Darla and I wanted to let you know that the staff and students here at YWAM Orlando have started a 24 - 7 prayer time which began Friday April 18th and will continue at least until we see the release of the campus. We are praying about the upcoming meetings that we will have with the owners of the 199-acre property. We believe that God desires to train literally thousands of missionaries in the upcoming years from this campus.
We have been negotiating the purchase of this property for 2 years and the recently planned meeting was postponed by the owners. The reason for the postponement is to allow them to approach the county one more time to see if they can sell it as a residential development, which would produce far more money for them.
Please pray that:
- God would move on the country commissioners to declare clearly that this property was committed for ministry purposes and that they must honor this commitment
- God would give us wisdom as we continues to negotiate
- God would provide all the money necessary to purchase and renovate this campus
Thanks for standing with us!
Michael & Darla Berg
P.S.
We invite you to join us as a part of the Remote Prayer Team anytime.
If you would like, you can sign up for a specific date, and hour through our website: www.ywamorlando.org/prayer
We would love to hear from you if you get any scriptures or words during your time of prayer. If God shows you anything during your time of prayer, please email: prayer@ywamorlando.com
Greetings from sunny Orlando! It's been a very busy time for me, and I guess you could say I started off the New Year with a bang!
In January I hosted the Eastern Discipleship Training School (DTS) Resource Team Meetings for a few days, hosted the Base Leadership Training seminar with Lynn Green (YWAM's International Chairman), I taught for a week in our January DTS, and our staff and students helped serve at the very first Call2All Congress which was held locally at a large church.
Call2All
Call2All is a worldwide movement calling the church to a renewed, focused collaborative effort to complete the Great Commission. The sole purpose of the 4-day consultation was to plan, strategize, and partner for the completion of the Great Commission. This was the first of 40 congresses that will be held in different regions of the world between now and 2010. Some of the speakers for this event were Jack Hayford, Luis Palau, Loren Cunningham, James Robinson, to name just a few. Around 550 people from various organizations and churches attended this first congress.
Last week I taught in the Jacksonville Discipleship Training School and really saw new freedom in the lives of the students. Next week our Discipleship Training School and School of Ministry & Evangelism outreach teams in South Africa and USA Cities return to Orlando. On Friday we have graduation for these schools and get to hear highlights of what God did.
Thanks once again,
Yours for the Lamb, Michael
Hello from sunny Orlando! As you know, a significant part of our calling is to train leaders, so we were especially excited to host a week of leadership training here in Orlando called Base Leadership Training. Lynn Green, the international chairman of YWAM, spoke the majority of the time. We had leaders from around the US and Canada. This was an amazing time of impartation into all of our lives.
Epic Quest Reunion
Immediately on the heels of this event was the Youth Ministry reunion, in which we invite alumni from our various youth programs to come for a weekend of inspiration, reconnection with friends, and further training. My son, Joshua, was a part of the worship team, playing a guitar which was his grandfather's. What a joyto see him use a guitar older than he is to worship and honor the Lord!
PROPERTY UDPATE
In our last letter we said that the next meeting to negotiate the price on the 180-acre piece of property was January 8th, but the owners had not obtained their appraisal, so they postponed the meeting to January 24th. Please continue to pray for wisdom and favor for us as we walk through this process. Especially join us in praying for a release of the property!
Thanks once again for your friendship and partnership!
Yours for the Lamb, Michael
We currently have 65 staff here
locally and 71, if we
count those on the field.
This fall we have 69
students in our training
programs, and when you
add children and guests
to the mix, we have over
150 people that we are
feeding. We are
currently working to
build out some
additional office space, and I am still in the negotiations of a large campus property. These
negotiations are going far slower than we would like, but we can only go as fast as the owners
and their committees are willing to go. Please continue to pray with us for God’s help as we
lead this work.
We are so grateful for your partnership and
friendship. You help to make this and much
more possible!
Dear Family & Friends,
Hello from YWAM Orlando! I just finished a week of teaching and ministry in our Discipleship Training School and once again we were amazed at God’s faithfulness to set people free from the prison of bitterness and unforgiveness! These students are great people and on the surface like so many of us, they look great, but living in this fallen world has taken it’s toll on even 17 to 25 year olds. Fortunately for all of us, we serve a very faithful God!
| Our Largest Basic Leadership School Ever |
Normally we only allow this school to be attended by 4 to 6 students because it is a leadership mentoring program. This time we allowed it to grow to 15 students due to our rapid growth and the desperate need we face for small group and outreach leaders as we send teams carrying the light of the gospel to places of utter darkness, spiritually speaking. Even with 4 staff helping me I had to turn away some potential students, because I wanted to be certain that we could offer a quality leadership training program. To the left is the Basic Leadership School and below I am teaching the school.
Speaking of growth, we are in the early stages of pursuing a large property that would be ideal for our training campus here in Orlando. I have not even been able to meet with the decision makers on this property yet, due to their scheduling issues.
Please pray for God’s wisdom, favor with the owners and provision. As with so much of what God calls us to, this property is beyond our human abilities, but God is able if it’s from Him.
Dear Family & Friends,
I’m excited to finally get to write about the extraordinary experience we had at our Southeast Conference! Immediately following the conference, I became quite ill and had to cancel my trip to Richmond for the North American Leadership Conference, but now I’m finally able to go back to work although I’m still recovering from a very strong bronchial infection.
