Edinburgh

I can’t believe that it has been a month since I last posted an update on here! When I got back from Edinburgh, I had so much to share that I didn’t know where to start. And so much to process that I hadn’t even finished thinking through that I didn’t know what to share!
Can I just say how incredible blessed I am to be here in Paisley, Scotland. I live in Scotland is such a wonderful thing to say and wake up to!
Let me do this update on Edinburgh! It was amazing! A crazy, wonderful two weeks, filled with tons of walking, learning, praying, stretching, spiritual “war- faring”, cooking, fellowshipping, exploring, and creating!
As I had mentioned previous, we (my DTS team and a few other staff members of the house) went to Edinburgh, which is about an hour’s drive from the house, to serve at Shine which is an outreach that works to be involved within the “Fringe” Festival, the world’s largest performing arts festival. I will start off that I absolutely love Edinburgh (pronounced: Edin-bur-ougha, but of course run-together). Beautiful city, the history, the architecture, the creativity, the set-up, the people, the life, the buildings, the rhythm of everyone/everything, is amazing. There is such life and light there, as well as darkness and heaviness. We definitely encountered some spiritual warfare, especially the first week that we were there. Our DTS was there to be apart of Shine, and we were the cook team and as well as the Media team.
Shine, is a two outreach that takes during the Fringe Festival (the World's Largest Arts Festival) and Shine is a way to bring in several Christian Artist from all over the world and perform within the Fringe Festival and do special outreach events and also they run a kids performing arts camp. YWAM Edinburgh started this years ago, they try and get all of YWAM Scotland to be involved, but so far it is just our Paisley base that participates. Some of the artist this year that came was a band called Anchor of Hope that were a Screamo/heavy metalish Christian band from Florida and they are on tour with a ministry that helps raise awareness of Human Trafficking, they were they the first full week. Then we had a team from South Africa that were a dance and singing group, phenomenal dancers, they didn't arrive until the second week. Then we had a team from 24-7 house of Prayer from Portland, Washington the last full week where they were running a room for 24-7 prayer for the city and Shine and Fringe Festival. There was the band Trelese, they are the worship band for Amy and Spencer's church in Kansas City....they were my favorite! They would of course lead worship for us sometimes, but then when they were "Busking" or performing in the clubs/pubs they were more of a easy rock/listening band with fun and funky songs to dance to. I loved them because of how non-cheesy they were. They were talented artists who happened to be Christians! They would easily have a group of 100-200 people watching and listening when they were "busking". They would interact with audience, they formed friendships, they partnered with some of the other "buskers" that were performing before or after them, they made cookies and handed them out while they were playing. The presence of God was heavily upon them and I loved watching them and learning oh so much from them! That you can actually have quality in your art and be a Christian and not be oober-preachy or showy about it. Just live it.
Well, we helped feed all these teams as well as the staff of Shine so because of the staggering of people coming and going we would have about 50 people max at a time, but I think it was about 100 people or so that were involved in these last two weeks with Shine.
Cooking went well, it was a bit crazy at times because our sleeping/living space was the universal meeting area for everyone! The kitchen and the big open space were connected and people would come with their stuff and practice there or just hang out there...which was great I loved it, but sometimes a bit overwhelming with all the noise at times. When we weren't on cook team or in the kitchen we were doing media stuff. Which this was the first year that they had a media team so it was a huge learning curve on everyone’s end of things, but the fact that it was the first year, I think we did great! We got some great footage that Raj, is going to be working on as well as photos and some of us made some videos that we posted...one that Kelsey and I made with a few of the others..."what's your beat?" and it was fun! Challenging. Here is the link for you to watch some of these videos...and yes there is one on there that is of me crying like a baby...lol. http://www.youtube.com/user/ShineConnect#p/u/3/H4gGwloL12E. These will be used for promos and stuff for Shine.
During these two weeks, I learned a lot about myself and the time there really helped d my DTS team and helped to understand one another better and taught us ways on how we can function as a healthy team! God taught me a lot, but two basic things were this: Make the most of every opportunity and to be truly content in whatever the circumstance…..by me saying that He has taught me these lesson does not mean that I ignorantly think that I have them mastered, but to say that I was always aware we needed to have this, but He has revealed it to me in a different way and it is something that I am praying into and seeking it in my mind and heart-set.