A Great Opportunity in the Making

The above picture is of a permit which I just got today for something spectacular that will happen this summer.  In downtown Salem, is the Riverfront Park.  It is a big park located rite on the Willamette River and is a popular place for festivals, etc... in the summer months, not to mention a very popular place for people to walk around.  In this park, is an amphitheater. For six weeks in a row, every Thursday evening this summer, we will be holding open air evangelism for our MA groups and local churches.  The idea is bring out the speakers, and preach the Gospel.  The day will be spend having our teams hand out invites, and then that evening we have an hour long program, all which will have a powerful message of the Gospel.  Please begin to join us in prayer for these meetings and that people will come to know Jesus Christ.  We are hoping to have volunteers from city churches give us a hand in doing certain "crowd drawer" type things, but in the end, I do not want to have this be a show or performance.  It will be simple.  A time where the Gospel will be preached.  So stoked!

A Day with the Mormons

From now until Easter, we are asking people on the street about Easter and the Resurrection.  Monday it seemed to draw a lot of people...in particular quite a few Mormons.  One guy in particular named Lewis spoke with us for over an hour.  Believe it or not, it was the first time in his life he ever heard a Biblical Gospel message.  He could not get his head around that our works before the Lord are like filthy rags and that our whole redemption must lay in the grace of the life, death, and Resurrection of Jesus. After Lewis left I had a long discussion with another Mormon lady.  It was quite the conversation, and it mainly centered on Jesus' deity.  It was a great conversation, but frustrating as well.  In the end, this lady contradicted her belief system countless times, and even admitted it!  Pray for her, her name is Audrey and she works nearby so my guess is we will see her again.

Spring Break Group

This past week we hosted a spring break trip for a youth group from down by the San Fransisco Bay area.  It was an awesome time, and many of the students lives were changed.  We were very encouraged how they responded to our training and outreach times.  Three of the students are planning to do a DTS in the near future, which is always exciting to hear.  At the end of the week, I said my typical, "I'm getting to old for this stuff.." But oh how rewarding it is to see the Lord change the hearts of young people in such a short amount of time, and to be able to be a part of it.  for many of these students, they shared the Gospel for the first time in their lives with people while doing Mission Adventures.  What a priviledge to be able to train, and provide them the opportunities to do so.  Our group was only one of many across North America providing short term trips for spring break groups.  it is so encouraging to hear testimonies from other Mission Adventures locations of all the amazing things God is doing.

Autumn turns 5...Anders Builds a Castle

Today Autumn turned five years old!  How time sure flies.  She celebrated by going to a local indoor water park and then had a blast riding her bike in the park and playing with her brothers and sisters. Autumn was our first born here after we moved from Russia.

Anders built himself a homemade castle today in the garage.  he is ALWAYS building something, or trying to write out plans to build something in the future.  What a creative kid.  I actually think he knows how to build stuff better than me.  He usually is teaching me how to do the building on all his THOUSANDS of projects.

Alistair as you can see is not hurting for want of food and calories.  This morning I took this picture of him while he was relaxing in a bath...rite after breakfast of course.

Hit the Trails!

This weekend we had a glimpse of spring in the Northwest here which means the Walter family hit the trails and did some hiking. This was Alistair's official first hike!

Big brother Aidan ended up carrying little Annie for a while.  He is good on gas mileage.

Autumn insisted she climb a big hill by herself.  The whole way up she kept telling me, "I'm tough daddy, I can do it!"  And sure enough she did!  Autumn is definitely our outdoors one of the girls!

Spring Break is Here!

The above picture is of one of our staff getting ready to great our first Spring Break team of the year.  For the next 3 weeks, Mission Adventures locations all across North America will be hosting mission trips for hundreds of youth.  Places like Salem, Las Vegas, San Francisco, San Diego, Orlando, Minneapolis, Charlotte, Ozarks, Boston, Vancouver BC, all are receiving teams just to name a few.  Domestic trips as well as international ones.  Please be praying for all these mission trips.  Being the chairman of Mission Adventures in North America, I also have the privileged to help see these programs flourish and I would love for your prayers for these locations!  May Jesus be glorified in Spring Break this year!

Born Again in an Alley Way

About two months ago I wrote to you all about a young man named Eric who works for the city.  I met him doing the Gospel Guy and over the past few months we have had some great conversations, and I along with our staff have been praying for him. Eric was one of the people that works with my Christian friend Tim who Tim told us was asking him questions about Jesus and things after he had spoke with us, read our questions, etc..The Lord has been working on his heart and we have earnestly pleaded with the Lord for his soul.  Today, Eric came up to me and we began to talk.  I turned the conversation around to Jesus.  As we talked, I asked him once again what is keeping him from putting his trust in Christ.  His answer shocked me when he said, "I'm ready to do it today Tim...I want to receive Christ as my Savior."  He then asked me if I would meet him in the alley where he takes his lunch as he felt uncomfortable doing it rite there on the corner.  I said sure.  So at 1:00 today, Eric repented of his sin, and became a new believe in Jesus Christ!  Oh how faithful God is!  Pray for Eric as he lives 30 minutes out of town. Pray he finds a church, and begins to study the Bible.  I plan to continue to meet with him as much as I can.  Thank you all for your earnest prayers.  

