As we started the Uniquip we remembered how Howard Malmstadt and Loren Cunningham sat on two metal chairs and confirmed the vision that God had given them for a University... This is how the UofN started. We set up two chairs and had two cups of water in between. Darlene served to create a learning community of hospitality and space.
Jose spoke about an attitude of gratefulness to start our time together with 250 people. The DTS staff were with us for the first two days too.
Andy came for a short session on Revival and Reformation and how the goal of both is to see restoration. We need the urgency of Revival and the legacy of Reformation.
It only lasts if we have the two together and if we continue to champion young people in both revival and reformation within the mission.
We also had a welcome protocol from the Islands.
We had amazing worship times throughout the event.
Rebecca shared her personal story of pursuing her degree with the UofN and in her experience working in the Middle East, learning Arabic and then pursuing her Masters degree and wanting to complete a PhD.
Adriano introduced us to Biblical Education and how it differs from education that shames us. God comes into the garden (the first classroom) and gives the students three questions which serve as a reality check.
Context: Where are you? This is to deal with our shame after the fall.
Authority: Who told you? This is to help us with our fears.
Responsibility: What have you done? We can’t take responsibility if we are still blaming others for our circumstances.
What does education look like in a fallen world? Knowledge is power and you must know things that others don’t know to have power over them... But, in Biblical education knowing is loving. Knowing is intimacy shared, a safe place to be vulnerable and vulnerability is truth shared in a safe place. Truth is a person you can relate to in humility. Education is relational humility. Obedience then follows instruction which leads to wisdom, discernment, transformation - all of this is intrinsic to a healthy education.
2 Peter 1:5-8 New International Version (NIV)
5 For this very reason, make every effort to add to your faith goodness; and to goodness, knowledge; 6 and to knowledge, self-control; and to self-control, perseverance; and to perseverance, godliness; 7 and to godliness, mutual affection; and to mutual affection, love. 8 For if you possess these qualities in increasing measure, they will keep you from being ineffective and unproductive in your knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ.
Education is about Faith + Character + Knowledge. We care about all three in the UofN, other institutions may only seek out on or another of them. All three leads to true transformation.
The Great Commission is for all of us, thus education is for all too. As we learn we teach and as we teach we are learning. Live/Learn is what YWAM is all about. Do first, then teach others...
We also looked at how tension is important in education. We start with a God who live in healthy tension in the Trinity - Father, Son and Holy Spirit, three persons - one God. Trinity is important to all of life with God.
We compared a singular god with a smal “g” to a Trinitarian one with a big “G”. The first leads to a dictatorship and death, the second to all the gifts of the spirit and abundant life.
God is relational and calls us into an educational relationship that includes Formal, Non-Formal and Informal learning.
Aleck shared about his own journey through educational wounding and failing two years of school compared to his starkly different experience in the UofN where he found a learning environment that was about exploration, discovery and excitement in the presence of God, school leaders and staff who believed in and championed young people. No-one is left out of this big story of God that we get to be a part of. His becoming Dean of the College of Communcation and completing a Masters as well as leading a Masters now is healing and redemptive.
We are a University embedded in a missions movement and the two are inseparable. YWAM exists to train and the UofN exists because we are to care for our neighbour, our community even our enemy and fulfil the Christian Magna Carta through discipling nations.
We also had a panel with Loren Cunningham, Darlene, and Joe Portale
This was such a rich time of story-telling and hearing about how the our stories fit into the big story of God, the history of YWAM, the establishment of the University of the Nations and how God was at the start of it all co-labouring wth us as YWAMers.
On the third day we started to shift into the future of the UofN and how we all get to take part in it.
Worship was central to all we were learning along with rich processing and intercession together...
Watch some of the sessions here:
We also had Tom Bloomer sharing on Transcactional vs. Transformational Leadership
After each session we had rich discussion around the tables and feedback so we could have a conversation over what God was imparting to us each day. These times were the most fun in that we heard from each other and could also learn from each ones experience and point of view.
Finally, we took some time think about our inheritance in YWAM and the UofN as Adriano shared his experience of having his inheritance San adopted son robbed from him because he did not know it was his.
The Last thing we did was to take the piece we were taking from our past and our piece from the future and ties those puzzle pieces together and hang them on the big timeline of God’s work and purposes. Only hanging there in the tension of past and future can we trust God for the fruition of his many promises to us.
We ended praising God for a rich week together!