Probably the best way to describe the Southeast Conference is to start at the beginning. Normally at one of these conferences, I invite a key note speaker, and we set up workshops on various topics. But as Darla, the Southeast leaders, and I prayed, we sensed that God wanted to minister to our staff and students with a team of people made up of YWAM leaders from the Southeast bases and of a church we know in Tacoma, WA. This proved to be exactly what the conference needed. We had a team of over 30 people ministering to about 300 people at the conference and God moved in literally almost everyone at the conference.
The most encouraging part of the conference was for God to reveal to us what His individual purpose was in creating each of us. God has good thoughts toward us (Ps. 139) and to hear His specific thoughts for us was tremendously uplifting. Also, we discovered that some people had struggled silently for a long time with major problems. Some were even ready to give up on their marriage, but as we prayed, God revealed the root stronghold causing the problem and gave us insight as to how the person could literally rip it out—and they did. One couple told Darla and I that this conference saved their lives. There are so many stories that it would be impossible to tell them all, but next time we talk on the phone or in person, ask us about this conference. To see more photos of the conference check out our web site the address is below.
http://www.ywamorlando.org/blogtour/blog_Flickr.asp?CID=37&OCID=1&PID=420
In the photo to the left I am praying, blessing, and commissioning the release of a new Youth With A Mission Base in Louisville, KY. We also prayed for the release and blessing of a new base in Tampa, FL. It is always exciting to see new growth in our district
Dear Family & Friends,
As we look back over last year we are amazed at all that God has done. In 2006 we have had 565 participants trained here in Orlando. We’ve sent outreach teams to Egypt, Jordan, Russia, Norway, Sweden, Finland, Latvia, Canada, Brazil, Nicaragua, Panama, Dominican Republic and Jamaica; not to mention many cities throughout the USA. During these outreaches 440 people came to Christ. We’ve trained leaders, had our staff team grow to 67, and currently have 54 students on outreach and 29 students training here in Orlando.
We have continued to oversee renovations on the ministry houses. Right now we are holding our second School of Missions, with students planning to work in China, Turkey, and the Muslim world. Last January I led our first School of Missions and we sent our first long-term team to a Muslim Nation. We are so amazed at all that God has done. What an adventure it is to serve the Lord! And yet we hope and pray for even greater impact in 2007.
At the end of each year I spend time reflecting on the previous year to see if we’ve accomplished all that God had in mind and I also look forward to the next year asking God what His priorities are for us this year. During this season of reflection and prayerful planning, Darla and I went to Tacoma, Washington for a time of training and preparation for our Southeast Conference coming up at the end of February. This turned out to be such a refreshing and refocusing time. After our trip to Tacoma we have a fresh commitment to live our lives in a place of radical obedience to the Lord. As we prayerfully planned our schedule for the year— it was important to have God’s priorities in place. We’ve learned over the years that if we don’t schedule God’s priorities well in advance then they get pushed out of our schedules by urgent things of lesser importance.
We are so grateful for your partnership and friendship that helps to make this and much more possible.
Yours for the Lamb,
Michael Berg
Dear Family & Friends,
Hello from Norway! I just finished teaching the Youth With A Mission staff from all over Norway. “This week God has given me hope and now I know why I’m involved in YWAM!” These were the kind of statements people made throughout the week.
Mirjam (pronounced Miriam) attended a shorter version of my seminar in Norway last year. She gave testimony of how her life and the life of her family was radically changed as she applied the truths she learned. She declared that their effectiveness, as a family in our mission, was more than doubled! Needless to say I was very encouraged.
I taught every morning and afternoon and some evenings. Creagon Muldoon went with me and was able to teach on a few occasions. He was also a great help with the role playing and workshops. In addition Creagon and I met with people at virtually every meal to plan for upcoming meetings, give advice or to help process the teaching. I think I underestimated the significance of this teaching to YWAM Norway.
Sometimes I think that teaching on Support Raising is not as big a deal as the Father Heart material, but in terms of releasing missionaries, it’s very significant! It was very encouraging, but as always I’m eager to get home to Darla and the kids!
One reason I am currently visiting Norway is to see more success story’s like Mirjam’s, so that an army of YWAM missionaries can carry the light of the gospel to the world!
On left side : Michael speaks to YWAM Staff in Norway through an intrepreter
The photos above and below are of Christians from a tribe in Kamchatka, Russia. They presented their native culture at the seminar that I gave in Norway. God is beginning to move among the natives of Russia, but there are still so many tribes that have no access to the gospel!
As I look back over the last month I’m amazed at all that God has done. The East Coast Conference was very inspirational with Alejandro Rodriquez from Argentina and Trent Sheppard as the main speakers. Trent really connected with everyone, especially the under 30 crowd. He gave a real sense of significance to those of us who have given our lives to the “Epic Story” of the King of King’s as He rescues planet earth.
The N. American Council meetings were fruitful, too. It was especially good to have Jim Stier, our new Director of the Americas, join us. He worked with us to improve the protocol document for establishing new works in N. America.
Immediately after this week with the N. American Council, we began our New Staff Orientation and Training in Orlando, and in the midst of this, we started our Basic Leadership School. It was exciting to have a new group of staff and students join us!
On left side: Michael in front of a church in Norway.
For pictures from Michael's teaching in Norway, Click Here.
Thank you so much for your friendship and prayers!
Yours for our King,
Michael Berg
