Chapter Six (of 6): The final leg…

Now I won’t go into the rest of the story, since it would take too long to explain it all (you can view my archived mission newsletters from my missions journey) but let’s just say that God works in mysterious ways, sometimes so differently than we would expect, and at times, He will move in ways that you had not initially planned or desired, but when you look back on it, you see that His hand was on it, despite the fact that it was HARD, CHALLENGING, NOT WHAT YOU EXPECTED, AND DIFFERENT THAN WHAT YOU’D ORIGINALLY THOUGHT IT WOULD BE.

YET WHEN YOU STOP AND LOOK BACK, YOU REALIZE IT WAS BETTER THAN YOU COULD EVER DREAM…

God works out His plan in our hearts and lives and does His thing, even when we’re kicking and screaming and throwing tantrums since He isn’t doing things the way we’d planned. Haha. God is funny that way.

To make a long story slightly shorter, in brief, I got accepted to the Performing Arts DTS in Kona, Hawaii in Sept 2005. After 3 months lecture training phase, where much healing and learning was done, I flew with a team to Asia, where I was able to meet relatives and see my roots, where part of me is from. It was truly healing for my heart.

Since the beginnings of my missions journey, I was led in 2006 to join the staff with the YWAM base in Oxford, New Zealand. I had a blast as the Registrar from August 2006 until March 2007 and then transitioned to join the April 2007 Around the World in 80 Days DTS Staff team, where I led the school and base worship team and World Awareness Mission Nights and discipled a small group of 5 gals. I then co-led an outreach team to the continent of Africa from July to September 2007 (amazing!) and graduated our students in Israel on the Mount of Olives! What an adventure 2007 was, that’s for sure! I returned in 2008 to direct the Ski + Snowboard DTS for 2 years. I was able to do an outreach in Jakarta, Indonesia where God moved powerfully. In 2009, I took a team of my own to a nation in the Middle East. I fell in love with that nation and hope to be able to minister there from time to time in the future.

In 2010, God very clearly had me “dock the ship” and take a whole year out (like a sabbatical year from ministry and leadership) and BE WITH HIM. This led me to move up to the North Island of New Zealand, to do a 3-month prayer and worship internship with Tauranga House of Prayer. It was during that time that God clearly spoke to give 2 years to becoming a part of the foundation of the Prayer and Missions convergence, and minister to Him in prayer full-time. I am still linked with YWAM, as it connects with the House of Prayer in ministry. I am spending my time and energy to pioneer day and night continual prayer in New Zealand, through the ministry of dynamic prayer, anointed worship ministry, study of the Word, teaching and preaching of the Word, and ministering to young people. God is awesome and greatly to be praised. I am overjoyed to be ministering to the Lord in this way, in this place.

Email me anytime if you want further details of the ongoing story.

Sincerely,

Alison

NAVIGATION:

• Go back to the previous chapter 5 (of 6): God Moves in Mysterious Ways

Chapter Five (of 6): God moves in mysterious ways

I was only going to be given a rental car for one day, until the car would be ready the next day, but I was set to go the very next morning to a 4 day Hearing God Course in Mississauga and I was needing to use my car the entire time. The manager looked at me for a split second and then said I could have the car rental for the full 4 days at no extra charge. Now THAT’S God! And then I mentioned that I wouldn’t be able to return the car until the end of the day on Monday since I had to head to work for a full shift that day, and so the Manager said that I could return it at the end of the day, instead of early morning. Wow! God was just paving the way for me. I was very grateful, to say the least.

Then I went off and got my rental car and headed off for this intense course on Hearing God. It was an amazing course. I learned a lot. But the coolest stuff happened when we were practicing prophetic stuff with other students. The woman who got me saw the words “Bird of Paradise” and “Snow” and she felt quite sheepish because it seemed so silly to her. But for me, it seemed SO significant, but I couldn’t quite interpret it at the moment. I mentioned these 2 words to some of the course leaders and some of the women I’d come with, and they all said it must mean something to do with traveling between Canada (snow) and a Tropical place (bird of paradise are flowers grown in tropical places), and that God was bringing me to a tropical place possibly. This started stirring up the YWAM desire with missions and so many people started mentioning the main YWAM base in Hawaii. One woman who did not even know about me and my YWAM desires, told me straight out she could see me at the main base in Hawaii with YWAM. Talk about what?!! So I left that weekend course with some renewed inspiration… but I went home and started asking everyone I knew what their interpretation of “Bird of Paradise” and ” Snow” meant… and I started getting a bit obsessive with this asking around. At one point about a week or so after I’d gotten the 2 words, I left my friend’s place and got in the car, and as I drove away, I kinda heard this inner voice say, “How many confirmations do you NEED, Ali? How many have you had to go off with YWAM?” and I realized I’d had about 30 or 40 (maybe that’s an exaggeration.. but it was a LOT), and then I heard, “And how many confirmations have you had to STAY in the Barrie area?” and I realized I had no confirmations to stay here. So a moment later, at the stoplight, I burst out and shrieked, “I’M GOING OFF WITH YWAM IN SEPTEMBER TO HAWAII ON THE MAIN BASE!” and this excitement burst out of me and I drove home sooooooo pumped! I’d finally made my decision. Boom, like that!

Once I got home, over the next few days, I had to work through a few issues… such as the fact that I still had wanted to go to Latin America on missions, but the Hawaii base went mainly to Asian countries on mission outreaches. So I had to just surrender these desires to the Lord. I sent off my application and a few weeks later, after much prayer and waiting, I got accepted into the September 2005 DTS in Kona, Hawaii! I was off to YWAM!

NAVIGATION:

• Continue to the final chapter 6 (of 6): The Final Leg
• Go back to the previous chapter 4 (of 6): Breakthrough in the midst of utter despair