Week Three

As usual it has been another busy week here at the Oval! Trent Shepherd, a great speaker, came to share some of his wisdom with us along with some incredible stories. One involved him and another passer-by rolling a huge fish that had beached itself back into the sea as they shouting at it, “You gotta live, fish!” And it did! We spent one afternoon on the grass in the sunshine talking about our favorite stories of the man, Jesus, while Trent dug a small hole with his hands, spat into it, made mud and rubbed it on his eyes. That was a moment I will never forget. My concept of who Jesus really was has been completely revolutionized. It’s hard to believe a carpenter from Nazareth would ever mean so much to me. I came away from these lectures pondering what it means now that I know what I know about this man.

In the middle of that incredible time, we took a trip to London to see the sites. Armed with packed lunches, umbrellas and 13 cameras we descended on the unsuspecting tourist hot spots of…. St Paul’s Cathedral (we climbed to the very top…offering the best view of London by far), the Houses of Parliament, Big Ben, Westminster Abbey, Buckingham Palace and briefly the Natural History museum!! Needless to say, by the end of the day we were SO tired!! Some of us stopped in at an Italian restaurant (where we ordered 5 cheese pizzas…the cheapest thing on the menu!!) and the rest saved even more money by frequenting the local McDonalds!! Even though we were blistered and aching like crazy by the time we got home, it was a brilliant day with some fantastic memories that we’ll share for years to come!!

On a sad note, our final school member Pendo is still yet to hear about her visa and the longer it takes to come through the further behind she gets with lectures etc. We are still hoping and praying she will get here soon…so remember her!!

I am so glad to report that the sun is finally shining here! And that is great news for the 120+ people that are flocking to the Oval this weekend for an evangelism conference. Myself and friends from the DTS now bear wounds marking this special event after erecting huge marquees and tents in preparation for their arrival…and getting flicked by giant toggles that are now holding there roofs on!! I am really looking forward to sharing time with so many people from all over the country. It will be great to have so many English people here at last – Hooray!!

This week we have been spending some time with John Peachey, the Base leader here in Harpenden, talking all about forgiveness and repentance. We have our last two sessions with him coming up these next few days and then I have a visit from my best friend from home this weekend, which is very exciting! In the meantime, I am going to enjoy the sunshine while it lasts!! See you next week!!

A Week One report from a Discipleship Training School Student

Join us every week for the next five months as we check in on Kim Hart, a young woman from England doing her Discipleship Training School (DTS) at the Youth With A Mission training center in Harpenden, England. Kim will tell us about what she’s learning, what it’s like to live in a community with other young Christian missionaries, and how God is changing her.  Then we’ll “travel” with Kim and her classmates as they take what they’ve learned to another nation.

Week One

I arrived here at ‘The Oval’ on a wonderfully sunny Wednesday afternoon and was shown around a property that looks rather like an army barracks. With exercise class at 7am you may well believe that you have come to the wrong place! However, despite daunting first impressions, I instantly felt as though I was walking into my home. People who live and work here at Youth With A Mission-Highfield Oval are so welcoming and friendly and have an amazing capacity for remembering names and faces, so although the environment felt foreign to me at first, I felt I belonged here.

I share a room with two other girls, one from America and one from Rwanda, so I’m sure you can imagine the vast differences in our cultures, our habits…even our sock drawers! My concern in sharing a room was not the space or even the bunk beds. It was snoring! But, I’m glad to report that my roomies are silent sleepers!! Praise God for small mercies!

After a few days of orientation exercises, a trip to St. Albans and a “high tea” welcome, we began our first week of lectures. Oh my goodness! Talk about intense. Before I left my home church, a woman told me that during a prayer time, God had given her an impression of me as if I were on a very fast moving motorway. The speed of the cars was immense and the word from God for me was that I would be “fast-tracked” into what God had for me during this training (the DTS), and that I shouldn’t be scared that I wouldn’t keep up with Him but rather that I should prepare myself for new and exciting things. Well, it’s a good job she warned me because otherwise I think I would have been out of here! This week’s lectures have been all about how to hear God’s voice, that is, learning how to recognize when He’s speaking to me and then responding to Him. We’ve talked about the Trinity, the Holy Spirit, intercessory prayer, faith and obedience…and I don’t think that covers half of it! Lectures are great and the teaching we’re receiving is inspiring, yet it is so out of my everyday routine that I struggled to keep pace at first. But God has been faithful to get me here in the first place and He has promised to sustain me so I am excited to see what’s still to come as this adventure unfolds….

