So close, yet so far..

     Hi my dear ones,


My DTS is almost over and I realized I haven't updated my blog for many weeks now.
I am really sorry for that!

So where to begin..hmm.. Since last time I wrote, we've had many speakers coming in and sharing some pretty amazing stuff with my school. But I guess what I would like to share with you is what's been on my mind lately..
There's actually been a lot on my mind lately so it will be really hard to tell you about everything!

I have been here for 3 months now, and let me tell you, it has been probably the most important 3 months in my life and I know for a fact that these next 2 months in India and Nepal will be life changing. I know that I will come back as a different person, I know I will not be able to look back on my life and say I want to continue to do what I used to do! I know and I expect a change in my life, from God. A Change in my dreams that were mine, but now belong to Him just like my life.
I have come to a conclusion that my life was never mine to begin with, but because I have had the free will, I have decided to make a lot of the decisions on my own and that's why I have made a lot of mistakes as well! But now being here and learning that, we really need to surrend our lives to Christ so that He could take control in our lives. So that we would let Him use our lives to change the world by starting with ourselves. Because you see, we cannot change or understand the world unless we understand ourselves, us in God. How can I tell the world who they are, if I don't even understand who I am?  I need to know who I am in God, I need to know that I am his child, his beloved, His, before I can make a difference in the world. And God doesn't want me to just help people, He wants them to be changed forever. He wants them back, so it is not enough when I try to help them, because when I just help them, I help them to continue the way they have been living, but if we are able to change their lives and by changing I mean lead them to God and letting Him do His part (restore them), we are able to get them out of this mess. And why does God need us?  Without God man cannot do, and without men God will not do! We are his tools, we are His to be used in this world. God has called us, me and you to be His extended hands and feet in going to places and reaching the unreached. It might mean you are called to your hometown to the ones who have heard about God, but have never met Jesus. To reach the students, elders, homeless, jobless etc in your own city or your neighbour cities.  I am not sure what my calling is exactly, but I know I have a calling. There is something in me that breaks every time I hear stories about kids in different countries, girls in human trafficking, so I believe I have jet to discover my calling, but I already know my destiny, it is God, right here, right now!
Hearing this I hope you have a bit clearer picture of what God has been teaching me!
Now it is time for me to serve his people, put everything I have learned into actions and reach the fatherless in Nepal and India. Now it is time for me to go!
Don't you think that this is it, no more posts, I still have 2months in Nepal and India, to tell you all the great things God is doing in these nations, in me, through me! There is more to come!! This is not the end, not yet! So bare with me !
And thank you all who have been with me throughout the DTS time, praying for me, thinking about me, helping me with finances. I hope this will speak to your hearts!
This is from my heart to yours,
Love you all,
Liis

Finish the task

 
          So after our week of Spiritual warfare we were able to go to Ohio and be apart of Dts conference called: Finish the task.
We had a lot of different DTS students coming together from all over the United States.
Our journey there was longer then we expected. About 10min into our trip, early in the morning, our bus broke down and we had to wait for about an hour before we were able to get back on the road again. It was fun because half of the time we just stayed in the bus and the other half we decided to take the little van and group-by-group take the students back to our base. Afer everybody got back to the base and settled down, some ate their breakfast and some thought about taking a shower when we found out that the bus was fixed and ready to go again. It was funny to see how people started running around and getting ready for another try. We got passed the spot where our bus broke down and felt like we can do this. Our bus ride was long but a lot of fun. Good for me cause I was able to talk to one of the Northwood dts Staff members  (another dts 2h away from us joined us for the journey) on our way to Ohio.
      The night we got there was a happy moment. The minute I noticed my dear friend Nicole, I ran to her and didn’t even care about the ongoing konference meeting that was happening, I just hugged my dear friend and told her how much I had missed her. I realised I had missed a lot of people so It was so nice to re-unite with all of them.
The conference was one challenging experience for me. Having all the people around me and getting out of my comfort zone, while sharing a big gym floor with about 100 girls, having no privacy while taking a shower in a basement where the shower water was up to my ancles, having to sit with new people while eating my breakfast/lunch/dinner. But I must confess, it was nice to meet other DTS students and hear all about their program.

