Sunday, February 26, 2012

Rest (Week 6)


This week there was definitely a different tune playing, there are like 200 people at the base, wowser!! It was exciting on Monday we had base worship and all of the students from the September `MOTA school of a hundred or so, plus our 15 student school and some leaders worshipped together in one room! They just came back from outreach, so the energy in the room was envigorating! 
Although, it was very exciting and everything having all these cool people around it has gotten a bit overwhelming towards the end of the week, just because of the "aggressive schedule." haha On a serious note, I think this week is a good example of resting in God, despite the chaos around you, putting God first no matter what. I felt a little frustrated with blogging and pictures and everything, its crazy that this is how the school is usually like, the bustle of people and crazy crowds! In light of all this frustration, I am super excited for mini outreach! For my mini outreach I am headed to Germany, whoo, so staying right where I am, yay! I am developing a heart for Germany and the people here, I am enthralled when I get out of the castle, go to Shalbot, or Jesus Haus and spend a little more time in the culture. I love how direct, most Germans are, and I just have a curiosity for the missions side of things, all the atheists and the darkness we always speak about. I could probably go on for a paragraph more, but I will keep it concise. 
So, how I am trying to keep myself in check with my frustrations and gnarling, fleshy, side of me, is by addressing my spiritual tree and arrowing up. An interesting point, Corey made (our speaker this week), was that the same power that raised Christ from the dead is in us. That when our roots are soaking up nutrience from the spirit we can be used as tools for Christ, that power that we soak up with our roots can be expressed through our fruit on our spiritual tree. So, its such a blessing word to receive for the week, because all week I was struggling with frustrations, like a normal human, and I just needed to soak my roots in the word and prayer. 

Friday, February 24, 2012

Prague!

This is the weekend Fina, Raquel and I went to Prague. 
Luke(one of our leaders), with the stuffed french toast! yummy
It was an awesome weekend, I love all the buildings and architecture of Prague. 

Fina and I.


We toured around the old part of the city, and checked out stuff! 

Raquel

One of the unique church buildings.
Luke, hiding in the castle wall.
I loved the castle, so rich with history and there was so much to see! I wish you could all go to Prague! It is an interesting city for sure.
The Castle

A parade we ran into while touring!

This guy was determined to paint our face black??


The view of the city from the castle steps!

Here are some black and white pictures I took of Prague, for fun and for my project!
This was a protest we ran into, while we were there! I have more pictures of this,  but
on the scanner it deleted a lot of mine and I had a time schedule for my project. I have all the negs though, yay!




Schweet Warehouse In Herrnhut

This is an amazing warehouse about a 15 min walk out of Herrnhut that the photo students here love to go and take pictures and practice their art. Here are some of my pictures!





Thursday, February 23, 2012

Old Habits (week five)

So, week five was kind of a contingent from what Ollie said Friday and the weekend. On the weekend before the begining of this week Raquel and Fina helped speak into a weakness of my life. Raquel said to focus on God, instead of what I am struggling with and sometimes you will be stuggling with something, not being completely happy or depressed, but content just focusing on God. I think sometimes thats just the way it is, you have to muscle through the rough patches, you feel like your not making any progress, but its just a grizzly part of the metaphorical steak.
Then Ollie, before the weekend spoke on Friday about your passions and hard times. I am paraphrasing, but he said sometimes its just hard, because its hard, not because your in the wrong place, wrong track. Sometimes its just hard because its hard and you have to have the endurance and perseverence to see it through, the endurance to see what God has planned for you and more.
You have to have the discipline in prayer when its tough, discipline for your art.

So, the weeks before these last two I was riding the honeymoon high of DTS. So excited to be here, and experiencing revelation upon revelation of God's truth and love in my life. Then, these two weeks I definitely crashed a little. I understand God's power in my life, now its retraining my thought patterns that dwell on sin and choosing to not go back to my old ways. This is the hard part, where it really means something, past the emotions and feelings to the actions from your words.
Its ironic that this week Fiona our speaker, spoke to us on sin, repentance and the gospel. She spoke about sin, what it is exactly. It is not just the action of sin, but the habits and thinking patterns of sin. You have to retrain your thoughts in every way, and ARROW UP to God, exactly what I needed to hear, so faithful God! This knowledge also shed light into a revelation of mine to concern myself only of what God thinks not to do it on my own or think on my own prideful standards for myself, all made possible by arrowing up!

Fiona also shed light into an interesting topic of the Gospel. When we go out on missions and when we talk to non-believers who have never heard of the gospel what will we tell them?? We responded oh, yes, of course we know the Gospel and she told us to explain it. Hmmm so yah, there is a God, umm they might ask who is that?? Uhh well He created the whole universe, they might ask why and we respond because He loves us and wanted companionship and in some cultures, they would be like huhhh okay...... so you can see my point. She explained with non-believers we have to break it down, always start with God loves everyone, sin seperates (that will be hard to explain), Jesus saves, and then theres a choice. The Gospel to me is the foundations of Jesus Christ and this resonates something within my soul, what she said. The Gospel is so simple, yet so difficult just in these few steps of faith, the biggest steps of your life.

She was such a cool speaker, and I quite enjoyed an exercise she made us do with a partner. We took our partner and stared directly into their eyes for about five minutes, and weren't allowed to look away. Then she spoke to us that we are to look at the person as how God sees them! Wow, that was so cool and the end of looking into that person's eyes I just couldn't stop thinking how beautiful they were and I almost cried. How heinous we are as creatures to insult God's creation, to insult that which He loves so deeply!

