PayPal donation button

You can now donate directly to us with a credit card through PayPal. Just Click --> Donate through Paypal

Click here to view our slideshow of our recent outreach to Taiwan and New Zealand https://youtu.be/mL1Tu3y8ycw

Hi everyone!

Here is a recent update from our director and his wife Andy and AJ Scalas.

"I wanted to share a quick update and an amazing testimony. One year ago we started YWAM Queesntown and we had 6 staff join the initial team here including Amy-Joy and I. As we started there were so many unknowns of who would join us, where we would sleep, or what God was doing. We have had so many miracle stories and we now know God is really doing someinthg big here!" 

One year ago no one would believe what is happening today. This year we are training 85 missionaries and sending them to 10 different countries! All of it is so amazing. If you would ask me what our staff team would look like today one year ago, I would never have imagined or believed.

 

One year ago we had 6 staff. Now one year later our staff team is 26 and growing! All of them unpaid volunteers who had felt the call to serve here. Truly awesome! 

I can't begin to explian how grateful and blessed I feel :)

If you havn't looked at our Website or Facebook page please look at it today:

www.ywamqueenstown.com

https://www.facebook.com/ywamqueenstown

Please see attached photos

Adventures In Asia

God Changing Lives    "With man this is impossible, but with God all things are possible." Matthew 19:26     God continues to remind us how much He has blessed us, we feel humbled and thankful to be here doing what we’re doing. We know that we would not be here if it weren't for your prayers and support! You are the backbone to our ministry and give us the encouragement we need. You believe in us and that has given us the courage to leave home and trust in God’s plans. Thank you for all that you do for us and for the sacrifices you have made so that we can be here. We love you!  North Island:      Recently we were commissioned and sent on outreach starting on the North Island of NZ then we went to Taiwan and other areas in Asia. Here a quick summary of whats been happing in New Zealand. Sunday May 3rd (Jeremy's birthday) the pastor asked us to lead the Sunday  morning service, Jeremy preached and Alex gave his testimony and was blessed to inspire the church in evangelism and faith. Our team had a ministry time at the end of the service and several people came forward for prayer for boldness and faith to step out in evangelism. Over 100 people heard the message that day. Then we gathered as many of the church members as possible and took them out to evangelize on the street. Exciting things happened including someone being healed from being mute. We joined up with the church's community dinner ministry where we cook and serve dinner to needy families and build relationships with them, followed by a Bible study. Lindsey got to share about how she found inner healing through God as a father and wants to bring healing to people's hearts that have been hurt. Two people responded and asked for prayer that had never heard of God being a father. God is so good at bringing exactly what we need! We continued to do ministry with the church the rest of the time there then on a Friday night our team spoke at the youth group and as a result 6 people gave their life to JESUS! By the next day, we were able to take over 25 members of the church and youth group out for another ministry day loving and serving people. We did a free car wash, skate park ministry, and farmer's market evangelism ministry. We also took a team to a small town called Wairakei where we handed out baked goods offering prayer and free lawn mowing service to families in need. About 30 people were a part of the ministry and an estimated 60-70 people were touched. During evangelism, a member of our YWAM team took one of the youth kids out to the skate park and was able to lead someone to Christ right there in public. He then inspired the youth step out more in evangelism. As a result to all the amazing things God has been doing, many of the families whom have been involved in the church now want to continue evangelizing even after our team has leaves. I would say God's love truly has been activated here and the church wants to continue in what we have been sowing into.   Taiwan      Its hard to believe we are already finished with our time in Taiwan. In a culture far from what each of us are used to, our team transitioned so smoothly. We arrived around 2 am and were greeted by an awesome local named, Fang Pei. Fang Pei welcomed us with an incredible amount of love and energy. As we drove off into the city, all we could see were city lights and shadows of buildings knowing God had something beautiful in store for our team. Without Fang Pei, getting around would have been much more difficult, (she was like an angel sent by God!).      During our stay, we were blessed with diverse ministry opportunities that gave us a chance to immerse ourselves in Taiwan's culture. Our first week, we served a ministry/coffeeshop that welcomes local Taiwanese people to come learn english while they enjoy coffee and tea. We spent time painting the ministries doors and walls (Katie designed it all- Go Katie!), shared testimonies, and prayed for the locals who would stop in. We also performed a drama in a nearby prison sharing testimonies and preaching the gospel of how God redeems and loves us all no matter what past we come from. A powerful moment, we all will remember forever was when 17 prison men raised their hands saying they wanted to commit their lives to Jesus. Please join us in praying for these men that Gods love continues to wash over them as they hold on to the hope of Christ and as the local Chaplin disciples them!     We were blessed to work along side Kings Kids International lead by Tim, Naomi Gillette and their beautiful daughter Nikola and others. Their family showed us the ins and outs of Taiwan while loving our team passionately like we were part of their family. Tim and Naomi took us to a village in the mountains called Han Xi. We spent time with the local village kids playing games, crafts, and teaching them bible stories. Joy was abounding through the smiles and love these children have, despite the tough circumstances many of them have been raised in. During the afternoon that day we split up and went around from door to door asking other villages if kids would like to come to Youth that night. Walking around meeting the villagers opened many opportunities to hear stories, pray and bless many of the families in the villages. What a powerful experience! The Youth event was full of Gods spontaneous wind like Spirit. We didn't plan to teach the kids a drama called “He Lives in You” but during a break our team was goofing around dancing to the song of the drama and we looked at each other and thought “why not? could this be what the spirit was leading us to do?” The night ended with five youth teens asking for Jesus to enter their hearts and many more recommitting their lives to Christ, it was truly amazing to see God captivate the hearts of these kids.      