Every week, our missionaries from Youth With A Mission head out to the local communities to find families in desperate need of a new home through our ministry called Homes of Hope. With The Lord leading, they seek out those that are in emergency situations.  A few weeks ago, as the staff were out visiting families, they happened across a newly constructed "house" on the hill when they were about to head out. The Lord told them to visit that one. They hiked up the mountain and found one of the most joyful men they had ever encountered especially living in their present condition. Think Cutter's Gap, TN from the book/movie Christy. Here is an account of their conversation from one of our missionaries, Brock Mix. 

Scripture says in Luke 10:2 "He {Jesus} told them, 'The harvest is plentiful, but the workers are few. Ask the Lord of the harvest, therefore, to send out workers into his harvest field. Go! I am sending you out like lambs among wolves'"  Have you ever wanted to be a part of something bigger? Have you ever thought about giving back to those less fortunate than you? 

If you can answer yes to either of these questions, please prayerfully consider coming down and building  house for one of these families. For more information, check out our website www.ywamsdb.org. I would LOVE to experience this life-giving opportunity with you!

The need is great but God is greater!! 

Enjoy this story? Make sure you check out other stories of the transforming power of God through the Youth With a Mission (YWAM) ministry, Homes of Hope by clicking here.

Many of you were praying with me for my friends Nick & Aubrey Rodrigues, specifically in the month of February as they awaited the birth of their beautiful daughter, Leilah.  At 20 weeks, Leilah was diagnosed with anencephaly which is a fatal neural tube defect affecting the formation of the brain and skull. Most babies that survive pregnancy are stillborn or at best live a few hours.  We rallied around Aubrey and the entire Rodrigues family and prayed for healing, peace. You name it, we prayed for it concerning sweet little Leilah.  As you know, Leilah was in fact born with anencephaly on Feb 12 but she defied all odds and hung in there for 3 1/2 days.  On Feb 15, she went to be with her Creator. Here are some beautiful words that her mom, Aubrey posted at that time:  

A few weeks later on March 4, Aubrey was able to put into words the things she was feeling and share the intense pain she was going through.  Here are some inspiring thoughts & feelings by her on the final moments with Leilah. 

Read all of her thoughts, feelings and words on their blog here:  http://bit.ly/1ibc39s

I can't imagine the pain of losing a child though I know my mom & my sister both have been through stillbirths. I have a brother and nephew playing together in Heaven right now with Jesus and I know they, along with her Aunt Amy that was also stillborn, welcomed little Leilah and are showing her the Streets of Gold and playing in Jesus's Backyard as I type this & you read it. 

Please continue to lift up this precious family to the Lord as I know their grief is not done it is just beginning.  Thank you so very much for standing in the gap for them. 

A few weeks ago I was able to share in our morning community meeting about all the things God is doing in our Little Builder's Preschool & Foundation School.  If you've been following along you know that this quarter was a big one for us. We added 7 kids from our Classic Discipleship Training School and 1 middle schooler from our Community Transformation & Development School, plus as I told you before we also had several toddlers waiting to join us as well.  Needless to say, this quarter has been quite busy!!  We opened our Toddler Class in May with 5 kids and on those days, we averaged 22 kids total in our classroom! On our non-toddler days we still had an average of 17 kids in one classroom! WHEW, no wonder I was exhausted most days!! 

As I prepared to share with our staff, students & guests, I decided to make a video showing what our normal day looks like. Many of our staff & students have never been inside the preschool as they don't have kids that attend and some think all we do is play.  Plus I was only given like 15 minutes to talk and those who know me know this is NOT enough time, haha!! (and we HAD to be done early cause MEXICO was playing that morning at 9 in the WORLD CUP)  This video allowed me to share what we do, the importance of what we do & show off the amazing skills of our students all at the same time & still have a few minutes to share some prayer requests at the end.  Check out our awesome video below, bonus points as it is bilingual, just like our class!!! (ps, i translated it myself & only had a few mistakes, SCORE!)