The Big MOVE! Help Us Get There!

Moving To Work with YWAM Salem, OR

          For a lot of you this update is a long time coming, because admittedly I’m not the best communicator when it comes to long distance. We do have a family blog that has mostly been used for work related updates for our friends, family and supporters. Facebook has been the main way I’ve been able to keep in touch with many of you, which I’m so grateful for, especially when there has literally been an ocean between us!
          For a quick recap, my wife Bora and I have been working with Youth With A Mission (YWAM) for about 10 years. We both have a strong calling on our lives for discipleship and for equipping young people with the tools they need to go into all nations and make disciples and worshipers of Jesus. As a family we have adopted YWAM’s mission statement, to know God and to make Him known. We believe that discipleship is the calling of every Christian, regardless of the many cultural or theological differences that exist today in the global church.  Youth With A Mission is a global movement of Christians from many cultures, age groups, and Christian traditions dedicated to serving Jesus throughout the world. YWAM is made up of 18,000 full-time volunteer staff and has over 1,100 global operations in 180 countries.


^19 [a]Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, ²⁰ teaching them to observe all that I commanded you; and lo, I am with you ^[b]always, even to the end of the age.”  Matthew 28:19-20  NASB

            An oldie but a goodie, I think Jesus said it best, making the Father’s desire for deeper relationship through discipleship training clear, and further equipping His church just days later when He sent His Spirit at Pentecost.
YWAM’s University of the Nations is unique in that its learning structure is modular and community centered, with its core course being the Discipleship Training School.(DTS) Rather than take several different courses at once, a typical 12 credit course runs for three months with a three month outreach following. Students live in community as they study a single subject each week, and immediately put into practice what they’ve learned on outreach.
            So why discipleship schools? Paul wrote to the church in Ephesus about the importance of discipleship as a role that all believer’s shared.
^“11 And He gave some as apostles, and some as prophets, and some as evangelists, and some as pastors and teachers, ¹² for the equipping of the ^[d]saints for the work of service, to the building up of the body of Christ;”    Ephesians 4:11-12  NASB
Notice that Paul didn’t say that it was the pastor’s job to equip the saints, or the missionary, but he listed several different gifts at work today in the church, we are all included in verse eleven. Verse twelve also mentions equipping saints(that’s the church)…for service. No one is excluded. Disciples make disciples, and the way we live our lives, the way we interact with our coworkers, lead our families, we are making disciples. Our calling is to make disciples in the likeness of Jesus, disciples who will make disciples.
                Our family has been living by faith for about 10 years in the area of finances. One of YWAM’s core values is faith for finances. Of their 18,000 staff there are no salaries paid, not even for their founders Loren and Darlene Cunningham. We live off of the gracious and sacrificial gifts of our friends and family. We have a decade of awesome testimonies of God’s faithfulness for our finances, and in this season we’re needing to increase our monthly support.
                One HUGE praise report is that we’ve just this month reached our target is a minimum of $1700 a month! Our minimum was raised from $1500 to $1700 when we were informed that we needed to find off campus housing.  All of our essentials are now covered, our lodging, food, utilities, and vehicle expenses. We are hoping to reach $2000 monthly so that we can afford to accompany teams on regular outreaches as budgeting our eventual trip to Korea which is overdue.(Bora hasn’t been home in 3 years, and little Jinha has never met his Grandparents there!)  We are extending an invitation to our friends and family to partner with us on a monthly basis tohelp us raise the remaining $300 to meet this goal.
                Our second and more urgent need is for one time gifts over the next couple of weeks as we are finalizing our moving plans. We’ll be driving cross country all the way from Maine to Oregon, visiting many YWAM bases, friends and family along the way to keep costs down. We have about $1000 saved for this move, my projected budget looks to be around $2000. In addition to this big moving expense we're going to have to furnish a new apartment and also pay a security deposit that is generally one full months rent. These are the specific needs that we're asking for help with this summer as we transition or family to YWAM Salem.
             Would you prayerfully consider supporting our family financially? Would you consider taking our needs to your church, your home groups and your prayer networks?  We welcome any and all questions you might have regarding our work and our needs. Please connect with us on Facebook if we aren’t already linked, and don’t forget to follow us on our journey at thewillsontribe.blogspot.com.
                If you’ve made it this far, thank you for reading! We are preparing for a long, 60+ hour drive from coast to coast in just 12 days! There's a lot still to organize and all of the "good byes" will be difficult as we've really laid down our roots deep in Maine this last trip. We're in the process of updating our family prayer card. If you would like one for your fridge or your Bible please send me your information and we’ll send you one!

