Young leaders on the rise and the mother heart of God

This morning at Belleville, we said goodbye to Christian Binggeli, a 23 year old Swiss young man who has done an internship at church during the past 7 months.

We've had contact with Belleville interns the past 5 years and Christian has been among the creme of the crop. He's done childcare at Nicole's women's group on Thursday mornings and during the 9:00 a.m. Sunday service and our kids love him. He's also helped at the June arts conference in Paris and at the Mission Radicale youth conference. After seeing how we do one crepe night, he helped run the following crepe night one week later. He did very well with French (not his first language) and knows English quite well too.

One thing that makes him stand out above many others is his initiative. Some interns only do what you ask them to do. Christian takes the initiative and sees what needs to be done and does it.

I wouldn't be surprised to see him as a future pastor. But I expect that whatever he does, he will be successful in.

A second standout young person was 19 year old Kyria Osterhouse from the Toronto team. She was raised on a farm in Michigan, a state where many other outstanding people come from. Last Tuesday she appeared quite shaken up from the robbery at church. The Lord has obviously ministered to her since then. Today she preached an excellent message on "the mother heart of God." This was not based on a radical feminist agenda, but rather on the nurturing heart of God for His children. She referred to her experience on the farm of watching hens raise their young chicks. Mothers are often more natural at nurturing their young than fathers are.

At the end of the talk, quite a few people responded to her invitation for prayer regarding struggles with relating to their mothers, as well as about not accepting the nurturing of God.

During the last day of the Mission Radicale conference, God spoke to me about my mother. I love my mother deeply and greatly appreciate the care and love that she has expressed to me over the years. However, no father or mother is perfect. God seemed to say to me that He needed to minister to my heart in areas where my mother was lacking in her relationship to me. Also, I would be not just a spiritual father to people, but also a spiritual mother. I think that this also has to do with nurturing my children, as well as other spiritual ones that God brings into my path.

It is thrilling for me to see young people like Christian and Kyria already using their gifts and calls in service for the Kingdom of God. May God continue to raise up a faceless army of servant warriors for His work.