YWAM News that Bill finds Interesting » News

YWAM Working to Provide Clean Water

Bill Hutchison — Mon, 12 Jul 2010 03:59:20 +0000

I remember first hearing about some of the work YWAM was doing to provide clean water when I was in Kenya in 2001 for the University of the Nations (U of N) Workshop. Howard Malmstadt demonstrated a new water filtration and purification device that he developed with Rolf Englehard. 30 of the units were given away, which was to be the start of a larger distribution of the water filtration and purification devices to provide clean water around the world.

Youth With A Mission has been active around the world over it’s 50-year history in bringing clean potable water to the nations it’s worked in.

Some of the things that Youth With A Mission is currently doing to help provide clean water are:

Repairing damaged wells and pumps in Haiti after the earth quake
Proving clean water along with education and health care to the Aluwawe People of the Zambezi Delta in Mozambique (here)
Building concrete rain water collection tanks in Vanuatu where they have already built nine water tanks in the Northern villages of Efate, where I did my YWAM DTS outreach(here).
Building and improving wells in southern Sudan (see video below)
Running a Community Water Technology Seminar through the University of the Nations (U of N) in at least two locations in the world (here),
Water for Life & Platypus Go-Teams out of YWAM Tasmania to help provide access to safe water through seminars, training and short term missions trips (here).
Water for Life ministry in Kona, Hawaii as part of the University of the Nations (U of N) which currently has projects to help people develop safe and sustainable water sources in Kiribati, Indonesia, Brazil, Kosovo and Rwanda. (here)

YWAM work continues to help provide clean water for the estimated 2 billion people around the world who are lacking adequate water supplies and sanitation.

Dean Sherman in Denver Hospital with Cardiac Problems

Bill Hutchison — Fri, 09 Jul 2010 07:42:39 +0000

While travelling through Denver on his way to teach in Cimmaron, Colorado, Dean Sherman fell ill with severe chest pains. He was taken from the airport directly to the hospital after having terrible chest and stomach pains.

At the hospital they discovered that his gallbladder is shot and that he has several stomach ulcers. The problems that they found need surgery to repair. The first surgery was a little more complicated than expected so they had to schedule a second surgery.

They were unable to do the second surgery because they found some cardiac problems. The heart pumps aren’t working together as they should. Dean Sherman is currently in a lot of pain, is feeling weak and is very tired.

After meeting with the Cardiac Consultant they found that he has severe aortic stenosis that will require open heart surgery with valve replacement sometime in the next few days. He still also requires the follow up gallstone surgery.

Dean’s wife, Michelle Sherman is now in Denver with Dean. He is currently having to change his next five-weeks teaching schedule and is expected to be in hospital for an extended period of time.

The best place to follow the news on Dean Sherman seems to be his Facebook Page here.

Stop Paying for Slavery Tour in Australia

Bill Hutchison — Mon, 05 Jul 2010 16:00:22 +0000

The Not for Sale Campaign is bringing the “Stop Paying for Slavery” tour to Australia this month. Here are the dates and location for the tour:

Adelaide June 29 and 30
Melbourne from July 1 – 3
Townsville July 4 – 6
Brisbane July 7 – 9
Canberra July 9 – 11
Wollongong July 12 – 13
Perth July 14 – 16
Newcastle July 17
Sydney July 18 – 19

The tour aims to bring together people from education, law enforcement, faith communities, corporations, consumers and justice seeks to help bring an end to modern day slavery.

At many of the locations the people from the Not for Sale Campaign will be partnering with the location Youth With A Mission (YWAM) Centre for the events. I know that in Townsville the event will be held at the YWAM Centre there, and that appears to be the case in many other centres around Australia.

Faces of Slavery from David Hepburn on Vimeo.

You can read more about what the tour is about, and where it will be visiting after Australia, on their web-site at www.notforsalecampaign.org.

YWAM Building a School in Angola

Bill Hutchison — Mon, 05 Jul 2010 15:28:32 +0000

YWAM Angola is looking at building a school in the nation. The area that they are looking at is so undeveloped the government has no plans to address basic needs in the area like literacy and primary education. YWAM has already started up three literacy groups in the area and will be working with the tribal leaders to develop the school. There has already been land set aside and they are now waiting for approval from the local authorities.

Funds have been raised for the building supplies needed for the school but there is still a need for a vehicle to transport the supplies to the location of the school. The materials need to be moved piece by piece from Huambo, where the YWAM Centre is located, to the region of Kamakoyo. After the school has been built the off-road vehicle will be used to transport outreach teams into the region.

You can read more and find out how to donate on the YWAM International web-site, here.

Voluntourism and YWAM

Bill Hutchison — Sat, 22 May 2010 04:17:27 +0000

CNN had an interesting article about something called “Voluntourism”. Voluntourism is defined by Wikipedia as:

Volunteer travel, volunteer vacations or voluntourism is travel which includes volunteering for a charitable cause. In recent years, "bite-sized" volunteer vacations have grown in popularity. The types of volunteer vacations are diverse, from low-skill work cleaning up local wildlife areas to providing high-skill medical aid in a foreign country. Volunteer vacations participants are diverse but typically share a desire to “do something good” while also experiencing new places and challenges in locales they might not otherwise visit.

I find it kind of entertaining that they are saying that it is something that has started in recent years. YWAM has been involved in voluntourism almost since it’s inception 50-years ago and has been sending people to the ends of the earth to experience new cultures, undertake new challenges and tell others about God.

What they call voluntourism Youth With A Mission and the Church calls “Short Term Outreach”.

