Building platforms

A week I wrote a post on Facebook about building platforms. Literally we are in the process of building a brand new ‘stage’ in our multipurpose building. You could think maybe why do we want to build more buildings, when it is all about Jesus and the nations who have not heard about Him. Yes, it is not about building concrete structures or a wood and steel stage. This is not just a stage, but a platform.

This is not about a building, a physical stage of wood and steel. This is about creating a place where the new generation can come to be trained, equipped and send out into what the Lord has for them. This is not about getting more and more people inside the ministry just to keep them here and have more people for the sake of having them. There is a purpose for everything we do.

One is that we are responding to the Word of the Lord to us to see a Campus build in which students can come and introduce Jesus to them, to train them in the area of their gift and passion for the glory of God the Father and for the expansion of the Gospel of Jesus Christ.

In responding to the Word of God, we are moving in faith one day at a time to co-create with Him. Our first step was to put up a multipurpose building where we can come together, where we can eat a meal together, worship together, gathering people to pray, seek His face and hear His Word.

This building is in the process of being finished and it is nothing short of a miracle, yet we know this is not about the building, but all about the Master Builder who has given us a call and a charge to develop this place.

Second is that obedience to this word is key. First is our response to start moving on the Word He gave, second is to stay 100% obedient no matter what.

There have been set backs, there has been a pandemic, there is new ways of living and doing things, but the Word and Work of God can not be stopped. Not even the cross could stop Jesus from fulfilling what He came for. He was not going to let anybody around Him stop Him for moving forward.

We are not building buildings, or stages, we are building platforms. A foundation on which to stand, on which to set our feet on solid ground – this foundation is Jesus Christ and no-one else.

He is our security, He is the one we get to stand on. The rock on which to put our feet. He is the One who provides us with the vision needed to move on, the security that what we will face He has already faced and knows what to do with.

Recently I have pondered a lot about those who have gone before us – hundreds of years ago – building towns, cities and nations. Those who gave up their lives to establish the cities we get live in today. The disease, the filth, the dirt, the season of building they had to go through so we could today live where we live….

Our ancestors, the things they had to face to give us a chance to live – I think about those who lived in the fields when there was nothing there and still there are many towns like that in the world – no electricity, no running water, no big supermarkets – surviving yet another day.

The reason why I have been pondering on this is because it is so easy to forget – so easy to just look at the now, when we struggle, when we are having a hard day, when things don’t go the way we like them – I think of them.

Building platforms isn’t always easy. Some don’t want the platform, some don’t want the help, some don’t want to go further. So my prayer today is that there will be a hunger, a desire, a passion, a perseverance to reach for more. Not more luxuries, not more things, but more for our lives and those who are to come after us. Yet not because of what we want, but because of what our Heavenly Father is dreaming.

Are we asking Him what He wants? What He longs for? What He hopes to see? I guess we already know what He longs for? He longs for His people to know Him, to live with Him, to walk with Him, to experience His love.

So how can we help make this happen? By asking Him. So we did back in 1999 and He led us back to Costa Rica to begin building a place where people would come to find new life in Jesus.

You are part of this and have been all these years.

Three years ago this March the Lord led us to this property – a land flowing with milk and honey – like Deuteronomy so beautifully describes the promised land. This is our promised land. The land the Lord (quite literally) kept for the ministry to develop His dream.

Three years ago we went through loss as a ministry and personally. We lost one of our very dear friends who helped pioneer YWAM San Jose with us. She suffered a brain aneurism and passed away in April 2018. Two months later we moved to our forever land. It was a season of deep pain and yet deep joy. How could those two be merged in one moment? In the letting go of our friend, while also walking into a promise that we had been contending for since 2004.

Here we are and have been now for almost 3 years. In 3 years we have been through lots of change, both physically, as a ministry and on the land.

We are ready to keep moving forward, keep building platforms, we are picking up speed, we are needing you to continue to walk with us. We are not stopping now, we are not giving up now, we are pressing into the Word spoken to us back in 1999. We are leaning into the strength of the Lord, not our own, but in Him we are more than conquerers. This is not about us, but in every way this is about Him – we want to raise up praises to the Name of the Lord, who is worthy to receive all honor and glory forever and ever.

YWAM San Jose does not exist to be known, or to be perfect, but we exist because God spoke, because God had a dream in His heart and gave it to us and ask us a question if we wanted to run with it – we simply said YES and we continue to say yes, because He is worthy!