Well it's been a very long time since I've posted anything in my blog, but for some reason God has never let me forget that it existed and I believe that it's for such a time as this; I hope that by relaying my experiences and some of my intimate moments with God throughout each week that I'm in the program I might encourage others going through similar trials or lessons. So without further adieu, here is is synopsis of the key moments of my first week here. Just a forewarning, a ton happened this week covering a plethora of areas of my life so this will be a pretty long post. I'd really encourage you to keep reading it, I'm sure you'll be encouraged by it despite the length.
Upon arriving I was consumed by an incredible feeling of loneliness and longing for my friends back home. This last month and a half was absolutely awesome: I made more friends, and closer friends for that matter, in that time than I have in the past several years and upon realizing that it would be a long time before I'd see them again made it hard for me to settle in. God is good and I realized that this was a problem that required prayers from others so I emailed a couple close friends and asked for prayer and within a day I settled in and was filled with such an inexplicable joy that our director has already identified me as one of the people that is always smiling. It's awesome how swiftly God moves, and how inexplicable His actions are.
The diversity of nationalities and denominations here is quite incredible and reflects beautiful God's desire for unification in the Church, something that I believe is grossly lacking (38,000 denominations? Don't even get me started on that rant). Surprisingly, it's been quite easy to assimilate into this spiritual melting pot; everyone has a very good outlook on how to handle disagreements in opinions on everything from "who's better, Canadians or Americans?" to "post-trib or pre-trib." As Chris Black, our DTS (Discipleship Training School) director, has reminded us, "we need to major on the majors and minor on the minors." The absence of this attitude is what has caused such a disunification of the Church, but again, I won't get started on that rant. It's been a very fun, a very awesome, a very unique experience to be able to get to know and befriend so many different types of people with such diverse backgrounds; it's only week one of the DTS! Only when Christ is your main focus can this kind unity happen.
One of the things that's still kinda weird for me is feeling like I'm at the "bottom of the totem pole." This is by no means the fault of the program, but my own failing to recognize and practice the very challenging verse, "submit yourselves one to another," found in Ephesians 5:21. I've become used to being a "second-year" or intern alumni, and with that is a temptation to vaunt a supposed superiority over those "younger" in the program(s). The fulfillment of that temptation can be an ever so subtle thing, but it creates a tear between yourself and those that you are supposed to be filling through authentic relationship and that tear can grow and become a very tender (like a pulled muscle, not a juicy steak) rift between you and the ones that you're supposed to be being an example to. The iniquity is pride and the temptation is status. As a DTSer, which would be equivalent to a first year intern, I find myself having to submit myself to my brothers and sisters as I've failed to do many times in the past year because of my "status." This has been such an incredible thing though, because in just one week I feel such a closeness, such a brotherhood between these people that I didn't think would ever be possible in a week.
This program has been such an immense blessing. Our worship time is so authentic, with everybody having an opportunity to contribute to the body individually if God puts something upon their hearts for the whole, it's been incredible. I've really learned a lot about worship and stepping out in faith and the elasticity and grace of God in any situation. The environment we're in is conducive to stepping out and "experimenting with your faith" in a manner of speaking; to paraphrase one of our teachers, "don't be afraid to fail, God can handle that." So good, and encouraging.
Last night I got a taste of home when we had Kingdom Night, the equivalent of Prayer Stops back home in Boise. A group of about 15 of us went downtown to pray for anyone and everyone that God put on our hearts. We started off with prayer for the night and God gave pictures of a couple different people to some in our group and so we made a point to look out for those people throughout the night; we all split up so I'm unsure if those two people were found and ministered to. However, God definitely used myself and the two others in my group to minister to several different people in the city. One man we prayed for had been wet the entire day because of the precipitation that started the night before and persisted through the entire day and into the night. We prayed for warmth, comfort, dryness, and the means to provide for his family. Within the next couple hours the rain which was supposed to continue through the night, stopped very suddenly. Another young man that I came in contact with God put on my heart to share the gospel and my own testimony with. To keep it short in the end this person was beaming and accepted my invitation to pray with him readily and even eagerly. About an hour and four homeless people later our group was praying for a half-blind man with an incredible story, a very "Cinderella story" indeed. However, he had been so affected by the abuse of his parents that he couldn't talk or stand straight, I thought that he was on drugs at first. After the group as a whole prayed for him three of us continued to pray for his blind eye. Three times we contended for him. I told him to cover his good eye and held up some fingers and he could see how many I was holding; I stepped back a few steps, then a few more. He could see quite well! God had healed him! And it didn't require or induce some sort of "Hollywood, fuzzy moment" like when Tom Cruise died and came back to life in "Far and Away," possibly the worst movie moment ever. I learned something that night too. When praying for that man's healing I had trouble believing that it would be done, but I had faith that despite my lack of faith God could still do it, and I think God really honored that, and also taught me that it's about more than me, though that doesn't mean He loves me any less, he just has plans for me that are bigger than my own abilities.
Overall, it was an absolutely incredible week. I can't believe that everything that has happened, everything that I've learned, has occurred in just this one week. I can't even fathom what God has planned for the next 11 of the DTS and the 8 weeks of outreach! He's just too good.
"Position channels passion."
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