We didn’t just meet new people, but I also spent time with God, and taking part of different sessions.

Some of the things I learned:

During the conference they talked about different topics,
I really liked the thought of my identity.

„Your greatest identity is to be known as the Child of God“

I want my identity not to be in what I do, where I go but in what I know - Jesus Christ, my saviour.

I loved that they touched the topic about Passion as well.
One of the questions during that session was:

What is it for you?

One of the students answered: Fuego, another one said that in greek „passion“ means „suffering“ . God’s passion for the people can be put into suffering.. He suffers for us.

One of the things I learned about passion was that passion is not about emotions. It is the work of Christ on the cross!!

But how do I get the passion?
Intimacy with God, I need to ask for it, exepting God’s love, receiving it. Also getting around people who are passionate.
So I also cant let the enviroment around me change my passion, I am not a thermometer, that changes in the enviroment.
So I know now, that it is not about my emotions, I can feel happy, sad, cry, not cry and still be passionate, because I know what Jesus did for me on the Cross and it makes me passionate for this world to know about my Jesus.

During the conference I heard God speaking to me while hearing the topic about Justice.
We were in the middle of talking about biblical justice and how the people are so much more important and how we need to seek for the Lord for solutions, when I got this understanding in my heart:
    I can never go back to normal!!

Basically I came to the understanding that I can never go back to what I did before dts. It was so sudden and so real. It was almost a bit scary to think that my life will be changed forever but exiting as well!

I want to be passionate for God and for His people, for the rest of my life!

One of my fav sessions was hearing about Muslim culture.
it was so very exciting to hear how this family lived among Muslims in India and in Thailand. How they lived amond the muslims. They learned about the culture and language and how to become friends with them and love them. And not forcing Jesus on them but letting the Holy Spirit work through them. Because we are not the Holy Spirit, He will reveal himself when it is the right moment. And he will give you the opportunity to witness to them. Not judging them would be a great start already!
Knowing also that the discipleship proces is not fast, it will take time.

Something that I learned about muslim people is that they have a great power of shame and honor in their culture – at times it is so strong that it can lead them thorwards killing their own children if needed. Why he said that was when a muslim becomes a follower of christ, and is no longer a muslim it is a great shame to the family.

I also learned that I as a „white person“ will be labelled into a „christian“ group, and the group is an overall statement, but in their culture it is not about you declaring you are a christian, but you showing you have a relationship with Jesus. It is personal and never a religion.

I believe I am called to missions, I don’t know if full-time, I don’t know where, but I know that I will never go back to my old life again. I want to give my life to god. It is life-for-life desicion. Jesus gave his life for me, and now I give my life to Jesus and let him use me where I am needed.

I really enjoyed my time in Ohio, and learned new things about this world, about God and how to continue my relationship with Jesus and being confident in who God created me to be!

Week of Spiritual warfare

        Hey guys, I am sorry I haven’t written anything in my blog recently. You guys have missed some of the awesome things that have happened here.
Week before this week, we had a very neccessary topic. A guy from Germany who lives here came to talk about spiritual Warfare!

First of all half of our school, Rescue Ops, left us to go and do their week of camp in Arkansas - so the beginning of our week was so different, like waking up without being woken up by some of the girls for work-out or not having to run in order to get your breakfest before it’s gone, or class being half empty, just little things that were missing but they were noticeable.

So let‘s get to the topic and what I learned this week.
I don’t know how about you but I didn’t know much about spiritual warfare before I came here. I don’t really remember that we had talked about this in my church or online churches. If they did then I just missed it and I feel bad because it is a very powerful topic and every church should look into it more.

