OH Canada!

The last six days have been quite the adventure. It's been really interesting to see what God's done already in such a short amount of time. It makes me even more expectant and excited about what He's going to do during the rest of my time here!

This blog is going to be an overview of my schedule for the next three months and let you know the surrounding and environment that I have found myself in!

First off, this is a REALLY small base. There are just about fifty people here at the base. That's everyone! Students and staff! Our DTS has 9 students, only one of which is a guy, and 5 DTS staff. I'm the only one from the states! There is one girl from Australia who is 23 and a girl from S. Korea who is 26. The other six students are all from Canada and are all between the ages of 18 and 20. The town of Turner Valley which is where the base is, has less than 2,000 people which has been a huge adjustment for me to make! I think Great Falls is small and there are somewhere around 64,000 there!

It's definitely been a huge adjustment but I love the people and I love the area.... for the most part! :) It really reminds me a lot of Montana. We're right on a river and there are tons of trees and farmland all around. Sunday I went to a small church which REALLY reminded me of Montana! It was great!

Alright, now onto my schedule! I know there are some people out there who are probably wondering why I would be asking people to help me pay for a school and hopefully this will give you some insight into that. Yes, what I'm doing right now is a schooling program but it is not like any sort of regular college at all! One of the big differences is that we have work duties. My work duty is supper clean up. And let me tell you, cleaning up after 50 people is quite the job! We are required to put in two hours of work duty mon-fri. This makes it pretty near impossible to have any sort of job outside of the DTS school, not to mention the fact that they don't allow to be working any sort of outside job while you are here because they want to be focusing on the school and what God is doing in you and teaching you. So, with that said, here is what my weekly schedule looks like:
Monday:
7:30am- breakfast. This is not mandatory but encouraged. 7am comes way to early for me but I've been making it a point to be at breakfast every morning and get into a good schedule
8am- prayer and bible meditation. Once again, not necessary but STRONGLY encouraged
8:30- intecession. This is a time when we get together to pray for issues that God places upon our hearts. It could be a people group, a country, an event or an issue. Pretty much anything.
9:30- Class. Every week is a different theme/topic/class and the school brings in different people each week to teach and lecture. The themes are: Wk 1- Kingdom Life and Community. Wk 2- Father heart of God Wk 3- Personal Design Wk 4- How to Study Your Bible Wk 5- Laying Down Your Rights Wk 6- Go Conference-- this is a missions conference that we will be attending Wk 7- Kingdom of God & Mini Outreach-- this week we will be traveling to the very north of Alberta and doing some missions work in a town up there. I'll be giving more information when it's made available. Wk 8- Relationships Wk 9- Fear of God Wk 10- Holy Spirit Wk 11- Spirtual Warfare/Financial Stewardship Wk 12- Mission/Eveangelism. After this we will be going on our outreach which I'll exlpain more about later!
12:30- Lunch
1:30- Bible Study-- this is something we will be doing as a group. Every week we will doing a study on a different book of the Bible. We will be looking at it using the Inductive study method (I might go into that in another post) and discussing the book.
2:30-- study/work duties/free time-- Because my work duty is supper clean up, I have this entire time to do pretty much whatever I want with. Every week we are given a creative processing assignment to help us work through what we are learning (this assignment is really cool! basically we just have to come with something creative that explains what we've gotten from the week's lectures. It can be a song, a dance, a painting, a story, a drama.. pretty much anything creative!) and we also have book reports we have to do. This time block is a space where I can work on my assignments, do laundry, take a nap, go into town.... pretty much anything.
5:30 supper-- After supper I have two hours of clean up so depending on when I get done eating, I'll be done with my work duties sometime around 8pm and then have the rest of the evening free.

Tuesday:
7:30- breakfast
8:00- prayer and bible meditation
8:30- all base worship-- this one pretty much explains itself. This is time when the entire base comes together to worship the Lord through song in an intimate, corporate setting.
9:30- class
12:30- lunch
1:30- world view discussion- this is a two hour block of time where we will dicuss different world views and how that compares to a biblical world view. Each week we will look at some form of artistic expression that displays a different world view. We'll be watching documentaries, listening to music, etc, and then discussing.
3:30- free time/study
5:30- Supper/work duty

Wednesday:
730- breakfast
800- prayer and bible meditation
830- out loud readings-- during this time we will be coming together to read outloud the book of the bible that we'll be studying the following week
9:30- DTS worship-- this is time of worship for just our dts and staff
10:30- class
12:30- lunch
130- study/free time
530- supper

Thursday:
730- breakfast
800- prayer and bible meditation
830-- prayer for the nations-- this is when the entire base will come together to pray for a specific nation or people group
930- class
1230- lunch
130- study/free time
430- community outreach prep, every other week-- every other week everyone will participate in community outreach, some will be doing cowboy church at a local church and others will be helping with a local youth group this. every other thursday is cowboy church
530- supper
630- community outreach

Friday:
730- breakfast
800- prayer and bible meditation
830- outreach prep-- this will happen as we get closer to leaving for our big outreach at the end of our lecture phase
1000- class
1230- lunch
130- small group- this is time for us to just hang out and have fun as a group
300- study/free time
430- community outreach prep (youth group) every other friday
530- supper
630- community outreach

Saturdays and Sundays are free days.

In addition to this, each one of us will also be meeting once a week with a staff member for one on one times. During this time we'll be able to talk with our staff, pray and ask questions. This will also be when we turn in our creative processing assignment.

There's so much to share with you all but dinner begins in 2 minutes so I'd better hurry up! I will be posting again soon when I find out more about where our outreach will be and what we'll be doing. If you have any questions, feel free to ask!!!!