Thinking about this past year 2016 gratitud really fills my heart. It has been such a great year in terms of health, friendships, family, provision and many more things. I feel privileged to serve God with my talents and gifts and to be part of this big movement of the church which is alive and mobile.
Our Christmas celebration was awesome here. I'm already getting used to the fact that it's summer, it's hot & humid, the celebration is outside and beyond the good food there's joyful music and dance. We celebrated together with our Art ministry but also other people and family members joined in and together we were around 30 people.
Few weeks before the Christmas Eve we had a big Christmas dinner for the whole neighborhood. It's one our ways to reach and evangelize the people around us every year.
My piano student Joas performing
We shared the gift boxes from Operation Christmas Child to every kid who came
Here also some other photos from the last times:
Our band Pujahca playing in December
Celebrating the independence day
I wish you all a blessed and fruitful 2017! Get fully involved in God's adventures and I bet it won't be a boring year!
Thank you all for your prayers and support and love during this past year! It makes the difference!
Now it has been few weeks back here in Buenos Aires Argentina. It was easy to readapt here.
In the first week we held a hip-hop event at the base. "YWAM Street Battle" was as any other dance battle, only arranged by ywamers, at our local base in YWAM Ituzaingo. Our hall was filled with around 200 dancers as they competed in the styles of break dance, hip-hop dance and house. The event was such and success, the dancers were amazed by the good organization and our love and care. We have been able to continue the good work we’re doing with them.
A photo posted by Compañía De Arte AME (@ame.artcompany) on
If you'd like to see more photos please click here. What else?
I have been editing some of our videos.
We inscribed our band Pujahca to a band competition. We’re still waiting for an email wether we passed or not.
Yesterday we visited a worship conference. Hiram, our leader was teaching about evangelizing and influencing in every sphere of the society and the guys danced.
Please be praying:
I’m a bit sick right now. The weather has been variating radically lately and many of us are catching cold. Let’s pray for healing!
Our project of opening a base in Rosario moves slowly forward. However there’s a man living illegally in the house we are looking forward to move into. Let’s pray he would leave as soon as possible and we wouldn’t need to wait for the police to interact.
It's a promo of our art school AME. My leader asked me to make a promo video. Honestly, I wasn't really enthusiastic about it, because finding good video recordings about the stuff we do as a school and ministry is frustrating sometimes...
Well, however luckily I prayed and asked Daddy's opinion. So He gave me this idea to make a story. I started forming this idea of a dancer, musician and actor preparing themselves for a show and thinking deep stuff in the same way. So instead of just using already filmed material I planned to film something new.
When I told my idea to my leader she liked it but took it to a totally new level. She made it more real and dramatic and split one video to three different stories!
So we wrote and filmed this first part quickly. Naka was the director, while Cami filmed the most of it. The actors are all from our base, as usual :D Later on we edited the material with Naka and I composed the music with Joel.
To be honest I'm super happy for this product. It could be a way better of course, but we still have two more videos to make ;) Let it touch you and come to do our school! Or at least share it forward.
P.S. It's the same school I came to do here in 2011. It will change your life!
This is something I've wanted to do for a long time! I really would like to introduce the amazing people I'm serving with. They truly are as a family for me! They are the AME Art Ministry.
Here at the YWAM base in Ituzaingó, Buenos Aires we are around a hundred staff members serving voluntarily and full-timely. Each staff member belong to an ministry which is the group of work where they spend the most of the time of their days. The ministries are focused in different spheres of the society: family, education, sports, arts, communication etc.
So today I will introduce you the ART MINISTRY AME (Artists in their Maximum Experience)
The art ministry of YWAM Ituzaingo is composed of an internationally diverse cast of artists. Our main focus is to use all areas of artistic expression to feature principles and values. Through what we do we try to challenge society to embrace a different worldview.
OBJECTIVES:
To co-create with God and to express his heart through the arts, seeking out new creativity and taking hope and salvation to people.
To disciple and minister to artists.
To redeem the arts of all nations.
How do we do it? Through different artistic disciplines, participating in social, cultural and sporting events, offering workshops and performances to churches through the following projects:
Art Studio
AME School
Liberarte
Bands
AME productions
Additionally, our ministry has the vision of promoting artistic events during summer and winter vacations in the more touristic locations of Argentina like Mar del Plata and Villa Carlos Paz. By doing this we offer a family-friendly and evangelistic show to the public. Our goal is to be a part of the official show business grid, to participate in national awards in Argentine theater and to bring influence and transformation to this area of society.
Contact: jucumarte@gmail.com
The Maldonados: Hiram (Puerto Rico), Paula (Argentina), Mia, Lucca & Tiago.
The Ramires: Daniela (Italia) & Joel (Argentina)
The Nakayamas (Argentina): Maru, Naka & Takeo
The Arredondos (Guatemala): Edi, Marielis, Daybel & Zoe
The Kodys: David (USA), Noemi (The Dominican Republic) & Eloise
The Lozzis (Guatemala): Sara, Joseph & Walfer
The Theimboueones: Katie (Australia), Mathias (New Caledonia) & Owen
Chile
Canada
Guatemala
USA
Guatemala
Brazil
Guatemala
Finland
Chile
Finland
Mauro (Argentina)
Gabriel (Argentina)
That's who we are. These people are amazing and brilliant. If you want to pray for some of them specifically or support one of them financially, just let me know!
Few days ago we finished our Art Seminar called ELEVEN 246. It was a camp -like seminar we held here at our base in Ituzaingo, Buenos Aires. The participants were 16 teenagers and young adults. Most of them came from different churches of Argentina but we also received one girl from Finland and two from Chile!
