Past Ministry & Future Calling2/16/2015 In September of 2003 I went to Honolulu Hawaii to do a DTS. While there I discovered the radical truth of the Gospel and who God is. During our 2 month outreach one month in Cambodia and one month in the Philippines God began to show me the great need of the gospel throughout the World. After graduating I returned to Ywam Honolulu as a volunteer DTS staff. I felt like God was calling me back to Cambodia. In July of 2004 I went back to Cambodia for 6 months working with the local church we served while on my DTS outreach. I started an English program at the church. At the end of 6 months the class had grown to around 50 students and I had trained 3 of the best students to teach as well. All 3 of them are now in full time ministry. At the beginning of 2005 I came back from Cambodia. It had been one of the most difficult but fruitful times in my life. I spent a few months running maintenance on the Honolulu Ywam base and prepared to staff another DTS in April. I led a small team back to Cambodia in July where we spent time training the young leaders at the same church as well as pioneering team contacts in 2 new areas of Cambodia for future teams to be able to connect with. God began to show me the need to train up the youth of Cambodia to do the work in areas where the gospel wasn't yet established. To that end I signed up to be a student in the S.O.M.E (School of Missions and Evangelism) in September. During the S.O.M.E we learned more about missiology, missions strategies, and the 10/40 window where 86% of the 2.7 Billion people who are "unreached" (those who are apart of a people group where less then 2% of the population are Christian) live. I began to see that there is great need for the gospel everywhere but it seemed to me a great injustice that some had so much opportunity to learn about Jesus while others had no opportunity. God began to challenge me to be willing to carry the gospel to these "least reached people groups" So for my S.O.M.E outreach I went back to Cambodia at the beginning of 2006 I went to continue learning the language, search for ways to contextualize the gospel and to meet with missionaries and church leaders in hopes that God would show me a wise and effective way to begin spreading the gospel in Cambodia. Especially the areas where there was currently no one working. Romans 15:20 " It has always been my ambition to preach the gospel where Christ was not known..." In conversations with rural pastors who were working in the areas of greatest need I began to sense a reluctance to release their young leaders to be trained. I found out that churches throughout the country had been sending their best and brightest to the capitol city Phnom Penh to the bible colleges. There hopes were that although they desperately needed these young leaders to help continue the work in the hardest and darkest areas; they believed that their young leaders would be trained, and sent back to them better equipped and impassioned to advance the gospel in their home churches. Sadly this wasn't the case. These areas of Cambodia are the hardest and darkest for a reason. Any normal sane Christian would want to run for their lives from communities like these. Rampant poverty, alcoholism, death, and disease are just a few of the things that permeate these areas. So the young leaders they sent out, potentially the hope of their communities almost never came back. They got comfy jobs working in the office buildings of Phnom Penh, they like the western church ignored the need in order to ease any sense of responsibility. Little did I know that in time I would fall prey to this same apathy myself. In 2007 I had brought a team to Cambodia with the expressed mission of establishing the school I felt God had given me the task to begin. Me and my team lived in the Province of Kampong Cham praying, serving the local churches, hosting outreach teams, leading many people to Christ but no school. It wasn't until my team was leaving and it seemed that it was all a failure that I received the call. Jeff and Heather Williams are missionaries with CMA. Click to learn more about Jeff and Heather. They're virtually unknown to anyone outside of Cambodia but to those in the know they're probably the most radical frontier missionaries in the country. They've been involved in ministering to Cambodians since the 80s. First with the refugees on the east coast while Jeff finished seminary and when Cambodia opened up in the 90's they were some of the first missionaries into the country. They had been mentoring me in the ins and outs of effective ministry for years. Much of the time I simply learned through watching them live their lives. I first met them while leading my first outreach in 2003 at that time they were overseeing a small church plant they had begun amongst the Cham Muslims in Cambodia. A COMPLETELY unreached people group of around 250,000 with maybe a handful of believers. They called to inform me that CMA Christian Missionary Alliance had been asked by the KEC (khmer evangelical church with roughly 200 congregations) to begin practically the exact school I had been praying for in the exact location I felt called to do it in! I was so excited but unaware of the war that lie ahead. I returned to Honolulu to staff an S.O.M.E one more time in September. At the beginning of 2008 I took a small team for that DTS outreach to India, where I had gone to teach at YWAM schools for 3 weeks the year before. 