After sitting in three months of mind-blowing DTS classes, I was ready to get our there into the real world with the rich truths I'd learned! The best way to solidify all God has done in our lives is to transfer the knowledge into our daily experience, allowing His grace to have its perfect work. And that’s just what He did during our 8 weeks of travel covering 20,000 miles, including 2 nations in East Asia.
5 min read
4 Earth Shattering Truths I Learned on my DTS Outreach
Topics: Outreach Korean Missionary YWAM DTS YWAM Outreach Poverty Making Him Known Nations Faith God's Presence Mission Trip Make Disciples Prayer Redeem Go Dependence on God World Changer God's Love
3 min read
Ministry to Displaced Ukrainians
A team of 25 missionaries from East Texas-based Youth With A Mission, or YWAM, are on a two-month outreach trip to Poland, providing immediate aid to Ukrainian refugees who have fled violence in their home country. Josh and Meg McClung are leading an outreach team through MercyWorks, a YWAM ministry.
Topics: Home Mercy Works YWAM Outreach ywam missions DTS Ukraine Poland kltv
5 min read
Keith Green's Message Continues to Encourage a New Generation!
It was July 28, 1982, exactly 35 years ago to date (at the writing of this blog post), when Keith Green and others took off from an airstrip, almost in walking distance from where I am sitting now, and left the earth behind never to return. The airplane accident that took the life of singer-songwriter Keith Green, shook the lives of the evangelical Christian community around the world.
Topics: YWAM Tyler Missions Change Obedience Knowing God YWAM Outreach Calling Families in Missions Go Children in Missions memories devotion Called to Mission keith green
7 min read
Let's Go to Mongolia Together
Want to hear an audacious goal? We want to reach the entire nation of Mongolia with the Gospel and place a Bible in every home⏤with God's leading and your participation we can do it! There are 900k homes in Mongolia, and God's given us a plan to reach them all! One day we will knock on the last door, hand them a Bible, share about Jesus, and shout with joy that we did it. What a day that will be!
Topics: Outreach YWAM Tyler YWAM Outreach Bible Gospel Travel Mission Trip end bible poverty bible poverty mongolia bless mongolia
2 min read
Led by Drunken Sailors
Guided by God through Uncertainty
It was dark, and we were tired. "God, what should we do?"
Our long day of outreach started when men from another village came to guide us into a different region of the Philippine island of Bucas Grande.
Topics: Outreach YWAM Outreach Mission Trip philippines short-term missions medical
2 min read
Sharing the Gospel with Armed Guerillas
Sharing the Gospel with a Terrorist Group
Early one morning, we were abruptly awakened by a teammate, "Guys! Come quickly! There are men outside with guns!"
Topics: Outreach Obedience YWAM Outreach Gospel Mission Trip Go humanitarian aid philippines short-term missions terrorists NPA communism
3 min read
Evangelism Outreach Gone Bad
THIS SHOULD NEVER HAPPEN TO ANYONE ON OUTREACH
We zigzagged up the dirt roads into the mountain jungles of Thailand to visit a small children's school for our Discipleship Training School outreach. Our team had prepared well, but not for what was about to happen to me.
Topics: YWAM Tyler Missions YWAM DTS Thailand Story YWAM Outreach Missionary Missionary Life YWAM Family Missions Mission Trip Missionary Training ywam missions
5 min read
How I Became a YWAM Missionary
Become a Missionary at Youth With A Mission
It was a huge shock to everyone around me when I decided to become a missionary in 2016. Having come out of 6 years of deep addiction before entering 3 rehabs, I was the last person you’d expect to see joining Youth With A Mission, Tyler.
I was totally living for myself. I thought I was the center of the universe back in May of 2015 before I entered my last rehab. I finally came to a point of surrender about four weeks into that program, when I felt God’s love for me for the first time. It was game-over after that! I was hooked.
Prior to that encounter, I was so consumed with myself I did not ever really love, or allow myself to be loved. Everyone and everything around me was a resource to get whatever I was looking to gain in the moment.
My self-absorbed life stifled love from every crevice and corner of my life.
[Photo: I know right? A mug shot. That's how bad my life had spun out of control.]
However, there was a moment which changed everything for me. A true encounter with God can accomplish what one hundred counseling sessions could not. Something changed when I allowed myself to be stripped before God. No mask, no presuppositions, just a real, vulnerable openness to Jesus as my Savior.