Lynn Green to Address YWAM Live On-Line

Bill Hutchison — Sat, 10 Apr 2010 04:36:13 +0000

On April 28th at 5pm GMT (10am Pacific) Lynn Green will be addressing YWAM globally on an online video stream. Youth With A Mission has been streaming many of their GENESIS (video conferencing) meetings live to include as many people and YWAM locations as possible. So far there have been over 23,000 views of these different live recorded videos.

In addition to Lynn Green speaking on the live online video broadcast Shirley Brownhill will also be speaking. Shirley Brownhill is the director of YWAM Perth and will be sharing stories and video from Mexico City. YWAM Perth is currently engaged in a “Mega Cities” outreach in Mexico City and they have seen many people come to the Lord during their time there.

You can join into the live video address by clicking here at the time of the event.

To find out what time the event is in your time zone click here and then select your location.

The YWAM Ship MV Pacific Link has Arrived in Portland, Victoria

Bill Hutchison — Tue, 06 Apr 2010 03:10:12 +0000

After two weeks spent in Adelaide, South Australia the YWAM Ship Pacific Link has now arrived in Portland, Victoria after a day and a half sail.

Upon arriving in Portland they went straight into a youth camp with some of the local youth.

Tours of the ship will begin on Wednesday and continue through to Sunday. They will be open for public tours from 9 – 4 Wednesday to Saturday, and 1 – 5 on Sunday. For individual visitors there is no appointment needed, but for larger groups it would work out better if an appointment was made before hand.

Other planned special events during the visit to Portland are:

A special reception for medical professionals on Thursday the 8th at 7:30pm on the ship.
Free Concert on Friday the 9th of April at 7:00 pm with “Five Star Street” and “Saving Sparrows” at the Civic Hall
Free Concert on Saturday the 10th of April at 7:00 pm again at the Civic Hall with Proper Way Productions, and island dance act

You can contact the YWAM Ship tour on their web-site here to confirm these events and book tours for any large groups.

YWAM Perth Battered by Freak Storm

Bill Hutchison — Mon, 29 Mar 2010 06:19:10 +0000

A freak storm hit Perth, Australia last week causing over $100 million worth of damage. It is the worst storm to hit the city since 1994.

The storm brought with it hail, rains, flooding, landslides and gusts of wind more than 120km/hour! One of the staff with Youth With A Mission Perth reported that:

However, we rejoice because the rain has broken the drought. We had all of March’s average rainfall in 7 minutes.

Thankfully no one was injured at the YWAM Perth training centre, but the centre did receive a significant amount of damage. Ceilings were ripped off of the kitchen and classrooms. There was also flooding through the classrooms and through the auditorium. Some of the students also had to be relocated when one of the properties used for accommodation was badly damaged.

There is no new news yet from YWAM Perth about the cleanup, but you can find out more about their ministry, and hopefully read some updated news from them here.

What Is the Official Sport of YWAM?

Bill Hutchison — Mon, 29 Mar 2010 03:58:48 +0000

In keeping with the theme of the Official YWAM Board game (which wasn’t official, but was a board game) we now have the official sport for YWAM.

The official YWAM sport is …

Football!!!

Now before you Australian’s, Canadian’s and American’s get all excited I am not talking about Gridiron football, Aussie Rules football or Rugby. I’m talking about the sport that you call soccer (which is played a lot more with the “foot” than any of those other games called “football”).

I have played football at nearly every Youth With A Mission centre that I have been at. Just off the top of my head I have played football with YWAM at:

The front lawn of YWAM Lausanne, Switzerland
The oval at YWAM Harpenden, England
The field near YWAM Auckland, New Zealand (it used to be across the road, but looking at Google maps there are houses in the way now …)
The Strand at Reef to Outback in Townsville, Australia
Vanuatu on outreach
YWAM Vunayasi in Fiji
East Timor on outreach

My wife and I have been encouraging my son that if he wants to play a sport he should play soccer. Not only has it been in my experience the most played sport in YWAM, it is also the widest played sport in the world.

The runner up for the most played sport would probably be cricket, which is also the second most played sport in the world.

I know that the people over at YWAM Hockey will probably be disappointed with my finding, but it’s hard to find a good ice surface in most places of the globe.

YWAM Ship Tour – Next Stop in Adelaide, South Australia

Bill Hutchison — Mon, 22 Mar 2010 17:28:25 +0000

After a successful time in Geelong, Victoria the YWAM Ship the Pacific Link is now on it’s way to Adelaide in South Australia (my wife’s home town!).

While the ship is in Adelaide they will be berthed at the McLaren Wharf in Port Adelaide from March 25 – April 4 at Birth 4. While in Adelaide the YWAM staff and students will be visiting schools, churches and youth groups sharing about the ship and about the “I Want to Live” campaign.

There are three public events planned during the time that the ship is in Adelaide:

March 25 – YWAM Ships Dinner at the British Hotel in Port Adelaide. Cost is $20 per head and includes dinner, music, live entertainment and tours of the ship. Read more.
March 26 – YWAM Ships Youth Event at The Marketplace Church. This is a free event and includes an international hip-hop crew and a music fest. Read more.
March 27 – YWAM Ship Family Event at the Lighthouse Square end of Commercial Road in Port Adelaide. The event will include tours of the ship, live music, speakers and family fun activities. Read more.

During the rest of the time that the ship is in Adelaide they will be continuing to collect glasses for distributing in Papua New Guinea (PNG) and running school tours of the ship.

After the fantastic response that the YWAM ship has received in their previous ports on their tour of Australia it is looking like their time in Adelaide should go pretty well. Hopefully I’ll be able to get some of our friends and family who are in Adelaide to stop by and check it out.