New Beginnings

Hello friends & family! We have some bitter sweet news! We feel like God is calling us out of YWAM and into Nashville. We decided this just a few weeks ago, we were waiting to tell anyone so we could talk and pray with the leader of our YWAM base first. We told them and then Ryan went into a job interview for welding and machining the next day.. we were thinking that job hunting would take at least a month if not longer, but the day after the interview he got a great job!! So we wanted to tell everyone in advance but since Ryan got the job so fast we are telling you now!

Even though we absolutely love YWAM and are totally behind what they do, we feel like God is moving us out of YWAM and into the city of Nashville. (We are currently located 45 mins away from Nashville). Sarah will be pursuing music..she feels like God wants to use her voice to make relationships with different musicians in Nashville. God has broken her heart for the celebrities and musicians as weird as that may sound! Ryan will have a job with welding and machining, then eventually he will take classes to become a cop. By becoming a cop he will work onto getting into vice to be able to work against human trafficking.
 Some have asked us if  this means we are done with missions, the answer to that question is no! we will never be done with missions, Nashville is our mission for this year! We are just doing missions in a different way now. We still love Thailand and YWAM, but right now this is what we feel is the next step!

We are very excited and we thank you for all of the support financially and spiritually. You all are blessings to our lives! Please keep supporting us through prayer! Sarah is always updating every one on our lives by posting pictures and things on facebook so if you're not her friend you should be! ;)
We would also like to encourage you to pray about sending your financial monthly support that you'd normally be sending us, to the base YWAM Nashville!
Sending a check you would still write it out to YWAMNASHVILLE, but in the memo write general donation.

Please contact us through e-mail (ryanandsarahowen@gmail.com) , facebook, or give us a call if you would like to ask questions!

We love each of you!

We are sharing a slideshow video with you all.  Because this a public blog I cannot post it here for the safety of our refugee friends in the video. I will be sending a link that is private for those of you on our email list. If you didn't get a link you can request one here ryanandsarahowen@gmail.com. We will also be posting on our facebook profiles that are private so no one can see it unless you are friends with us.

New Things!

Putting pictures on here have been much more difficult than I expected! We have many Facebook for those who use it. For those of you who don't have it thank you for your patience and we will definitely have them available when we return from Thailand.

There have been some very exciting things happening recently! Our teams relationship building with the girls in the red light bars has been going really well. We have been able to pay "bar fees" for many of the girls we have been talking to, taking them out to spend more time with them. Some of the girls we have even been able to build a good enough relationship to meet up with them outside the bars which is a big step. A couple of the girls we have been talking to have decided to quit the red light bars they are working in to move on to better things!WOOHOO!God is good!

In other news, we have had the opportunity to love on some Pakistani and Vietnamese refugees. They all have either asylum seeker or refugee status because of persecution in their countries because they are Christians. We have been able to offer them fellowship, teaching/discussion, and entertainment for their kids. In Pakistan a majority of the Muslims are extremist and have been known to even kill liberal Muslims for standing up for human rights. One of the families in the household we have been visiting had been threatened to have their children abducted and raped.

We have also been doing outreach in a slum to kids and adults. The usual day looks like first playing with the kids in Buddhist temple/public center and then we teach bible and English. The  ministry has been run by a pastor an  his family so we have been able to bless them with extra man power!

prayer points:
team unity
team health (recently a team member got an intestinal infection)
God would go ahead of us blaze a path


If you are interested in partnering with us financially on our upcoming outreach to Thailand or would like to join our monthly support team let us know!

If you would like to send a check please send it to P.O. Box 78219 Nashville,TN 37207. Make it out to YWAM NASHVILLE and write #130 in the memo!

You can also donate electonically here: http://ywamnashville.org/donations. Make sure to select staff support in the "select an option" field and specify us in the additional information box!

Thailand!

