It’s been good settling into a routine and a rhythm this week working with YWAM, although it could be argued that it’s not really a routine when every day is different! This week we’ve been spending a lot of time cleaning out the houses that the students (and myself!) are going to be living in when they arrive at the beginning of November. More to come next week about these houses…hopefully some pictures and a story about why they are some pretty special, location wise…so keep your eyes peeled for that!
One thing that has kept us occupied this week was that the Shankill Methodist church asked YWAM a while ago if we would be interested in helping to open up a café with them. This is something that we as a team decided to take on for the next few months before the students get here, both as a way of raising some money to help fundraise for some of the students who are coming from developing areas of the world, and also a way of helping our staff team bond a bit and figuring out our working relationship before the students get here!
Below is a picture of the café we're working in.
We spent the last few days preparing for the big opening of the café today, figuring out a menu, shopping for the food and getting the café ready for having people coming in. A pretty amazing story that happened yesterday when we were setting up was that Shankill Methodist was having a prayer meeting, and one of the congregation was standing outside the doors welcoming people to it. Amalia (also on DTS staff) and I were going out to pick some stuff up, and got talking to this guy. It turned out that he was a local vegetable shop owner, and when he heard what we were doing, he took us over to his van and gave us a load of vegetables to make the soup! He also gave us his number and told us to give him a ring next week and the weeks after that to let him know what vegetables we needed for the café, and he’s going to donate them to us! This is an amazing gift to us, and a real sign of God’s blessing on what we are doing.
Today went well, we saw quite a few people coming through the doors, and even made a bit of a profit which was great for our first day open! Thanks to all who came around and visited! If you’re around any Friday in September and October between 11 & 2, feel free to drop by and enjoy a sandwich and bowl of soup… It’d be great to see you! Text or email me if you need any directions…
A few pictures of today's café:
As promised, I thought it was time I let you know exactly what working with YWAM Belfast actually entails! My role here is going to be working with the DTS (which stands for Discipleship Training School). The DTS will start on November 4th this year, and will involve two main parts, 5 or 6 months of a lecture phase which will be followed in the middle of March/start of April by a 2 month overseas outreach phase, the location of which is still to be decided, but will most likely be to an area that has seen conflict and is in need of reconciliation and forgiveness. This is owing to the fact that the DTS in Belfast is known as a ‘Reconciliation DTS’, with a lot of the lectures being focused on this aspect of our faith and our mission to the world.
Most of my time with the DTS will be taken up in sitting in on the lectures, running small groups and working on a one-to-one basis with some of the students who come, encouraging them in their relationship with God and helping them to figure out stuff in relation to this. It should be a pretty exciting time. My DTS really was life-changing for me, so I’m excited to be a part of these new students experience and trying to make this year a time both of learning, but also of great fun.
Another ministry of YWAM Belfast is known as the Forgiveness Programme, also working in the area of reconciliation, (are you sensing a theme?!), in which a team of staff are working in schools in Belfast and presenting a message of forgiveness and reconciliation to the kids who go there. It’s an exciting ministry, but one that I don’t really know a lot about, so I’m looking forward to hearing more about it, learning and working alongside them for a while too!
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