Sticking Around.

Well I haven’t even left for the Outreach to Ecuador yet and God’s already answered my 2 main questions that I wanted answered when I started the DTS. I wanted to stop running into the same problem with relationships and I believe the answer to that question is to walk completely in the fear of the Lord and the second question was: What am I going to do after this DTS is over? Well, even though I was hesitant at the thought at first, I’m sure that I’m supposed to stay in Chile for another YWAM school. I graduate from the Discipleship Training School on June 10th The Biblical Counseling School starts June 22nd so with any luck I’ll be able to just push my plane ticket back until after December 5th when that school ends. I’m still intimidated of staying in South America for so long but the more time I spend down here the more I find myself falling in love with the culture, the language and most importantly I’m growing closer to God in ways I can’t see myself doing yet in Santa Cruz. I know I’ll do more growing on the outreach but I’ve been getting a bunch of “clues” from God that I need to stick around and take the counseling school as well. I made a list of them, in no particular order of importance.

1. I believe I have a word from God: Luke 22:31-32 “Simon, Simon, behold Satan has demanded permission to sift you like wheat; I but I have prayed for you, that your faith may not fail; and you, when once you have turned again, strengthen your brothers.”
I prayed that if I was supposed to take the counseling school God would give me a word from the Bible and this is it. Jesus is the one saying this to Peter and in the same way I’m sure that Jesus interceded for me to get me here to this DTS and my faith didn’t fail (and won’t on the outreach either). Now that I’m here and have turned again to the right direction I need to cement the change, learn more and then strengthen others when I return to Santa Cruz.

2. I was talking with a girl named Jamie that graduated from the last counseling school and without knowing it she really encouraged me to take the counseling school sooner than later. We are the same age and have the same educational and work experience backgrounds, and we both took a DTS before getting accepted to graduate school. However Jamie was feeling called to take the counseling school after the DTS but she didn’t go for it because she missed home and wanted a break. I feel the same way, I want to take a break after this DTS too, but Jamie said that looking back she wishes that she would have taken it right away because after about 8 months of solid living she started falling back into old habits, and it cost her something she may never be able to recover. Her testimony spoke right to me and the coincidences of how our paths crossed right as I was debating whether to take the counseling school or not makes this interaction make the list.

3. The director of the Counseling School, Julio, taught the classes last week and explained everything that you learn and what you do on the outreach and it all sounded like things I wanted to take part in. Everything that you learn how to do for others you take part in first and then you do free counseling sessions for 3 months while on outreach. Also during a time of prayer after one of the classes Julio actually spoke a word of prophecy over me, he said that: “My words are a ‘Sharp Sword’, and that they will cut into people and revive them, that they’ll revive marriages, families and churches. Like Ezekiel did in the Valley of the Dry Bones (Ezekiel 37:1-14)” After hearing this guy’s testimony and what he’s done for the last 12 years while being on staff at YWAM he doesn’t seem like the kind of kind that would just give out “warm fuzzies”, and if I want to live out the destiny I believe God has for me I need to have more knowledge in the biblical areas of counseling.

4. I was thinking that the cell phone that was given to me in Rancagua might have been a sign that I’d be staying in Chile longer than I’d expected (and that I’d have to stay here long enough to become fluent in Spanish to use it). I’ve also been encouraged to take the school by my one-on-one pastor, one of the directors of the base, and my parents.

5. I had a really vivid dream, that I wrote down because it was so easy to recal,l and I think could be interpreted that I should take the counseling school. I’ll show you exactly how I have the dream written down in my morning journal (with my commentary in parenthesis):

2/20/2011 “I was in this sketchy neighborhood like the bad one I visited in Rancagua where everyone was desperate for escape into drugs and alcohol, everyone was young & angry except those who were old & sad, at one point I had a full beer in my hand and when I placed it down, like I was done with it, all old and poor and broken people’s eyes shot to it (all at once, with the scary kind of adrenaline that only a bad dream can give you). I tried to find my friend but he’d run away from me because I know he was doing coke (it’s one of those dream things where you just ‘know’) and then I found a girl I know who told me that she was lost and that she was always getting lost . While I was dragging her around blindly trying to get her to my car I saw another lost friend of mine but I couldn’t help her because I was already occupied. I couldn’t find my car but instead we found a train station, when the girl saw it she suddenly had energy and said something like ‘Now I can just get away’. She sprinted ahead of me and as I ran on the tracks to catch her I turned to my left and there a black cloaked figure advanced on me quickly, I jumped into the air and with both feet kicked it in the chest but the force threw me backwards and I woke up.”

I’ve had a lot of dreams here but this was the only one that I wrote down because I remember waking up from it thinking “Whoa I haven’t had a dream like that before” I prayed that if it was from God I’d remember it when I woke up in the morning and I remembered all of it. In the dream I was unprepared to face the challenges I was up against, challenges that I need to be ready for. I not taking the Counseling School because I had a dream but it makes the list.

6. Finally there are all the practical reasons that I should take the school. I want to be a counselor/social worker as my career and here’s a chance to learn more about it from a biblical perspective, get some experience that will no doubt look fantastic on any resume or graduate school application, and have more immersion in the Spanish language. I don’t have any reason to come back home besides the fact that I don’t have the money to pay for the counseling school’s outreach but if God’s really called me to take the school He’ll also provide the finances to pay for it.

We’re leaving for Ecuador on Saturday and it’s exciting to think that it’s not my last 3 months in South America! Sorry that there aren’t many pictures again, but I haven’t been very inspired to take many pictures of the same school stuff, but don’t worry I’ll be traveling over the entire country of Ecuador and I’m bringing my camera.

This is THE look. Thermos under arm and your Mate w/ Bombilla; I may not be going to Argentina but I have three different people on the team tracking down each piece in the set for me (people don’t drink Mate in Ecuador). At first I was disappointed that I wouldn’t be picking out my own items (and believe me there are a million choices for each thing) but I have Argentinean and Uruguayan natives who’ve been drinking Mate their whole lives picking out the good non-touristy stuff for me. When we all get back from the outreaches I post pictures of what they picked out.