Now faith is...

Ok so It's been a while... I left off with the commitment service, That was pretty sweet! We spent the day fasting, in prayer, and silence. I enjoyed it, one thing i have been learning out here is you don't always have to be hearing or learning from God. Sometimes its okay to just hangout with Him, be in His presence in silence. It is the most peaceful I have been in a long while... I read a lot, then finally want outside to the baseball field and just laid down at the back wall.  I didn't feel God speaking a lot about my commitments and such, i had most of it before that day anyway. But He was just showing me peace... and almost just saying give me control and i'll take care of your future. Which helped me out alot... but  yeah that was good, Then we went to the service there was worship, prayer, communion, and we prayed over our commitments with a TL. 

Then this past week we did a lot of training with the ministries, and just walkthroughs of there rules and how everything is run. We kept going to classes, i like most of them my favorites are Foundations of Faith, Ministry gifts, and callings, and Transformed Living. The Ministry gifts class is... different to say the least... very... spirit led. The info is good, and i like the teachers its just a whole different mindset... Transformed Living is taught by Ron Macintosh, He is an amazing speaker! He has a whole mindset that we as humans are the only ones stopping ourselves from a Prosperous and blessed life living For God. Again a different mindset but it's really good and he is backing up his thoughts with scripture and such.  Finally there is the faith class, and this guy is a beast his stories and teaching style i love! At the end of the class he gave us a assignment to believe for something that you need or want. then write it down ask God and believe for it. Thats a stretch for me in itself... But God will help me overcome! :) i will keep you up to date on that! He was pulling out of Hebrews 11:1 where it says now faith is... thus the title... But he was just saying how faith is now not tomorrow, God wants to bless us now, we are just so easy to push are hopes and dreams off until tomorrow. That we should believe it for now... whatever it is just have faith that God will provide and He will if we are where He has called us to be. Also it blew my mind away to hear how much passion he had in this believing system, I asked him after class If he has ever believed for something and it didn't work out, and if so what do you do? He said defiantly and that first thing is God's always right, and the next step is check yourself, motives, and if you are in Gods will, then re-evaluate. Which was amazing seeing as i found out when i got home his wife had died of cancer the year before. I felt bad, but intrigued at the same time that his faith has stayed how it is. 

 Random fact... Vivi is the most beautiful brazilian girl i've ever met, and she's awesome! and she thinks I'm cute... which in Portuguese means... nice? I am not being forced to write this.... :) On another note... We did witnessing rooms on saturday... which if you don't know... or aren't  Christian it may sound weird... ha... but basically it is simulated evangelizing... we have 6 minutes to make a difference in there lives... weird... i know, but we had 4 situations... a person who's best friend just died, 2 people drinking at a bar, a woman who husband is abusive, and a emo guy... it was weird... I thought i did better then i thought i would but 6 minutes was entirely not enough... 

Besides that, everything is good we start outreaches this week, i am kinda excited but also nervous... but it is all good. Today was chapel pastor Rod spoke. 3 things that stuck out to me was him saying selfishness will stop you from being a leader. That we MUST trade selfishness for selflessness. And finally God isn't looking for ability but availability, that unless we acknowledge our fears we will never see gifts in others. All of these things i have heard before to one degree or another but it really clicked. It doesn't matter wether i am good at something or not if God is calling me there, He WILL find a way. But back to the pastor he is the kids pastor, he has such a heart for kids, they do a bus ministry every saturday where they send 55 buses around tulsa to pick up kids who couldn't get to church otherwise. So about 1000 kids come into a room... maybe 1.5 times the size of the Satellite center... yeah crazy! But it was cool spending time and loving on them. But... yes this is it for now. i love you all! Comment it up!

In The Beginning.

To start things off i would like to say I dont like writing at all, so this blog 

will most likely be me rambling, also there will be alot of run on sentences.

And sentence fragments. So, here goes nothing.

Lets start rewinding about 6 months, after interrogating Rachael for a month about IMT,

I finally decided to accept that God was calling me to tulsa for at least 9 months.