As part of our schedule each week, we each have assigned work duties, doing anything from cleaning toilets to mowing the grass on the Oval. My job? I work in hospitality making beds and vacuuming with Henry (the Hoover…yes, that’s what they call him) and I’m really enjoying it. Our free time as classmates and friends is special since we don’t have much of it… so it’s not uncommon to find students diving over the coffee table wrestling each other for a spoon during our infamous card games in the evening (I believe there was blood drawn last night!).

Tonight we have our first local “outreach” time in Harpenden and we have no idea what we’ll be doing, a challenge for a girl who’s a bit of a control freak. Right now, I’m off to write in my journal, do homework, shower (an interesting event here) and make tea…being the only English girl in the school I have to do the tea pot proud!

Stay tuned next week as Kim shares what takes place during Week Two of her Discipleship Training School experience.

We’ve just come back from our outreach in Blackpool. We had no idea whatsoever that this would be our destination until about 2 weeks before the end of the lecture phase. We were praying as a group that God would reveal to us where He wanted us to go for the last 15 days of the UK outreach, since it still looked pretty much unsorted. The answer was Blackpool.We were hosted by a church in the most needy area of Blackpool. Their hospitality and generosity were amazing! We all felt as part of a family there. During our time there we were able to pray for the city, considered to be one of the darkest places in England, and speak life onto it. We also prayed for our host church, the spheres of society and people we came across. We picked up trash on the streets, helped out at a cafe that is run by a lovely couple from the church who happened to be my hosts, and got actively involved in activities at the church such as giving testimonies and leading Bible study, Sunday School and Prayer Meeting.

The highlight of this outreach though, was, for most of us, helping out at the Hope Project. The project consists of bringing hope to the homeless people in Blackpool by providing food, clothes and assistance for them. I got in touch with many beautiful and valuable people so full of potential who have gone through lots of pain in their lives. I felt helpless and all I wanted to do was stay quiet, look them in the eyes and listen to them. We were able to pray for the original design of almost everyone there and give them words of encouragement from God. It was touching to see some people with tears in their eyes as we were telling them how precious they are to God. We also handed out leaflets about the Hope Project in 3 big blocks of flats where apparently most drug dealers and addicts are concentrated. It was quite an adventure…

I was so blown away by how much the leaders of the project care for people. There’s so much love in their eyes that, honestly, I just wanted to stay near them just to feel a bit of that love. As I watched people all excited gather around the van to get something to eat, I remembered that passage in Matthew 25 which says: “whatever you did for the least of these brothers of mine, you did for me”. I could visualise Jesus Himself queueing to receive pot-noodles, coffee, a new pair of jeans and love. A massive amount of love.

We went to Blackpool to bless that city but I reckon we ended up being the ones who were blessed the most.

Ester, Brazil

DTS is a time of refreshing, restoration and God’s power of healing in my life. It’s good for me to be in this DTS as God called me and I obeyed. It’s like a process started in my life from the first day I was here, and it’s not finished yet. Every single day I learn something or something happens deep inside me. Sometimes maybe I cry and other times I’m filled with joy. It’s the best time. I’ve enjoyed my relationship with God and have an understanding of being an intimate disciple.

The most significant thing for me was in this past week. I was praying for a new revelation through the teaching about the Father Heart of God. God revealed to me that He loves me as much as He loves Jesus and Jesus loves me as much as He loves God through John 17. I might have read John 17 more than 20 times, but I have never experienced this amazing love of God for me, as He is my good Father and wants the best for me.

Through DTS I have experienced God’s love, caring, providing money for my school fees and outreach, knowing my original design and walking in it, seeing myself through God’s eyes and having my identity through Him.

Mary, Egypt

Inner Healing
We are not aware of how much we are affected by sin until we ask God to show it to us. As we move away from God’s principles, we experience pain. As we go back to God’s ways, we experience inner healing, freedom and joy.
Inner healing is not only about feeling better inside but also helping other people to get healed from the same things we used to suffer from in the past. “But I will restore you to health and heal your wounds” (Jeremiah 30:17). We won’t forget what happened to us, but it won’t hurt anymore.
This teaching on inner healing was very helpful to me as I could deal with the pain that was hidden in some dark and dusty spots in my heart.