I'm writing this from a internet cafe in Thailand! First, the students finished strong in lecture phase. We had some really good times in our one on ones, walking with them in different area of there lives where God was growing them has been an awesome journey. My guys and the school in general have grown so much in those 12 weeks.

To prepare the students for outreach we scheduled 2 hours of outreach preparation time per week. During these times we had them conduct a research project which covered the seven spheres of society: economy, religion, government, media, education, family, and health. We also included basic language learning, cross-cultural communication, and basic intro to Theravada Buddhism(The buddhism of southeast asia) and Thai culture.

As some of you know we will be working with Jim Larson at The Well in which we will be working with at risk children, red light district outreach, and ministry to his current Well students. Recently we went into a couple red light districts for a prayer walk and to meet some of the girls who worked there to make relationships with them. It was really intense to see the girls pain in their eyes and to see them being used. We left feeling pretty hopeless but then the next day we had a socializing time to get acquainted with the students at The Well. There is hope and redemption for the girls in the bars and we want to show them that by coming along side The Well and making relationships with the girls.

Pictures coming soon!


If you are interested in partnering with us financially on our upcoming outreach to Thailand or would like to join our monthly support team let us know!

If you would like to send a check please send it to P.O. Box 78219 Nashville,TN 37207. Make it out to YWAM NASHVILLE and write #130 in the memo!

You can also donate electonically here: http://ywamnashville.org/donations. Make sure to select staff support in the "select an option" field and specify us in the additional information box!

   

Full of life and color!

These past few weeks staffing the Discipleship Training School (DTS) have been amazing, we both love it! I (Sarah) have 5 girls in my small group..their names are Amanda, Lacey, Jerica, Erin & Casey. Ryan has 4 guys in his small group, Vince, Mike, Jono & Michael. Besides having to be in class every day we have small group once a week so the students can process the class time and get deep and have fun together! We are there for our small group whenever they need us..on call 24/7.

Even though I am done with my School Of Worship (SOW), God has been giving me opportunities to lead worship. We had a 24/7 worship & prayer week a couple weeks into the DTS and I found out that all of my small group girls can either play and instrument or sing or both! So we led worship for an hour and it was amazing. Erin led the intercession (getting Gods heart for what He wants us to pray about.) and felt like we were to pray for freedom from past hurts and things that were keeping people in bondage. The students & staff that came really needed this so we were all thankful that God let us be apart of it!! I also have been slowly starting to dance again (I was a ballerina from about 11till I was 19) because I feel like God is putting that back in my heart..not going pro ;) just a hobby & a way to worship. So during that week me and my friend Lillian led a time of dancing for an hour of worship, it was so great! We also had a drum circle during this time and it was crazy and freeing! we played different kinds of drums and danced and praised God!
This past week we had Spiritual Warfare as our topic and our speaker was very insightful. In previous weeks we have also had teaching such as father heart of God, Holy Spirit, relationships, and forgiveness. This week which is the half way mark to the end of the lecture phase of the school they will be getting a teaching on hearing the voice of God. Please pray for the students that they will understand that God speaks to them all in different ways!

Side note: The base (ywam property) is absolutely full of life and beautiful right now during this fall season! Every time I walk around the property i'm just amazed at His creation. Thanks God!

Please pray for even better time management than we already have as we are busy many hours of the day and when we are not in class or doing one on ones (we have 1:1's with each small group member every week, to pray for them & to discuss how their heart is & process more on class and whatever else they need!) we are grading journals and papers.
Along with that we are keeping up with the 2 cutest boys ever (william & jude.) I am starting to teach william a few basic school type things and teaching him some easier Thai words & numbers..He's doing really well with it even though i think the Thai language is pretty difficult! Jude is starting to talk a lot more and his personality is bursting! He now says hi, night night, ok, mama, dada, nice, bye, thank you...and i'm probably missing a couple. They're both super goofy and loving! We're so stinkin' blessed!! 

