How the Lord has Moved in my Life
I grew up in a Christian household and in a Southern Baptist Church. I never questioned whether God existed but I never really knew him either. I went through a really deep depression starting at the age of 17 that quickly took my will to live. I didn’t care about anything, I lost about all my friends because I was really bad at friendship. I was put on depression meds and prayed every night not to wake up the next day. Depression was a result of growing up and experiencing things but not having the tools to deal with the things that were happening to me in life. I didn’t know how to feel, think, or talk about things. One Tuesday night at 17 I was in my bed praying to God and I was angry. I was mad that He would create us even though He knew we would be miserable. I had an “Ecclesiastes—Under the Sun” mentality. I was there in my childhood bedroom calling God selfish and deeply hurting. The Lord kindly entered my bedroom and told me that every thing I just said, every hurtful reason I just listed, every reason why I was wounded was EXACTLY why He had to come to die for us. He said I was experiencing the fallen world without Him. In order to not feel this way, live this way, experience death, was to follow Him because without Him we cannot come alive. It was like a veil had lifted, like something shattered within me and my mindset completely changed. In that moment I told him if I wasn’t going to live for myself I was going to live for Him because nothing else mattered.
My Testimony
Wichita Falls, TX
(THE BEGINNING)
After graduating high school, I went to Midwestern State University. Shortly after moving, I receive a text from a childhood best friend asking whether or not I wanted to be a church intern. With no details and despite the distance of location, I simply responding “Yes”. She replied that she had given my information to a man who was a kids pastor that would shortly be reaching out to me. Proceeding this I receive a message from the Children’s Pastor at Grace church in Wichita Falls, TX to come for an interview to be a children’s church intern. At this meeting I find out that his wife drove 3 hours to my hometown to get her eyebrows done by a lady considered to be the best in the area that happened to be completely booked and she was willing to still go to get them done by her apprentice who happened to be my friend. Then after meeting this friend she invites her husband to join her for the follow up appointment where he asks her about her relationship to Jesus, how she became a church intern, she asked him where his church was and when he responded Wichita Falls, TX, she responded this may sound crazy but I actually know someone who would love to be your intern. Shortly after this yes to the Lord I worked serving in the children’s ministry at Grace church for 2 years, that opened doors to working at Christ Counseling Non-Profiit Mental Health Clinic for 2 years that lead me to therapy and changing my major to psychology. After this two year time period, the Lord told me to leave my church and join Redeemer Church of WFTX for faith of community, quit my job, and I was put in a situation where I had to move out of my apartment with no place to go. He told me to find out what it meant for Jesus to be my provider AND my provision. In this time of joining Redeemer and finishing my college classes I had 1 month to find a place to live so that I could graduate. DURING THIS TIME—I met the most amazing people who have changed my concepts on community and family and gave me an amazing idea of the Kingdom Family at the table of God.
Wichita Falls, TX
(THE DEPARTURE)
I met a girl named Maddie who I felt the Lord ask to fast for one week with me. On this fast, I prayed to Jesus that if she was who He had for me to live with to give her the desire and idea because I wanted someone to WANT to live with me. At the end of this week fast, Maddie asked me to live with her for the whole summer. Then one night at my new home I was spending the evening with the Lord and He convicted me that all paths that is not His path lead to destruction EVEN if they are good paths. He wants the BEST for us not just decent. I began a prayer that lasted 4 hours into the morning and repented for all the things I chose to plant or pursue without Him. I asked that he remove it all, till the entire soil to be prepared for something new to be planted that was FULLY his and his path only. As I fell asleep after there were no things left to say in my spirit the Lord spoke to my physical ears “It is done.” I jolted awake, looked around the room, and said “What did you just say?” never had heard the audible voice of God before. That exact morning just a few hours later I went to church at Redeemer WFTX and my roommate Maddie walked up to me after service and said “I have to introduce you to someone!” She walked me up to a woman and just plainly walked away. This woman looked at me, introduced herself as Cristina, and told me she has been asking people what their dreams are, then proceeded to ask me… “What is your dream?” I responded… “I want to teach art to children. I am in school for Psychology. I want to get my masters in family children mental clinical health and my specialization in art therapy. I want to see healing to the family unit and creation restored to children of God.” She then responded, “This may sound crazy but I worked for an organization called YWAM, have you heard of it?” I had heard of it but wasn’t very familiar. She explained the school she worked at and said.. “These kids have never had an art class before and we have actually been praying for a year for an art teacher to come to our school. You should come.” From that conversation I had decided and this was a door opened directly from God. Over the following weeks, God raised $30,000 and sent me across the Pacific Ocean by myself to Kailua-Kona, Hawaii to teach 10 grades and start an art program for this school. Finally 8 days into being in Hawaii I finished my last test and graduated from college!! It was also over this time span that the Lord healed me of my family related wounds, I watched my family members fall even more deeply in love with Jesus and entrusted each on of them to God.