We are learning more and more about who God is an how He loves us all. His timing has been impeccable and a constant reminder that He is faithful and desires His children to draw near to His heart.      As a team, each of us has had to step out in faith with being placed in situations that we have never been in before. Each of us taught English classes to a Taiwanese junior high school Monday through Friday our second week in Taiwan. In this public school they allowed us to teach our favorite bible stories to these kids… IN A PUBLIC SCHOOL! (How cool!!) We were able to share the gospel with 600 students that week! The kids are amazing and as much as we poured our hearts out to them I think they encouraged us even more. (Alex found out that he has quite the gift of teaching and a passion for kids!)     Everyday after we would teach we would then participate in more ministry opportunities. This looked like coffee shops, a women's shelter, meeting up with new friends, teaching at a University, or worshiping with the local church.      Lindsey, Payton, and Tasha had a powerful opportunity to share testimonies and sing “How He Loves Us” to 10 girls at the Women's Shelter. These girls had either been abused or in prostitution from ages 13-18. A special moment came about when one girl boldly asked for prayer that “Jesus would unlock the door to her heart”, she was so eager to change it was beautiful to hear the desire in her words. He never stops pursuing us.      Finally, we taught English in a local Christian University! Many of these students are hungry to know more about God. Although they go to a Christian University, about 5% of the students actually are Christian. A central theme to our teachings was overcoming fear and releasing dreams. A majority of the students had never been asked what their dreams were! It was inspiring to hear the dreams of the students and what ways they plan to pursue those dreams and purpose in life. Getting the chance to encourage them to follow the dreams God has placed individually on their hearts brought joy to our hearts!     We may not think saying “Yes” and encouraging someone in their dreams could really actually make a difference, but it can. The “Yes” in Christ makes all the difference. Kids learn by what we say yes and no too. As a team, God really put it on our hearts to be that “yes” to the younger generation we encounter during outreach.      Our time in Taiwan was 14 days each of us will hold onto forever. Much of our time was filled with so many new opportunities that at the end of each day we played down knowing that through the prayers of you all supporting us God would refill us in the hours of sleep. And He always did. We are thankful for you. Your love for us has protected us and wrapped us in Gods love.  We thank you for your reverent prayers, love, and encouragement! The words of love that each of you placed on our hearts over the years is being poured out to the people we meet in each new place. Please continue to pray for health and endurance. The days are quickly passing by and we want to continue to do all that God has called us here for! May Gods love pour down and the joy in Christ abound in you all.    What did we learn? God has a plan. Wherever He sends us, He is faithful provide and bring people in need of hearing the truth. When we're willing, He constantly gives opportunities to share about who He is.    God is intentional. He knows exactly what He is doing and has every day, month and season planned out in our lives before we’ve even thought of it!   God is everywhere! It doesn’t matter what country we've traveled to, we sense God’s presence with us and working through people, churches, ministries etc.    Flexibility! Bringing a family on the mission field means going with the flow, not complaining, and choosing to focus on the positive rather than the negative things.     What’s next for us: We feel strongly that God has called us to New Zealand and specifically Queenstown for a purpose. We don’t feel it was an accident or coincidence that He brought us here. We see that God is bringing young adults from all over the world to join YWAM to fill their hearts with a deep purpose to impact their generation by going home and getting their friends and the people in their community saved. We feel honored that God would use us to be a part of the big plans that he has for people and the nations.    We are currently back in New Zealand working as the outreach coordinators and helping train and equip the new staff at our center. We will be leading two DTS schools starting in October- February. This means we are taking on a lot more responsibility. We are excited to do this but know that it will take a lot of time and energy to prepare for this. We also want to set aside time to rest after our two month trip over-seas and feel its important to feel refreshed and spend time together as a family so that we can have lots of energy for when the next school starts!    Prayer: -Marriage: time to spend together, dates, quality time, fun, enjoy doing fun things together  -Prepping for the next school -Humility, serving, working hard, giving everything our best  FINANCIAL SUPPORT: One of YWAM’s Foundational Values is to be dependent on God for financial provision. We are both full-time missionaries trusting God to meet 100% of our needs. Living by faith has been a huge step for us and it blows our mind how God constantly provides our needs. At the moment we are currently aiming to raise an additional $500-$700 a month. We have been receiving in-between $2200-$3000 a month which has been such a huge blessings. In order for us to cover our long term living and travel expenses we are trusting God for a few more monthly supporters. We are also extremely grateful for one time gifts. There is no amount that is too small. We are truly thankful and humbled to be here doing what we do. If you are interested in joining our support team please feel free e-mail and we can send you our information.

