We’re starting a new video series called This is Discipleship, which give a 3-4 minute snapshot of our coaches’ discipleship ministries. First, let us give a huge thanks to the videographer, Daniel Moye. Daniel is 17 years old and the son of Jim and Fran Moye. He spent a couple weeks in Ghana with Ash this summer. Here’s a note from Ash about the first video:
One of the fun challenges of my job is to help you get to the know the YLI Coaches as people, their lives, personalities, families and ministries – how they live as disciples of Jesus. Until now, I’ve done my best with words and pictures, but last month Daniel Moye traveled through Ghana with me. Daniel is a fun and creative short movie maker! This video he created captures our Coach Naomi Awuni’s spirit, passion and winsome personality better than I’ve been able with just words and pictures. This is discipleship!
The video is just over 4 minutes – click the photo above or this link. Please watch it…I dare you to try not to smile.
After landing in Ghana, I drove with some coaches up to Tamale in Ghana’s north. YLI has a lot going on in Ghana these days. The coaches and I have a busy schedule – building relationships, planning, praying and ministering together in ‘the north’. We ask you to pray for for our time together and for our safety as we are traveling around the country. Here are some prayer points related to the work we will be doing over the next several days.
1. After three years of prayer and careful selection we have invited four new Coach trainees to join our team in Ghana: Zak, Constance, Francis and Achare. This raises the number of our leadership team of Coaches in Ghana from five to nine. With the exception of one person, the entire team and I will be retreating away for a few days together – for prayer, teaching, collaboration, and enjoying time together.
2. Two new water projects are kicking off in the Saboba district. I’m reminded over and over again how simple-acts-of-love that are grounded in discipleship vividly illustrate the message of the gospel so effectively, and lead to spiritual multiplication. I’m looking forward to spending time with some of the people in these communities this week.
3. One of the greatest needs in the Fulani ministry has been transportation. The Fulani are a widely dispersed and nomadic people. Not only are they hard to find, but the team has had no reliable way to visit the remote clusters of Fulani homes. Some American YLI friends (I call them the YLI tribe) stepped up, and along with Nate Harkness and Love Nomads Coffee have raised some money for a motorcycle. If all goes well we’re going motorcycle shopping in Tamale later this week!
4. The Ghana coaches are in regular communication with Emanuvel Dass in India, and we are beginning to find ways to support and encourage what God is doing in India through YLI. Its exciting to see that our coaches and leaders do not see themselves as receivers of mission only, but are also leading mission both inside and outside of Ghana!
I’ll do my best to be updating Facebook, Instagram and Twitter for the remainder of my time in Ghana. As always, thank you for your prayer and support.
While in India I was asked, “What do you need to see in order to return to India?”
My response: “I would come back for one person as long as he is the right person.”
To find this person of peace, I had a few questions of my own:
1. What are some ways God is already working through young Christian leaders in India?
During the leader gathering where I taught, I met young pastors leading small house churches in areas where the gospel faces strong opposition. One young man is training pastors and missionaries to go to areas that currently have no Christian presence. Emmanuel Daas, who I told you about recently, leads a growing church out of his house, and reaches out to to both very poor lower-caste neighborhoods and more prosperous higher-caste neighborhoods.
2. Are there clear ways in which YLI could be of service to them both in their ministries and in their discipleship journeys?
Many of these leaders expressed that they had never heard a discipleship message like the one I taught, and have a desire to go deeper both in relationship and training.
3. Most importantly, “Is God leading YLI to begin investing in a few young Indian leaders through discipleship?”
Yes, I believe so. To do that, I’ll need help. And my best help is in Ghana.
I am now praying, planning and beginning to raise funds so I can return to India in June with a team of Ghanaian YLI coaches. I am excited to go deeper in training and discipleship with Indians and Africans together. I think that there is much for us to all learn from each other.
Thanks for praying with me, as I am still processing all that I saw, experienced and learned. It was a lot. I certainly saw God working creatively and dynamically through young leaders in this country in which the Christian population is small, but growing rapidly. I now consider each of these young leaders my friend and I’m moved to be part of what God’s doing there. More news to come as details are worked out.
