The September Discipleship Training School headed out on Saturday 29 October for a couple weeks away from The King’s Lodge. The TEAM that returned last Saturday was not the same GROUP of people to which we said good-bye two weeks prior.  Don’t get me wrong.  Ever since the beginning of this school, we’ve known that they are quality people, and that God was going to do amazing things in and through them. But until this time away, they have seemed somewhat reserved, only going as far as was asked of them, not really going for it.

When they left that Saturday, they were joining up with the ‘YWAM Trumpet Tour’, a tour of churches around England that had the purpose of raising the profile of Youth With a Mission in the local church. The idea was to give people in the Church a little taste of what YWAM stands for and what it is like. Each night for a week, our DTS would join in the meeting at a church, participating in the worship and listening to the teaching; sometimes one or another would give a testimony – a short statement of what God has been doing in their lives.  As the days went on, a comradery developed within the team that was so refreshing! People were looking after each other in a new way, praying for one another, helping each other out like never before.

At the end of that week, they moved on to East London, in the Tower Hamlets Borough, for a week of teaching and evangelism along with more than 200 other DTS trainees from around the UK. They were also joined by two groups representing the YWAM School of Evangelism – one from Carlisle, England, and another from Skien, Norway.

They had challenging teaching from people like Yan Nichols, Connie Taylor, and YWAM England leader Carl Tinnion each morning, and then in the afternoons and evenings, there were opportunities to go out into the community and practice what they had been taught.   These ranged from practical things like doing gardening and cleaning in local churches to full on walking-up-to-people-in-the-street evangelism. Many people had life-giving conversations with people, and the Name of Jesus was lifted up in East London!

For our team, the result was that there was a bond formed between them that will not easily be broken. They spent loads of time together on the tour sharing life and stories, really getting to know each other at a deep level, and learning to work and minister together. In a few months, they will finish the Lecture Phase of the school and move into the Outreach Phase. With the new changes and the experiences they have just shared together, that should not present much of a challenge!