Kailua-Kona, Hawaii
(Art Teacher)
In Hawaii, I lived at the Kailua-Kona YWAM base and worked at The Learning Center with a team of teachers ranging from Pre-school to Ninth grade. These teachers were all ages, all experiences, and all different walks of life. The program was structured for core classes such as Bible, Math, English, Social Studies, and Science. When I arrived there was no curriculum, no budget, no plan, no common core standards for art, and no one to help because they had never had an art program before. The team entrusted the Lord had called me and trusted me to build the art program. I built curriculum, structure, procedures, grading systems, and thought processes for grades Kindergarten to Ninth grade and then taught all of them what I knew, was honest where I didn't know and partnered with them to learn from God as the creator. It was the hardest and most challenging but most fulfilling and life changing experience I have ever had. I have watched the Lord work in so many ways but I have learned through this opportunity that my dreams are safe with the Lord, He ACTUALLY delights in me, He is first and foremost a creator, and He loves doing life with all His children of ALL ages, that there is NO baby Holy Spirit, and we are all children in the eyes of God. He has taught that He loves ABUNDANCE. That one drop of blood would have been enough for us all but He spilled in all for us. Im learning to sit in the chair of abundance He has prepared alongside the table. The door to the Renaissance DTS opened through the team I had the pleasure of working beside. Cristina, the woman of God who recruited me in Wichita Falls, is close family friends with the family that started the Pisa YWAM base and their child used to be at the Learning Center that I worked at. It was a beautiful connection that seemed so natural and supernatural at the same time. I have begun to learn that God really does hold the world in his hands still and that there are people deeply in love with Him scattered across it everywhere I go. The Kingdom of God is a majestic thing. My team and students prayed over me consistently and have commissioned me to embark on this next Gospel opportunity with YWAM Pisa. Over this span of time—I wastched my family and close friends grow in faith to Jesus, fall absolutely in love, and experience immense healing in their personal lives. God cares just as much and even more than I do about the people I love. I encourage you all to not only know of the Jesus I am following but to dare to fall in love with the one who loved you first, to know the God of faithfulness, abundance, the one who delights in you, the one who created you, knows you inside and out, died to have relationship so you can experience life and love that is perfect in HIM, and still wants your burdens and your cares. He is big, full, and waiting for you and asks for nothing but the authentic, full, and surrendered heart to have relationship with HIM.
Transitioning to DTS
After being at YWAM Kona (The University of the Nations), staring the art program at The Learning Center for Kindergarten-Ninth graders, I heard from the Lord. He told me that He was ready for me to dream with Him again. At first, this took me by surprise and I didn’t know what to think about it. I had spent so long doing what I thought God wanted me to do that I didn’t even realize that He didn’t just want me to do things for Him, but that He actually wants me to do things WITH Him. Dreams? Dreams are illogical, I thought. Dreams, as an artist, from my perspective at the time, weren’t practical. The only two dreams I had ever really had was to do things like, dance, sing, go to art school, go to Italy. Dreams that would never make enough money to survive, surely not truly live off of. I had been raised to work hard because that is what you do, you work hard for what you want, but when what I want is illogical to the world I was raised, “is it even worth it?”, was a phrase that begin to root in my life. A root that began to bring hopelessness and began to kill all of my dreams. A couple of my favorite quotes say, "Never give up on what you really want to do. The person with big dreams is more powerful than one with all the facts."
“Every child is an artist. The problem is how to remain an artist once we grow up.”
Psalm 126:1-2 says, "We were like those who dreamed. Our mouths were filled with laughter, our tongues with songs of joy."
When captives are freed, there is a substantive change in their mindsets. They are like men who dream, and because they are like men who dream, their mouths are filled with laughter and their tongues with songs of joy.
There is a direct relationship between those who live most free and those who dream most. Captivity not only steals our freedom but cripples our imagination. When the captives were released, they were not only freed from their oppressors but they were free to dream again.
The Lord was challenging me to dream with Him again. What a beautiful yet daunting challenge. So, I prayed about dreams I used to have but had let wither or that I had “logic-ed to death”. I had always wanted to go to art school and in high school I dreamed of going to Italy.
How did I end up doing a DTS then?
Well—I’m glad you asked. I was already sure that the Lord placed me in Kona Hawaii to start this art program for The Learning Center, and this is a special program in YWAM. This program allows people to come teach for one year with The Learning Center, and after one year of you want to continue to serve with YWAM, or teach, you have to do you DTS. This is the only program that allows you to join staff with YWAM or do any other schools with YWAM BEFORE doing a DTS. Without your DTS, you can only volunteer for a few weeks where people need help.
So in my logical head, I prayed about doing a DTS, really felt a yes, searched on the YWAM website for all the different programs and campuses offering an art focused DTS, and found one that spoke my spiritual language. The welcome page brought me to tears and knowing the Lord wanted me to dream with Him again but still nervous to make a wrong choice I asked Jesus to confirm through people who had no idea what I was thinking. Then, shortly after my students started projects on Italy, my Italian friend talked a lot about Italy, people were wearing Italian things, Italy seemed to be EVERYWHERE I looked.
So I brought the idea to Cristina, the woman who brought me to YWAM from Wichita Falls and she very excitedly agreed. She said that the family who founded the YWAM Pisa base is a close family to her and used to live in Kona at the Ships base. That their son used to be enrolled at The Learning Center and everyone on staff with us is very close to them. She said that I would absolutely love them and that base. Everything else seemed to fall into place fairly quickly. The finances for DTS came through in the following weeks after deciding to do this DTS, I was commissioned from Kona to go home for one month to spend time with my family and then before I knew it I was fully funded and on a plane to EUROPE!
CONTACT INFORMATION
EMAIL: skylaraveryperkins@gmail.com
JESUS LOVES YOU
