I have now been with Youth with a Mission (YWAM), receiving missions training, for five months. I completed the first three months of the lecture phase in Switzerland, and I have been in Ireland for over two months doing outreach. Doing mission work in Ireland has been a huge growing experience and a blessing beyond what I could ever have imagined. I have developed such a great love for people, for the culture, and for the country of Ireland. I can honestly say that God is on the move in Ireland and He is doing a good work. I have seen firsthand, in the Irish people, a need for restoration, a new identity, and a hope that can only be found through the grace offered by Jesus Christ. Because of the support that has been given, I was able to enter ministry here in Ireland for three months of outreach, and it has made a permanent impact in my life.
Yet even as I have poured into the work God has me doing in Ireland, He has also been preparing me for what He in store for me after Ireland. I will complete the missions training program with YWAM on the 2nd of July, but because God has called me into missions I knew that He would bring a new missions opportunity in His time. Though the future was unclear and I had no idea what I would do after YWAM, I knew that God had a plan. I just had to trust Him and He would make the path clear. While I was still in Switzerland God met me at my point of need. He gave me clear direction and called me to India after my six months with YWAM is over. While His call to India was clear I had no idea how He would open the door for ministry in India, or even where in India He wanted me to go. So I prayed and waited for God to open a door. Then about a month ago I was able to get in contact with a young woman I met about a year ago. We originally met through a contact my dad made through his ministry. For a year she had done work with women and children who had been sex trafficked in India; which is the same kind of missions work I have been called to do. She is now married to an Indian Pastor. We had spoken over the phone once about a year ago and she said if I was ever in India to come see her. So I was able to get in contact with her again while I have been in Ireland. She is now living in India, and God has called her and her husband to begin their own ministry to women who have been sex trafficked in India. So not only did she invite me to visit India and stay with them but she also said they would love me to stay and work with them in the new ministry they are beginning. Wow! What an incredible opportunity and a huge answer to prayer!
The whole process of waiting on God to direct my steps, then the way He called me to take a trip to India, and then in the way He gave me a place to stay and an offer to enter into long term missions in India has been miraculous. Right now the plan is that I will fly to India and stay there for about a month. I will live with the young couple that I mentioned and they will teach me about the culture and take me to visit different ministries that are doing the same kind of work they will be doing in the future. During this trip I will basically be doing missions reconnaissance. I will be learning more about what it will take to do ministry in India long term and it will give me an opportunity to learn if God is calling me to India for ministry or not. Another reason I am only going for a month is because I will have to come home and raise fulltime support if indeed God does call me back to India.
I have already applied for, and received my visa for the trip; praise God! Now I am waiting for Himto provide the finances. When I raised support for the missions training program with YWAM I was only budgeting for the six months that I would be with YWAM. So my trip to India, so far is not funded at all. But God has given me a very clear call, He has opened the right doors, He has provided the visa in time, and I know that He will provide the finances as well. I will need money for a plane ticket to India and home again. I will also need money for living expenses for the month I am in India. So I am asking you to please join with me in the call. I need financial support so that I can go to India and answer the call God has placed on my life to, “Seek justice, encourage the oppressed. Defend the cause of the fatherless, plead the case of the widow” (Is. 1:17). I want to thank you so much for all of the encouragement, prayers, and support that have been given in the past. Because of the faith and obedience of the Body of Christ I have been given the privilege of entering into cross cultural missions and seeing God move in grace and power around the world. Thank you so much for joining with me in ministry.
May mercy, peace, and love be yours in abundance,
Bethany Carmichael
In the Slums
In the city