During this week I learned that I should be careful when accusing God in everything or saying that he is behind everything that happens, that it is His will for this to come into my life. Not everything that happens is from evil, but they don’t go by Bible, we need to through them out. So like if there is a lie in your head and it is something that God hasn’t promised, or Bible says differently about it, you should consider taking that as a lie in your life and getting rid of it.

There are 4 areas in us, we should protect:

·      Mind

If you have thought of lies, it’s gonna effect your everyday life

Thoughts of fear are really strong – they can keep you from doing what you need to do.

*      Thoughts of condimnation – you are not pleasing to God; you are not

being spiritual enough? Wrong. We want to get rid of it, Go to God with it.

You think about others all the time, but what is it for you?

*      Interiority – under-dog; doupt of everything you ought to be. You always

compare yourself to others. You won’t step up for what you are meant to do.

What are some areas you feel insecure about? What are some areas in your life where enemy wants to have power over you?

Ask the lord, pray&don’t be afraid to step up!!

2 Corinthians 10: 3-5

For though we live as human beings, we do not wage war according to human standards, for the weapons of our warfare are not human weapons, bt are made powerful by God for tearing down strongholds. We tear down arguments and every arrogant obstacle that is raised up against the knowledge of God, and we take every thought captive to make it obey Christ.

·      Heart/emotions

     Proverbs 4:23

Above else guard your heart, for i tis the wellspring of life.

     Ephesians 4:26-27

Be angry and do not sin; do not let the sun go down on the cause of your anger. Do not give the devil an opportunity.

   2Corinthians 2:10-11

if you forgive anyone for anything, I also forgive him – for indeed what I have forgiven (if I have forgiven anything) I did so for you in the presence of Christ, so that we may not be exploited by Satan (for we are not ignorant of his schemes).

·      Mouth

Be careful of what you say. Encourage one another when you truly see it is needed. Don’t just say whatever but think before you say anything. A lot of times we just want to speak out encouragement not because we want to encourage that person but because we want to speak out words.
Speak out the truth so it would be fruitful.

Psalm 141:3

Set a guard over my mouth, O Lord; keep watch over the door of my lips.

·      Relationships

Forgiveness

This week I learned that spiritual warfare is not a magic thing. We wrestle not with flesh and blood. People are not the enemy. The power behind all the people who do wrong things is the enemy, the spirit behind them. So be aware of the enemy and not impressed with him.

How did Jesus deal with people in sin?
He never converted the ones stuck in sin, he showed kindness, love and mercy.

We cannot win battles by arguing with people, but in our innersession we can pray for them.

Ephesians 6:11

Put on the full armor of God so that you can take your stand against the devil’s schemes.

So learn to recognize the strategies of the enemy, refusing to co-operate with them, agressivly cutting them off in the name of Jesus.

Ask yourself „ What would I do to me if I was the enemy? “

Know the nature of the enemy

Look at statistics&conditions (areas where a lot of something happens)

Ask the Lord for stratégy against the evil

Live by Spirit –

Galatians 5:16

So I say, live by the Spirit, and you will not gratify the desires of the sinful nature

1Corinthians 2:10-13

God has revealed these to us by the Spirit. For the Spirit searches all things, even the deep things of God. For who among men knows the things of  a man except the men’s spirit within him? So too, no one knows the things of God except the Spirit of God. Now we have not received the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, so that we may know the things that are freely given to us by God. And we speak about these things, not with words taught us by human wisdom, but with those taught by the Spirit, explaining spiritual things to spiritual people.

How do you live by the Spirit?

Remove the hindrances

1Thessalonians 5:19

Do not extinguish the Spirit

Stronghold

Not just know and talk about it

God shows this to us so we could avoid it’s influence

God shows us what the strongholds are in a place so we could pray more specifically

Live the opposite (give up something that to you is normal, but the community has problems with)

Without God, man cannot do it, but without man, God will not do it.

