by Craig Blair | Jul 9, 2026 | Connections Article
The goal of MBI Debriefing is to provide an opportunity for those who minister to others to pause, reflect, be ministered to, and gain God’s perspective in their situation. Our focus is especially on long-term missionaries and ministry workers so they can continue to thrive as they pour into others. Debriefing can be a time to be refilled, renewed, and refreshed.
Over the past year, MBI’s Debriefing team has grown to three members with a combined 80 years of ministry experience in YWAM and more than 35 years of cross-cultural living and family life. Their firsthand experience enables them to minister effectively to long-term missionaries, offering wisdom, encouragement, and practical support from those who have walked a similar path. By strengthening and caring for missionaries, the team seeks to help them remain healthy and effective in ministry while reducing missionary attrition.
Liz, who experienced the impact of debriefing, shared:
“There was a season in my life where I felt paused between chapters, unsure of what God was asking of me or what was coming next. I was in a place of transition, uncertainty, and waiting, sensing that God was asking me to trust Him more deeply and shift my focus out on my own.
“Debriefing gave me something I didn’t realize I needed so deeply: space to reflect honestly and listen to what God was stirring in my heart. It helped me process the uncertainty I was carrying and reminded me that my value was not rooted in having all the answers, but in being loved and led by God.”
Liz also shared why debriefing matters so deeply for those in ministry:
“Ministry often comes with unseen burdens, constant pouring out, transition, loneliness, and emotional fatigue. Debriefing creates space for healing, reflection, and restoration, helping people remain healthy spiritually, emotionally, and relationally.” — Liz Collard Arnold, author of Finding Freedom from Rejection: Breaking Through the Glass to Embrace YHWH’s Love
Sometimes what people need most is simply a safe place to be honest, breathe deeply, and remember they were never meant to carry everything alone.
by Craig Blair | Feb 26, 2026 | Connections Article
Partner Architects helps build the mission by working with ministries to create places that support God’s redemptive work in the world. Underserved nations with low Christian populations often have no access to professional services. Partner Architects fills that need by providing design services. One of their ongoing projects is in The Gambia, West Africa.
Since 2024, Partner Architects has been helping design a new YWAM campus in Soma, The Gambia. YWAM Gambia is reaching its local community, the surrounding villages, and the nations while also discipling Muslim converts in how to thrive as Christians in a Muslim country. They minister to youth by giving them real world skills through their welding apprenticeship school. Partner Architects came alongside YWAM Gambia to execute a campus development plan to meet their diverse ministry needs.
One challenge that Partner Architects and the YWAM Gambia team faced was how to creatively make use of inexpensive and readily available building materials. For example, earthen blocks have been dug and pressed by ministry members who are actively part of the construction process.
A key structure the YWAM team has built is the Bantaba. Partner Architects director, Ross Lackey, says: “In designing a Christian campus in West Africa, one of the most significant spaces may be the Bantaba – a large, open-air gathering space positioned near the main road and front gate. It serves as both a communal hub and a symbolic bridge to the surrounding population, which is 97% Muslim. Although the country has long been known for its religious freedom, rising radicalization within the Muslim majority and efforts to rewrite the constitution now threaten these liberties. In this context, spaces like the Bantaba become essential for fostering dialogue, building trust, and reaching across deepening community divides.”
YWAM Gambia has now completed a water tower, a workshop/vocational training building, a bathroom block, and a staff housing structure. Their missionary team has labored diligently and are very proud of their accomplishments. Watch a short clip of their progress here.
by Becky Hefty | Aug 28, 2025 | Connections Article
Youth With A Mission (YWAM) is an international mission organization that has reached every continent through its mandate “to know God and to make Him known.” YWAM locations and ministries have been reaching the nations since 1960 through training, evangelism, and mercy ministry. Navigating the fulfillment of the YWAM mandate has sometimes meant complications and complexities, requiring knowledge, skills, and practical help to overcome challenges.
Mission Builders International—best known as MBI—began in 1978 with a simple yet impactful idea: What if people with practical skills could serve YWAM ministries worldwide, helping them thrive? From its inception in Kona, Hawaii, MBI developed into a global volunteer movement that supports YWAM locations through practical, hands-on service. Over the years, MBI has mobilized thousands of volunteers—ordinary people with a heart to serve—who’ve helped strengthen YWAM campuses in more than 100 countries. Whether it’s building classrooms, cooking meals, fixing plumbing, or just showing up with a servant’s heart, MBI volunteers free up full-time missionaries to focus on their calling.
In 2019, we began expanding our services to include unique, professional, and contextualized support tailored to the specific needs of mission leaders and staff. We recognized a growing need to come alongside those on the frontlines, much like Aaron and Hur did for Moses, to help hold up the arms of those faithfully carrying the weight of ministry.
Through leadership coaching, personal debriefing, and strategic site and building design, we’ve been able to share the load, bringing strength,
clarity, and encouragement to those who often serve behind the scenes and under great pressure.
Every day, our heart and focus remain the same: to find meaningful ways to keep missionaries on the field, thriving in their calling, and supported in the life-changing work God has given them to do.