Copyright © 2015 Jeremy and Lindsey YWAM, All rights reserved. You are receiving this email because we wanted to give you the opportunity to read about what we are doing with YWAM Queenstown.

To Asia and Taiwan

Through praying as a couple, we both felt we were to lead the team into Asia and Taiwan. We will start our outreach by going to the North island of New Zealand for the first 3 weeks to work with a pastor doing local outreach, then we will be heading to Taiwan for a couple weeks the spending 25 days traveling through Asia (from end of April to end of June). We have been praying God would give us His heart for the people as we learn about the language, religion, food, safety and history. We are personally leading a team of 9 (Yes we are bringing Hunter). Our contacts will be preparing ministries for us such as, helping in orphanages and possibly helping prostitutes and trafficked victims. Our heart is not only to help the people in but also equip our students with experience on the mission field where we hope to see them develop a call to missions and life long ministry whether at home or in the developing nations. 

Fundraising:
As staff we need to raise some funds to lead this team. At the moment the three of us are in need of $4800 USD. If you would like to help sponsor us, please click the link to give through PayPal

Or if you would like a Tax deductible receipt, please make a Check out to YWAM and send it to our account in Texas.
YWAM Tyler Accounting
P.O. Box 3000
Garden Valley, TX 75771
(Please do not put our name on the check but attach a separate note with our name on it)

Family Photo Shoot! Thank you Amanda!

Evangelism in Queenstown and Recent update

Hitting The Streets 

 

Even though we will soon be running a discipleship training school and taking students overseas for missions, we feel its just as important that the staff spend time praying and evangelizing in Queenstown as well. Our team has been meeting weekly to pray for specific things such as:

• Love for Queenstown as though it was our hometown 
• That people would become aware of God’s existence as they look at the beauty surrounding them
• Young travelers come from all over the world to party, find adventure and a purpose for life…our prayer is that they would find God in this place to fulfill that ultimate need for purpose and identity

 

One of our goals with evangelism is approaching strangers with wisdom and boldness.

Evangelism testimony from Lindsey:

Amanda (one of our staff) and I were in downtown Queenstown, looking for someone to pray for on our evangelism day. I prayed “...God, let the specific person you want us to witness to come to us!” We stopped to watch a group of people trying out a new outdoor activity called slack-lining. As we stood there, a man in his early thirties came straight up to us and suggested we try it out and we joked that we would probably fall. We chatted for a bit and I told him the reason we were hanging out here was because we were offering prayer for anyone that needed it and asked if he needed prayer. He said he didn't believe in prayer because God didn't answer his prayers now or when he was a child who grew up in a broken home with an abusive dad. He asked why God could be so passive if he was a God of love. Why did bad things happen to him as an innocent child? I have to be honest, I wasn't prepared for a deep discussion…I thought if he wanted prayer we would pray a simple prayer and if he declined, we would simply smile and walk away. However, this guy had a valid point and it was something I needed to face head-on because I too have thought of this question many times. I realized, even if I had prepared for this talk ahead of time by compiling all the “right” words to say and relied on my own intellect, in the end they would be empty words in my my own human attempt to try to convince him. I had this moment with this person, I knew I would most likely never see him again, all I could rely on was faith that God would help me in this situation. This was my one chance to show him that God is real and that God is good. I prayed to myself “Holy Spirit guide me in this conversation right now, give me the right words to say to help him become more aware of your presence and your existence.” I felt God was in this and brought to my mind certain scriptures from the Bible. Here’s what I said: 