Have Authority

It is an actual legal reality.

It is not a feeling, or how long I have been a christian, or my personality.

My authority is based on what Jesus did to Satan

Colossians 2:15

And having disarmed the powers and authorities, he made a public spectacle of them, triumphing over them by the cross.

1John 3:8

He who does what is sinful is of the devil, because the devil has been sinning from the beginning. The reason the Son of God appeared was to destroy the devil’s work

God gives you power to continue.

1John 4:4

You, dear children, are from God and have overcome them, because the one who is in you is greater than the one who is in the world.

I hope that this will help you to realize the reality of Spiritual Warfare and the fact that we are able to overcome the enemy in the name of Jesus and what he did for us on the cross!

One of the serious ones...

Hello everybody!

I can't believe it's already been 4 weeks here in YWAM Madison. So much has happened this week.
I would describe this week as one of the most serious weeks we've had so far. Serious because of the topics we have had teachings on and serious because of so many things happening.
I will start with our topics, we talked about this week!

First speaker for this week was Warren Keapprom and he spoke about our foundation. How we can't build our foundation based on others feelings, experiences. God doesn't have grandchildren, he has children. And here in DTS we have the opportunity to start over.
Kingdom of God is built by our loving God, on love and trust. We touched some bible verses like Matthew 7:24 where it speaks about building our house on rock.
Romans 12:2 "Do not be conformed to this present world, but be transformed by renewing of your mind, so that you may test and approve what is the will of God - what is good and well/pleasing and perfect."
What I really liked from all that Warren was talking was the fact that a lot of times people want to go to heaven, but don't want to know God. Our goal should be knowing the Father, and heaven should be the place He happens to be.
So if there would be no Heaven, would you still live for Jesus?
Because what is the point of going to heaven when He is not there.
So the question is:
Are you living for Heaven of God?

2 Corinthians 5:15 says: "And he died for all so that those who live should no longer live for themselves but for him who died for ghem and was raised."

Our second speaker was Dawn Borschers and she spoke about Fear of the Lord.
I really liked the topic she was talking on!
She spoke about healing because of all the things happening with some of the people. More about that later..
So in situations like that (sickness, death...) we should ask God what do you want to do in this situation? Who are you in the midst of it?
In this life we are going to be dissapointed, but are you gonna go through these times with God or without Him?

Some awesome bible verses about Fear of the Lord:
Psalm 33:8 "Let all the earth fear the Lord; let all the people of the world revere him." 
Revelation 15:4 "Who will not fear you, O Lord, and bring glory to your name? For you alone are holy. All nations will come and worship before you, for your righteous acts have been revealed."
Proverbs 23:17 "Do not let your heart envy sinners, but always be zealous for the fear of the Lord."

A lot of times we want to bring God down to our standards, but we have to rise up to His standards and share God's value system!
Something God once told Dawn was : "Everyone else has opinions, but I have the truth"
So what matters, is what God is saying.
Isaiah 40 is also one of the coolest chapters we read this week.

Something what Dawn talked about the Fear of the Lord was that we need the Holy Spirit to break the bondage with our sin because we can't be in the presence of the Lord when sinning.. we feel unconfortable, when having junk in our heart.

So Psalm 86:11 says: "Teach me your ways, O Lord, and I will walk in your truth; give me an undivided heart, that I may fear your name."
Some ways to move thorwards fear of the Lord:
1.Our choice (recuires both: me - God)
2.Get honest (you are so busy pretending who you are, so you can't really take the next step forward)
3.Ask for God ("but taste and feel that the Lord is good.." Psalm 34)
4.Diligence (pursuing Him. Don't be a "spiritual couch potato."    "I will give them singleness of heart and action, so that they will always fear me for their own good..I will assuredly plant them in this land with all my heart and soul." Jeremiah 32: 38-41)
5.Dealing with sin (confession-repentance-renounce-restitution. Conviction from God, guilt a gift from God; Condemnation from enemy as well as shame, a lot of times. Because when you feel guilty all the time, about everything, than something is wrong. When you deal with sin, your guilt should be taken away. Guilt a lot of times says: I made a mistake but Shame says: I am a mistake. God in the other hand says: I'll take it as far as east is from the west.

