transforming the lives of global youth
Overwhelmed with Excitement!
These are the final few days before the first classes at Opportunities NOW. It’s been a busy week doing a teacher orientation, tweaking the curriculum, and having lots of final meetings. It’s amazing how everything has come together. The last two years of ideas, meetings, and research are all coming together on Monday when students enter our facility to start their journey toward starting their own business. …
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This is what the LORD says: "Stand at the crossroads and look; ask for the ancient paths, ask where the good way is, and walk in it, and you will find rest for your souls..." Jeremiah 6:16a (NIV)
Many people who partner with us say they've found us on the web. Often times they're searching, looking for answers. We created an opportunities database to help people hone in on potential ministry opportunities. This is for people who have a desire to serve in a specific place or in a certain way. Sometimes, however, I think people come to us with a wide open perspective. They're not sure what to do, or more importantly, what they're being called to.
I know that most believers, especially young people who've not yet chosen a career path, wrestle with God's call on their lives. And rightly so! I think we sometimes think God has this wild and amazing dream for us that we're certain we don't want to miss out on. People ask …
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Here at YouthHOPE, one way in which we transform the lives of global youth is through internships. Every summer we send teams out to work with our Global Youth Workers and be a blessing to the ministries. This is a way for us to give encouragement to our youth workers and for their ministry to get a boost of energy.
In about 5 weeks YouthHOPE will be sending out 15 college students and team leaders “to go into all the world” and work alongside our missionaries in 5 different countries.
On May 28th, all of our interns will come together for training and preparation in Fort Myers, Florida and then on June 3rd, they will go out…to Bulgaria, Kenya, Zambia, Malawi, and Southeast Asia to learn, serve and grow.
This summer our interns will get a chance to learn and gain hands-on cross-cultural youth ministry experience while working with experienced Global Youth Workers and their ministries. Interns will
develop and teach in an …
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"But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth." -Acts 1:8
Tomorrow, our team of 12 riders will be cycling 300 miles to do what Jesus says we can do through the power of the Holy Spirit- to be witnesses of Christ in Florida, Bulgaria, and 'To the Ends of the Earth.' God has provided a way for YouthHOPE and youth ministers from 7 different churches throughout the Fort Myers area to come together for the same cause- to reach the unreached youth of Bulgaria with the love of Christ. Not only has God been faithful to provide riders, churches, and support for the ride,but He has also opened doors to share with the surrounding community the need for servants in youth ministry around the world. We pray that through this ride we glorify the Father on earth, having accomplished the work that he gave us to do …
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I love meeting new people and spending time with the elderly. They are never short on stories of "the way things once were." My former pastor, Gary Buchman, used to tell me stories about reciting the 23rd Psalm in public school every morning. Prayer in schools in America was common for decades and wasn't just something that the religious right endorsed.
It's been 12 years since I surrendered my life to Jesus as a teenager. I was 17 when God gave me "eyes to see and ears to hear." Over time I began to develop a Christian worldview and have seen the secularization of America increase ever since. From businesses requiring their employees to say "Happy Holidays" instead of "Merry Christmas," to the countless debates and attempts by the ACLU to remove the 10 commandments from courthouses, surely "because lawlessness abounds, the love of many [has] grown cold." (Matthew 24:12)
Recently I came across this article on msnbc …
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Will you join us in praying for visas? This is an exciting season for YouthHOPE.
We have a Chilean applying for an R-1 religious visa. He is hoping to join our development team and head up youth worker training and curriculum development, especially focused on the Latin American church.
We have a Canadian applying for a spouse visa. She and her husband are currently support raising and planning a wedding. They hope to work on the development team for a year or two before being sent out as Global Youth Workers.
We have a national Global Youth Worker from a creative access country in SE Asia applying for a visa to the US so she can join her husband as he travels back to the US for a few months of support raising.
We have a Thai national Global Youth Worker applying for US citizenship so that no government will ever be able to tell him that he cannot be in the same place as his wife and beautiful new son.
