (meaning that his teachings are good).

I am so glad to be home for Thanksgiving. I really miss my family, my friends, and as crazy as it sounds... I even miss my animals. The time home is going to be short and packed with things to do, but it's OK. I have to be back to the Training Center on Sunday night. Therefore, I know these few days (Wednesday afternoon through Sunday night) at home are going to be busy because I will be trying to see and visit everyone.

Thank you for taking time to read this.

Week 7 of DTS - Continuation of Last Week

Week 7... Whoa! Time is flying by. I really do not know what to say in this e-mail. I think it is going to be a short one. This week we had a couple different speakers: Paul Allen and Johanan Rehmt. Paul taught on Monday and Tuesday on Giving Up Rights. This just means that Christians are to place God before their spouse, children, work, etc. God is supposed to be # 1 in a Christians life. For me this was just a continuation of last week. Because last week at the GO! Conference in Colorado - I made God # 1 in my life again. But for me it is a daily thing that I struggle with... laying aside my concerns and worries and focusing on God to take care of the things that I have no control over. I also struggle with putting people or things before God (I make those people or things as a priority above God). God is so GREAT though, because He doesn't hold a grudge, He is always faithful and extremely gracious. :o)

Then on Wednesday through Friday Johanan taught us on the topic of Missions. He gave helpful insight of What is missions? and what it is like to be in another country and not understanding the language. He also gave many visual examples (through movie clips) and also through games. (Example: We had to play a game of cards that was like a mix of euchre and hearts. In this game we had 3 groups of 4 people and the team [the person across from you] who won after about 10 minutes would then move to the next table. But we could not talk, and we did not know until the game was over that each table had different set of rules. Some of the rules had trump, whereas others did not. Some of the rules had Aces as the highest card, where as Aces were the lowest cards and 6's were the highest cards. It was a good example of learning how to deal with each other and try to communicate with one another. It was fun, but also frustrating at times.) Johanan also told us some statistics about the country Rwanda in Africa - which was very interesting.

God's been doing a lot in the last couple of weeks, and I am still trying to process and figure out what it is that God wants for my life. Once I have things figured out then I will be sure to let you know. But in the mean time, please be praying for me. Pray for guidance, clarity, direction, wisdom, and patience.

Week 5 & 6 of DTS - Amazing

I apologize for not writing week 5, but I was really busy. I am going to give a quick summarization.

Week 5 was on the topic of The Holy Spirit and our speaker was Mike Esposito. Mike was AMAZING!!! He gave me so much clarification on the Holy Spirit. I grew up in a church that talked often about the Holy Spirit, but Mike's teachings taught me so much that I did not know, or was never explained to me. Now, don't get me wrong... I really like the church that I grew up in, maybe I just wasn't paying close attention when there were sermons on The Holy Spirit. Anyway, Mike had to leave early on Friday because his flight did not have a crew, so his teachings had to be cut short. All of Thursday was spent in prayer, he went around with some of the staff praying for people just waiting on God. What he prayed for me about was really good. I would like to share it with you, but it is kinda personal.

Then on Saturday I packed for the GO! Conference in Colorado. We left at 5 in the morning for a 12 hour van ride to Colorado, where we stayed at Valerie's (on of the staff members) aunts house. Then on Monday we had another 3 hours to go before we got to our destination: Estes Park, (YMCA of the Rockies). We had a time of worship and a short service at 7pm until 9:30 pm. The worship was AMAZING, I have never been able to worship God the way that I did this whole week. Then on Tuesday, I totally surrendered my life over to God, for Him to use me - completely. I also gave back to Him everything that He has given to me. My life here on this earth short, and how I see it... God created people to spread the Good News (in other words known as The Gospel). Therefore, why not let God use me for His purpose rather than for my own purpose. Anyway, Tuesday was the most intense day for me, however all of the other nights were pretty intense. I cried every night during worship due to the Holy Spirit working in my life. All of the speakers were really good as well. I was able to walk away with something that I did not know, that I could apply to my life. On Friday, we had a time of worship and intercession from 9 am - 11 am. We prayed for everyone is going out to other countries for short term or long term missionary ministry. Then we had lunch and after lunch we set out for a 15 hour van ride. The van ride to and from Colorado was the worst part of it all. It was so uncomfortable, but the experience that I had was so AMAZING that I don't even think about the van ride. We got back to the Training Center around 9 am on Saturday. I took a nap for about 3 hours, but I was still extremely tired. So today I ended up sleeping a total of 11 hours. It felt amazing! :o)

God is still speaking to me and slowly revealing to me what it is that He wants me to do. I am unsure of the specifics, therefore I am going to wait until I know more about what it is that I am going to be doing with my life, before I start to tell people. God is giving me "teaspoons" by revealing to me what it is that He wants for my life, and I know that if he showed me the whole picture then I would be completely overwhelmed. Right now I am already overwhelmed, however this is an excited kind of overwhelming feeling.

Well, I think that is a pretty good summarization. However, I will leave you with this: Psalms 33 . For me, Psalms 33 sums up what I was able to experience for this last week.