The winding straight & narrow “He will direct your paths…”
For the last seven years, all of my international travel with Young Leaders International has been to West Africa (nearly 30 trips). I went there because I sensed God intended for me to go deep in relationship with a few people and release the breadth of our ministry to His timing and sovereignty.
Today, I am traveling to a very different region of the world: India. The reason for this India trip is a relationship with an Indian pastor that was started through our Ghana ministry and Coaches. We went deep with a few in Ghana and God led us to India. I never would have imagined.
Over the next few weeks, in the midst of meeting new leaders and having several opportunities to teach YLI’s discipleship materials, I will be focused on discerning what God has in store for YLI in India.
In addition to leading the Fulani ministry in Saboba, Jonah is also working to provide clean water for Konkomba villages in northern Ghana. The main guiding principle for our water projects is that we only install them in communities where we have young leaders engaged in relational discipleship ministry. That ensures that the impact is holistic, touching both spiritual and physical needs. It has been incredible to see how the combination of clean water with the Living Water has led to dramatic transformation in villages. Communities of people have come to know Christ and have also experienced drastic improvements in their quality of life.
Clean Water in Basajado
When my daughter, Katie, and I traveled to the north earlier this year, Jonah took us to the very remote and very poor village of Basajado. As we sat with the elders, Jonah explained our plan to provide clean water because we believe that God loves them and also cares about their living conditions.
The response from the elders was an unexpected silence. After a few moments I asked Thomas, a local leader, what was going on. Thomas asked the elders and then said, “They are so shocked about this great news that they are speechless.” Thankfully, the water project was completed last spring as planned and today is providing clean water during the current dry season.
A New Clean Water Project in Sedbeni
Jonah is now planning a second clean water project for the village Sedbeni. There is already a small church that meets under a tree in the community, and Jonah’s discipleship ministry is working hard to address spiritual, and social issues like alcoholism. We are prayerfully optimistic that construction of a water project will begin in Sedbeni early next year.
Training conferences are not the focal point of YLI, but they serve a vital purpose: help us meet new young leaders. We asked a few new leaders in our community about the impact YLI has made in their lives and ministries:
Owusu shared how God is using him to relationally win drug addicts for Christ.
Achare said God recently used him to pacify, befriend, and ultimately lead to Christ a crazed man who would often invoke curses on people in his community.
Josephine is having success leading Muslim co-workers and family members to Christ, despite the fact that her Father is a committed Muslim.
Johnson works at the Ghana Water Company, and each month has been giving his salary back to the company to fund clean water wells for poorer communities. He also led his Muslim brother to Christ.
YLI’s conference ministry is fully under the care of Ghana’s coaches. I sometimes attend, but I don’t teach. The coaches are not only better culturally equipped to relate to the young people, but are also incredibly gifted communicators. Each year coaches travel together four or five times to teach YLI’s discipleship material and identify a few young leaders to ‘go deep’ with. They then journey back to the same towns many times to invest in the new relationships and provide additional coaching.
The young leaders we encounter at YLI conferences typically do not have to be convinced to share their faith with those who do not know Christ. Evangelism is embraced as the responsibility of all African Christians. What they need and receive from YLI is training, community, discipleship, encouragement, friendship and partnership. The YLI conference ministry opens the door for the YLI Coaches to engage with young leaders in these areas.
Naomi Awuni experienced great loss in 2014. Her 16-year-old son King (shown above) succumbed to a long illness in July. King was a sweet kid and model student.
A School for Migrant Children
Naomi started the King James Academy, named for both her sons, to educate and disciple migrant children around her town of Sunyani. Thousands of northern Ghanaians have migrated south for subsistence farming and have settled in makeshift villages around Sunyani. Among these migrants are West Africa’s well-known nomads, the Muslim Fulani. Not only do the settlements suffer from poverty, alcoholism, violence and dangerous traditional religious practices, they are also filled with children who are invisible to Ghana’s education system. Thanks to Naomi, some of these migrant children now have access to education and a hot meal every day. Additionally, the children are hearing the gospel and seeing God’s love modeled daily.
