2016…wow, it is amazing how each year seems to come so quickly after the next and yet looking back 2015 was truly a great year. As a family God allowed us to experience so much of His faithfulness when we stepped out in faith and trusting him. We went to Burkina Faso, USA, Australia (Joseph also visited South Africa and Ivory Coast as well) and made many visits to different locations in most of those as well as Togo too! Many of these trips were huge leaps of faith, often only departing with a small amount of money or none at all! Yet, every trip was completely covered by God and there was wonderful experiences to trust God as a family and see God do great works while we were there.
For ministry Joseph has had many opportunities to expand his
influence with his teachings at new locations as well as now being apart of the
board of regents for the University of the Nations, (the training branch of
YWAM). On our campus we have seen great breakthrough with new schools beginning
on the campus and have new nationalities join our campus either as students or
staff. This year we have hosted 6 different outreach teams some YWAM, some
church groups, there have been testimonies of miraculous healings, deliverance,
salvations, and transformations. There have been many challenges, but each one
God gave wisdom and showed himself to be teaching us new things and giving us
authority to walk out freedom in our lives and for this campus and nation. We
are grateful for each challenge that has taught us these things and we are so
looking forward to new things. One of the most exciting things that has
happened this year is the fulfillment of part of this campus’ original design.
God spoke about how this campus would be a sending location into the Muslim
nations of North Africa and then into Europe. This word was spoken in the
1990’s and as of December 26, 2015 that dream became a reality for the first
time. One of our DTS outreach teams travelled to a North African nation to
share the good news in a time when there is not much good news in that region
of the world. As campus leadership, we have had this nation on our heart right
from the being in 2011 but was waiting for the right timing, and this year when
the DTS leader approached us and asked what we thought about them sending a
team to this very location we gave an enthusiastic yes. There were some
challenges to see this happen but God paved the way and we cannot wait for them
to return to share the testimonies of what God did.
2016 looks to be a truly great year, even more so than 2015.
September marks our 5th year living here in Togo as well as the
fifth year of the campus running once again. We are expected to start two new
schools this year along with continuing the ones that started last year. We are
looking at hosting many outreach groups and have many visitors as well. Most
excitedly we are hosting a leadership training seminar on our campus in October
called the DNA seminar. It is an event where the speakers are none other the
very founders of the mission and those who are leading it with them. Loren and
Darlene Cunningham will be here for two weeks teaching young leaders from all
over the region of West Africa about the heartbeat of YWAM. We are so honored
and excited to be hosting this event as they only do a few each year (this year
only 4) and we have been asked to host one this year. Needless to say, we are
expected a lot of fellow YWAMers to join us for this time and so we are going
to be full! Actually we are looking at needing to do a lot of remodeling on the
campus and hopefully building as well in order to host this event properly! We
are not in a place where staying at a hotel or guest house is an option so our
campus will be the one and only location for accommodations. So you will be
hearing lots from us this year in this area as we have much to do and are
looking forward to all the ways God provides and supports us in this
preparation.
If you want to check out more about what's happening on the campus click here.