Lot’s of Love,
Noah, Bora, Jubilee (3 ½) and Jin Ha (11 months)

noahlovesjesus@gmail.com (email and paypal)
www.thewillsontribe.blogspot.com

Two Year Recap: Maine Timeline

Summer 2012

          We left Kona to visit our friends and family in Maine. It was a refreshing time to reconnect with folks and to build some new networks. Bora and I also felt a strong and new leading from the Lord for myself(Noah) to get more training. 

                   

Fall 2012

       After visiting Maine we returned to support the School of Worship in Kona. We were now staffing along a lot of amazing people who had just finished the previous SOW, and it was exciting to work with a fresh batch of worship leaders!  This quarter would wrap up our two years spent in Kona, where we had made so many wonderful memories and friends, and where Jubilee was born. 

         

2013 Winter/Spring/Summer 

The transition to living in Maine was made easier because of the wonderful support of family and friends. We remembered God’s leading for training, so I immediately began looking for work while I shopped around for a Bible College. It took over three months just to find part time retail work, but we were never in need of anything because God is always good. We plugged into a local church plant started by some good friends, as well as the occasional drum gig at nearby churches. Being in foreign missions you tend to make a lot of different relationships at a lot of different churches, and I had created a monster trying to divide my time between as many as three different churches a month! Things eventually slowed down and we became more involved in a small group at Redemption Hill.

2013 Summer/Fall

          God had opened the doors for me to study at New England Bible College, with hopes to transfer credits into the University of the Nations. This was such a good experience for me, as short as it ended up being. Our son Jinha was born the week classes started, which made for a perfect storm of business and joy. It was a challenging time of growth and work, while also a precious time of welcoming Jinha into the world!

2014 Winter/Spring to now

          After an eventful and busy end to 2013, things came to a quick halt. Over the course of 3 1/2 weeks I totaled my car, lost my job, and had to take a break from studying. Thankfully loss and frustration wasn't what marked these cold early months of 2014, but encouragement! We got to assist the first of two YWAM teams sent to be sent to Lewiston this year in January. They managed to pick one of the coldest weeks in Maine's history to visit, and that didn't stop them from sending the second team in June! It was so refreshing to spend time with our friends from Nashville. This first half of the year has also formed our next initiative with YWAM, working with a Korean DTS in Salem. God is so good to our family, Jinha is so loud and smiley and awesome....Jubilee is gorgeous, and so clever and so kind. Bora and I have enjoyed leading worship in local churches more and more lately. God get's us through difficulties, is patient and full of grace when we fail, and loves us unconditionally.

Moving Our Family to Salem, OR

Hello friends and family,

       Jinha is such an easy going guy, sometimes I forget he’s there because he behaves so well… haven’t forgotten him anywhere, yet though.  :)  Jubilee is all about princesses now...we tried hard to shield her from Disney Princesses but we failed. Disney’s marketing geniuses are a forced to be reckoned with. So far she’s only dressed Jinha up as a princess once that I’m aware of.  

• Maine Happenings

We’re excited to be re-joining our family of YWAM while I chisel away at studying. The short time I was at New England Bible College felt like an appetizer that really wet my appetite for studying the Word and awoke a passion for knowledge of God. I’m excited to cap off a two year degree through YWAM, and will continue to pray about how to develop that into a bachelors down the road.