As the staff of the art ministry we had different roles during the seminar: teaching, worship leading, sharing devotionals, leading games, helping in the kitchen, etc, etc... I myself spent lots of time translating everything to Finnish. Luckily I was not by myself with that and in some moments my brain started to think in my mother tongue once again!
During the seminar all of the guys received and took part into different art classes: acting, music and dance in its diverse styles: contemporary, hip hop, folklore, break dance and salsa. So each one of them had some classes they had never tried before. And in the end of the 11 days they got to perform in their final show.
The group was really united and open to receive our teaching and hearing God's voice. As God had told us beforehand, many of them found their way back to God, some received Him for the first time and others took important decisions for their future. For me personally it's such a joy to be part of their life with my own part. We're all so thankful to God for using us for His Kingdom!
Teaching outside when it's too hot to be inside
Argentinean folklore
Salsa
Thank you all for your prayers and support! I'm so privileged to serve Lord full-time without needing to worry about my financial support. Love you all!
Hope you all had the best Christmas ever! I spent mine in the coast of Argentina in a city called Mar del Plata. I came here to the local YWAM base to rest a bit before starting the 2016 with everything!
This year 2015 has been full of action as the missionary life always seems to be. Once again it's hard to believe that all these things happened in one year. Let's see a bit.
It was the beginning of the year as we created the musical "Huesos Secos" with the art school students and performed it. The school finished in March and some students joined our ministry.
The YWAM conference was this year in Mendoza. We went a bit beforehand to help with the sound system. But beyond the work it was time to renew in the Spirit. In 2016 the conference will be in our base..!
One of the happiest memories of the year was when Marko, my youth pastor from Finland came to see me here! We even got to know the famous waterfalls in the North of the country.
We also got to arrange LIBERARTE, the art event for the youth of our city. This year was very fruitful cause some of the guys stayed in contact with us and we were able to disciple them.
Then the real miracle of the year was our outreach to USA. I had a little faith in the beginning but by your help the trip came true! And how God blessed every single detail..!
Our second outreach was to the South of Argentina where we performed our family musical in 7 different cities, all together 25 times including schools, churches, theaters even outside... Thousands of kids heard the message salvation through this play.
In September we had this unique opportunity to record three songs in a professional studio with our band Pujahca! It was something we didn't expect but God just arranged it all! Such a great experience!
And the rest of the year we had three weddings at the base, we started reaching out the hip-hop culture, continued giving art classes, celebrated the Christmas with the neighborhood and many more things...
This was just a quick look to the year to be able to WONDER God's goodness and faithfulness! Remember that all this was possible because of your support and prayers! I couldn't be able to do any of this by myself! So thank you soooo much!
The year hasn't been super easy but it's good to see how fruitful it was anyway! I'm expecting new things of 2016 and trusting that Daddy has some cool stuff prepared for all of us!
We'll start the new year with an art seminar. The invitation is open for everyone!
P.S. Even though my plan and vision is to stay here in Argentina and serve Lord here for now I do want to visit home back in Finland this year! So please join me in prayer so everything will fit together!
Just wanted to upload some photos of the hail we got this morning..! They are not like the ones we have in Finland. These ones are HUGE :D
It's late winter here but the last weeks have been really warm, more than 20°C every day.
Last night we finished a wedding party and I sighed how I actually miss snow. I mean, not touching or feeling the snow... But seeing how beautiful it is!
Ok, it has been more than a long time since last post. There have been lots of things going on and I have been more than busy at least the last two weeks.
Two weeks ago we had a music concert here at our base. We invited three more bands to play with us. God has been really generous with us as we have received lots of instruments and sound equipment of the best quality. So it's our honor to use it and let others to use it as well.
This time we had a new drummer and bass guitarist playing with our band Pujahca. To be honest the guys just exploded it and I really enjoyed playing. And so did all the other bands as well.
The goal of the concert was to evangelize, create relationships and raise up funds for our rehearsal room. Praise God it went all well!
Last Saturday we started once again with our musicalEl viaje de los hermanos Luna. We will be presenting during the weekends and then non-stop for two weeks during the winter holidays. This time it's a theatre in the downtown of Buenos Aires.
It has been such an effort and work once again. During the months I was working with different promotional designs, new tracks, videos, radio promos etc. And during this last two weeks we made a whole new set up. As we didn't have lots of time and resources we have been working super hard. Last week we stayed up almost every night till 1 am.
We used a projector to mark my drawing to the material.
One of the many many designs I've made.
So it has been kind of crazy till yesterday. I don't personally like pressure because it easily makes me stress. Or actually the work and tiredness aren't that big deal but the way we handle them. In my case, the pressure and tiredness make me see the crap I still have inside and that doesn't really encourage me.
However God has been more than faithful. There have been so many days I have just said "God I don't know how to go though this". But He has given me strength and helped me in every task. He has healed me from my flu and covered many possible mistakes.
A video I made to promote the play.
So this is basically what I have been in to. Well, just a small small part of that. Everyday is a new adventure and new challenges. I find myself once again so poor and needy for God. I keep on being surprised by the deceitfulness of my heart but as well by His everlasting love. If I'm alive it's by His mercy. If I manage to do something for His Kingdom it's only by his grace.
Last week we had our national conference as YWAM Argetina. Actually it was international because we received our people from many continents. In total we were around 500 ywamers.
The whole week was super blessed and there would be a LOT to share with you. God really spoke to us and ministered us as a mission and individual. Physically we are more than tired but in our spirit we all are renewed.
However now I just want to show you the video we made to present our base and some things we did this last year. The song we presented is an old Christian song. However we made our own version. Joel recorded that electric and bass guitar and I made the rest of the musical production.
So here we go if you want to know a bit our staff here at the base...
In the end of the conference we did thae same with all of the people...