[Photo: Graduating from Shiloh Ministries after 1 year of rehab.]
After I graduated from Shiloh, I joined my first Discipleship Training School at YWAM Tyler. Youth With A Mission understands knowing God is paramount. Understanding I am His child is vital. Everything else hinges on this realization.
I believe, “you don’t really know yourself until you know Jesus.” Through my discipleship experience, I finally understood, “in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.” (Romans 5:8) is a remarkably freeing statement.
While I was still self-centered, caring for no one, stealing, and lying–Jesus died for me! I love Jesus now and do my best to genuinely love the people around me, but Jesus died for the version of me who cared neither for myself, or the people around me.
Whether I am still roaming the streets with a pint of vodka in my belt strap, or I am preaching in front of thousands, Jesus’s love for me is the same! It never changes.
Knowing God, really knowing Him is what life is all about. “And this is eternal life, that they know you, the only true God, and the one whom you have sent.” (John 17:3) Each time I read this verse it chips away at the block of religion that has crusted up around me through years of never actually encountering and pursuing God for myself.
To know God, and to make Him known. This is the motto of Youth With A Mission. I love the simplicity of this, because when you boil it all down, it is what life is really all about.
Now do we just spend our time alone in a room, with a Bible and a cup of coffee? Heavens no! James says, “Show me your faith apart from your works, and I’ll show you my faith by my works.” (James 2:18). Such a confident statement that my personality appreciates!
I love being active, pursuing, and creating alongside God for His name’s sake. Prior to coming to YWAM Tyler, I thought all missionaries were old, white, married couples. I thought a missionary wife wore a bonnet (no slight to bonnet wearers!) and the husband had spent years in seminary and pastoral training. The thought of becoming a missionary wasn’t in the solar system of my thought process, but boy did that change after coming to YWAM Tyler.
My understanding of being a missionary changed when I ran into a former X-Games athlete, met men and women who had struggled with addiction, eating disorders, vanity, homosexuality, been through a divorce, and the list could go on. These people were seasoned missionaries who had been around the world several times over, impacting lives every step of the way, yet had a life transformation with Jesus!
This was me too! I was just like these people!? “But God chose the foolish things of the world to shame the wise; God chose the weak things of the world to shame the strong.” (1 Corinthians 1:27)
[Photo: Making God known took me to Korea with my Discipleship Training School.]
Out of an overflow of intimacy with a living God our life begins to move. A true faith—a living faith—has the natural outworking of good works. To Know God and Make Him Known. This really sums up how I became a missionary.
If you are ready to take the next step in your personal life of Knowing God and Making Him known, today is the day to sign up for the next training school at YWAM Tyler. We are here and ready to help you discover God's purpose for your life.
Other blogs by Anthony:
Topics: Training School School of Evangelism YWAM Tyler Missions YWAM DTS YWAM Outreach Missionary Missionary Life YWAM Missionary Training ywam missions DTS
2 min read
A Desperate Journey for a Better Life
What is Really Happening at the Border?
There's only one way to get to the truth of what's happening. Go and see for yourself. Join our missionary friend, Matthew, in this raw footage taken at the southern border of the US, and discover what most of America doesn't know.
Topics: YWAM Tyler YWAM Outreach human trafficking border border crisis humanitarian humanitarian aid
2 min read
Masses Displaced Without Hope
Thousands of desperate people stranded at the U.S/Mexico border.
We could hardly take in what we were seeing. Fear and turmoil seemed to permeate the atmosphere when our YWAM Tyler team arrived in McAllen, Texas. We saw masses of displaced people without hope, searching for a future.
Topics: Outreach YWAM Tyler YWAM Outreach YWAM human trafficking border mexico border crisis humanitarian humanitarian aid
2 min read
Discipleship Training School | The Day My Life Began
A YWAM DTS Brings Life Transformation
This picture was taken on the first day of my DTS five months ago. This was the day my life truly began.
Topics: YWAM DTS YWAM Outreach YWAM DTS
2 min read
Mercy and Compassion Warms the Heart
Texas Winter Storm Puts Missions to Action
After a week of freezing temperatures and, in some cases, no heat in homes for days, Mercy Works, our compassionate ministries department at YWAM Tyler stepped into action.