2 of the students stayed in India long term and I went back to Cambodia for the 5th time to continue working towards the formation of a school that wouldn't pull away young leaders from the most needed areas but would train them in there own context. At this point I also began to learn how to read and write the Khmer language. In June of 2008 We finally started the RMTC (Rural Ministry Training Center) the entire vision and need for a school like this is hard to understand but I assure you it's meeting one of the greatest needs in the most practical way I can think of. It's sustainable multipliable and is funded, and ran by the KEC. No foreigners needed. Khmer people taking the gospel to Khmer people. Khmer pastors training Khmer pastors. In a rural context with focuses on sustainable agriculture, sustainable technology, teaching EE evangelism explosion, Chronological Bible teaching, basic health care, community development, and a wonderful basic theological training program called T.E.E (theological education by extension) Sadly for me I didn't make it through the first year. 9 months into the school I decided to leave Cambodia and step out of ministry. The same comforts that pulled the young Cambodian leaders away from the hardest and the darkest pulled me away as well. I was tired and wanted the comforts of the western world. I left in February of 2009. I didn't know for sure at that time if I'd ever go back. But the RMTC was started and is still running today. In fact I just got word that they're starting another one and Jeff and Heather asked me to pray about possibly joining them. 2010-2015 To include more details of the past years would require a book I believe. Perhaps I'll go into more detail someday. For now this is the best summary I can do. I should however include a note here that during the past 5 years I've walked through some really tough consequences of some really foolish and selfish decisions. I don't think it was a coincidence the columbian put "new call for ex-missionary." I hid from God and my brothers and sisters in the church and walked in sin and brokenness. It wasn't until just last year that I even began to allow God to restore me. My leaders here in Kona are aware of what I'm coming out of and are believing with me that God is able to redeem anyone and anything if we allow Him to. I'm so grateful to be back in ministry and am just getting my feet wet again. I'm believing God for the next 20 years to be spent in obedience to fulfilling the calling He's placed on my life. I want to see the gospel spread throughout Cambodia that all the people there would at the very least have the opportunity to come to Christ. I'll be co-leading a team of 10 back to Cambodia in April. It's a 2 month DTS outreach and I'm believing that God will use it to inspire some of them to commit there lives to radical long term missions amongst the least reached people of the World. I know that the 48 students currently enrolled in this DTS will be forever changed for the better. I know that our team is going to make an eternal impact on Cambodia and as for me I know that God will continue to use me as long as I let him. Thank you for caring about spreading the gospel to the unreached. May we fulfill the task of bringing the gospel to every nation together. I cannot do it without your help. You partnering with me in finances and prayer make it possible. Thank You!
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Team Cambodia!2/9/2015 I'm going to be co-leading a 2 month outreach with these guys the beginning of April. I can't wait to see what God does in us and through us. Please be praying for us!
Keeping Your Head In The Game2/8/2015 Welcome to my blog. So that I don't bombard Facebook with lengthy posts I thought I'd try this format and just put a link on my Facebook page. I wanted to write about keeping our head's in the fight, keeping on mission, eyes on the prize, enduring hardships, not growing weary in doing good, or like Jesus for the joy set before us enduring our cross. I joined Ywam when I was 18 years old. God called me and He used Youth with a Mission to disciple me, and send me. I learned of the amazing opportunities and joys of reaching out to the least reached people with the Gospel of Jesus, The only hope for the World that we've had for 2000 years and still haven't completely made available to all people. I'm a hedonist at heart and embrace a life of pursuing the best and most satisfying things available. It's this hedonism in me that is terribly dangerous if I'm not allowing God to be my pleasure and settling for scraps from the garbage can of the World. It's also the hedonism in me that has compelled me to a radical snobbishness towards the world's dainty rotten morsels and a hunger for the meaty things of God. Not just the milk buffets so readily available in most western churches but the choice cuts of spiritual goodness that are to be found in a life completely surrendered. To be honest I've found the choice cuts of the world to be as satisfying if not more satisfying then the watered down milk that's being greedily lapped up and poured out to the spiritually malnourished here in the west. I'm a big guy and have never been able to survive off of it alone. My hunger for hedonism has been too strong. The problem in my opinion in the western church isn't that we have too much desire for pleasure it's that we don't desire it enough. The bible does talk about two different desires that dwell within