Our European Interns

A few weeks ago at Intern Training I stood in a room with these people and I remember feeling like I was about to cry, with deep deep joy. 

This summer we have 110 summer interns serving with us for three months or longer in our countries across central and eastern Europe. And thirty of those interns are European! You can see a most of them in the photo above. There are two from the United Kingdom and the rest are from "Josiah Venture countries". And this is double the number of European interns compared to last year!

A lot of our European interns will serve in their own countries, some in their own cities. But we also have some going to different European countries - the two guys from Scotland and Northern Ireland are serving in Estonia and Czech respectively, we have a Czech serving in Estonia, two Czechs are serving in Ukraine and a Czech serving internationally as part of our creative communications team! 

As we gathered in that room to discuss the particular joys and challenges they will face as they serve in Europe this summer I couldn't help but get so excited. Partly because these are people I've known about for months as I've read their applications and helped with various details regarding their internship.

But the main reason for my excitement? These people are so much of the reason why I'm here, and why Josiah Venture is here.

Many of these incredible people came to Christ through Josiah Venture camps and ministries. There are faces in the photo above I've known for over five years because they were part of Dejvice English Camp (the Czech church my home church in Saintfield partnered with for years). 

And not only have these people come to Christ but they are being discipled and are passionate about reaching their friends, cities, nations and continent with the Good News.

So I can't help but be excited when I see these people and what God is doing in these nations. And I'm excited about what He's going to do in and through these people not just this summer but also in the years and decades to come!