Also pray for finances for our up coming outreach in late December to Thailand & we are trying to find people that would like to come alongside of us and support us financially with monthly support! Prayer for the plane ride would be fantastic as well along with safety & health for our family & the team!
Thank you all! If any of you have prayer needs please send us a message, we want to support you with prayer as well! Check out some pics below!

a few of the changing trees

Sarah's small group

Our Thailand Team! Jerica, Jono, Ryan, Betsy, Anna, Anthony, Casey, Quinn & Maggie! And then Me, Ryan, the boys & another leader/friend Lillian. *in the blue shirt on the right! pray for her too!

sweet boys!

Change of Plans

As the title says there is different plan on the table than we had originally stated. We are no longer going to Scotland and Madagascar, God has steered us in a new direction. We will now be staffing the DTS as small group leaders where we will be able to directly disciple students! After we decided to go with the latter plans  the school leader for the September DTS approached us about being small group leaders. We are very excited because we will be leading outreach to Thailand! During this school we will have our own students to pour into during small groups times and we will also be doing what we call "one on ones" which is a time for an individual to be able to discuss their on going DTS experience in a setting that's just between the small group leader and the student. We will also be planning our foreign and local outreaches along other various tasks involved in running a training school. Any support that was given will now be going towards our outreach to Thailand. Also, the School of Worship that Sarah was involved in are doing a US outreach to N.Carolina, Indiana, & Nashville instead of going to Scotland/Madagascar. Small group leading for the DTS will be a part of Sarah's School of Worship outreach phase, she will be leading worship & also teaching on worship & helping with our new 24/7 house of worship & prayer. Even though plans have changed everything is very peaceful and we know this is what is supposed to be happening! If you have any questions or concerns regarding the change of plans please contact us, we would be happy to hear from you. Keep an eye out for new blog posts about the happenings of the school!

Please partner in prayer with us for God to give us a heart for our students and energy as this is a 24/7 job, there are many days of long hours ahead of us!

If you are interested in partnering with us financially on our upcoming outreach to Thailand or would like to join our monthly support team let us know!

If you would like to send a check please send it to P.O. Box 78219 Nashville,TN 37207. Make it out to YWAM NASHVILLE and write #130 in the memo!

You can also donate electonically here: http://ywamnashville.org/donations. Make sure to select staff support in the "select an option" field and specify us in the additional information box!

Thank you all for being our support!

School of Worship

Hey friends!
So as some of you know i've been crazy busy being a student in the School of Worship here at YWAM Nashville. I've been loving every minute of it and i'm learning so much about myself again. When I became a mama I kind of lost who I was, I mean obviously I knew I was a mom but some of my personality disappeared because I thought I had to be someone different so people would take me seriously as a young mom. Since the school started our speakers would pray for me and say that God was telling them to tell me to be silly and that my laughter and joy would bring freedom to others. God has also been working with me to get rid of a lot of anxiety that i've been having my whole life because it's so in the way of my relationship with Him and with anyone for that matter! So, here I am a couple months later into the school and i'm trying to let go of fear and walking in freedom in who I've been created to be. I am dreaming again with God and just running full force into what He has for me..WOO HOO!!!


I have 3 more months left of the school and in those 3 months we are headed to N.Carolina, Indiana, Scotland & Madagascar. Crazy right? yep.
We want to bring revival and awaken those who are spiritually dead and aching. We want to bring life, love and dreams that God has for each person! Scotland is actually only 7% Christian and Madagascar is around 50%. All God wants is to love and to be loved in return, we want to show that to everyone we meet.
In order to do this we need your help! Please be praying for us always and also pray about supporting us monthly or with a one-time donation!
Send me or ryan a facebook message with any questions or if you just want to chat with us!

If you would like to send a check please send it to P.O. Box 78219 Nashville,TN 37207. Make it out to YWAM NASHVILLE and write #130 in the memo!

You can also donate electonically here: http://ywamnashville.org/donations. Make sure to select staff support in the "select an option" field and specify us in the additional information box!

We are so grateful for your prayers and love.