Communication
We looked at the eight different spheres of society and how God is revealed to each one of them. In education, for instance, He is the Rabbi. In economics, He’s Jehovah Jireh, our Provider. In politics, He’s justice and wants to ensure equality and justice for all citizens.
The teaching focused particularly on communication (God is the Living Word) and the power of the tongue. Scriptures like “pleasant words are a honeycomb, sweet to the soul and healing to the bones” (Prov 16:24) and “with the tongue we praise our Lord and Father, and with it we curse men, who have been made in God’s likeness” (James 3:9) have made me wonder whether the things I say really bless people.

Ester, Brazil

Greetings from Muizenberg,

It was very difficult to leave Worcester, but we are also excited to be here at the YWAM Muizenberg base. The weather is much cooler here and the beach is beautiful.

This past week, we have been busy working with many ministries. We have gone to the Living Hope soup kitchen, where we have led devotions, made relationships with the people and helped the staff to clean the place and prepare food.

We have gone to the refugee camp in Cape Town, where people are from Zimbabwe, Somalia, and Ethiopia. They live outside and wait everyday for papers that let them stay in South Africa so that they can get a job. We bring them sandwiches and drinks and we pray over them and hear their stories. Many are open to receiving prayer and many believe in God but are really discouraged and losing hope.

We have also gone to Reach Elderly Home, just to hang out with the elderly, listen to their stories, paint with them and go on walks with them. We have gone to the townships to work with a church and help out with the children’s church. We’ve also led bible studies in the homes of people from the church, gone to small groups for the youth and to people’s homes showing them love and praying over them.

Emmanuel has taken us on prayer walks to learn about the history of Muizenberg and to pray over the strongholds of the town. We have also worked around the base with whatever they need help with, like cleaning and making food.

As for fun activities, on Friday we went out to Cape Point and saw wild ostriches, then walked up to the lighthouse in Cape Point and saw the beautiful ocean. The Lord was with us as we went. To get into Cape Point park, there was a 55 Rand fee per person but the lady let the 10 of us go for 100 Rand! Then she asked us to pray for her to get a house. God is Awesome!
We also went to Simon’s Town where we saw penguins an inch away from us, they were so cute! Then to end the wonderful day, we went to Fish Hoek and watched the sunset on the beach.

Greetings from Nicosia, Sicily!

For the past two weeks we have had the privilege of caring for children at a children’s home called Il Faro, or the lighthouse, in Nicosia, Sicily. Il Faro was founded by a Swiss couple, Walter and Elisabeth Hasenfratz who felt that God was calling them to minister in Italy. After planting a church here in Sicily, the Lord opened a door for them to minister to single mothers. They welcomed single mothers into their home and from that Il Faro was established. The Lord is still using this ministry mightily even after seventeen years and they truly are a lighthouse for many children. Each of us has experienced the challenges and blessings of working with orphaned, abandoned, or neglected children while we have been here. As the date of our departure is approaching, we believe that we will find it hard to leave such a wonderful place.

Our ministry here has been largely practical as it has involved simply taking care of children. Il Faro is organized into four “houses” and each of us works separately within one of the “houses.” Priscilla has worked with children of varied ages which has required her to be creative and flexible. She has had opportunities to teach some of them English and has also helped prepare meals for them. Amanda has taken care of two babies, taking them for walks and pushing them on swings. She has seen that simply spending time with them has made a difference. She has become very attached to them and them to her. Angela has spent time working with six, school-age children including one boy who is autistic. She has enjoyed the duties that come with taking care of a household of children. She has perfected her ironing skills and is now an expert at sewing pillowcases.

The fact that we don’t speak Italian has not been an obstacle. The Lord has been so faithful! The children even find it amusing that we don’t speak Italian and enjoy teaching us new words or acting out what they are trying to say. We can confidently say that we have been a blessing at Il Faro. Even so, we have been equally blessed by the simple joy expressed in the children faces when we spend time with them. We hope that we have made a difference in their lives and, most importantly, that they will attribute our love and attention to the One who loves them the most, our Heavenly Father.

Love,
Priscilla, Angela, and Amanda

P.S. We would like to invite you to visit the website of Il Faro. The address is: www.ilfaronicosia.org.

“Whoever welcomes one of these little children in my name welcomes me; and whoever welcomes me does not welcome me but the one who sent me.”
Mark 9:37

January 08 DTS week 7
Intimate Discipleship and Politics & Justice

Discipleship, that’s what a Discipleship Training School is about.
It’s a great challenge for all of us students.
Why? - watch this!
- Are you hungry for Jesus?
- To love Jesus IS to obey Jesus
- Become who you were born to be!
- Take up your cross every single TODAY!
- Intimacy with Jesus means ultimate vulnerability and ultimate freedom
These are just some of the points we had to deal with.

