Y.W.A.M.
Youth With a Mission is an international, interdenominational Christian Missions organization that has been around for just over 50 years. It is one of the largest in the world, with over 1000 operating locations and over 20,000 full time workers around the world. YWAM is decentralized and broad-structured.
Discipleship Training School:
Our primary ministry is to work with the Discipleship Training School or “DTS”. The program is made up of two parts, the three month “lecture phase” and the three month “outreach phase”. Students come from around the world, usually ranging in age from 18 to their late 20’s, experience living in community (which means doing basically everything with other people of different ages, cultures, and backgrounds); weekly teachings from a variety of teachers on topics like “The Father Heart of God,” “Evangelism”, “Servanthood”, “Relationships”... etc; local outreaches in the city of Los Angeles; worship; and preparation for their overseas outreach. For the 3 month “Outreach” the students travel to a different country with a team of around 10 people with 2 leaders and their goal is to share Christ’s love through evangelism, mercy ministry and teaching/training. This takes on a different look with every team and depends very much on where they go. For instance Haiti is in desperate need for construction of homes and water-wells, so our team would go, assist in that while also caring for widows & orphans and putting on demonstrations where they tell people about how Christ loves the Haitians. In Thailand the need may revolve more around human trafficking and the injustice of women being sold into prostitution against their will. So then we would send a team to serve at a rescue home for girls who have been taken out of prostitution and are now trying to live life as normal young women. It is also very common for our outreach teams to be given opportunities to teach English and speak at churches. After the 3 month outreach portion all of the students return to YWAM LA for a week of “Debrief” before they return home and begin their next life adventure. Once they have completed the DTS many students return to YWAM to continue serving in ministry. We encourage students to take what they have learned in their DTS and apply it in their neighborhoods, universities, jobs, families, and churches back home.
Skate Track:
The community of lost teenagers that hang out at the skatepark in Sunland, CA is no longer a community of lost teenagers. It is a community that has been invaded and transformed by the gospel of Jesus Christ.
A few years ago Shaun saw that the teens at Sunland skate park did not have good role models in their lives. They had never seen what it looks like to follow Jesus. They were sitting around, getting drunk and high, and wasting their lives because they had no hope for a future.
Shaun and some other local Christian skaters started going to the skatepark every friday afternoon with a BBQ, food, and lemonade. They hung out with everyone at the park; invested in their lives and shared Christ with them. After a few months of God working, many of these teens surrendered their hearts to Christ and began learning to do life with Jesus.
First, Jesus invaded the skatepark, then the skatepark invaded the church. The Chapel of the Hills church youth group grew from around 10 youth to 50 in just a few months, as nearly the whole skatepark started attending.
For the last few years Shaun has been helping to serve at Chapel of the Hills on Wednesday evenings as a teacher and mentor to the youth. Many people from the Sunland community have come to Christ through the ministry at the park, and are now getting discipled in the church. Some have even brought their families to church and family members are coming to know God.
Create Track:
Inspired by a love for the arts and a heart for people struggling in the areas of beauty and identity, Jessica began the Create track in 2009 alongside her close friend Beka Brigleb. The girls put together this ministry with a goal to use dance, drama, spoken word and music to communicate the truth of God’s Word in a form that is relevant and creative. This is a ministry within the DTS that students are invited to join with during the “lecture phase” of their school. Create track puts together events that give talented Christian artists in Los Angeles opportunities to share their gifts and their love for the Lord to people who may not otherwise hear it. Create also partners with Models For Christ (MFC) each week to help serve as they provide a place for professionals in the Arts, Entertainment and Fashion Industries to come and grow in their relationship with Jesus while being encouraging to remain faithful in the midst of temptation. Jess also dresses backstage for different fashion events, as a way to bless the models. The Create Track ministry shifts a bit each time a new group of students arrives, as it takes on the new personalities of the group, but the vision remains the same: to use the arts to make the name of Jesus famous and influence the arts, entertainment, and fashion industries with the love of Christ.