Practical Needs of King James Academy
The school is run in a very simple open structure and lacks many of the supplies and equipment found in Ghana’s government schools. Most of the school’s toys and books are left over from my own children’s time in Ghana this year. If you would like to make a gift to Naomi’s school, just send a check to YLI with a note designating it for King James Academy. We will use it to buy equipment and educational supplies.
Discipleship of Muslims
Naomi’s passion for the Muslim community around her reaches beyond its youngest members. When I last visited Sunyani, Naomi introduced a Muslim Fulani teenager to me as her disciple. Consistent with YLI’s teaching, Naomi engages Muslims with discipleship even before they accept Christ. She told me, “He (the Fulani disciple) goes everywhere with me, to church and even to minister in migrant villages”. The young man has not yet accepted Christ, but he receives instruction from the Bible and sees Christ’s love lived-out through Naomi. Naomi’s discipleship is effective because it is grounded in love and relationship. Migrant people know that Naomi loves them and their children enough to improve their lives and futures.
During our family’s time in Ghana, I took the coaches to a global missions conference outside of Ghana’s capital, Accra. The day after we arrived, Naomi came to our table with a young Indian man she introduced as ‘our new friend’. She was right! Emmanuel Dass was with us for the rest of the conference and really became part of our team. Throughout the last year, Emmanuel has kept in touch with the coaches me and through emails and texts. Interestingly, Emmanuel does in India the same kind of ministry work some of our coaches do in Ghana – training and discipling village pastors.
Over the last six months, events lined up for me to combine a visit with Emmanuel with some other opportunities to teach discipleship to young leaders in India. On January 7, I depart for India where I will meet up with friends Dave and Cathy Hicks, long time missionaries who serve with Alongside Asia and have worked in India since 1963! As you can see on the map, I will be visiting six different cities.
In Mumbai, Cuttack, and Coimbatore I am meeting with young Indian Christian leaders to learn more about what they are doing in ministry and discipleship.
In Kolkata, I will be teaching YLI discipleship material at a three-day gathering with young leaders. I will also have the opportunity to teach students at the Hindustan Institute of Mission.
In Ooty I will be visiting Freedom Firm, a Christian organization that rescues girls from sex trafficking.
From Ooty I am taking a night train to Chennai to spend six days with Emmanuel, his family and his ministry in villages.
In all, the trip is just under three weeks. Please pray for my time with young leaders, for my teaching times, and for discernment about how God might be leading us to engage with Emmanuel and other young leader in India.
I had intended to spend part of October in Ghana with our coaches, but concerns about the Ebola outbreak and air travel lead me to postpone the trip. Although disappointing, the necessary change in plans afforded me the opportunity to go on a walk with YLI Coach Vincent Asamoah, who was in Atlanta to raise support for his basketball ministry, Shoot-4-Life. As we walked through the woods in Peachtree City, Vincent shared some stories of new young Ghanaian leaders in the YLI community who are growing the Kingdom in amazing ways. When I expressed amazement that YLI’s impact is spreading so spontaneously, Vincent said, “Ash, no one encounters YLI and walks away unchanged”.
It is God’s power that fuels mission, and without Him YLI would be ineffective. Over the last ten years we have watched the Holy Spirit form in YLI a quality that is both intangible and unquantifiable, but leads to a vibrant spread of the gospel. I believe it is our culture and community, the way that we live out our values of Intimacy with God, Love Evangelism and Going Deep with a Few ‘together’. We are in intimate fellowship with God, and sacred community with each other. YLI is about relationship and love. And lots of fun.
This year has been unique because for the first time the coaches have encountered new leaders with reach outside of West Africa. Specifically, two new leaders to our community have begun to live out YLI’s culture and values in mission fields outside of Ghana.
Emmanuel Dass is an Indian pastor and missions leader who spent a number of days with the coaches and me at mission conference in Ghana. This man developed friendships with the coaches and has begun to do ‘YLI-style ministry’ in India.