us. One for the things of the Spirit (things of God, holy and pleasing things) and one for the flesh (worldy things, sins). For me half measures in my pursuit of satisfying either one have seemed pointless. The worldly person who does his best to maintain an appearence of goodness so far away from his claims of agnostic or atheistic belief baffle me. If we are freak accidents of a scientific phenomenon, no more then evolved pond scum then crush your fellow man, do all you can to establish your own kingdom and fulfill your own fleshly pleasures. Life has no value no meaning. If however we are created and loved by God, if God sent Himself in the form of His son to bring us a message of hope and pay a price necessary for our restored relationship with God then we must live as though we believe it. Nothing compares to knowing God, and walking in the light of his presence and love, let us do all we can to eradicate anything in our lives that separate us from that light and love, let us throw off everything that hinders and run the race marked out for us, let us get our heads in the game and play for keeps. For a number of years I had my head in the game. I fought the good fight, I labored in the ripe fields where the work was overwhelming and the workers non existent. Sadly after 6 years of fighting and getting knocked around quite a bit I quit. I had no more fight left. Like Forest Gump I suddenly stopped running. I was tired and wanted to go home. For me the final kick in my pants I needed to get my head back in the game was the death of the Rogenback family. Jeff his wife Jiin and their daughter Jasmine died this July in a car wreck in Thailand where they were actively waging war against the darkness and lies of Buddhism. That's right I said darkness and lies of buddhism, live in a buddhist nation, see the end result of a buddhist worldview and tell me it's all peaceful and lovely. See the Grandma tell her grand daughter that she's an orphan and a cripple because she was a bad person in her past life and has to pay off her karma now in this life. Watch the crowd of onlookers staring and murmuring as the mangled carcass of a half dead person lays bleeding in the street and no one does a thing to help lest they simply delay his inevitable karma. Watch as the Khmer people allow their land to be destroyed by the wealthy and not care because it's all an illusion anyways and to care would be to sin. Anyways the Rogenback's went to Thailand out of the love for the Thai people and gave their lives in the belief that nothing in this world compares to the surpassing worth of knowing God. I on the other hand was sitting around in Idaho feeling sorry for myself, smoking cigarettes and reluctantly considering being a nominal Christian again. However when I found out about their death it pissed me off. In fact it pissed me off just enough to do something about it. I decided that if God would free me of the chains I had allowed myself to be enslaved to once again that I would take up my rusty sword and return to battle. Like Samson I prayed "Sovereign LORD, remember me. Please, God, strengthen me just once more, and let me with one blow get revenge on the Philistines for my two eyes." Miraculously I am now here at Ywam Kona. Running through a 3 month spiritual boot camp we call DTS alongside 25 fellow veteran soldiers and 48 new recruits. Getting ready and being willing to storm hell with squirt guns if God would call us to it. I can feel the missions zeal burning again deep within my heart and my hunger I can akin to that of my favorite missionary C.T Studd who said. "some wish to live within the sound of a chapel bell; I wish to run a rescue mission within a yard of hell" So my desire is there and God is doing the necessary work within me to make it happen. However without a home base to provide prayer and support I will be of little use. I hope and pray that God will speak to some of you right now to partner with me once again. I've done what I can and will continue to do what I can do. I'm willing, able, and I humbly submit that with the power of Holy Spirit I'm competent. I'll be starting things off with a brief 2 month tour in Cambodia. A place I know and love well. I have a good knowledge of the language, the land, and the enemies strategies there. My primary purpose will be to help strengthen the long term missionaries and their ministries while providing reinforcements with the 7 students and the other 2 staff that will be with me. I'm praying about committing again to this long term. There are realities and consequences to the 5 years I spent out of the game. I'm financially in debt, and many of my relationships are broken. I need your help if I'm to actually do this full time in order to be restored fully. I will use any finances given wisely as a good steward. I will pay off my debts, do the Lords work, and God willing we will reap a harvest and share in the rewards together. Please pray that I will have the strength, faith, and wisdom to continue to keep my head in the game, and finish my part of bringing the gospel to every tongue, tribe, and nation. AuthorMy name's Uriah Lyford and I'm a volunteer with YWAM. My dream is to see the spiritual solution of a restored relationship with God through Jesus be made available to every person on earth. I do this through the mentoring and training of young people to build and become the Church Jesus died for. Archives
June 2018
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