River Valley 500. Our focus is equipping local Christian leaders (for Venture and with our local church) in hard to reach (tough) places in SE Asia with resources to help them share the Gospel, plant churches, and build the Kingdom of God.
Krista Smith - Wife
Alaithia Smith - Daughter
Jotham Smith - Son
Ryan and Andrea Crozier minister in Bucharest, Romania where they work to prevent human trafficking and sexual exploitation.
Our mission field is in a university town called Potchefstroom South Africa. The general population is university students, Afrikaans families, township communities and very few internationals. South Africa is extremely culturally diverse and acts as almost a ‘melting pot’ of Africa! There are 11 official languages spoken in this nation. The various religious beliefs here are Christianity, African religions, Islam, and Hinduism.
Patrick and Kalyna live in Moldova where they currently minister to victims of human trafficking at a Freedom Home (safe house).
Dareth and Thida are working to plant churches among the unreached Khmer people of Cambodia. They are using multiple approaches to accomplish this goal, including a compassion ministry that focuses on children through school and feeding programs.
John focuses on apostolic work on the University of Minnesota campus (most recently with fraternities) and is an associate pastor at Sojourn Campus Church in Minneapolis. Jolene is currently seeking strategic direction on how to reach the U of M arts community as an independent choreographer.
Estonia is a small country, about 1/5 the size of Minnesota with just 1.3 million people. About 400,000 of them live in Tallinn, the city we live and work in. Estonia is one of the least religious countries in the world. Only 14 percent believe religion has any influence on their lives, and less than 1 percent are Evangelical Christian (Pentecostal, Baptist, or Methodist). After centuries of various occupations, Estonia was established as a country in 1918, but Soviet and Nazi occupations would follow. Estonia regained independence from the Soviet Union in 1991. The country is around 70 percent Estonian and 20 percent Russian, although some border cities are up to 90 percent Russian. Despite such a difficult past, Estonia leads the way technologically. Skype, Pipedrive, and Wise were all born in Estonia, and it's not uncommon to see delivery robots pass by on the sidewalk.
Majority of Norwegians are involved in secular Christianity, with less than 3 percent being born again Christians.
Thailand is a primarily Buddhist country with little access to the gospel. Out of the 71.8 million people in Thailand, 71 million are not Christ-Followers. Yes, you read that right, 99.4% of Thais are unreached. In our province of Chumphon, there are 732 villages and only 26 evangelical churches. With a population of over 550,000, only 1,200 (0.2%) in our province are Christians.
River Valley 500. Staffing and leading (directing) DTS: This includes being a mentor and walking alongside students in this 3 month lecture phase and leading the 2 month international outreach. -Worship and music ministry: We get to lead worship at our YWAM base and once a month at our local church, Horizonte. Currently we are leading worship for our summer Mission Adventures teams (highschool/college teams that come back-to-back for a week camp to be trained in evangelism and go out into our community and share Jesus). We’ve also been a part of the music ministry called Contraste where we play music in cafes/restaurants and use it as a tool to draw people in to evangelize. -Homes of Hope: Building homes for families living in poverty in our community. My husband and I get to host teams and be a part of the 2-3 day house builds. My husband has also been a part of the family-selection team.
Mark and Anjali are located in Swaziland, a small, landlocked country within South Africa and bordered by Mozambique.