So we all can't deserve His Grace, but we are worthy of it!


I wanted to share with you why this week has also been sad and serious for us, and why I am sharing this is so that you may pray for our team, and for their families.
This week there has been a lot of sad news for some of our team members. I won't say any names for the respect for their families and for their privacy, but some of our team members lost one of their close ones and it all happened this week. So you can imagine that it has been hard on them and a lot of processing has been going on throughout the week.
I ask you to pray for our team, for God's peace and protection against enemies attacks!

Thank you for being here for me and supporting me!

Also some good news.. whoever hasn't heard yet:
My outreach will be in India from January to February!
I will send out newsletters about my outreach and how you may be involved in it so if you would like to get one newsletter, please let me know!

Love you guys,
Liis

Weeks go by!

Hello my dear friends,

I haven't written anything in two weeks already so I am sorry for that! It has been quite busy for us and we haven't had a lot of internet time as well!

But I want to tell you of everything that has been going on here :)

So the second week we focused on Father heart of God and let me tell you something-it was an incredible time. I think the first day I could not hold my tears back, my face was wet from all the tears!
it was emotional for a lot of people and very refreshing and renewing!
For me at least. I was reminded of so many things about my Father, the God almighty! We talked about how we often see our God according to how we see our earthly dads, so depending on our relationship with our own dad, we see God the same way, uncomplete. 

The speaker reminded me that I need to know who I am in God, as his daughter in order to be helpful to others around the world!
I really enjoyed the time we had with the speaker, because he prayed for many of us and had revelations for some students. God spoke to us that week through our speaker!

We also started talking about dangerous territories - bible and what's in bible and how we know it's the truth and how we can use bible to speak to people with different beliefs! It was very awesome and I am so excited to have many more classes on those topics, cause the first one was a short one!

During that week we had to start praying for our outreach countries. We were shown precentations on different locations and had to take time in prayer to find out where we were called!
Our options were:
Thailand-Myanmar,
India,
Mexico,

Uganda.

The third week we didn't have many lectures, on Monday we had to write down the outreach country we prayed for and felt led to. Mine was ....!
I was so sure that .... will be the country where I am called but the more I prayed and talked to people about different countries, asking questions, my heart was set on ....! I was so moved by the video I saw the first week, of the street kids, aids kids, girls in brothels and how we are able to connect with them, serve them and love on them!
I am so excited to see how God will be using me there.. How I will learn from that culture and those people, and share God’s love with His daughters and sons.

 We left for survival camp on Wednesday - we had to get ready, before that take a test on how well we know South America.

But let me tell you what happened during out survival camp:

First of all,
We had a packing list, of things we could take, it was limited..
like 3pairs of socks, two pairs of pants etc.
We weren't allowed to take any toothpaste or any deodorant, no cosmetics and stuff like that.
We had four tribes and each tribe had to sit together in the bus.

When we got to the place we were dropped off in the middle of nowhere and we had to wait with our team for next instructions from a staff member! 

