Outreach Destination!

     Aloha all! I finally know where I'm going on my outreach! I will be staying in the Hawaiian Islands, but taking the time to travel around them and go to some of the other islands, getting off of The Big Island. There is only one other student on my team and we don't know who our leader is yet either.  The other destination options were Cambodia, Palau, and on the boat, where they would travel between Christmas Island, Fanning Island, Washington Island, and Fiji.  None of us know what kind of work we will be doing yet, only where we are going, and the other students that are on our team.  So ya... Just wanted to keep you guys updated and in the loop, Love you all and mahalo!

Week 3 (and some of 2)

     Its been a lot harder to post as often as  I had hoped I would, things are so crazy here, they keep us running. 
     Last week was awesome, we had a speaker named Steve Shamblin talking/teaching on Healing a Wounded Soul.  He showed us verses proving that we were not made capable of handing the hurt of a wounded soul, and then he showed us all the things that can cause a wounded spirit:
1. Words (Proverbs 15:4)
2. Traumatic/emotional based event that produces a physical symptom (Proverbs 17:22)
3. Sorrow (Proverbs 15:13)
4. Sexual Sin (Proverbs 6:32-33)
5. Addiction (Proverbs 23:29-35)
6. False Prophesy (Jeremiah 5:30-31)
     The next day we discussed our identity, where he proved that we are not our bodies. Who we are is in our soul... and nothing else.  Our bodies are made from dirt, and they will only return to dirt, so why would you put your self worth into that? Our bodies are a temporary dwelling place of who you are.  And the same thing goes for beauty, beauty comes from who you are and not how you look.  There are only two places your worth should ever come from... 1. God made me 2. Jesus bought me. The last day of lecture (last Friday) Steve discussed how to open your heart to be healed from a wounded spirit.  During the week I found a few things where I had been wounded, and I am glad to say I am being healed.  Healing is a slow process, and I know that and am not expecting it to happen over night, but God is healing me and giving me strength. 
     This week we have two speakers who are co-teaching.  Their names are Jonathan and Taylor (I don't know their last names).  And they are teaching on the Culture of Revival/Culture of the Kingdom of God.   We were taught the Romans Road, (which I had never heard of before), which is five Bible verses through Romans that can be used to teach the Gospel. 
1. Romans 3:23
2. Romans 6:23
3. Romans 5:8
4. Romans 10:9
5. Romans 5:1
     Tuesday we were taught that how you view God dictates how you view the rest of your life.  If you view God as an angry God, you will be angry at your entire life.  If you view God as a disappointed God, you will try to do good deeds, and prove yourself in everything you do.  We then worked through Genesis, working to change our view of God to a loving, and nurturing Father. 
     Yesterday we went over the 4 R's of repentance
1. Repent (call sin, sin, and see it as such)
2. Receive (forgiveness of God)
3. Rebuke (rebuke the enemy with the authority given to us by God)
4. Replace (replace the lies of the enemy with the truth from God)
The greater part of yesterday was spent going over unbelief.  We discussed how unbelief is the opposite of faith, and how faith, and unbelief were the only things that surprised Jesus.  We then went through a checklist of unbelief and checked all of the ones that applied to us.  We then as a class repented, received forgiveness,  rebuked the devil, and replaced the unbelief with God's truth.  Every single person in my class left that room with a smile on their face, it was beautiful! We all shone, felt light, and had the joy of the Lord in us.... And to thing it's only the third week!!! I can't WAIT to see what else God has in store for my team!
     Bless you all! And miss you!

