LOVED ONES When I sit down with a friend after a long time of absence, there is usually an exchange of sharing and listening that happens between us. It is not forced. We have no sequential plan of topics. We simply share what is on our hearts. Because so much has happened between the last time I wrote and now, this post for me will be like that. I want to tell you of some things that have happened and…
All of our students and families arrived back in Kona after their two-month outreaches in Burundi, Cebu (Philippines), Mazatlán and Uruguay. It was wonderful to hear about how God not only brought healing and salvation to so many, but about how families were also radically transformed. We had another beautiful renewal of vows right before graduation. Now, our students are integrating back into their communities or launching into full-time ministry. For example, one family has already started their work in…
We left for Uruguay two weeks ago and have been on the move ever since. After two very long days of traveling, we had to leave Jeff and our Mongolian family in Brazil because the airlines overbooked the flight. Yikes! I went with the team so I could translate once in Uruguay. Through an absolute miracle, Jeff and the Enkhbats made it onto a flight after 12 straight hours of Jeff talking with airline agents. A flight that did not…
God did it! Our family leaves on Monday, April 1 to go to URUGUAY!! A month ago, we had a huge goal of raising $24,000 in order to be able to go, and we are down to $0! We praise God for his faithfulness! We invited people to be part of our sending team, and God put it on several hearts to join us. Many of them were our students!! 😍 THANK YOU to all who contributed! He continues to…
Does God heal? On Sundays, a group of men gather on the base to play basketball. Two Sundays ago while Jeff was playing, he heard and felt a pop in his calf and then was unable to walk. He managed to make it to our room so that he could ice his leg, but as the day progressed, he was in more pain and his calf really tightened up. He decided to call his parents and brother to ask for…
This was originally posted on January 28, 2024. We discovered that my blog posts have not been going out for some time, so this is a test as well as a re-post. If you have not been receiving emails, I invite you to read previous posts as well. Blessings! Tori We have our team! If you look closely, you will see us in the picture below, being held in Britain’s hands. We were out sick when “The Reveal” of outreach…
Last week was arrival week! Twenty families made it to Kona for the start of our DTS (Discipleship Training School) season. It’s so evident that they are hungry for God’s touch and want to grow as much as possible through lectures, team building, small groups, one on one time, intercessory prayer, worship and outreach training. It will be a full eleven weeks before going on outreach. I can tell that this will be an amazing group! With kids, we have…
I heard a knock on our door just now. I expected it to be a resident who either needed to have something fixed in their room, to return a key or to have a cleaning inspection before outreach. Instead, I was met by a crowd of smiling faces looking for Jeff. It was his work duty crew coming to thank him for all that he poured into them this quarter. They’re all dispersing to different parts of the world now:…
“My food,” Jesus said, “is to do the will of him who sent me.” John 4:34 When we were commissioned to go on this trip, I really had no idea what to expect, yet I knew God was sending us. Initially, we thought we were going to Honduras, but God clearly re-directed us to Uruguay and Chile, starting with how Jeff met Cristian here in Kona. After spending several days together, Cristian invited us to his base in La Paloma,…
When we first decided to staff at YWAM Kona, I was incredibly excited to write this Blog about all of our experiences. I ran into a few immediate issues. First, we were so involved with ministry here that I didn’t have time to write! Second, I couldn’t settle on a focus for my posts. I kept oscillating between family updates, things I was learning personally and Bible principles. Third, I felt that since I was already sending email updates, I…