Lance and I are quite often involved with the basic school of YWAM, called Discipleship Training School. This is a fundamental course for anyone wanting to work in YWAM which is why we also see the Equip school as just as important since it is for those that staff DTS schools!

Lance and I participated in this school in 2012 in Montana and then Lance has staffed it several times and we staffed together in Ternopil in 2014. We love being a part of this school because we love equipping leaders to be successful in what they do.

This year we had an awesome group of 11 students from 7 different countries working in 7 other different countries, some had years of experience, some had no experience. It was such a great time of learning from each other not just from a speaker or book.

The course itself is very intense, 6 weeks of classes that go all day and some evenings. Everyone needs to read 3 books, do multiple group projects, homework, journals, and an exam.

While we do invite speakers and teachers to come, we are also doing much of the teaching. Lance spoke on hearing God’s voice, preparing for an outreach, and one on ones and Megan taught on applications, evaluations, leading in the classroom, and outreach preparation.

Teaching through Skype

All 11 students graduated and took the skills they learned back to their locations and will be putting them into practice in the schools that they staff.

Youth With A Mission has many different ministries and branches, one such branch is education of the Bible. There is a 9 month long Bible course that takes an in depth look at the Bible and then after that course, students have an option to do a practicum somewhere teaching the Bible. This past fall/winter we had two such teams come to teach!

As we have said before, we love hosting different teams and individuals for various reasons. It was fun to have a team that had a focus for their ministry. We set up some places for them to teach. This was in different churches, one in another city, we had one for English club and one for the staff.

There was a wide variety of places to teach as well as topics. The most requested topic was an overview of the Bible, but the team also taught on Ephesians. This was an important one for us as staff since we felt that the book of Ephesians was something we needed to study together. It was good to spend time as a staff to study together, we enjoyed gathering together once a week for something special.

We will be happy to host another Bible-teaching team anytime!

If you have not heard of Jack Hart, you are missing out. He is one of kind and is incredibly talented. He is a great example of someone using their gifts and talents for God. I will just say that Jack was nominated for an Emmy for his work with David Copperfield and also worked on set designs for TV shows such as Super Password, Family Feud, and the Price is Right.

Jack has fun at English club

All that to say, he is a pretty cool guy who is willing to come all the way to Ukraine to teach and share the Gospel message with people. He stayed with us for about two weeks and he had an incredibly busy schedule. I just was not sure how to write up the time he spent with us. So I will just give a quick rundown of the few weeks that Jack was with us.

At the teacher seminar

The first week that Jack was with us, he spent some time doing art therapy with a few families that were staying at the YWAM base from the east. At the end of the week he taught in a teaching seminar for teachers of English. It was a great time for him to share with public school teachers and encourage them in their work.

When we all work together, we can create a beautiful rainbow.

He also helped with a family seminar where families from the community were invited to come together for a learning experience. He spent time with our staff, leading a staff training time. It is always great to have all the staff together to learn and have fun.

In between all the major events that Jack did, he squeezed in time to share in the public schools as well as several different orphanages. No one tired of seeing him do some tricks and “wow”d us with his slight of hand. One of the last things we did together was to have a family night at the base. This is when all the staff come together with their families for just some fellowship and fun. This time we had a Christmas craft night. People made snowflakes, cards, ornaments, and decorated cookies. And of course Jack gave a little show for the kids. Everyone had fun!

Instead of telling you about what we did for a staff training time, I thought it would be more interesting to share what we learned.

Mary Jean Powers came to Ternopil for a week in which three days were set aside for staff training. She also spent time with our leadership team and with just Lance and I. The thoughts I will share with you are from our staff training time.

~We should be active blessers, blessing people should be normal and natural

~Things that God wants to use the most is where Satan attacks the most.

~Distractions take us away from people, hope and what God has for us.

~You need a strategy of how to keep your purpose and blessing.

~You won’t be able to disciple others until you are practicing spiritual disciplines.

~God has called us to be interdependent. Philippians 2:1-13

~Don’t just ask “What time is it?” We should follow the Greek word ‘kairos’ meaning “What is it time for?”

~Exodus 20:8 commands us to remember the Sabbath, and Sabbath is a day of rest.

~The Chinese word for “busy” contains the symbols for “heart” and “kill”

~To serve God is to do what he asks, not necessarily doing good things

~Jesus walked everywhere, he didn’t hurry, he didn’t run. Heaven is not in a hurry.

~Genesis 2:1-3 The first day that Adam was alive, was a day of rest. God gave him a day of rest before he “earned” it!

~If we forget to rest, we can forget who we are, we forget our families, we forget to be curious, to explore, to play, and how to have fun.

~It’s not honorable to exhaust the home of the Holy Spirit

~Honoring the Sabbath is to lay to rest the previous week and not drag it into next week

If you are interested in Mary Jean’s work and ministry, you can check her out at: Get The Word Out!

This past spring I was able to teach a very short course on speaking. This was not any speaking class, it was for those wanting to pass the IELTS exam, or International English Language Testing System. Scary sounding isn’t it?

Deep in conversation

It was a small class but I was happy to have a chance to teach some English. They really wanted to focus on speaking since that is the hardest to practice or study for and is really best done with a native English speaker.

Sorting phrasal verbs

We did simple activities such as sorting phrasal verbs and collocations. We looked at common idioms and used them in speech. We put an end to dead, dumb, and boring words such as “good,” “like,” and “fine” to exchange them for more exciting words.

Can you answer these questions in a concise manner in 2-4 min?

There were basically lots of discussion times, all they really wanted was a place to practice speaking English. We went through a lot of practice test questions and just general chitchat. Overall, it was a great class and time well spent for all.