Week One1

     Well we all made it through the first full week! Its been fantastic! Our lectures this week were given to us by Bret and Karen Curtis.  They spent the first three days telling us the history of YWAM Ships, as well as their part in the story, all the way up to our current DTS.  On Thursday Karen spent half of the lecture going into the Fear of the Lord.  She spend the first part of that discussing sin and talking about how we should respond and react to sin, as well as how to face and conquer it.  Then she helped us work through a Bible passage (Psalm 34:11-14) about the tongue and mouth to begin to help us with the first step in addressing sin in our lives.  Friday Bret told an amazing lecture about Hearing the Voice of God.  We went over the ways God speaks, discussed some of the characteristics of God that helps Him to speak and reveal Himself to us.  We also talked about the "Principles of Intersessionary Prayer" or the things to do when we are trying to hear from God.  We then split up into small groups to work through the steps he gave us to practice, and we spent time learning to hear God's voice.  We did the exercise with the intention of praying into our outreach (which we know virtually nothing about).  Many of the extremely varied and different pieces that the each group received all seemed to fit together to give us an amazing picture of our outreach. 
     As the weeks go on we are working on going through our testimonies as a team.  We are doing them alphabetically by last name (bleh), so I still wont be going for a while, but so far we have gotten through about 10, so we are 1/3 of the way through them.  I am becoming more and more amazed by me team as I learn more about each of them.  I can't wait to find out why God brought each of us to THIS DTS at THIS time, and how we will impact and shape each other. 
     I miss you all, and I send my love! Feel free to leave comments, I would love to hear all your thoughts on everything if you want to leave them!
Mahalo and aloha nui loa  (thank you and all my love)

First Couple Days

Hey all! Sorry I took so long to get on and let you all know I am here! Its been a little crazy around here, as I'm sure you can guess.  I arrived Thursday evening, but didn't make it to our campus or bed until late due to registration and everything.  And yes I said our campus, the Ships DTS (and related courses) have our own campus... and its almost right on the ocean! Its positively marvelous! Friday, we had an orientation at the big university campus, and had lunch up there before a free afternoon (spent swimming, in both the ocean and our pool) and then we had dinner at the big campus followed by an absolutely amazing Aloha Ceremony, where they welcomed us to Hawaii, with hula dancers, a flame thrower, and then a flag ceremony, with flags from all of the nations currently represented on the campus.  After that... was worship! It was just as I remembered it! Standing there I could feel the constrains on my heart fading away... the joy and passion I had received the last time I was here just all came back to me.  I remember the words God told me though Danny last trip when he said "Grab that fire Dawn. And hold onto it." I knew I had lost that fire, lost that flame. But our God is faithful, and he rekindled the flame in my heart. 
Saturday, we spent at the beach, only to come back and swim in the pool.  And yes, I did get sunburned haha, but luckily it seems to be turning into a tan already.  Yesterday (Sunday) we went to one of the local churches called Solid Rock.  There were many native Hawaiians there, which I found so exciting.  I loved the message from the pastor as well, he was going through Matthew 16:19 talking about having the keys to the kingdom of heaven, and how with keys we can lock and unlock things.  The Bible says we can bind, we can bind the devil, and put him in his place, and because of our authority he will stay bound.  We have that power.  We also have the power to loose bonds and chains that bind us.  The keys give us the power to do both of those. We have that power! We can bind and loose!  I was actually thinking about this today as we were discussing things with my DTS, and trying to remind myself that I have the power to tell the devil no, and tell him in a way that binds him to where he cannot come back against me with the same things.  I was also reminding myself that as I had the power to bind the devil, I had the power to loose the years worth of chains he has wrapped around me.  We have that power! How incredible is our God????
This morning we had another campus worship at the university, and then we spent the day beginning our lectures and then spending time with our DTS group this afternoon.  I have already had several opportunities to sit down and talk in depth with several of my teammates, and I LOVE getting to know them, hearing their stories, and hearing how they came to be here.  I am so excited to see what God does throughout this trip! I know He's going to mold and shape each of us, and also use us to sharpen each other.  I love the comradeship and bonds that are already growing between all 33 of us, and I can't wait for God to draw us closer to each other and help us to become a family with Him as our Father. 
Blessings on you! and mahalo for everything you have done.