There is no doubt that the year 2020 has been a different year and one that none of us have ever lived before. In the beginning, before the COVID pandemic arrived, God spoke two specific words to us as a base; “Growth and Beauty.” Of course, this could mean anything, and God always surprises us in His own way.
We didn’t expect months of quarantine and having to close down our base. How would we see growth and beauty if nothing is going on? Even though we didn’t see with our physical eyes, the Lord kept speaking to us as well as to the global YWAM family. Through different speakers and international elders, the Lord spoke about His desire to prune ministries and personal lives like a tree.
Pruning is necessary to develop a healthy tree and produce more fruit, but it doesn’t really seem to look beautiful in the beginning. Yet we know growth and beauty will come forward out of the pruning.
During the months of closing down, we could not go about our normal day to day. Our sports ministry, Homes of Hope ministry, our UofN Courses, and gathering in person as a community, it all stopped. We had to lay our daily lives down and once again place our eyes on God to ask him what He was doing. His desire is always to teach us something and that was true this time as well both for every person individually as well as for us as a community.
It’s been a time to Reflect, Reset, Repent, Revive, and Restart. We have allowed God to cut off the branches that were dead or fruitless and we hold to the promise that we will see new growth in our lives. Some of this growth we saw right away, however, others may take a little longer.
After we were allowed to start up again and begin, we saw the beauty with our physical eyes as well. As a community, we are able to get back together again, although with the necessary protocols. Our new building which has been in the process of construction since November 2019, is slowly getting closer to being finished. Flowers that have been planted before the pandemic are coming up and the blue tent where we have our classroom was replaced and looks like new, ready for our September DTS.
Not only in the ministry do we see new branches growing, but also in the different families of our community. New life is springing forth and five babies are ready to make their way into this world between November 2020 and April 2021. We are looking forward to seeing a new generation in YWAM San Jose.
We enjoy seeing the beauty that comes forth out of growth. To find it, we only have to seek the Lord our God. Only in him as Creator of everything can we find healthy growth and real beauty.