CELG 2013 | Iași, Romania
Over 40 leaders gathered from throughout the Central European region in the beautiful city of Iași in Eastern Romania, for 3 days of gathering – great teaching, good worship, times of intercession and just getting to hang out with each other – a YWAM gathering is never dull!
Our main speaker was Tom Bloomer, who is the Provost for the University of the Nations, and known as “Mr History”. We had a great time sitting at his feet and listening to him share stories and insights from his life -and we were all challenged by his sessions:
There were many other times of great teaching: here is Carmelita Clarke, YWAM Central Europe’s leader, sharing on Circles of influence in YWAM Central Europe and what that looks like:
And we also took time to share our stories: it is always encouraging to hear what is going on in the region: from an amazing outreach by Roma from Bulgaria to a Roma village in Albania, to teaching many people with incredible results about “hearing God’s voice” in Slovakia, God is doing many things in our region!
We also took time to pray for each other in various ways…here we are praying for Ad who has taken a step out of his role in the CELT (Central European Leadership Team) for a year, to focus on many new things happening in Slovakia – including a brand new ministry centre in Lukatin
We also took time to use the location of the conference (on a hill overlooking the city) to pray for the city of Iași: 
The city is a beautiful place, and one afternoon we were able to enjoy the sites: There are many amazing buildings within a short walk of each other: The beautiful Church of the Three Hierarchs:
The Palace of Culture: 
The oldest church “Saint Nicholas” and next door, the oldest house in Iași: 
On our last night we were treated to a concert by four wonderful singers (the ones on the left are brother and sister and both sing for the Iași Philharmonic). It was a truly amazing experience. And we got to see why Iași is known as the “city of culture”.
We gather as leaders once a year, and as a whole staff every other year, and this is deliberate – we need to renew relationships, not just with each other, but also with the One we are serving, so we can continue to do His work here in Central Europe and beyond. This gathering was not just a good time of input, but also of remembering why we do what we do, so we can keep on doing it! Until next year…
Leadership in the front seat | Drive 2013
As we have had have had a vision for some time of seeing more leadership development and YWAM DNA in our region, we invited YWAMers from Central Europe for a two-week gathering called ”DRIVE 2013”.
We were very happy to have many from our region being a part of it. Around 35 people had the privilege to listen and process together with Stephe and Rite Mayers, our leaders in YWAM Europe. Stephe`s emphasis on teams and healthy team leadership was a great input for all of us. Rite`s creativity and inspiration was something that set a great standard. She also did a Pre-school seminar in the evenings, and a lot of people from local churches were blessed by that.
In week two, we were blessed by having Wolfgang Jani (Wolfi) teaching about coaching and ”good questions” that we should ask in our lives and in our teams. To conclude our time together, Carmelita Clarke led us through the Myers-Briggs personality test.
It was also a great encouragement and blessing to have Rita Pretorius with us for both weeks. She was teaching and serving in the area of hospitality. Anyone that has experienced her hospitality has had a wonderful taste of what she is truly about. She is a great woman of God.
Loren Cunningham, our founder, was able to invest in Drive 2013 from Kansas City via the Genesis video conference system. This was amazing, and we left the chat with many ”take-aways”. Lynn Green also joined us via Genesis, telling us stories about faith-steps he has taken, and it was a time of refreshment for all of us.
Drive 2013 was the first leadership training that our community in Constanta has set up, and we know that it is just the start. We are now looking into ”Drive 2014”, so get ready to invest in your leadership.
We were blessed to be able to set this up for our region and we would love to have you come next time, for a time when leaders can come together and say we need one another. Times like these, when those that have gone before us give insights and pour out their lives, are times of gold. Drive 2013 was a time of gold, and so will be Drive 2014…
Go and lead the way!
Rune Saether
YWAM Constanta, Romania
Faith and Conflict | Significant in Central Europe?
As many of you know, since I took on the role of the leader of YWAM Central Europe, I have talked about the fact that I believe God is going to use us as a mission in this region in a significant way when it comes to reconciliation. I have never pushed to find out what needs to happen to set something up, as I have always felt that when it is time, God will make the steps clear. There have been different initiatives from different YWAMers and there are some groups also working in this area too, so things are not static, but I have felt there will be a specific door that God will open regarding what we should do.