That night we had to go through customs with our "passports" . They also searched us, if we had items we were not allowed to take with us! Some of us had, and some didn’t. They tried real hard to be serious and harsh on us. Each of our team member was given a scoop of rice and beans and we were sent off to our campsite, each team with their own camp site! And the first night after putting our stuff down we had to play capture the flag. It was exciting and fun. Excitement caused by the darkness and the forest around us. Fun with different teams trying to take our flag!
The next day was a long day for us! We woke up on the sound of our „government signal“ and had to hurry to meet others. We missed our breakfast because of our sleep. The entire day was long and fun and freezing cold. We had team building games and we were able to earn prizes by winning the games. Our team got a second place in one game and we earned 5h of sleep for the next night. We got the last place in a canoe game and earned 6 slices of cheese. Also a second place for this another game and earned half a roll of toiled paper! FUn, FUN!!
We cooked some lunch over a fire, our team member bulit – we had rice and beans.. was that a good luch or what!
We saw a chicken-killing, it was terrible and made me not want any chicken for a while and were treated terrible, like prisoners, while getting our dinner!
Sadly our camp was over sooner then we hoped for- due to a bad astma attack, one girl had!
That night we prayed and worshiped God, praying that everything would be ok and no matter what, God will receive all the glory!
We didn’t know that one of the staff members got a panic attack as well. But God was great and took care both of them. That night we all slept in a warehouse and ended our survival camp earlier!
We survived, and everybody was ok!
Two of the girls who had attacks were not sent to a hospital but put on a bed rest for the next day. They joined us back at the base the next evening!
What a crazy week we had!

On Saturday we spent time in town, doing laundry and watching a movie with bunch of girls and a guy from our base. I think he got enough of girl time for the rest of the school program.
God took care of us this week,

And He will never stop loving us!

Love you,
Liis

New Beginnings!

 Hello everybody,

I am so sorry I haven’t been able to get online since here in Madison, Wisconsin!
Our first week of DTS is over and it has already been an amazing week. All the kids here are so friendly and it hasn’t been very hard to meet people and spend time with them!
I want to share a little bit of what we have learned during this week:
Our week was about hearing God’s voice, and during the days we were sent outside to spend a lot of time with God.. it was challenging because this week I have had a hard time focusing, and getting plugged in with God. I don’t know why it is like this but it made me sad a lot of times. I kinda felt empty, when hearing my classmates sharing how God spoke to them through the wind, or sitting on the cornfield, or reading bible and I had nothing to share.. Nothing during the quiet time..

But it changed when God showed me a scripture in bible during our last quiet time in between classes..

Isaiah 29:13 says:

„ The Lord says: These people come near to me with their mouth and honor me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me. Their worship of me is based on merely human rules they have been thought.“

This made me realise that maybe my heart hasn’t plugged in, and it made sense cause I didn’t really prepare my heart while in TX, so it made sense..

But when I look back on the lesson time, I think of the book we had to read this week, it is called „ Is that really you, GOD?“ by Loren Cunningham.

I really enjoyed reading this book and it was so exciting to read about his visions for YWAM before the school was formed. All the amazing things that God did, gave me goosebumps. It made me think how Big God can be when He has so big Ideas for our lives, and for him, Loren, who got his first glimpse of what God had planned for him, when he was only 13 years old. You have to read this book to understand and experience those moments yourself. Whoever is interested in the story how YWAM was started, should read this book!

What I really liked about our lesson in hearing God’s voice was, that God has a way to speak to everybody in their own special way. Like God knows how to talk to you so that You could hear him!
What I learned also from the lesson this week was that you have to understand who is in charge of your thoughts and ideas. There is a saying that: When God closes a door, he’ll open a window, or something like that. But you have to know God, and his character to recognize if it was him who opened the door or closed it. It could also be Satan, or you yourself.
SO it really helped me because now I want to get to know him and his character real good in order to understand his plans, and to hear His voice not mine or Satans!

THis week we also got our one-on-ones : A person we will spend time with (a staff member) and talk to and pray with! WE will also have small groups where we will discuss our lessons, and share our stories, what God has told us this week etc.
What was really awesome about this week was that, even though it was our first week, we were so open to share our stories, or memories of what happened to us when we were younger. Some people really opened up and shared personal experiences with everybody. It was nice to get to know people through their happy moments or something sad that has happened to them.
I enjoy listening to our stories, it makes you feel like one big hamily! And we are, one big family here in DTS!

I hope I am able to keep you guys updated as much as I can.
PLease keep me in prayers, I will be very thankful!!