Missions is not …
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An intentional 30 days of prayer for over 1 billion Muslims around the world has begun.
How should the Christian respond?
Last night, I took my 3 daughters to our local library and my eyes were captivated by an Islamic children’s book, proudly displayed, most likely with the onset of Ramadan. The author describes a young girl going to her grandmother’s house and hearing the nearby mosque announcing “It’s time to pray, come and pray,” 5x a day. The story tracks the girl’s time with her grandma, her interest in praying, and culminates with her receiving her own special prayer clothes, prayer rug and miniature mosque figure because there is not one nearby her house. The figure is a clock that goes off and reminds her to pray and the modern Muslim prayer rugs have a compass which points the Muslim toward Mecca. This might seem like a nice story but the truth is: This. Is. Bondage.
The word “islam” means, …
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It’s been one week. The death toll is up to 6,911, missing persons up to 10,316. I keep finding myself wanting to shut my eyes and leave the room when news about Japan starts rolling. People don’t have their basic needs covered, or even fuel to be able to drive away from impending nuclear meltdown… they are exhausted from seeing their homes swept away, from fear of radiation, from worry over loved ones who have not yet been found. Everything is ruined and there is a dark cloud of hopelessness and helplessness over the nation. It seems like too much for a heart to bear. Do the Japanese people know that they are not alone, that there is a God in heaven who is weeping over this destruction? Whose heart is shattered by the cries of His precious people? Do the Japanese know that the maker of the universe is ready to comfort all who mourn? Do they know that there is a hope of a time when everything will be made whole, …
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I have been following this event called World Youth Day for several years now. The Catholic church has been organizing this for more than 25 years. The purpose of the World Youth Day is three-fold: putting trust in the young, gathering together and meeting the international world on a human level.
"World Youth Day is not simply a gathering for the young people of the world, but a time to put trust in the world's youth."
Below is a video that highlights last year's World Youth Day:
In 2008, World Youth Day was held in Sydney and more than 400,000 people attended. Last year, more than 70,000 youth gathered for the Pope's message in St. Peter's Square. Now this sounds really good to me at first, but I want to take this opportunity to analyze this event, and I want to begin by asking some questions.
First of all, what was accomplished? In youth ministry, we have criticized the use of numbers and being too …
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Ryan Russell, our Director of Training and Networking, shared this video with me. It's about the reality of girls around the world and a simple but powerful process to deal with the issues they face. It talks about early marriage and pregnancy, the lack of access to education and health. Check it out. Not only is it very informative but one of the best animation style videos I have seen in a long time. …
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Recently I saw a episode of a show that I have started watching called World of Jenks. It is documentary series on MTV and is very interesting. The episode that I watched Highlighted the story of Danielle, a 22 year old homeless girl. Here is photo of her with Jenks.
I really felt like I had a good look into the issue and saw the pain and potential of Danielle. A recent article that I read that cited the following statistic "Two million people between the ages of 18 and 24 become homeless each year. It's the fastest growing segment of homeless population in America." You can read the article here.
Here are some questions that come to my mind as I think about this issue:
So if this is the case in the United States where we invest a lot if money in research and have so many resources at our disposal, how does the rest of the world's youth fair in this area?
Are there more homeless youth in less developed counties or is there …
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According to the International Labor Organization (ILO), there is an estimated 152 million young people who work but remain in extreme poverty. Youth in lower income countries are more vulnerable to suffer the impact of the unemployment crisis, where there is less social protection to provide for basic needs. The high rates of underemployment and unemployment could potentially result in a progressive loss of workers’ skills, exclusion of the unemployed from the productive economy, separated families due to searches for work, loss of hope of making a decent honest living, decreased social cohesion, and ultimately, dangers to national peace and stability.
By the end of 2009, the number of economically active unemployed youth ages 15 to 24 had reached 81 million—the highest number ever. It is projected that the global youth unemployment rate will increase to 13.1 percent by the end of 2010. In order to break the cycle of poverty …
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