Giving Thanks

This is post is about the how I find the importance of giving thanks to God on a regular basis. You could say its a bit of revaluation. Just so you're aware that I've written below hasn't been effected by anything that happened over the last week or ten days or so.

Revelation: I'm so glad I know Jesus as my personal lord and savior. There's times when I know I wouldn't have been able to make it through the situations that were coming my way, if it hadn't been for Jesus. I've been through a lot in my life. Its so clear to me, as I'm writing this, that God has been his hand on my life. I'm writing this because its something has come up this week... well, its a revelation as I'm writing this post. This week we've had a week of lectures on prayer and healing, and through this week the Lord has really shown me what it means to have a relationship with Him. Choosing to give thanks is something that really has helped me. By choosing to focus on the good things, the things to be thankful for, it brings a light to the end of the tunnel. There have been times when I haven't felt like I had anything to be thankful for, there is always something to be thankful for.

A Note on the Lectures That Took Place This Last Week. On Monday one of the staff spoke on the importance of prayer and how to have a relationship with God without having religion getting in the way. Then, starting on Tuesday, we had three days of lectures from a well known Dutchman called Jan Zijlstra, who runs a number of healing crusades in the Netherlands and overseas. He also led a healing night on Friday. It was enlightening, as on Tuesday (on Jan's first day of teaching) Jan taught a lot about how Jesus was the one that God sent to us, and in turn he has sent us to go.

This Upcoming Week: We're having lectures from Jay Bennett who will be speaking the prophetic life of an intercessor. Because we're doing a school of prayer and intercession, prayer plays a huge part of this role, and being able to hear God's voice. So I'm really looking forwards to this week's lectures, and how God will reveal himself to me through these lectures. He's always showing me interesting things, even with speakers who's teachings I've kind of struggled following.

A Point Of Thankfulness: Many of you have heard about what happened in Paris last week, and that my sister, Hannah, lives there. Thankfully my sister spent that weekend with friends of ours who live in the suburbs of Paris. On Monday, she traveled down to South Africa to spend a few weeks with our parents.

Prayer Requests: Please pray that God will continue to give me strength, especially over the last few weeks of the school (we're starting week 9 tomorrow).

I'm not sure why I've ended up writing my blog in this way, and with this style, structure wise. I haven't written in like this before... In regards to the photos, the reason why I've used these passages, instead of photos from my daily life, is because God has spoken to me through them. If you want to look them up yourself, do go ahead... all these references come from the New International Version. 

Studying Daniel's Life

The view from the SOIP classroom

Greetings, dear readers.

I'm going to bring you up to speed with what's happening in my life these days.

I've just finished the outline of my character study about Daniel, a man who was truly used by God. I'm learning so much about Daniel whilst I'm doing this study. You see this is part of the school's required 'course work.' At the end of the School of Intercessory Prayer SOIP we're expected to teach on what we've learned for about forty to forty five minutes. To be totally honest I'm looking forwards to sharing what I've learned about Daniel.

Over the last week we've had a few rather interesting teachings. We had some teaching on the prophetic this last week by Arleen Westerhof. She's a Jamaican Canadian woman who is married to a Dutch man from Groningen (this is the name of both a town and a province in north eastern Nederland). She taught on a few different areas of the prophesy... things like the importance of prophesy, what to do when you receive a prophesy or a word, and she also prophesied over each of the students (as well as the staff and the guests; as it was open week Monday through Wednesday). I'm still processing and praying about what Arleen said over me. I recorded what she said on my iPhone so I can accurately copy it, word for word, into my notebook of words and prophesies (its so that I accurately go back to my book if I need to double check a word or something, or to see if a prophesy is confirmed.

Jeremiah 29:11 (New International Version)

Then on Thursday and Friday, we fasted as a school along with the Discipleship Training School DTS. So we spent some praying cooperatively and on our own, on Thursday. Friday, we had lectures about the importance of having a relationship with God, and from there being able to pray effectively. Praying from the heart of the father is more effective than trying to keep praying from my own strength and zeal. This is something that links in with what I've been studying in regards to Daniel. Daniel was an extremely successful man, because he put his relationship with God before the opinions of men. You can really see this in Daniel 6, with what happened in regards to the incident with the lions' den. Daniel still prayed, even though it meant that he would probably get fed to the lions (the men who tried to get rid of him were the ones who were eaten by the lions). He wasn't afraid of the consequences that his relationship with God might have on him. He was so certain of how God saw him.

So this is a brief update of what's been happening in my life these days. 'Til next time.

Just Being In Father's Presence

The view from my room

Things have been extremely busy over the last couple of weeks, thus the reason why I haven't written anything here. So here's a post with some highlights from the last few weeks... I'll try to write more regularly because it'll be nice for all of you to know what I've been up to over here in the Netherlands.

The School of Intercessory Prayer SOIP has just finished week six, which is the half way mark for this three month school. Just to clarify (and before you ask), we don't have an outreach phase at the end of the lecture phase, like the Discipleship Training School DTS do. However, we have mini-outreaches throughout the school's lecture phase. Our first mini-outreach was to Amsterdam a few weeks ago (to read about that click here).

One of the things that I'd like to share with you happened during the last week of October, when, as a school, we had the Father Heart of God. Its a subject that I've heard so many times before, and to be totally honest, after having this topic on my DTS, I kinda stopped listening. I've had a good relationship with my father and even though we've gone through our fights, I'm still close to my papa (I still don't call him 'dad'). So last week, I kinda thought oh, okay, here we go. However, there were things that were shared by our teacher that really broke through for me.

The sunrise just the other day

One of these things is receiving God's love, I knew God loved me but it was stick in my head. When they say the longest mile is between the head and the heart, it's true. I knew God loves me, but with my head. Not totally with my heart. Last week, it sank into my heart. The truth that God loves me the way I am now, not the person I'm going to be tomorrow or in a week's time (or further into the future), was one of those light bulb moments. My parents always told me God loves me, but it took the Holy Spirit to actually hammer it home. So I spent a good deal of time over most of last week actually processing that. Sometimes, it takes a while for things to actually sink into our hearts because we're so used to thinking in a particular pattern. It's not an easy process.

We also the national gathering for YWAM Nederland last weekend. It was an opportunity for the two YWAM bases to come together and share the goodness of God. Its a time of testimonies and encouragement (and a football game or two). Its something that only happens once a year and this year Heidebeek was hosting. So we had YWAM Amsterdam grace us with their presence. It's the second national YWAM conference I've been to as I went to YWAM gathering for England and Wales in June 2014 (during my School of Leadership and Ministry Development LMD; for more on that click here).

At the Heather Fields with Anne Ruth

When YWAM Amsterdam arrived I knew that a certain young lady would be coming. This young lady is good friend of mine. So I was very happy to spend a few hours with her. We talked about life, our experiences and the future. God really blessed me with bringing her along that day, and making a way for us to hang out. She's on staff with Amsterdam after completing her DTS there earlier this year. We talked and prayed for each other, whilst enjoying the lovely weather and the heather fields (which are no longer in bloom due to the change in season, but it was still beautiful).

Now, one think I really like about Youth With A Mission YWAM Heidedeek is the fact that we're right in the middle of nature. The main base is situated on the edge of this beautiful forest (one of the last natural forests in this country, or so I heard). The student accommodation (from all the schools) live in the next village over from Heidebeek, which is good fifteen minute bike through this beautiful forest. I've really been enjoying the biking, since we've had such lovely weather (we've had barely no rain since the school started!), which has meant that forest is truly beautiful, with all the autumn colours and the leaves changing from different shades of green to  a whole multitude of different reds and oranges.