Hello friends and family,
I apologize for not updating you in so long. Something I really need to work on is my organization and keeping on task with things like this. I will try to update you at least once more before I get back to the States.
A lot has happened since I last updated you about the giving day. God has done a lot of awesome work both in my own personal walk as well as in the school as a whole. The school really continued to bond and grow in the Lord. We had a week on the Father heart of God, Missions, Biblical Worldview, Biblical Standards, Spiritual Warfare, and the Cost of Discipleship. God really spoke to me through these lectures. The two main lectures I really felt God speak to me was during the Father Heart of God week and Spiritual Warfare week. During Father Heart of God, I really learned how to trust God as my Father and to believe something He has been trying to teach me since early on in the lecture phase of DTS, that He is big enough and good enough to follow. God really began to show me during the Father Heart of God week that as Christians, we are not orphans. We very often get into an orphan mindset thinking we are fatherless and live and act like it. How God really spoke this to me was through another student on base, Angwar, and School of Biblical Studies(SBS) student from India. I went out one night to pray and Angwar and another student came up and started visiting with me. As Angwar prayed, one part of His prayer stuck out to me. He prayed "would Travis know that he is loved by you without doing anything. That the you love Him simply because he is your child." It was something I had believed as a Christian but it really hit home at this point. My efforts and works and all of the good things I have done don't make me any closer to you or a better disciple, that just as our fathers on earth show us love simply because we are their children, He delights to do the same to those who are His.
The theme in almost all I have learned this year is the bigness and goodness of God. My other big learning experience came through Spiritual Warfare week. Not one thing about spiritual warfare week stuck out so much during the week, but God really used the week to show me how big He really is. There is a verse in Ephesians says that people who believe in Him and know "the immeasurable greatness of His power toward us who believe." God really has used that teaching among other things to really take fear away and grow my relationship with Him and to believe how big He really is.
Ministry in Taiwan went pretty well as well. We didn't necessarily see any crazy things happen but I had some really good conversations with people there, some with Taiwanese believers encouraging them and helping them get plugged into places their faith might be able to grow as well as with people who are not believers in Jesus but are interested. It was a really awesome thing to just be able to invest in a country and in the kingdom of God in a real way. About a week before we left we celebrated Thanksgiving as a base and then lecture phase ended at the end of November.
We left on outreach for Siliguri, India on December 1. Our first week we spent time every day with a youth group only a few minute drive away from our house and were able to invest in believers and people who were not believers there and see God work in the hearts of everyone from the leaders to the students. Our time in India has mostly consisted of team building and teaching as well as spending time with each other and investing in our team. God has really worked on my heart for teaching and is really giving me a comfort with speaking in front of groups about who He is and what He has me speaking and taking away almost all of my anxiety of public speaking. Personally in my walk with Him, He continues to show me how big and how good He is.
The differences between Taiwan and India are probably bigger than the difference between The U.S. and Taiwan. Taiwan is very western in many ways. Taiwan has a lot of western food chains, good roads, and busy people walking around with cell phones. India has a lot of roadside shops and quite frankly very dirty. If it were clean it would be a beautiful country, the tea gardens are everywhere and hint at the beauty the country could have, but garbage everywhere keeps it from becoming that.
India really has a lot of spiritual need, and although there are some good ministries happening, there are still over a billion people who do not know Christ and the forgiveness for sin He brings. Financial needs are big here, but so are teaching, and really just care for people, especially kids. India is really a country that is in desperate need of Jesus.
Specific prayer requests would be for perseverance. It's easy to get to this point and think that we only have a week left until Taiwan and a month until we go home, so prayer that we would look to Jesus for our help and that we would not slowing down because we are almost done.
Personally I could use prayer for just seeing that Jesus is enough in all situations. Sorry I'm not more specific, but really just in all areas what I need is to look to Him and see His sufficiency.
Again, I thank you all for being patient in waiting and just for your involvement in my life. I am so thankful for your support of me in every way you give it and am excited to see you when I come back to the States.