Monday, February 20, 2012

Bautzen!

The graveyard!
This weekend we went to Bautzen for the weekend, which was about 3 or 4 weekends ago now. It was awesome, all the streets were cobblestone and the buildings were all old, it was pretty cool I have billions more pictures to show family and friends back home. Just take a look and experience a little bit of what I have experienced.

Amanda front, then chloe, then pia.
Chloe!







Monday, February 13, 2012

God Says Walk and I Stand (week 4)


This week for me, was all about understanding " The Calling." We talked about missions work and the leaders spoke about their experiences. Ruth spoke about four girls her and Ola helped to make a cafe with in Ethiopia. Only one came to Christ, that was a bit of an eye opener for me. The rest of the girls couldn't handle the freedom, I guess in following Christ and leading a different life, so they went back to their old ways of life in prostitution. All of these testimonies from the leaders really moved me, as well as when Liz spoke about when she went to Africa and how she and her team got swept off their feet when they left. They left Africa in a time of crisis and it hit me when she told us that she was overwhelmed with the fact that the U.S. Army even sent in airplanes and military to get all their American people out, but the people of Africa had no choice but to stay, because that is their life. Wow, what is this?
Another thing which made me think was the team who went to Ethiopia who talked about the children they rescued from mingi. Mingi is a condition where in a tribe, if children are born out of wedlock, with deformed teeth, or other deformities they are killed. The team in Ethiopia at the time realized something must be done to rescue these children and they made trips to put these kids in orphanages or what not. Kristen spoke about how the first child they rescued, had to sleep on her stomach for the night, because the child was so ill. It was incredible hearing this even second hand it was so moving. All of these stories, just really made me think, what I was doing with my life, to help people, to further God's kingdom and use the talents he has given me. 
I feel God's hand so strongly in my life in this time. All of these things are built up, the base, the cool experiences, God's love, the passion I feel inside of me, but when He calls me to walk I stand. True I get off the ground, but He has called me to so much more. I even had some experiences of people at the base speaking into my life, what they felt God wanted them to tell me. Dycke from the base spoke to me about some things, that reconfirmed past words that people have spoke to me before and feelings and words I have received myself from God.
I can remember on tuesday in worship I felt like shouting YES JESUS, just being so excited, and i stopped after one really awkward Jesus cheer… Yeah… Jesus… Fear of man swallowed me whole in this moment. I felt dead to the spirit, it was horrible. Past issues of fear and bonds I already have broken popped back up . What the heck is going on? 
I felt like God wasn't speaking to me, I was a little out of sort! It came to me that God had already spoken to me and continues to, but it was the same questions He had for me. Will you follow me no matter what, in whatever circumstances, no matter whatever people think?How much will you really commit to me, Sierra? 
When the week started to wind down, I realized when I felt I let God down in the little step of not shouting in worship, its true I couldn't follow through, but my calling was not sabotaged in this action.    I felt paralyzed by fear, because I know God tests us in the little steps in order to lead us to the big steps for Him , but God was trying to show me something. Its true I have choices to obey, but the God of the universe knows me better than anyone else and He knew I wouldn't be able to feel shout that day. God knew that an area of my life needed to be exposed, before I could move on. Fear of man was rooted in past fears planted in my brain. I let the fears of the past define who I am, based on what I try so hard not to be. Its a constant proving myself strategy, which has nothing to do with 
God.
What happened next was really cool, such an answer to prayer. I went to Prague, Czech Republic for the weekend with Fina and Raquel and through that we had some cool conversations! I explained to them what I was struggling with, past issues I thought I had dealt with etc.. Raquel told me not to let the sin itself become your idol. She explained in her experience when she tried to let a sin or something go, she would focus on what she wasn't going to do and then do it again get mad and start all over. She would continue to focus on what she wasn't going to do, when she did it it got worse and she felt bad that she did it, cause that is what she wasn't ever going to do again. It was a vicious cycle. She finally figured out to focus on God, not the sin, and to not beat herself up if she did it, but to just go okay I messed up, now what is God doing in my life today. This was extremely helpful, and made me think of higher things, instead of getting pulled into old thought patterns.  
That rest of the weekend after we had that talk Friday night went well, and I was way more content. Not necessarily always overjoyed, but content to be with God amongst the struggle. 
We also went to church on Sunday and i just thought it was so school that in a nation where christianity was rare I was going to church and worshipping God! Although, there was nothing extraordinary about church that day, just being there and praising God was really cool! That suffices week four!

Thursday, February 9, 2012

Castle Life, and Work Duties


The Once Photo Lab/Now Ollie and Liz's place, (base staff).

Community Room/ Lecture Room
The top floor, hallway, where the girls rooms are.

A photo at the top of the stairs.
 This is a bit of insight to what goes on in the castle. They make us work for hours..... actually only from 2-4pm everyday we all have work duties, for me I do the breakfast duty from 6am till around 8am with clean up and everything. So, I don't have to do 2-4pm work duties. As well each day is scheduled out and we have assignments to do for bible reading, art projects, etc...

The staff floor.

The Cafe



The bottom of the stairs.

The boot room at the bottom of the stairs.

Dining Room

Map of the world, in the dining room.

Coffee hallway, and entrance to the castle.

Map of Germany in the middle of the stairs.

Kitchen!


The dungeon, where we're kept when we're bad and
I go to get food for breakfast prep.

The freezers for food!