Here in Maine we've really been so blessed to be a part of a church plant of some of our dearest friends with Redemption Hill Community. Bora and I have really been fortunate to work with some fantastic worship leaders and musicians from this church and will miss them dearly. We’ve been part of a smaller home group called a Missional Community that as of late has moved into our apartment for weekly gatherings. It’s been really essential for Bora and I to journey so closely to several families and individuals from our MC. It’s been a second family and we have really been blessed by the fellowship and the exhortation that goes on in our church family. Together we live life as a family of missional servants. Back in January during the coldest week of the year our church hosted a DTS outreach from Nashville. Outreach teams from out of state always bring fresh excitement and enthusiasm, I know our church and the Root Cellar ministry were really blessed by their coming.

My families’ ministry of Hope House that my parents founded has seen some really awesome fruit and relationships formed both with local community businesses and even with neighbors. This past Christmas Hope House distributed large gift boxes for 145 families that requested help for holiday gifts this year. It was a blessing to have a small part in arranging the boxes. It’s also been fun to see my parent’s vision for an international community garden realized. Over twenty 8’x4’ plots have been tilled and last week Jubilee and I were planting veggies alongside local Mainers, Somali and Congolese. It was a blast!

• Moving to Salem, OR 

After skyping with YWAM Salem and praying with Bora for the past couple of months we are entering into a two year commitment with YWAM Salem, OR! Our roles will be in the area of discipleship training, worship and translation. We’ll be working with their Korean Discipleship Training School starting this September, Bora’s great translating skills will be of much help for the different guest speakers and corporate gatherings on campus. I will also be serving as staff while also continuing towards a degree part-time, currently enrolled in a two year Associates of Biblical Studies with the University of the Nations. In Salem they have an excellent Chronological Bible Core Course which I’d really love to take next year,  in the off quarters I’ll be studying online.
YWAM Salem was founded over 35 years ago and currently has three active Discipleship Training Schools running. (DTS, Korean DTS and Engage DTS /social justice focus/) Salem has an outreach focus on nations including Russia, India, China, Thailand, Myanmar, Sudan, Uganda, Rwanda, Morocco and Egypt. This is in addition to their regular local outreach into Oregon, their on-site public ropes course, and Mission Adventures that mobilizes and equips teens for short term missions.   In addition to the DTS this location is an invaluable training center of the University if the Nations, offering about half a dozen secondary courses that include Biblical training, ESL and leadership training.
 

"From the first Discipleship Training School (DTS) pioneered in Sept. of 1978, we have seen remarkable growth, development of ministries, and many voluntary full-time workers who have been trained, equipped, and sent out. We have sent out teams to over sixty countries, resulting in over twenty new ministries being pioneered world-wide.  From its very beginning, God has called YWAM Salem to be a training and sending base, which continues to be what we do best. Our desire as a base is to see, not just a “select few” involved in missions, but a vast array of people. We have about 80 full-time staff and 5 volunteers at any given time. For a large part of the year, we run the NIKO program and Ropes Course Training. The Mobile Team travels to churches, schools, special events, and universities both in America and abroad sharing our passion for world missions. Most of our energy pours into running high quality schools, focusing on equipping and then releasing people into the nations."        

            Taken from their website http://www.ywamsalem.org/about-ywam-salem/

  We are honored and feel greatly privileged to be joining this community of missionaries for the next couple of years. We are excited to exercise our abilities and talents while we continue to learn and grow in a community who's core values are evangelism, training and mercy ministries. Please continue to pray for the Holy Spirit's leading of our family. Please consider taking our needs to your own church body and also please consider financially supporting us yourself!

Our family needs to have $1500 committed monthly support before joining as staff in September. We currently have 1/3 of what we need. Our extended stay in Maine meant that some past supporters were released and some discontinued in order to support other ministries with more immediate needs. Now we'll be asking individuals and churches again to begin supporting us monthly.

Our start up costs for this transition will be substantial since we'll be driving our car all the way across the country from Maine to Oregon. One time financial gifts of any size historically have been crucial for our family.

