DTS Week three & four
Time has been flying by so fast!
I have been processing everything we have learned these last few weeks and I just have been feeling so blessed to have this opportunity to do nothing but go after God for six months straight. Week three was about learning the full story of God through the bible and week four was about the holy spirit so here is a recap of everything I learned!
Week three really changed the way I view the bible. Before coming to DTS I was always so confused honestly how to read the bible and where to even start. The speaker for week three went so in depth with the bible and how it really applies to the life we are living today. The day that spoke to me the most was when our speaker broke down the book of Genesis. I did not realize the depth of Genesis (and all of the other books of the bible) and the life lessons that can be learned from it. One of my favorite things the speaker said this week was “the enemy calls you by your sin, but God calls you by name”.
There are so many meaningful things I took away from week three that helped me develop a new understanding of what the purpose of the bible really is. This week set my heart on fire for scripture, something that I did not expect to happen. I get so excited learning the history and purpose of each book, then thinking about how it applies to my life. Some of my favorite free time here is sitting with one of my friends on the deck and just reading/dissecting scripture. It has honestly felt like I unlocked a whole new door to learning about God and realizing how personal He is. In a few weeks I will be teaching the book of Phillipians to a small group (big shout out to the bible project on youtube, it has been a game changer!)
I’m also going to be studying the book of Ephesians with my outreach team!
Our lecture topic for week four was on the Holy Spirit and Spiritual Gifts.
I first want to talk about the speaker this week. She was so vulnerable and real from the very first day of teaching. She shared her whole testimony and it was very eye opening for me because I actually related a lot to it which made me realize that I am not alone with what I was struggling with. After sharing her testimony she told us that the power of our story can help point others to Jesus and I am starting to see how my story can do just that.
To be completely honest I wasn’t really sure who or what the Holy Spirit was. But after this week I definitely have a way better understanding of the Holy Spirit and in what ways He works. I can now see how the Holy Spirit is present in my life and that I can have a relationship with Him! I understand the Holy Spirit's role in the trinity and what the purpose of the trinity is. Something that clicked for me is how the Holy Spirit is in me and how we are partnering with what the Holy Spirit is doing.
Another thing we learned about was our spiritual gifts which were very insightful! We learned that no spiritual gift is better than the other and that the purpose of these gifts is to put God's glory on display while serving others in love. My top gift is mercy, which is to feel empathy and care for others who are hurting in any way. This was really significant for me because these past couple of years I feel like I haven’t been merciful with myself or others. I really had hardened my heart and become numb to my emotions. So to have that be my top gift gave me a lot of hope that week because that is the person who I know God created me to be. This is something God has really been working on in my heart because each day I can feel my heart becoming more tender like how I know it used to be.
A couple of the biggest takeaways from these weeks was that fact that God created me! So He knows my heart and the person I am slowly but surely becoming.