The Gospel Guy Gets in the Paper

Check out the link below from Salem's newspaper the Statesmans Journal!  The Gospel Guy made the news.  God is awesome!

http://www.statesmanjournal.com/article/20140309/LIFE/303090009/Duo-witness-strangers-Gospel-Guy-?fb_action_ids=10152370916842289&fb_action_types=og.recommends&fb_ref=artrectop&fb_source=other_multiline&action_object_map=%5B675531079173987%5D&action_type_map=%5B%22og.recommends%22%5D&action_ref_map=%5B%22artrectop%22%5D

Crosswalk Changes a Life

Friday I took the DTS students out to do our Crosswalk outreach.  One particular story of how this outreached changed a life I felt like sharing.  A girl name Rachel the day before the outreach was terrified about having to do it.  She literally was so nervous that she began to cry while speaking about it to one of the DTS staff.  That evening, we had our monthly Night of Missions at YWAM Salem in which we had speaker come share about being full of faith, foolish, and flexible for the Lord.  Rachel was brought to tears during the worship time, and she felt the Lord asking her strongly to participate in Crosswalk the next day.  So the next day when we got downtown after I did our briefing, prayer, and put the cross together I asked who would like to go first.  Nobody moved.  It was obvious the students were battling fear.  Then, form the back of the group a hand went up...it was Rachel.  She stepped up to the front, and was the first to drag the cross.  The Lord taught Rachel a lesson in obedience that day, and I was very proud of her as she took that bold step of faith.  What are you doing today that stretches your obedience to Christ?

Spring Break is Just Around the Corner!

The above picture is of our spring break t shirt orders for our groups!  In two weeks we will be getting our first group for spring break.  It is a group of 21 high schoolers and their leaders.  Spring break is kind of like the "pre-season" for the upcoming busy Mission Adventures Summer.  As always, I will be getting complete new young staff to help with the groups and this year it looks like we got quite a dynamic team.  It is always neat to see the "progression of our MA staff.  For example, two of our staff did their DTS at our base last year.  I spoke on evangelism in their school.  Now, they are staffing Mission Adventures and pouring into the lives of the students who come through.  God is good!!

A Great Week in the DTS

The above somewhat out of focus picture is from the classroom today as I was finishing up my week speaking on evangelism with the Winter DTS.  It was a great week, and I am looking forward to tomorrow when I take the students to drag a wooden cross through our city and then do the Gospel Guy.  Please pray for the students as this will be way out of their comfort zones in many ways.  This group of 12 students leave in three weeks to head to India and Nepal for their 10 week outreach.

Fall DTS Graduation

This past Thursday the fall DTS graduated 23 students who returned from outreach the same week.  Our building was packed with about 150 people! the kids love coming to these graduations and hearing all the cool stories of what God did on outreach through the students.  These young people have just returned from Kenya, Tanzania, South Africa, and Thailand.  It is always a privileged to be present at these graduations.  Especially since I get to know the students pretty well as I speak for a week in their schools on evangelism....which I will be doing this week again for our winter DTS! Prayers appreciated!

Word on the Streets

The above picture is of our weekly round up for the Gospel Guy.  We simply write some questions that people asked us on the street in those black bubbles, for people to read, and then contemplate how they would respond.  More than anything, it is a simple way to keep the Gospel Guy and evangelism at the forefront of our staff and students as they stand in line and wait for meals!

A Place of Darkness to a Place of Light

The above picture is taken at our youth pastors monthly coffee hour last week.  All these people are youth pastors in our city, passionately serving God.  Why I took this picture is because it is taken in the new "Shine" cafe which is run by the Salem House of Prayer.  It is a brand new coffee house in our city that has been in the making for the past 3 years.  Here is the amazing thing....this cafe used to be the darkest night club in our city where sex trafficking was going on.  We actually give all our Mission Adventures groups tours of place which takes them into basements where there where "sex rooms", trap doors, and all sorts of horrible things.  Today...it is a Christian coffee house!  What an amazing God we serve!!

Tons Going on at YWAM Salem

The above picture is of the announcement board in our main eating area on campus.  I decided to take a picture of it because it is so encouraging to see all the awesome things going on here at YWAM Salem.  From DTS students going all over the world, to the present Foundations in Counseling School, to the Ropes course, to Mission Adventures, and the Gospel Guy....things are busy here!  Often I will look at this board for encouragement.