GoWests!

Greetings from Cambodia!

This year is going so quickly.  In the past month we have wrapped up the Montana DTS Equip leadership training school, the following week I was in Mexico conducting leadership training for a group of YWAM school leaders, trainers and staff (by the way, the Eastern European DTS Equip in Ukraine just finished their second school, too).  The Mexico trip was special to me; it was the first time I was able to take one of my kids, Joel, along with me.  Just him and me, it was a fun and special time.  A week later we were back in Montana and preparing to move house.  On August 23rd the Wests changed address!  As many of you know it has been a busy, but exciting year as we built our new home.  So many God-stories are to be told, all accumulating to make-up the blessing and miracle of our first new home!  We are already using our guest room for hospitality, receiving family and friends the first weekend after we moved in.

As our friends were arriving, I was off again—this time to Cambodia—from where I am writing now.  I am here helping to kick off the third South-East Asian DTS Equip, running in Battambang, Cambodia.  This is first time we have not brought our whole family here for the two-month program.  Our roots and our relationships here are deep, so not coming as a family is something of a disappointment for us.  As hard as it is for our family in Cambodia at times, the kids still wanted to come!  But our intention has always been to pioneer it, empower others, and hand it off.

We have always wanted to develop regional leaders to facilitate this program who can take it to places we can’t.  So it is an answer to prayer, but it’s also hard transferring something that you have worked so hard for to other leadership; even if you pick the leadership team!  It has, in fact been a great joy.  The leadership team we put together is diverse, complimentary and committed.  This is an exciting time, but also a little tenuous.  Please join with us in prayer to support these leaders who are attempting to take this school to the next level; they are already experiencing some obstacles, but I am confident of their abilities, faithfulness, and of course the Lord’s empowerment, both practical and spiritual.  This school has 16 diverse participants, representing 7 nationalities (Costa Rica, New Zealand, Cambodia, USA, Canada, Sth Africa, Vietnam).  Collectively they represent ministries in the Philippines, Thailand, USA, and Cambodia.

Handing off the school was a step of faith.  But now, with a house that was completed late, with rooms still full of boxes, the kids entering higher grades at school, and an overly packed year behind us, we see God’s wisdom.  I will continue to oversee the DTS Equip programs internationally, teaching, training and supporting, but my direct leadership of each school is on a deliberate decrease as I develop and release others into that role.

As always, we are so grateful for your partnership and support.  You are sharing the work and you will also share in the inheritance.  Thanks.

Jeremy.  Cambodia, September 2014.