I took a van full of boys and bags from Belfast on Wednesday morning while the girls took the train, and we’re now in Cork. In the next couple weeks, we’ll be helping with a couple local ministries, including the Haven – an interdenominational ministry of a coffee shop, bookstore, and prayer room. We’ll also be on the streets busking for money for homeless ministries, praying for people, and leading worship and services in churches.

We’re back in Belfast for a few days mid-May, then we’re off to South Africa for the remainder of the outreach.

Our team will be working with a variety of ministries in the Durban area, primarily helping with discipleship and helping empower people in practical skills. I’ll tell you more about these ministries later…

We certainly appreciate your prayers. We’ll be leading nine trainees from this DTS – four guys and five females; five Americans, one English, one South African Zulu, and one Israeli Arab. They’re a great group with lots of talent.

This update is coming a bit later than I intended, but I had no hard drive space to download pictures from my camera, so I had to wait until I could remedy the problem.

YWAM staff from around Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland met in Dublin over the night of Friday 7th of November and the following morning to pray in a new era of our operations in Ireland. In short, on the 8th of November, the works in both the North and the South became united in leadership and vision as YWAM Ireland.

Friday evening we had a time of sharing from Rob Clarke, who has been leading the work in the Republic for about 25 years, reflecting on the ministry of YWAMers and the hand of God during that time. We also had the opportunity to pray in the new leadership, as Rob Clarke passed directorship over any work in the Republic to Jonny Clark (no relation), the director of YWAM in Northern Ireland. The food and craic was great – hospitality provided by the Clarke family – , and having the chance to hang out with other YWAMers we don’t get to see too often was nice as well.

During our time, we had the pleasure of the company and input of Stephe Mayers, the director of YWAM in Western Europe. In the morning, he shared about how to engage in new opportunities (counting the cost, committment, etc.) in relation to being YWAM in Ireland and looking around the island at places for new teams.

We’re excited for the future, and there’s a sense that God has good things in store for our YWAM community – especially good challenges and potential to do new things.

Check out more pictures from the YWAM Ireland event in Dublin in our photo gallery album.