End of Year Update

Hello Friends,

Blessings to you from the Missions Base in Uganda, Africa. This a SPECIAL UPDATE to inform you about some of our current initiatives planned for 2010, and how you can be a part.

• We graduated 11 IAM students, 9 of whom were in the full-time missions training program. We are receiving applications for 2010, and we expect to take in a total of 20 new students, reaching a total of 29 student-missionaries for the 2010 school year.

• 9 Students who just graduated the first year training will enter the 2nd Year track focused on Leadership and Missions. They will study Muslim evangelism, Arabic language, missions, church planting, and eschatology. They will be preparing to go to unreached places in North Africa in 2011. Our focus specifically is on Sudan (138 Unreached People Groups), Somalia (17 UPG), and Ethiopia (20 UPG). We are strategically networking and planning for these nations.

• We are bringing on new staff members: A Kenyan couple, Michael and Stella Wafula who will oversee the 1st Year program of discipleship training, and Paul Muwanguzi who is uniquely qualified to help develop the 2nd Year training program for missionaries to North Africa.

• In 2010, YA will send two missionaries to the unreached people of the Karamajong tribe. These will be the first full-time Youth Ablaze missionaries. (See Uganda in the book Operation World for information on the Karamajong. They are one of the least reached tribes in Uganda.) We will accompany these men, Paul Jaka (In Picture), and Paul Maruk, to plant a church with our team in February.

• The house of prayer also continues to grow as our base expands. Our plan is to bring on full-time intercessors and increase the open hours of the prayer room. The vision is to have a prayer center that will cover the clock night and day for the end-time harvest in the 10/40 Window.

• We need to expand our facilities to accommodate the new intake of students and staff as well as the prayer center that serves our area of Uganda. We are looking to buy or build instead of renting. Recently we found a place that would serve the mission well and we are looking for partners who have an interest in helping begin this project.

PLEASE JOIN US IN THIS WORK:

We ask that every one of our friends help us to expand our mailing and support base by forwarding this information to your friends who are concerned about the completion of the Great Commission. Currently we are operating at about 60% of our needed budget for 2010. We ask that you would spend some time praying about whether you will begin to support a student missionary to reach the Muslim world and the unreached tribes of North Africa. Now is the time! Please help us by:

1. Telling someone about the work we are doing and giving our information to people who want to receive our regular email updates and mailings.

2. Give a special one-time donation to help us meet our goals in the coming year.

3. Pledge $30, $50 or $100 dollars per month to support a full-time native missionary. All funds designated for missionaries go toward training and sending.

4. Let us know if you are interested in sowing into a large building project.

5. Pray regularly for all these missionaries and for the unreached Muslims of North Africa.


SUMMARY OF THE 2009 SCHOOL YEAR:

• The purchase of a 15-passenger van for the School
• 384 Hours of the IAM Course and Muslim Evangelism Seminars
• 92 Hours of Book Study (Joshua)
• 45 Hours of Arabic Language Class
• 1580+ Hours in the House of Prayer
• 35 Days of Corporate Fasting
• 100 Hours of 2x2 Evangelism in the community
• 88 Hours of Volunteer Work (physical labor) at orphanages and our farm
• 5 Monthly 24 Hour regional fasting and prayer events
• Dozens of outreaches, crusades, hospitals, prisons, markets, villages etc.
• Mission trips to: Karamoja, Kitgum/Gulu, Bugiri
• A public Muslim/Christian Debate
• Over 703 salvations, including several Muslims!

We give glory to Jesus, and we thank you for being a part.

Jesse Digges
Director, IAM Youth Ablaze – East Africa

Bethany Rose Digges

On August 7^th, 2009, our second daughter, Bethany Rose Digges, was born at International Hospital Kampala, Uganda. We praise God that the delivery was without complication and Bethany is very healthy. Hadassah is now a big sister and loving the role.

Jesse and I are learning how to manage a bigger family with the responsibilities of the Missions Base, and God is giving us the grace to do so.

Folks here are so happy to meet and hold Bethany. They always say, “I thought all Mzungu (white) babies were born without hair!”

Our daughters are gifts from God, and we are confident He is going to use them to do the ‘greater works’ here in Uganda and in the nations of the earth. We are very blessed.

~Rachelle

Recap - Prayer, Prayer, and more Prayer

Praise the name of the living God!

We are in the states at this time enjoying time with our families and also the ability to fellowship with believers while we are home.

Before we left Uganda many significant events happened. First we took the entire team to Gulu and Kitgum, these are the towns of northern Uganda that were afflicted by the war with the ‘Lord’s Resistance Army’. There we met with some missionaries who are running a house of prayer. We become deeply connected with a couple who have the same exact vision that God has given us for seeing strategic missions bases for training and sending native missionaries to North Africa out of the context of day and night prayer. We spent five days in Kitgum, a town about 45 minute drive from the Sudanese border, helping to establish the foundation for a 24 hour house of prayer. The Lord spoke to a pastor during his 40 day fast that He was establishing a “Global revival prayer network”. Our team spent the time in prayer with the believers, teaching on worship and intercession, while sending out teams for door-to-door evangelism. Even now we are hearing reports that some of the leaders in that area are coming together and are committed to beginning a house of prayer. We are committed to building the night and day prayer network in Uganda, anticipating the return of Jesus Christ.

The weekend before we left for the states we called a twenty-four hour solemn assembly for the young adults in our area to pray for revival and breakthrough in the this generation. We had about 70 young adults from our district come to fast and pray. It was a powerful time to finalize our first year there.

This first group of students have completed the first term of the first year of the YA school, and we are very pleased! Praise God! Everyone has gone home to spend the 'holiday' with family. The school will resume with the 2nd term beginning in July.

I am convinced that this is the last hour and that prayer (the intimate union, communion of the soul with the Lord Jesus by the Holy Spirit) is the key. It is the key to bringing in the last and greatest harvest of souls the world has ever known. Prayer is also essential for a prepared life and an intimate walk with the Lord Jesus Christ. Prayer is about opening up and yielding your life to the ministry of the Holy Spirit, that He might release His mighty grace into your spirit. This will enable you to stand in the time of great trial and lawlessness that is coming upon the earth. Jesus warned us about this hour in Luke 21 and told us what to do: “Stay awake at all times, praying that you may have strength to escape all these things that are going to take place, and to stand before the Son of Man.” As you read this make a commitment to dedicate your life in prayer. Spend time every day waiting upon the Holy Spirit, listen for His voice, and intercede for the nations to be saved. Wherever people are gathering to pray join them, if they are not gathering, gather them or get involved with a local house of prayer.

We are in the states now for the next two months and are traveling to different places to talk about the ministry and what God is doing. I ask you to pray for us that this would be a strategic time for apprehending the purpose and strategy of God for this season in Uganda. In the next email we will explain more of the vision and steps that God has given us for sending laborers into the harvest of North Africa.

-Jesse Digges
Director, Youth Ablaze East Africa