At its core, MBI exists “so others may thrive.” Every act of service becomes part of God’s greater story of transformation around the world.
by Becky Hefty | May 5, 2025 | Connections Article
YWAM missionaries are fulfilling the Great Commission worldwide through their unique callings and ministries. MBI helps them succeed through contextualized services designed to equip leaders, build the mission, and engage the nations. Here’s how MBI’s Leadership13 (L13) members recently accomplished those objectives.
Equipping leaders: Dawn Masucci, Ron Brewster, Nate Ballivian, and Amy Stevens traveled to Tyler, TX, to coach the leaders of Living Alternatives in vision and strategy. Living Alternatives has focused on the wholeness and well-being of pregnant, single, and underprivileged moms for nearly fifty years, protecting the unborn, educating parents, and providing resources for women and families while promoting a culture of life. The ministry provides living spaces, support, counselling, and testing and ultrasounds through their clinic on wheels.
Building the mission: Dawn connected with leaders at YWAM Durres during a recent trip to Albania. Discipleship, training, reconciliation, and pioneering within the young generations are at the heart of the YWAM Durres mission. Since 2015, YWAM Durres has expanded to include three other campuses and multiple staff and personnel. Rapid growth means they require extra help. Dawn says, “They’d heard about MBI but didn’t know how to connect. When I contacted them, they shared their story with me. We had a great discussion about how MBI could support them. MBI will be moving toward partnering with them to send the additional help they need.”
Engaging the nations: YWAM North Cascades in Bellingham, WA, consists of three interrelated training and ministry locations. The newest is a farm that grows food to distribute among the poor in the Bellingham community and provides a place to train/disciple young people in farming. Dawn, Ron, and Jared Peifer offered staff training and leadership instruction, helping YWAM North Cascades navigate the dynamics and logistics of running three locations while maintaining community. L13’s input enables them to fulfill their mission to train and send young people “from the Pacific Northwest to the ends of the Earth” to reach the lost.
by Becky Hefty | Mar 5, 2025 | Connections Article
MBI provides targeted services that help YWAM missionaries thrive. Sometimes, YWAM leaders and staff
taking on the complexities of ministry may not know what they don’t know. MBI can help them prevent challenges before they arise through training opportunities like LIFT (legal, immigration, financial, tactical).
YWAM attendees at MBI’s recent LIFT conference in Colorado Springs had this to say:
“We returned to Santa Rosa after the conference, and as I was organizing our documentation and checking things, I realized we did not have the 2023 taxes done. We had just taken over in July 2024. I had no idea what happened in 2023! However, because it was just before the deadline, I could reach out to the previous accountant and find out what we needed. Also, I made friends with Michelle at MEI (Misson Enablers Int’l) in Arkansas and contacted her to help me make reports for the accountant. All those pieces fit into place in just enough time to avoid the daily IRS fine for late taxes.
“All this to say, thank you for running LIFT! We didn’t know we needed to sort out a tax issue. But because we were asking questions and being asked questions at the conference, we discovered this problem before it became a crisis.” —Melissa, YWAM Santa Rosa
“I just finished my first MBI LIFT conference. As a fairly new personnel director at our YWAM location, I wasn’t sure what I would learn. I knew I needed to understand more about immigration laws, but I thought all other subjects would not necessarily apply to me. I still wanted to gain some understanding and at least get a broad picture since I also sit on the team that oversees operations on our campus.
“I want to report that a new world of understanding opened up! The presenters were knowledgeable and skilled in their areas and gave us lots of information to process. The conference leaders would go above and beyond to serve us and ensure we took the best information back to our campuses.
“Knowing MBI is there for us when we need expert advice is a comforting thought.” —FinnGirl64
Visit MBI’s LIFT website here.
by Becky Hefty | Sep 9, 2024 | Connections Article
God is a champion of the vulnerable. That’s why MBI is committed to helping ministries like YWAM San Francisco, CA, maintain their life-changing work among people subsisting on the streets.
YWAM SF focuses on the people living within the Tenderloin—San Francisco’s most diverse and unusual neighborhood—part of which sits outside the front door of their main ministry center at 357 Ellis Street. Their mission is to engage San Francisco with a loving God.
Director Tim Svoboda says: “Homelessness is a large problem across American cities. There are many
reasons for this. Housing, high rents, unemployment, mental health, drugs, and so on. We find the number one problem facing most of the unhoused is loneliness. A lack of family connection. The isolation and loss of dignity people find on the streets can make them want to give up and live on the street because it’s easier than solving the complicated problem of finding a job or a place to live.”
At the Ellis Street center, the YWAM SF staff engages their homeless, lonely, and addicted “neighbors” in practical and relational ways, from providing showers and haircuts to playing ping pong and hosting community Bible discussions. “Whatever we do,” Tim says,” it focuses on building relationships so people feel loved, accepted, safe, and trusted. We concentrate on belonging first, which then leads to believing.”
Does it work? Tim points to Jason, who is beginning to embrace faith in Jesus, actively volunteering at YWAM, and contemplating his future with newfound optimism. As one of YWAM SF’s Mission Adventure outreach participants noted: “God taught me that some people just need someone to listen or talk to.”
YWAM SF’s current practical needs include volunteer help in communications, maintenance, and renovations. They also need mature, relational staff and an administrative assistant. We invite you to volunteer and help them continue loving their neighbors into God’s kingdom.
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