The first three months of a DTS are known as the Lecture Phase. Your job was to absorb as much as possible over three months. A new speaker was brought from different nations to speak on a specific topic every week.

The First Week was on where the need was worldwide, taught by Andy Bird. He spoke a lot about the statistics: how many missionaries are out there, who still needs to be reached, Bible translations, and how to find people of peace. I had been raised in a Christian household where missionaries seemed like the ninjas of Christ, I knew there were few but this week recked me in ways I wasn’t expecting, but welcomed it with an open heart.

The Second Week was on the relationship between us and God. Peter Lewis came and spoke on Genesis and the garden: how much God desires us, and loves us as individuals. He spoke about Adam and Eve, why they were cast from the garden, and the consequence of sin being death. Revelation feels like such a small word to describe the ways I began to understand God’s word from just one chapter in the bible. That week something shifted in my heart where I once struggled to convince myself to open the word, I began to long read my bible because I now saw it as my letter from God.

The Third Week was on freedom, true freedom, and walking it out, Chloe and Derek Mac a couple who lead a missions program partnered with YWAM, Circuit Riders. Chloe discussed freedom from anxiety and depression walking into the call God has on your life. Derek spoke on walking in strength knowing your foundation being in the word and being armed by the word. It felt like training for soldiers in the military, and I felt God move into every room I had locked in my mind and those around me.

In the Fourth Week, we discussed the voice of God, and David Guava taught this. He spoke on the nature of God reading from the Old Testament where again and again we see God speak to so many people. “God desires to speak to us, do we desire to listen?” was the question asked that week that left me a mess, thinking of when the last time I had simply sat in his presence and waited for him to speak.

In the Fifth Week, we discussed the reality of missions, this was taught by Herbert, and I failed to write his last name. He spoke on the severity of what we are agreeing to when we say yes. The promise of trials of all kinds, of being hated, and refused. Of what it looks like to have a family in the missions field. Of the sacrifices you have to make, the costs that extend further than finances. Herbert was my favorite speaker.

In the Sixth Week, we talked about the Holy Spirit and who he is. This week was taught by Amy Ward, she most frequently repeated God is the Holy Spirit, the Holy Spirit is a person. She spoke on the baptism of the Holy Spirit and that it can manifest in tongues, but not speaking in tongues does not mean you have not been baptized in the holy spirit. Even with her saying this I begged God for my prayer language all week. I did not receive it, but God put me to rest that he would give it, only, not then.

The Seventh Week, I did not write any names, but I know we spoke about bringing Jesus into culture, not Western Christianity. I witnessed firsthand on my outreach what it looks like in West African culture to worship because it is very different but holds the same heart and Jesus holds it just as precious.

Our Eighth Week was on holiness and the fear of the Lord, taught by Gabriel. I don’t think anything I write could accurately depict what God did in my heart that week. I remember, Gabriel ended one of his lectures early one day and said, “I can’t teach what you haven’t experienced, tomorrow come two hours early to class I will be here and we are going to worship God without music.” I went. I sat in the back on the floor and spent two hours telling God who I knew him to be, at one point I ran out of Christian-ese words to speak and my words became like poetry, proclaiming everything I knew he’d done in my life but never professed. The time went by too fast.

Week number nine was outreach week, taught by ‘Coach Philip’. All week we ran through practicals for the counties we’d be ministering in. What a cold culture versus a warm culture looked like and how to honor each culture. A lot of open questions and answers, and it holds the most pages in my notes.

Our last week, week ten, was on Evangelism, Frenchie spoke all week, and he had been there every Friday teaching and taking us out to evangelize up to that point. All DTS we were training on getting out of comfort. Breaking the chain of passivity, and that week Frenchie and Christoph commissioned us to go.

The next week, I was in Africa.