Now fast forward back to real time, For those of you who don't know i am now in Tulsa, Oklahoma doing a program called In Ministry Training through Victory Bible Institute. It is up to a 2-3 year program if you want it to be, as of now im only going this year but i am leaving God to make that decision. :) I am going to school full time, in the mornings from 8:00-12:20. 2 classes a day then after all the IMTs meet up and go out on outreaches of some sort. We will be doing things like helping out with Victorys Ministries. We are leaders in their Youth Group, 24.7. Also we will be doing kids trucks, and street evangelism, helping the community, and im sure a bunch of things i haven't heard about yet. On the majority of the weekends we will be doing a outreach of some sort either in Oklahoma or any other state. I will be home for a few weeks at the end of december, besides that as of now i will be home in 9 months. 

Their are about 50 IMTs 15 of which are guys.... We live with 4 guys to a 2 bedroom apartment with 2 bathrooms and we share a living room and kitchen. There are quite a few rules, but the focus is to devote and focus on God so it makes since. We cant watch TV, movies, videos on the internet while on the VBI property. No secular music can be listened to or in the houses(including instrumentals), basically anything you cant buy in a christian store you cant listen to. Dating is strictly forbidden, so are front hugs with girls and talking to any IMT girl by any means other then in person. We can call them on the phone before 10pm if we HAVE too. So basically we are choosing to not acknowledge them or ELSE... Also we cant talk to any other girls at all after 10pm... but on the bright side... guys dont have to tuck in our shirts while at school. I would say thats a fair trade. Then there are the assumed No drinking, drugs, cussing, fighting, wrestling with the opposite sex. There is a curfew of 11pm on weekdays and 12am on weekends.  Also we run on ryan time, which is 7 minutes ahead of real time. so we have to be 7 minutes early everywhere we go. 

I am 2 weeks into school just finishing up VP(Vale la Pena) which is basically a two week indoc. and basically we wake up at 5am to run for a half hour, go home get ready for the day, do a fire time and be out the door by 745. The first week we split into 4 groups and did a bunch of team building activities. and had a bunch of meetings regarding rules and what is expected of us. Then this past week we started school, I decided to do practical ministry which is basically ministry stuff. The only other thing i was interested in was worship but that would have been for the sole reason that i would get to learn guitar... But anywhoo.  after school we would do some cool team activities such as rappelling, Zip Line, a big rope swing thing, and getting our whole team over a 12 foot wall in 30 min. But during these 2 weeks we have been up and doing things basically from 5am until 11pm curfew. FUN! for the test we we took last night we had to remember 5 differant things biggest being 1 cor. 13, I crammed and thought i had everything done. I passed for sure 4 of the 5. I will know tonight if i passed 1 cor. 13. i messed it up a little bit. which stinks because that was the first think i memorized. We are finishing off VP today with a day of silence and fasting. we have a commitment service at 8pm. During today we are supposed to spend it with God and search for what He wants us to commit to. 

I am excited to see what God is going to do, reveal and show in me over this time of my life. A few things that i have to get used to/ try and grasp a better understanding of...

1. Tongues. The incessant need to pray in tongues at every prayer whether its for dinner, the day, or healing. Like i know about speaking under your breath but its more talking/yelling it while the main person is praying. It is kind of weird in my opinion but they have a very different view on this. I have some stories that are funny ask me if you want to know. I have been given this gift prior to coming out here, but i am no where near understanding it. So if this confuses you... Me too! My advice would be research it, and ask people about it. 

2. Believing for things. Like money, health, a car... This is new to me praying to God that he does something for you. In our principles of prayer class we all prayed for a car... I have no problem asking for  something,but believing God will give me a white Subaru Sti with gold rims because i prayed it seems like im the one in control... something i definitely  have to get with God about.

3. Healing. I believe God can heal people and use people to heal people for sure. And this hasn't been the overall theology out here, but the thought that If we have enough faith God will heal that person. God will do what he wants, regardless of how much we pray. And hypothetical if you are a pastor of a church standing on that belief... what happens when your wife or even you gets diagnosed with cancer and dies? Your faith crumbles...? or you didn't have enough faith?

Interesting question if you ask me. I am by no means saying that we shouldn't pray for the sick. I believe there is healing definitely and that through knowing Jesus and faith you MAY be healed, but a pastor having a magic hand and saying He can heal whoever, and someone saying if you aren't healed you didn't have enough faith is utterly ridiculous...

So yeah these are my beginning thoughts, and ramblings hope you enjoyed. More to come soon!

Comment and let me know what you think!

-TopHeR