At the end of this month I, along with three others from our region, will attend a seminar called “Faith and Conflict”, hosted by YWAM Ireland. I am suddenly very excited that God is opening up something to us and the doorway is this seminar. Jonny Clark, YWAM Ireland’s leader, has put on many things before in a similar vein in Ireland, but I have never been able to attend. I sense that as the 4 of us from CE pray and seek God about our region that something of what is on God’s heart will start to come into being and be birth at the Faith & Conflict seminar.
Please pray for this seminar and for what comes out of it. If you are interested in coming along, it is not too late to register at info@ywamrostrevor.com.
Is it time for YWAM in CE to take some significant steps towards its role and destiny in regional reconciliation?
-Carmelita Clarke
Tomatoes are FRUIT | Consultation
Several years ago I learned about Romanian missionaries, and how YWAM Romania was sending them out to India and other nations where many have not heard the Good News. I was impressed!
So as we were looking at setting up a European Frontier Missions (FM) conference, we decided, “why not hold it in Romania and celebrate the calling that God clearly has on them?” We then realised that others in Europe were feeling that God was saying to take more events to Central Europe.
After many months of planning we held the consultation 16-19 April, in Targu Mures, Romania. It would be called “Tomatoes Are Fruit”, as so often the things that produce fruit among the unreached, and even the “fruit” itself, does not look like what we expected… in the same way that we are surprised to learn that tomatoes are fruit!
We looked at such topics as:
- What “pathways” take a person from getting the call to getting to the field?
- What enables a European missionary to stay on the field?
- What is producing fruit among migrants to Europe?
- What can we as a group do to build the FM work in and from Europe?
In answer to the last question, we agreed to build an FM Europe network of about 15 people.
We had 126 names on our mailing list for TomatoesRFruit. If you are European or working in Europe and did not receive those announcements, but would like to hear about future events, write to tomatoesrfruit@gmail.com.
And check out our Facebook page: YWAM Frontier Missions Europe
Becky for the Europe FM Leader Team
Member Care | Do YWAMers have a life?
So the question is, do YWAMers have a LIFE?
Apparently not, judging by the content of many newsletters that we as YWAMers write. Often all we talk about is our WORK.
Why am I shy to admit in writing, that we had a relaxing holiday? Am I inhibited by the fear of possibly losing my support?
Or are the needs around me so pressing and I have never learned to say no? Maybe I get my self-worth out of my ministry and and it slowly has become my identity?
The speed of our lives is incredibly fast. We wear our busyness like a badge of honour. The result is often a restless, shallowness leading down a path to exhaustion…
We don’t take time to stop and smell the roses. (Actually, when was the last time you did just that?)
Personally I have found it helpful to sometimes totally disengage from all ministry activity for a day or 2 and spend time alone with God. For this to work well I leave my family behind and retreat in my sister’s garden shed.
It takes time and solitude to come down from our ministry adrenaline.
We desperately need to meet God to calibrate our compasses again. To reconnect with Him, to become aware again of being the beloved of our daddy in heaven.
As YWAMers our need is to continually KNOW God in order to MAKE HIM KNOWN effectively.
My temptation is to substitute an educated guess about what I am supposed to do for really connecting and hearing from him. It is so much quicker this way! And then I wonder why I am driven by every need around me. Maybe you are more the extroverted achiever type and the idea of being on your own with God for a longer period is a really frightening one.
Actually, nearly every time I am ready to leave for one of my away days with God, there is this strange reluctance and fear. What will I do if He doesn t show up? Well, so far He always has…
My wife always encourages me to go. She says: “You are far less grumpy when you return…”
So shut down whatever electronic device you are working with right now, head out the door for a stroll in nature, enjoy the spring sunshine, and have a chat with your heavenly daddy as you walk.
And don’t forget to stop and smell the roses!
Till next time,
Hannes Steets
Self Investment
Some weeks ago Drive 2013 took place, with leaders from Central Europe. It was an amazing time, with great speakers like Stephe Mayers and Loren Cunningham. We can look back on some deep insightful teaching, good interaction times and just a great time of fellowship.
Times like these are so precious to us, a time of great leaders investing in a new and young generation. Words of wisdom, insights and small takeaways with people that have gone before you.