Please click here for information on how you can make a tax-deductible financial gift to our family.(tax receipts sent by request)

Update from Lewiston, Maine

             It’s been a really long time since I last updated, so before a whole year passes I decided I  better update our friends and family on what we’re up to as a family. As I write this I’m balancing a laptop on my knee with a 3 year old falling asleep on my chest…another failed attempt at toddler bed training! I’m too much of a sucker to father a gorgeous little girl, she’s gonna play me like a fiddle and get whatever she wants when she’s older. J

             We left Kona back on Christmas Eve 2012, heading for the unknown in Maine. I had a hunch that I’d study at New England Bible College, but wasn't sure about the details of where we’d live, where I’d work, where to call ‘church’. Church was the hardest decision, since the church that had commissioned me 7 years ago had now given birth to two really healthy church plants, each plant including more and more of my friends and family, the body that makes up the church.  With the exception of filling in on drums every so often at East Auburn Baptist, we've naturally gravitated towards Redemption Hill since it was founded by some of our best friends. We still make visits to several churches where we have friends and relationship, you tend to make a lot of connections when you spend 7 years campaigning for missions.  I still consider myself a member of EABC, and our fiery friends at Kingdom Life in Oakland/Waterville, but Redemption Hill is where we’re called to serve and plug in regularly. I’m such a church floozy ha ha.

                We came home right when a local factory closed, releasing 90 jobless people into the local job market, and actively applied for nearly 4 months until I was offered a part time supervisor job at the local Staples office supply store. I know I’m so blessed to have any work at all, and I’m even more grateful to have a n employer that works around my school schedule and (at the time) wife’s pregnancy.  Oh yeah, we had a kid, did I forget to mention that?

                Jinha was born….sometime in August….I don’t know.  The 31^st maybe? Were there only 30 days in August this year? Anyway he was born and he smiles more than any baby I’ve ever seen! He must think his name is Jubilee by the way he smiles all the time! He’s also chubby, which is something I prayed for. I really wanted a baby with chubby cheeks and God was faithful.  His name means ‘Truth of God’, and we know that his life will be a testament of the Gospel of Jesus, the truth of salvation for mankind.  He’s so handsome, he’s a tiny Asian Noah. He’s way bigger than Jubilee was at his age, which is good. He’ll need to help me restrain Jubilee’s boyfriends into the chair as I prep the guy for my lie detector test.

                Jubilee is three as of a few days ago. She is growing more and more beautiful, which is something that scientists assured us wasn't’ possible anymore. She is outgoing, loves her cousins and friends at RH, and loves to sing and dance. She also knows how to unlock my smartphone and load a cartoon on Netflix, which is a little scary. She is especially clingy after Jinha arrived, but she already says “I love you” to Jinha and a couple weeks ago finally gave him a kiss

Jubilee Pic

                I’m now a part time student at New England Bible College. It is so faith building and life giving for me. I had a spell of about 8 months of some of the driest and hardest personal devotions  up until I started. I think it was part re-entry, part spiritual warfare, part poor bible study habits. The courses I’m enrolled in are teaching me how to better understand the Word of God and are equipping me with tools that will be invaluable for my future, be it in full time ministry or just in my personal journey to know God more and make Him known.  I’ve received fresh eyes and enthusiasm for the scriptures and I’m able to sit at the feet of some outstanding men and women of God that serve as professors and staff at NEBC,  Finding out I’d need to pay out of pocket for my tuition, I’ve placed that charge into the Lord’s hands and He’s now provided for my first semester %100 from amazing and even some anonymous gifts . God is always good, and he can always be trusted.

                Our plan currently is simple. Learn to be satisfied  and full of thanksgiving with what we have, learn to grow as  a family in the Lord, and keep preparing by being faithful with what He’s told us to do, which is “College”. I feel a draw to help the University of the Nations continue to develop it’s Worship program. I want to see the flame that is growing in Asia keep growing and spreading, and to see communities built around worship and prayer developed and encouraged. I want that same thing for my home state of Maine! Thank you God for your grace and your Spirit! You are doing amazing things in some of the darkest places on the earth! Maine needs faith imported, needs visiting teams and long term families with a vision to see New England revived. Maine needs your prayers.  Feel free to hit us up if you want to come and visit, we’ll find a place for you!

