Dear Friends,

This is a moment to pause and give thanks.

In the summer of 1994, thirty years ago this month, the first Josiah Venture (JV) English camp took place in the Czech Republic. It was a wild experiment, launched with only six weeks of preparation and plenty of chaos. I was teaching in a local school at that time, serving in a small evangelical church, and trying to figure out how to reach lost young people. Our youth meetings averaged five in attendance. 

One of my students had the idea for a summer English camp. My brother Josh volunteered to help us with his youth group from an American army base in Germany. We gathered over 80 young people for the evangelistic camp, and our youth group went from 5 to over 50 in just two months.

Fast-forward to today. During the first week of July, the Josiah Venture team is leading camps in Ukraine, Slovakia, Slovenia, Bulgaria, Poland, and the Czech Republic. This marks a significant milestone. It took twenty years to reach camp number 1000 and just ten more years to double that number. 

Many students from Central and Eastern Europe know Jesus because of this steady gospel proclamation. Over 107,000 young people have spent a week with us at camp, including 52,000 unbelievers, with 8,350—16% of them—making a profession of faith in Christ! Will you give thanks with us for these many changed lives?

One of these is Olena, who was born in Ternopil, Ukraine. In 2009, she was invited by her friend to a JV English camp in her town. The next year, she returned to camp, understood the gospel, and put her faith in Christ. Believers from the youth group began to disciple her, and the youth ministry grew into a church plant called Philadelphia Church.

There she continued to mature as a Christian and learned how to serve others. Her life became an exciting journey with God, leading her to serve as a Ukrainian intern with JV in 2015 and 2016. This was when God revealed his calling on her life, and camp ministry became one of her passions.

A young man named Evan fled to Ternopil in 2022 because of the war. He and Olena fell in love and were married in 2023. Olena and Evan are now JV missionaries and serve together in ministry. Olena is the camp team co-director, and Evan helps to equip and care for local churches and summer interns. Under their leadership and amid war, the Ukraine team will lead over 30 evangelistic camps this summer.

What a joy to see the gospel's impact as God grows his kingdom with young people from the harvest to the harvest.

This is a moment to pause and give thanks. I’m thanking him for your part in God's work through your gifts and prayers.