The question that I am left with is this. Do we take time to invest in our self development or are we to busy to do what…
If we don’t grow our ministries and work we will stay the same and our ministry will eventually collapse and so will we!
The time of investment is so important and the leaders I meet that are not doing too great have often missed this part of self investment. They stopped growing because they are too busy, not taking the time for it.
How can I say that you might ask? Because I’ve been there, I’ve done that and I know the pain that you go through when your lack of investment is sucking the life out of you.
Leaders are learners and leaders are investors first in themselves, then in their team and the people they lead.
So when are you planing a time of investment in your life? Take time off, time for investment…a time of going deeper and getting good input. I hope you have it in your agenda…
Till next time, invest in your self development.
Rune Sæther
YWAM Constanta Base leader
more articles like this can be found on http://attitude4success.wordpress.com
Make the Change | Final Edition
Click on the image or the link below to read the most recent Make the Change: YWAM Central Europe’s monthly focus on finances edited by Carmelita Clarke, YWAM CE Director.
Helping you make the change so you flourish in mission!
YWAM CHEB | DTS News
An old monastery is breathing in new life. Spiderwebs were removed, a classroom set up. With the donations of lots of furniture and equipment from the „Lighthouse“ in Germany, we turned the „Riverhouse“ into a temporary, cozy home. Cheb – the once infamous city in the Czech border region – becomes the meeting point for the nations.
February 1st, 11 students arrived from all corners of the earth: Czech Republic, Germany, Ukraine, USA, South-Africa and Australia. With further staff from Brazil, Columbia and Serbia, we represent nine different nations. The school is run in English and Czech – but you can also listen to German, Ukrainian, Spanish or South African prayers through the walls of the former monastery.
The first two months of the DTS (Discipleship Training School) went by so fast! Every day is filled with prayer times, lectures, music, outreaches and practical work.That the school is happening, is to me a huge miracle and confirmation of God‘s grace and guidance. Six months ago, I was with only one other staff member in Cheb and we had no place where the students would live. It‘s exiting and a privilege to participate, when God is doing new things. For years, I keep reminding myself of one verse, that God has been writing on my heart:
,And the things you have heard me say in the
presence of many witnesses entrust to reliable
people who will also be qualified to teach others.‘
2 Tim 2:2
When I imagine, that each one of the students will start new things after this DTS, and that some of the students will go again into other nations, I‘ll know, that all the effort and also difficult times of the last years, have been worth it.
The theme „to be a light in the darkness“, has been leading us through the school. With a small team of students and staff we were able to visit some brothels. On the International day of women we brought to the ladies some gifts and could build further trust to them. In one of the brothels we were received very openly. The bar-lady explained to the boss that she knows us and encouraged us to stay, even though there were some customers sitting around. At the end we had such a warm good-bye and they invited us to come during the next holiday again!
Besides the lectures during the week, we are also organizing once a week an „open evening“ for people from the local community. During the first evening I was amazed, how many people showed up from all over the place: from the Roma-church, the Baptist youth, christians and open-minded people from other churches and groups.
I love it, when people are gathering from different cultures, ethnic groups, languages and generations, to worship JESUS together. Because he said, that he is the WAY, the TRUTH and the LIFE.
At the end of April the students will go in two different teams to Bosnia and Serbia/Romania/Turkey for a two-month outreach.
Thank-you for praying for us during this first DTS in Cheb, Czech Republic.
-Doris Rabus and Cheb DTS
Wanting to host teams??
If you are a YWAM location looking to attract teams to come and help out, there are quite a few ways to do that… Ideas include partnering with a bigger YWAM base (especially in Western Europe which is focusing on YWAM Central Europe at the moment), keeping your YWAM.org details up-to-date* and another is to network, network, network!
And here are two more ideas to help with your networking: contact them to get them to put you on their opportunities list and who knows what will happen! Click on the below links…
The Student Mobilization Centre
Check out Mission Builders’ promo video for more information on them.
* Simply go to https://update.ywam.org. For the login, use your location’s primary email address. The default password is your location’s Go Code. You’ll find this code in the top-right corner of your location’s listing in the Go Manual. You would type in the code in all capital letters, with dashes, like this: USA-CA-ABCD. If this Go Code doesn’t work, your password might have been changed by someone at your location. Just click on the “forgot password?” link and the correct password will be sent to your location’s primary email address.