Means: First to analyse where we are, then to think where we want to be.
To find a way to get there, and finally to accept or to reject the challenge.

One place where the challenge turns practical is the Wednesday afternoon outreach in Luton. We set up a cafe in St. Mary’s, sent some people out to invite, some pray and some host and talk. I had quite some difficulties to approach people on the street and invite them to the cafe, just for the fear of being ignored or laughed at. I say, and I think I mean, that I would give everything for Jesus. However, I struggle to get out of my comfort-zone for that little an issue.

The second part of the week was about Politics and Justice. I think most of us, including me, understood for the first time, that Christians actually should get involved in Politics, as the world is God’s and he wants it to be ruled in his way. Who on earth would know better what God wants for the world than those who follow him?

These are the kinds of thoughts and questions we had to face this week.

Andreas, Germany

I admit I’m one of those people who have to study some thing before they feel justified to participate in it. For months, I read triathlon books, websites, and magazines, volunteered at a few events and meticulously purchased just the right equipment before realizing that the best way to gain triathlon knowledge and experience is actually participating in one. Silly how that happens. Needless to say, sometimes my pursuit of wanting to be an expert makes me realize I have to put ambition and caution to the wind and just jump in without looking back.

Joining this January DTS has really helped me understand how futile a sideline-approach to life can be and how rewarding a life of jumping in is. For a few months previous to coming to England for my DTS, I was absolutely looking at my faith from the sidelines as a lot of people in the U.S. do. Far too often, it is our Christian way of life. Talking about our faith, going to church, going to Bible study, feeling all Christian-y, or what have you. I didn’t quite know how to connect my faith with every aspect of my life.

For me, this DTS has helped me begin to understand how to develop a true discipleship of Jesus in my life. Christianity isn’t all about reading the Bible or going to Church–it is applying what you’ve learned from these important resources and living like Christ in every aspect of your life and this DTS has helped me begin to understand what that looks and feels like. Sometimes it takes a huge leap of faith to dedicate 6 months to God in order to understand. It feels awful right before you take the leap of faith, but, oh, how rewarding it is!

In fact, this DTS has been so much more rewarding than I expected. Our school’s Bible verse is Ephesians 2:10, “For we are God’s workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.” This verse has been incredibly encouraging. But more importantly, participating DTS has helped us begin to realize the love God has for us and just exactly how God is equipping us for doing good works. It really is a privilege to be here to grow closer to 10 other people as we all grow closer to God together.

I recently started a new hobby by purposely diving head-first. It’s a lot like scrap booking–making websites with only XHTML. It has been such a riot to learn as I go. I’ve made dozens of mistakes–alright, countless mistakes–but, wow, how sweet those mistakes make my success when I finally get it right! I think God asks us as Christians to dive into our faith head-first, and fully immerse ourselves in Him. The strength, experience, and success we find in Christ is so very sweet!

Heidi, USA

As I am writing this I find myself hungry in two different ways. One, I am fasting in faith for God’s provision, so, my stomach is grumbling quite a bit. The other is due to my lack of prayer, scripture and teaching. I didn’t even know I was that kind of hungry two months ago. But, since being here and seeing both in the teaching and in the examples of the staff, I have realized what I need to fill my spiritual appetite. Throughout the past 4-5 weeks I have taken ideas, thoughts and theology that I knew and then deepened my understanding of it. I have learned the importance of forgiveness, reconciliation, fasting, prayer, scripture, and humbleness. Back home I knew I wanted something more but, until I started to take in the amazing teaching I had no clue as to how much I had been missing.
The other aspect that I love is the community here on base. While yes, we are YWAMER’s and yes some are even Ovalites, it is an extremely open community. A lot of the events done here on base are open to the public and they are active in the community. Part of that is the DTS’s outreach into Luton every Wednesday. What we do is set up a place for people to have coffee and tea. Then we go out on to the streets and invite people in. We just talk with them. It’s amazing how much an entire city can hurt in the same way. Most people are just lonely and can’t believe that someone wants to pray for them or even just talk. I’m am unbelievably excited to take what I have been learning to outreach in Tanzania in April and look forward to the blessings God will bring. Oh, and for the record, when I’m not fasting the food here is always good.

Jesus loves you,

James Tock