History of YWAM Belgium
In 1982 an international team of young people led by Ron and Roberta Archer had a vision to go to Belgium.
At first we lived with a Catholic Charismatic Community in a castle in the south of Holland before moving to Belgium. There, we laid the foundation for our work in Belgium by praying for the country. We also spent time learning and rehearsing Christian dances and dramas. At weekends we would go as a mobile team to Belgium to serve the churches.
Ron & Roberta Archer
Croy Castle
Dancing in the streets
The Avenue des Celtes building
A year later we bought a building in Brussels, centrally located and close to the major European buildings. We moved in and spent the first evening on the floor of one of the apartments in the building eating Belgian frites!
During the first years, we organised DTSs (Discipleship Training School), summer camps and Discipleship Training seminars. We reached out mainly to the youth from Pentecostal churches. Our building was sometimes full with over 60 occupants. We had open Sunday evening meetings, that were very well attended by local people.
Very soon we needed another building and so we bought a beautiful house close to the North Station in a Muslim area, one street away from the red light district. We split into two teams: a national team that worked with churches in the nation and an Urban Missions team. Most of the Urban Missions team lived in the new building. We did evangelism in the cafés, among the prostitutes and among the Muslim children.
In 1989, the Archers moved to Amsterdam to become regional leaders of YWAM in the Low Countries.
Rue Quatrecht
We had to sell the second building because of a shortage of staff workers. With the money from the sale of this building, we renovated the other building in Avenue Des Celtes, making some beautiful apartments.
Annemarie Voumard
Our work with Catholics developed more and more. Beatriz Gaillet was our first Catholic staff worker and has been with us up to this day. She and Leanne Payne have organised very fruitful seminars and other events on counselling and inner healing.
Therese Hofmann a Swiss lady had a vision to help mothers with unwanted pregnancies. Together with another team member she started Choix de Vie.
Unknown to us, Therese had a serious problem that she had been hiding, that ultimately led her to commit suicide in 1997. This was a traumatic time for our community. The ministry was restructured and was relaunched as Alternatives. This ministry is now led by Sheila Cuthbertson and is doing very well. We also developed a mothers and babies meeting.
In 1996, we got back in contact with the Castle Croy community. We helped them start a Catholic youth festival in Holland. From that time on, we have had a great working relationship with the Catholic Charismatic Renewal in both Holland and Belgium. This year (2003) we had our first "Kerygma Team" DTS. We also have our first Youth festival in Belgium co-ordinated by the Catholic Charismatic Renewal and us.
In 2000 we started to organise summer outreaches with young Flemish people who have done a DTS. In 2003 we had three outreaches: to Belgium, Luxembourg, England and to Turkey.
We hadn't had a DTS here for several years, but in 2003, two ladies from the DTS centre in Budapest organised one. As a result of this DTS, we started a youth community on the top floor of our building. This involved an extensive renovation. In September (2003) we held another DTS in our building.
The work is expanding and we are very grateful for that. There are also more youth working with us and that is very refreshing. God has been very faithful!