There and Back Again

           We’re now in our FINAL WEEK of the 2012 Elevate School of Worship! WHAT!? Where did the last few months go? At the same time I can recognize so much kingdom activity. In the students I’ve seen huge leaps of faith in their character, passion for the Lord and for many even stepping out in faith to pioneer a new 9 month internship! For my team I see a new dream team. I thought last year was a dream team…we had so many seasoned leaders and I felt like the rookie among pros. This years’ staff was half made up of student participants from last year. You wouldn't think that by the fantastic way these guys have carried out their responsibilities and displayed matured leadership well beyond their years. 

             It’s been such a good quarter to run with these guys and not the least of which our school leader Daniel Lehmann who has discipled me and invested so much into me. I’ve been able to grow such much as a leader, as a worshiper or Jesus, as a musician and as a son. It’s really neat to look back at all of the leadership God has put over you and to begin recognizing the different anointing that they carry and how those giftings have been imparted down to you. During the Olympics 4 years ago I was trained by Julie in management, communication and in relying on the Lord to open doors that logic might declare as locked shut. How valuable these giftings would prove to be when staffing for two years in Kona, a community of visionaries and pioneers for kingdom works. It’s in Kona that I've learned the importance of intimacy with the Lord, community built around His presence, and the joys of being a family in ministry together. Maine needs to raise up Daniel Lehmanns, Andy Byrds, Kevin Norris’  and Loren Cunninghams …in Kona you can find them in each classroom and department. Being able to glean off of these leaders has had a huge impact on my private life, my family life and my ministry life. I don’t yet know just how blessed I am and how crucial these past two years has been for my development as the man God has made me to be and the destiny I’m daily walking into.

                 It is with joy and hopeful anticipation that our family will be returning home to Maine in the next couple of weeks! We will be looking for work as well as a vehicle. Bora will continue being the amazing mother that she is while partly pursuing translation work. I will be looking into taking some courses at CMCC or a local bible college as we are praying for direction for furthering my education to prepare us for our long-term ministry to Asia. Moving is expensive, and while we’re leaving most of the stuff that seems to pile up after 2 years, many of Jubilee’s things and our ministry tools like my drum equipment need to be shipped. If anyone would like to make a one-time gift to help towards the postage and our travel expenses you’d be a huge blessing to us right now J

               We love and appreciate all of our friends and family who have been following our journey and want to wish everyone a Merry Christmas from the Willsons!!

Psalms 150:5 - "praise him with the clash of cymbals, praise him with resounding cymbals"

  

            Man, in several days my daughter will be 2 years old! It’s bittersweet…she’ll officially be a toddler and no longer a baby.  At the same time we’re celebrating nearly two full years of working at the University of the Nations in Kona, Hawaii. The Elevate School of Worship is in full swing with us now 6 weeks into the lecture phase.  We have 24 amazing students this quarter and we’re getting wrecked by deeper revelations of who God is every week!

            This week the students will perform their own worship songs they've been writing at an open mic style event at the campus’ Banyan tree Café.  Open mic nights are always a lot of fun for the whole campus, and with a whole night of all original worship we’re expecting a really awesome evening where God will be honored and revered above all else.

 

           Also this upcoming weekend on November 18th we’ll have “Worship Jesus Together” at Waikoloa Baptist Church. Several Big Island churches are coming together for a night of thanksgiving and worship through music and scripture reading in different languages. A few of us School of Worship staff have been asked to help with music and I’m so excited to be a part of more events in the local community!  

           Besides the regular lecture times in our school, I've been playing drums for several corporate worship sets.  Monday nights we have “Ministry Night” that is 2+ hours of ministering to the heart of the Father. The amazing thing is that often when ministering to the Lord, He ministers to us! The most dynamic expressions of Joy, healing, repentance and deep reverence have come when the Lord has poured out His Spirit at these events. Wednesdays from 1-3pm our SOW has been leading out in worship and intercession times focusing on the island of Hawaii. Thursdays from 1-3pm we have been focusing on the arts and entertainment spheres of society. Drums are an important part of intercessory prayer. The rhythm sets the pace for the room. It’s easier to fervently pray out loud when there’s a driving, urgent beat in the background J In these sets I've been learning to ask God for His “heartbeat” and to put that to song. There’s a reason drums have been present since the earliest recorded wars throughout history…because they drive spiritual warfare. !

