Goin on a jet plane

I bought my plane ticket to Nicaragua last night! 

I am really excited about the youth pastors conference. It looks like there will be around 60 youth pastors there, but as for estimating things I would guess more than the estimated will show up. As we are preparing for it, If you would, be asking the Lord what he wants to do at the event. You can email me any insight you have at ledyard.k@gmail.com.

The poster for the event 

I still need to raise money toward my in-country cost and the youth pastor conference.

Be praying for US.

Nicaragua

I am going to Nicaragua!

And it is coming up fast.
Dates: January 5-January 15 2012.

Here is the plan:
I am going with a small team organized by Scott McClelland and Foundational Missions. (www.fxmissions.com) The main event will be a Youth Pastor's Retreat in Masatepe, Nicaragua.

The youth pastor / youth leader event will be a few days where we can seek the LORD together and ask for a blessing and encouragement for this arising generation. Nicaragua is one of the youngest countries in the world, with a very large percentage of their population being below 18 year old. We are asking the LORD to shape the future of this country by shaping the future of these young adults. We know He wants to do it, and we want to join Him in His efforts.

What I have been doing:
I have been asking the Lord what his heart is for the people of Central America and Nicaragua.

On November 12, Amy(my girlfriend) and I held a bake sale fund raiser toward this trip.

What you can do:
Pray for us as we go.

We are going to be funding most of the event from contributions from the U.S. If you would like to give towards the Youth Pastors Retreat or my travel costs please email me at ledyard.k@gmail.com. We would like to raise 3000 toward the retreat and my travel costs estimated 1500.

I have a deadline of December 1 to have the money for my plane ticket.


Blessings

Phil Santoemma

Today we lost one of the brotherhood. 

He was a man I greatly respected and admired. He loved his family and made everyone he talked to feel important. His name was Phil Santoemma. 

Over the last year or so, he battled with cancer. We know now that he is not in pain any longer and that he is literally with Jesus. I thank the Lord for his life.

One of the last conversations I had with him was before I went to Tanzania. He said "Maybe sometime I will go on a missions trip or to Africa". I do not quote him in regret but in inspiration. 

In memory of him I will continue to go.  

Transition

oh the time of transition and decisions. I feel like I have made so many of them in the past few months. Here is a recap of my last month in Tanzania.

I was really looking forward to the last month in Tanzania because my good friend Caleb Knighten was coming to serve at the City of Hope. He arrived on May 20th and we got to work right away. I knew he would want to get things done so we had prepared a few projects that him and I could do. Also I had scheduled my last visit to a church in the area.

Church- It was an adventure I had talked to the pastor and set up that we would be doing 2 services on Saturday and 1 Sunday morning service. Kind of like a seminar. And we would stay at the pastors house for the night. We taught a lot on the body of Christ and discipleship.

Eating together...A necessary part of visit

ing someones home

Worship at the Church

 

They threw a big going away ceremony for us and dressed us like Maasi Warriors

We also built some things such as benches, tables, a tree house that is going to have a slide mounted on it and many more things.
..................


Now I am back in the USA I arrived June 16th. Shortly after I moved back down to Fort Mill where I am now living and working at Vision Voice and Data (ask-vision.com). I am going to be helping lead the SF Missions program at Morningstar University (that I graduated from.).


Also, I have the opportunity to go on a 2 week trip to Nicaragua in January with Foundational Missions (fxmissions.com) more details will be coming soon.

Please keep me in your prayers!


Love and Blessings,

Kyle Ledyard

Focus

Recently I have been reading Oswald Chambers book "My utmost for His highest" it has been helping me bring my focus back to where it is supposed to be. This is an excerpt from what I read yesterday.

   "We must get rid of the plague of the spirit of this religious age in which we live. In our Lord’s life there was none of the pressure and the rushing of tremendous activity that we regard so highly today, and a disciple is to be like His Master. The central point of the kingdom of Jesus Christ is a personal relationship with Him, not public usefulness to others."

Wow, how much of our focus is on public usefulness to others?

Don't get me wrong I am guilty and continuously doing things and thinking about how publicly useful to others a am or am not. It really struck me though because there seems to be so many people trying to find their passion, purpose and what they should do the make a difference in the world. And those things are good even great things but if our first love is not Jesus Christ then they are just dim shadows.

April 2011 pics and Lake Victoria

Sunset at Lake Victoria

Sunrise service on the mountain with the older kids

Alaina and Greta

Chillin at Lake Victoria

The latest

Hello Everyone!

Mambo vipi? (What's up?)

I guess I could call this the one year update. It has been one crazy year!

I do apologize for the delay of updates but hope to reconnect with everyone soon.

Right now I am in Nairobi, Kenya last night I said good bye to my parents they were here for the past 2 weeks myself and my sisters Greta and Alaina had a wonderful time with them. My father helped build some benches for the children and my mother helped my sisters with their projects. Alaina also left with my parent she had been here for the last 7 months and was a big help and blessing. She helped with the children in many ways including the Library, First-aide and being a great big sister to them.

Over the past few months I have spent my time with the Hydraform machine making bricks and teaching safety techniques. We now have a team of young men from the village that we trained to run the machines. So far we have produced more than 15,000 bricks and the most in one was 1180!

In January we hosted a meeting for pastors in the area thinking it would be for 10-15 but 70 showed up! From all different denominations and villages, some from as far as 3 hours away! Denominations are a very big thing here everyone wants you to know that they are Evangelical, Catholic, Assemblies of God, etc. So it is incredible that we were able to bring them together in one place and share thoughts together. They all requested that I visit them at their churches and preach, so I have been trying to do just that. 

I am very excited my good friend Caleb will be arriving here May 20! 

I am also getting prepared to leave in some ways I will be leaving for the US on June 15.

Please pray for me as I continue to visit churches and finish up my last month here and say goodbyes.

Bless you all,

Kyle