“God did not cause bad things to happen to you, it says in the Bible every good thing comes from God and there is not even a hint of change in His character. We are born into a world that is full of sin and all kinds of evil and man-kind is affected by it." I explained the battle for his salvation, that God fights for it and that satan wants to make sure he doesn't receive it. "The devil is the author of lies, out to steal, kill and destroy. (John 10:10) God goes with us He will never leave us or forsake us, He has been with you your whole life. It says in the Bible, 'if you draw near to God, He will draw near to you'.” 

He said he’s asked and has quit asking because he doesn't get answers. I told him to keep asking because God makes a promise that he will find him. I told him that God wants Brian to want God with all of his heart, not just part of it. "Keep seeking him, keep asking and pray that he will reveal himself to you."

Our conversation went back and forth as he shared his thoughts and opinions and I shared mine. He was listening the whole time and genuinely interested in our conversation. The desire for this person to encounter God became even stronger that I asked again “Are you sure you don’t want prayer?” “You mean stand here awkwardly and pray?” he said. “Yes!” I replied. So he let me! As I prayed I felt God press on my heart to tell Brian how much God values him, that he is here on this Earth for a purpose not just by chance. I prayed that Brian would search for God and find him.

I believe he was the one God wanted me to find that day.  

Evangelism testimony from Jeremy:
Last Friday, Tyler Pippin and I "Hit the Streets," asking the Lord to guide us direcly to the people He wanted us to pray for. I instantly had a desire to go to McDonalds; (I'm not sure if I was just hungry or that is were God was actually leading us....) After we ordered our $2 McChickens we approached two individuals from Singapore and Malaysia. I mentioned part of my job was to meet new people and talk to them about their culture and beliefs. They seemed interested and invited Tyler and I to sit with them. We talked for about 30 minutes before we were able to transition the conversation into a spiritual one. We mentioned how God was a God of love and how we take teams all around the world to help and love people. We soon found out one of them was Buddhist and the other grew up in a Christian home and fell away from the Lord. By the end of the conversation, we were able to pray for both of them! I love praying for people from different religions. Even though they didn't fall on their faces repenting and accepting Christ, I know we planted a seed. Statistics say, (obviously God can work outside of this) it usually takes 6-7 positive encounters with a Christian before individuals commit their lives to Christ. I'm happy to say we may have been 1 of the 7 positive encounters.  

Update on Arise DTS school starting in January

The school has over 20 confirmed students and 7 confirmed staff including ourselves. We have been reviewing and praying over the applications for the school starting this January with  a few students in the waiting process and more applications coming in. We can’t wait to see how God is going to impact these student's lives! 

Building Community

We have been visiting several churches in the area that we feel a connection with. It’s exciting to see that they have the same vision for Queenstown that we do, to see the young adults saved as well as at the tourists. They have been very welcoming to us and we are thankful that God is building a connection with these people to not only partner in ministry with but have friendships with as well (something very important and necessary to have when you’re doing full-time ministry). 

We got another vehicle donated to our base!

A local businessman from Queenstown asked our director if there was anything our base needed. We said we needed another van and within weeks we were blessed with a turbo diesel 9 seater Toyota van. Our base now has three vans, all of which have been 100% donated to our Base.

Prayer points

* Housing for Students: We need to House 30 people by Januarry
* Continual Passion for Evangelism in the City and dedication to the Lord's work
* 2 or 3 more monthly supporters. We are so blessed to be in full-time ministry and can't thank everyone enough for their generosity. We both love working hard. As YWAM Staff we are required to fundraise 100% of our salary and we are 90% there! If you are interested in supporting us, just reply to this email and we will help you get started :)