              Bora has lately need the go-to-gal for translation needs. We have over 150 Korean students during this bi-lingual quarter and Bora has been able to help translate for both corporate gatherings as well as for videos. Below is a screen grab from a promotional video for the new 'Lion of War' film trilogy. She's a smart lady and she's pretty hot, too.

Please be praying for our core staff of 9 people as we are seeking the Lord for direction regarding the next internship phase of the Elevate School of Worship program. God is building something very exciting here in Kona that will be multiplied throughout bases all over the planet. Some exciting announcements are coming soon so stay tuned J

A Day in the Life of a School of Worship Student

               

                8:50 am  -  You arrive at the classroom located directly underneath Kona’s 24/7 Prayer Room. Several students are already waiting at the door to get inside. Some are misty eyed with a cup of coffee in hand from the on-campus coffee shop that’s right next to the classroom (thank you Lord).  Some are tired because they led a late night worship set in the prayer room, or were there soaking in time with the Lord…or because they were up all night with friends at McDonalds hanging out. Some staff are in the corner discussing the lecture time with this weeks’ speaker, some are praying, some are setting up the sound system and overhead projector and others are corralling their children into the back of the room that has become the baby ranch.

                

                9:00 am- Class begins with announcements and prayer. Some students sneak in the back because they overslept or because the line was too long at the café’s morning rush. There are always cool stories and testimonies of wonderful encounters with the Holy Spirit in the prayer room and ministry in and around the campus and downtown Kona. Today a young man shares about his growing friendship with one of Kona’s many homeless. A homeless man was drawn to the young man’s guitar playing by the dock and received prayer and fellowship that night. Another student stands up and shares that she got an unexpected check for $100 from a relative that wasn’t even a Christian and now has her lecture fees almost completely paid off. We respond with praise and prayer for this relative and for the finances of other students in the same situation. We transition over to the speaker whom we as a class pray over for the Lord to anoint this person and this time of learning together.

                

                10:00 am- Class is still in session as a few staff sneak out the back to prepare the food for our break time. Another staff member leaves to skype with one of our hosting contacts in Japan where we’ll be visiting in a matter of weeks for outreach. 

                

                10:30 am-   Break time! We all gather in the courtyard to rest our brains for 10 minutes. The speaker‘s table is buzzing with questions. Today we’re looking at Luke 7 when Mary washes Jesus’ feet with her hair and expensive perfumes and the speaker presents that moment as one of the first times Jesus receives due worship here on earth, and presents the idea that Mary was the only person in the room who truly knew who she was in the room with! Holy revelation hits some, confusion others, the one guy that challenges every opinion is surprisingly quiet today.     
             
                10:40 am- Back to lecture. The speaker asks for more questions, specifically from the table of Koreans that is never as loud with their opinions and questions as some other nationalities tend to be. For an English speaker it’s often not until you’re viewing a Korean’s weekly SOW journal entry that you really find out just what the person is processing and learning.  One Korea student shares a profound parallel to something in their own life. Another quietly and shyly asks the speaker to “Please slow down” for the second language students. Everyone laughs and we go back into the lecture.

                

                11:45 am- Lunch time begins with the rest of the campus of over 1000 students and staff. Need to make it to the lunch line before 12 when the Discipleship Training Schools break for lunch because they make up over 700 and that’s when the line gets crazy long!  Today we’re eating Portuguese bean soup…you hear a sigh behind you from the student who was hoping for pizza today. They step out of line and buy a slice from the Asia Pacific DTS that is selling pizza by the slice to raise money for their outreach trip. You don’t have time to be picky today because you need to be at the prayer room at 12:30 to set up and pray for the 2 hour set you’re helping lead.                