Travis
2 Corinthians 5:21
I apologize for not updating you in so long. Something I really need to work on is my organization and keeping on task with things like this. I will try to update you at least once more before I get back to the States.
A lot has happened since I last updated you about the giving day. God has done a lot of awesome work both in my own personal walk as well as in the school as a whole. The school really continued to bond and grow in the Lord. We had a week on the Father heart of God, Missions, Biblical Worldview, Biblical Standards, Spiritual Warfare, and the Cost of Discipleship. God really spoke to me through these lectures. The two main lectures I really felt God speak to me was during the Father Heart of God week and Spiritual Warfare week. During Father Heart of God, I really learned how to trust God as my Father and to believe something He has been trying to teach me since early on in the lecture phase of DTS, that He is big enough and good enough to follow. God really began to show me during the Father Heart of God week that as Christians, we are not orphans. We very often get into an orphan mindset thinking we are fatherless and live and act like it. How God really spoke this to me was through another student on base, Angwar, and School of Biblical Studies(SBS) student from India. I went out one night to pray and Angwar and another student came up and started visiting with me. As Angwar prayed, one part of His prayer stuck out to me. He prayed "would Travis know that he is loved by you without doing anything. That the you love Him simply because he is your child." It was something I had believed as a Christian but it really hit home at this point. My efforts and works and all of the good things I have done don't make me any closer to you or a better disciple, that just as our fathers on earth show us love simply because we are their children, He delights to do the same to those who are His.
The theme in almost all I have learned this year is the bigness and goodness of God. My other big learning experience came through Spiritual Warfare week. Not one thing about spiritual warfare week stuck out so much during the week, but God really used the week to show me how big He really is. There is a verse in Ephesians says that people who believe in Him and know "the immeasurable greatness of His power toward us who believe." God really has used that teaching among other things to really take fear away and grow my relationship with Him and to believe how big He really is.
Ministry in Taiwan went pretty well as well. We didn't necessarily see any crazy things happen but I had some really good conversations with people there, some with Taiwanese believers encouraging them and helping them get plugged into places their faith might be able to grow as well as with people who are not believers in Jesus but are interested. It was a really awesome thing to just be able to invest in a country and in the kingdom of God in a real way. About a week before we left we celebrated Thanksgiving as a base and then lecture phase ended at the end of November.
We left on outreach for Siliguri, India on December 1. Our first week we spent time every day with a youth group only a few minute drive away from our house and were able to invest in believers and people who were not believers there and see God work in the hearts of everyone from the leaders to the students. Our time in India has mostly consisted of team building and teaching as well as spending time with each other and investing in our team. God has really worked on my heart for teaching and is really giving me a comfort with speaking in front of groups about who He is and what He has me speaking and taking away almost all of my anxiety of public speaking. Personally in my walk with Him, He continues to show me how big and how good He is.
The differences between Taiwan and India are probably bigger than the difference between The U.S. and Taiwan. Taiwan is very western in many ways. Taiwan has a lot of western food chains, good roads, and busy people walking around with cell phones. India has a lot of roadside shops and quite frankly very dirty. If it were clean it would be a beautiful country, the tea gardens are everywhere and hint at the beauty the country could have, but garbage everywhere keeps it from becoming that.
India really has a lot of spiritual need, and although there are some good ministries happening, there are still over a billion people who do not know Christ and the forgiveness for sin He brings. Financial needs are big here, but so are teaching, and really just care for people, especially kids. India is really a country that is in desperate need of Jesus.
Specific prayer requests would be for perseverance. It's easy to get to this point and think that we only have a week left until Taiwan and a month until we go home, so prayer that we would look to Jesus for our help and that we would not slowing down because we are almost done.
Personally I could use prayer for just seeing that Jesus is enough in all situations. Sorry I'm not more specific, but really just in all areas what I need is to look to Him and see His sufficiency.
Again, I thank you all for being patient in waiting and just for your involvement in my life. I am so thankful for your support of me in every way you give it and am excited to see you when I come back to the States.
Travis
2 Corinthians 5:21