Over the last several years my goal has been to go deep in Ghana. Now, as the impact of YLI’s culture and values has naturally moved beyond Ghana, I believe God is leading me to invest in these new relationships. I am excited to report that next year I plan to travel to Emmanuel in India and to Zambia with Nate in addition to visits to Ghana.
The YLI board and I are deeply grateful for you and hope that you continue to lift us up with your financial support and prayer. You, too, are part of the YLI community.
Many of you prayed during my trip to Ghana’s north with my daughter Katie. We had a very rich 11 days traveling together. In between long, long hours in the car we visited communities where the coaches and I have been forming friendships for years, and also visited some villages where we are kicking off new discipleship work and water projects. We spent a day with more than 100 Fulani people as Jonah led a discussion of God’s love for them and the health, education and social issues they are facing. The Fulani backstory.
With Jonah (r) and a Fulani friend
Another very special highlight was sitting with my friends in Kpenchila village, site of our first water project four and a half years ago. On my first visit in 2009, I remember the awful pit in my stomach as I imagined my own children sitting amidst the Kpenchila kids, living life and trying to grow-up in that community – perpetually sick, no clean water, school access, or idea of a God who loves them.
This time was an immensely fulfilling experience. One of my own children WAS in Kpenchila, but she was sitting next to some of the same children who now have clean water to drink, and a new school (with a playground!) and a health clinic. Our YLI friends in northern Ghana, like Pastor Adam Brown, have done an incredible job not only in starting a church, but living out at great personal expense what discipleship is all about. Here is a photo from yesterday and one from my first visit to the village in 2009.
The people of Kpenchila are no longer just receivers of our efforts. They are going out to share Christ in villages like Tantwiane where the local imam asked them to build a church. They are really doing great.
We also visited Chaagbuni, the site of the third water project, which happened with Kpenchila’s ministry partnership. Chaagbuni has a new chief a former Muslim leader who became a Christian through the ‘water project church’. A Christian chief in Chaagbuni…that is a change.
Visiting the chief
Since Katie and I returned we’ve been busy-busy-busy. In April, we kicked off two new water projects, held a four day meeting with the coaches, enjoyed a visit from my in-laws, all in the midst of researching and writing my mini-thesis on discipleship within community in the African world.
Between the ‘spiritual’ activities, life has more resembled:
1. In the mornings before starting work Carrie, and I get the kids going, cook breakfast and then carry 12 buckets of water 75 feet for each load of laundry (somehow our kids still think its ok change outfits 4x per day…)
2. In many countries, Ghana included, plumbing is not robust enough to handle foreign materials like for instance…toilet paper. So we had a small army of plumbers and masons (along with a gaggle of unknown curious onlookers) dig up our septic and several parts of the sewer line.
3. Our electricity continues to be very sporadic. It may be on for a day or two, switch off for 15 minutes, then come back, on…and then switch off for 24 hours. This is difficult because we have perishable food in our fridge to worry about, lots of laundry, ceiling fans that keep us cool at night, phones to charge, and of course The Waltons and Cars 1 and 2 to watch.
4. We do not have running water in Akropong and no well at our house so we are dependent upon catching and purifying rainwater. When we run out of rainwater we have to drive around and find a water tanker that will come and fill up our tanks.
I wrote that these things are in addition to the ‘spiritual’ activities because that’s what they feel like — the time consuming and sometimes (often) frustrating work of living here. But in traditional African life people don’t see daily tasks as spiritual or non-spiritual. Kenyan, John Mbiti said that that in Africa faith is ‘written everywhere in the life of the people’. All of life is understood, and lived, as spiritual. It takes more time and effort to do mundane daily work here which sometimes (usually) makes me anxious as it draws me from the important…spiritual…work. But I’m learning from my Ghanaian friends how to relax and prayerfully acknowledge God’s presence while hauling countless buckets of water.
Thanks so much for all that you are doing for us. We are so grateful. Keep praying!
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