               

                1:00 pm- The prayer room is packed with standing room only for the campus’ corporate intercession set. Today we’re interceding for Japan and even skyping with an outreach team already on the ground in Tokyo. We open with the song ‘Shekinah Glory’ that begins a 2 hour flow of worship and prayer to our King. As soon as the worship leader sings the opening words “We wait for you…” several students are already on their knees and faces, pouring out their heart to the Lord. After 30 minutes or so of worship one of the campus leadership gets behind the prayer mic and leads us into a prayer for Japan.  We split into about a dozen different prayer circles and are each given a different issue to pray into. In my circle we’re praying for human trafficking victims that are always created as direct results of wars, kidnappings and most relevantly grand scale disasters such as the tsunami. The prayer group next to me is praying for salvation of souls.  In that group I see an older Japanese Crossroads DTS student. She’s weeping for her nation. I’m reminded of YWAM’s president John Dawson and the way he describes prayer as “Climbing up into the Father’s lap”. I later find out that this woman has been praying for her home country three times a day for the past 13 years! What an honor it is to be in community with so many generations and nationalities represented. On the TV on the wall we soon see the DTS team skyped in from Japan, crowded around a webcam smiling and waving. They give an awesome report of miracle after miracle of healings, salvations and divinely appointed occurrences. The room in Kona then prays and gets words of knowledge, strategy and encouragement. Pumped up and in response to the skype call we flow back into a time of worship.  It’s easy to lose track of time in the prayer room and soon the announcement is made for work duty students to head to their areas for work. Wow is it 5 minutes to 3 already?

                

                3:00 pm-   Much of the campus has their work duty chores to attend to at this time, but not you. The campus could not operate without the help of students, staff and short term mission builders all helping in areas or cleaning the grounds and housing, cooking and meal prep, as well as many other operations that are necessary for this campus to operate. You helped with breakfast prep at 6 am today so you’re heading up to the recording studio. After a 5 minute hike up the mountain-scaling campus you arrive at the studio. You look through the door and see several classmates studying music theory led by one of the staff. You move on to the next door and enter the recording studio. You spend the next hour and a half setting up, sound check and laying down vocal tracks for your newly written song on the new worship compilation album. The concept for this particular album is to fuel the global missions movement and will be taken with outreach teams into several nations next quarter and reach even further through the internet!

                

                5:00 pm- Dinner time! Rather than sit in the courtyard you grab your plate of food and head over to your small group leader’s room on campus. Every staff is committed to opening their homes and warmly welcoming their students for council and fellowship.  Your small group meets at least once a week together and same goes for your one-on-one times with your small group leader. After grabbing a cup of tea and welcoming in the rest of your group you get your journal passed back to you from the leader. You tend to be a softer spoken, internal processor generally so this journal has become an outlet for you to process all that you’re learning about worship and your journey with the Lord. After some lighthearted conversation and catching up on the week you all begin processing what you learned as a group of close friends. Here there’s more time for everyone to ask questions and share experiences out loud, and the trust and love your small group shares is a really special thing. Your group is international, interdenominational and wide ranging in age and life experiences. After praying together for needs to be met and more revelation to be granted you wish your friends goodnight and head out.

               

                  7:00 pm- The campus is still buzzing with activity. The campus vans are still shuttling back and forth into town, the campus theater room is showing a film, the prayer room floor is filling with students ready to pray and worship and its rows of tables with people studying the word. In the Ohana (family)Court the space is shared by local skateboarders and break-dancers, an ongoing outreach to the youth of Kona.  You find yourself drawn to the Banyan Tree Café where there’s an impromptu worship and ministry event just starting. These meetings have been coined as “Revival Gatherings”.   These fiery meetings are full of ministry to the heart of the Lord and crying out for spiritual growth among our community, starting with us on the campus. There are numerous healings and rededications to the Lord. We end with the group of students walking together into the town and evangelizing to the townspeople, there are many awesome stories of salvations and healings! As a campus we’re well aware of our generation’s role in the great commission, and it starts with saying “yes” to the Lord in what He shares with us as his kids. The motto at this campus and for Y/WAM is “To know God and Make Him Known”, and in this School of Worship we’re doing just that.