Lecture Week 2

After a week and a half of lectures and chores, it is hard to keep track of how long we have been on-base. I have begun to understand what "Discipleship Training School" means: missionary training. If Bible college deals with the intellectual knowledge of God--the foundations, and building principles upon them--then DTS is the missionary testing ground where idealism is broken, applied, and remade anew. That being said, the Lord has seized lectures as the opportunity to deal with deep heart issues. Last week's lectures were on our identity (in Christ). This week's lectures are on the father heart of God. But these topics blur together, much as the abstract ideas of the attributes of God blur together when the theology is explained. It is impossible not to see one in light of the other.

Chores around the base keep us busy for a bulk of the time. We have lectures for several hours a day, and worship or intercessory prayer (for people and/or for nations). We have devotions every morning, which begin corporately, soon we split off on our own for one-on-one time with God. Much as I am not a morning person, I find myself grateful that the time was set aside ahead of time, because it would be quite a challenge to do so otherwise, considering how full our days are. Outreach and small group are each once a week. Monday nights the base hosts Harbour, a sort of community night with worship and a relatively short service.

Thursday nights are a DTS "family night," on which we do something fun as a DTS. Last week--our first family night--involved visiting a local monastery (which was surprisingly modern) run by five Catholic monks. One monk answered our questions, and we sat in on an evening service. I have never been comfortable in or around Catholic churches, cathedrals, or minsters, and so I expected to feel just as spiritually cold as around one of the aforementioned buildings. What I did not expect was a tangible deep reverence for God (which we in the Protestant churches sorely lack), beautiful a cappella male singing voices, and the heavy presence of God thick in the air. I would not have thought to look for the Spirit of God there--would have thought He would need to be invited--and yet there He was, in greater measure than I have ever felt before in a church. It blew me away. It was also kind of cool that since they were Benedictine monks, they actually stood up whenever the Trinity was mentioned. Not-so-cool was the lineup before a painting of Mary holding baby Jesus, so that everyone could get sprinkled with holy water. I tried really hard not to feel like I was going to get struck with a baby rattle. Shows my ignorance.

Saturdays have been free days that, so far, have opened up the world to us. Our Northern Irish teammates, from Banbridge, have invited the rest of us in the DTS to join them for events that we would never have known about otherwise. The weekend before last, that involved attending the college-age group called Vibe, which met near Armagh. (I'm hoping to go there again this weekend.) Last weekend, we went up to Belfast for a little bit of mall exploration, and then to an international-style buffet restaurant called Cosmos, before heading to a worship concert hosted by a church.

Grace, me, & Renee (DTS)

Nashed (DTS) & Milad (DTS staff)

Linda & Lauren (DTS)

Renee, Grace, & Malari (DTS)

James & Jen (siblings)

The walk from where we parked to the mall was my first introduction to the Shankill--the area of Belfast where the troubles were at their worst. The high walls surrounding apartments, houses, and flats still have massive spikes atop them. It's hard not to feel the history of the city through the spiritual climate, even just driving into Belfast from outside.

On the bright side (literally) we actually got SUN yesterday! A cloud rolled in extremely fast (which was pretty cool to watch moving so fast across the water, but I'm pretty sure the fishing boat didn't appreciate it, as they ended up stuck in front of the base for a day), and of course today it was foggy and it's raining right now. The tides are really weird here. This area of ocean (or inlet) is called Carlingford Lough. The water is extremely shallow in front of the base, but comes up pretty far looking deceptively deep...and then recedes to ridiculously far out, to the point where you wonder if you could walk halfway across the channel to the Republic. The ground when it recedes is littered with what must be millions of mussel and clam shells, many whole as well as broken.

The water in Carlingford Lough (shore of Rostrevor) was super high! Beautiful day :) But don't go in; you'll freeze! You can see the cloud rolling in on the right, obscuring the mountain on the Republic side near the opening to the bay.