It has been awhile since we have given any sort of update about what has been going on with Anchored Warriors! Life has been extremely busy, especially since Kim has started a part time job and Tristan and Lesley have moved back to Eden Valley as Tristan has gotten a job working on his reserve. We are all juggling our jobs and life and Anchored Warriors. It has been a challenge but God is good and He is so faithful to us in everything that we do! He has continued to open doors and brought new connections for us in our personal lives and in our work with Anchored Warriors. We have been able to share at a couple new churches about what God is doing through Anchored Warriors. It has been so encouraging to see more churches and people wanting to partner with us and pray for us! We appreciate all the support. 

One of the newest developments, and a very exciting one is a new member of the Anchored Warriors team! She is going to introduce herself as she has written up a bio for everyone to read to get to know her and her heart better. We have been so blessed by her positive attitude, her excitement for life and her love for Jesus! So here she is - Cassie Flett! :) 

Well First of all! My name is Cassie Flett I was born and raised in a small community Gift Lake Metis Settlement in the Northern Alberta. you can google map it but all you will see is mainly trees =) and I can honestly say I am and big DREAMER, I always have all these big plans and ideas to do this and do that… and most the time i just don't do it! . So I had this one dream =) it was to travel the world and live of the land and the live like the people… I even had the thought to live off of rice because I just loved rice that much and just leave with the clothes on my back… I was at a point in my life where I just wanted to be away everyone I knew, everything i knew life was and just live my life… I wanted it to just be me and God… where i didn't have to listen to what other people thought of this and that  and what the world was telling me, I just wanted to hear from God himself. This dream that I was dreaming i didn't think it would really happen i thought it was just something that was gonna stay in my mind and never happen. BUT God definitely had other plans. 

During my 1st year of bible school, I always knew there was way more to God then what I knew like there was something more that I wasn't finding… it was always like this constant whisper being like there is so much more than you think… so after my first year of bible school I was like okay what is this something more… i started praying seeking trying to find and THEN God took me on this crazy adventure called the World Race you go to 11 countries in 11months and live with the people and learn how they do life and sharing the love of christ with the people and for the whole 11 months you were only aloud 1 backpack to fit everything whatever you can carry you can take … at first I was like Whoa seriously? but secretly inside I was like OH YEA this is gonna be awesome I am going to change the world help all these people, when really God was like no no no Im going to change your world… which I didn't know till after… So God provided every single penny that I need to go on the World race and I left Canada in September 2010 going from month to month to each country, learning way to much about myself and God constantly molding me and changing me inside and out. Literally reaching into my heart and stirring it up I don't think I have ever been so broken in my life, but the awesome thing was that in the middle of my brokeness I was able to lean and depend on God. 

Each country was unique in its own way, the people the food the atmosphere everything was always changing. Our lives were constantly changing our thoughts about life were always shifting, the things I was seeing in other countries began to move me. The countries were beautiful in itself but there was just something about the people that I was met, the people that I became friends with, I think they made the most impact on my life. Its crazy that it wasn't at all about the places but the people….  I had the opportunity to travel with 33 crazy Americans… and they became my family, the people in each country we lived with became my family, we looked out for eachother, they held my hand in the good and bad times. The 33 americans and then me the 1 aboriginal, the crazy thing was that for the whole entire 11 months I did not see one native person at all… I didn't get the good native belly laugh, seemed like no one got my humour and they said my accent was really different which was not even =) . I didn't realized that it was going to be that hard to not people around my culture my people, I didn't realize till about half way through the race how much I loved native my own people. Being away from native people made me realized how much of passion I have for our culture and our people. So travelling the world seeing all these different cultures getting culture shock was pretty much normal the funny thing was I got native culture shock which was seriously the strangest thing ever. Its just weird

I have always had such a passion for youth even when I was a youth, I was super involved with all these different youth programs in the community basically was always trying to get involved. I started to get this idea to have a youth ministry and just have young people ministering to young people. So this all came up while on the World Race and towards the end of the world race being God just really started to put this burning passion in my heart for aboriginal youth… not only just to minister to young people but loving them and letting God walk them in true freedom… showing them that God is just not this God who is not involved but the God who is interacting in our daily lives. The one thing that has really been on my heart is Creating a Safe Place… meaning a place where youth can come and feel welcome and wanted. a place where you can just be you… A place of worship where we can just come and Be before God.

I have been back from the Race for 3 months still can't believe it and God has just been doing crazy things in my life and the life of others breaking me down and building me back up. Coming back home I had been praying into what God had for me next and seeking out His will in my life, where my next steps were. Somewhere along the way I connected with Kim and Amy and the rest its just history =) all I can say that it was definitely was a God thing, God crossed our paths and just been going in the same direction. 

So being up here and the North and Anchored Warriors in the south 

God has place these 8 passion driven people in my life, they have such passion for God and a passion for youth. The 8 of us just started to get together we started talking about wanting to work with you and really wanting to seek God and it was so crazy how it happen it was like our hearts were all in the same place our passions all lined up together. So our team is Rebuilding Nations working to rebuild what the enemy has destroyed, represent Christ and to serve…

Watch this video about what Rebuilding Nations thinks about "Passion"

Anchored Warriors - Summer at a Glance

This summer has been a whirlwind! I honestly cannot believe how fast the last two months has gone by and how much stuff we have all packed into it between all of us!

The whole month of July included Tristan and Lesley being at Camp Gladstone as the assistant summer directors, and Kim travelling to Missouri and back with a group of youth to go to the Warrior Leadership Summit. I also was able to travel a little bit as I went to Saskatchewan to run the youth program at the First Nations Alliance Church familycamp.  Me and Kim were able to go visit and help put the spotlight on some of the youth that were planning to attend the outreach in Eden Valley by going to Gift Lake family camp and Kikino family camp. It was a great time to catch up with old friends, make new friends and talk about what Anchored Warriors is all about and how awesome the youth from those communities are!

EDEN VALLEY

After our two long drives up north we had a solid week of running around and preparing for our first ever local outreach. It was such a great learning opportunity as leaders for how much food to buy to feed 14 hungry youth/young adults, as well as planning, organizing and praying!

A few of our youth from Kikino and Lethbridge arrived on the Saturday night before the first day of outreach. Sunday morning we were blessed by Dan and Bev having us over for brunch along with a great prayer/church service held at their house by the house church that D&B, Tristan and Lesley and I (Amy) attend. It was so encouraging to have and know that we had people supporting us in prayer for that week ahead.

That evening we drove down to Millerville Church where we were blessed to be able to make our home for the week! We met up with the rest of the team there that night as many of them were coming in from just having finished up working as counsellors at Camp Gladstone and two others were coming in from Winnipeg! We unpacked, got settled, got to know each other, talked about our plans for the upcoming week, prayed together and hung out!

Overall the week at Eden Valley was beyond amazing. God showed up in so many ways, and by the end of it our team was family. The week included lots of prayer and planning, a prayer walk, handing out flyers, lots of murderball (it's not as horrible as it sounds!), basketball, volleyball, facepainting, hiking in the mountains (with great packed lunches donated from Longview Church!), swimming in the river and making new friends! We had a great evening bonfire with the youth, eating marshmallows and chips, singing songs and some of the youth on our team were able to share their stories of who God was to them and how He has and is working in their lives. We also had an art focus during the week that was led by Josiah! It was a great opportunity for youth to show their creativity.Anothe big focus of the week, which was a huge success thanks to all the prayers and donations and food and volunteers, was the community feast! We fed approximately 150 people from the community! We had many donations from Varisty Bible Church (as well as some awesome volunteers), as well as many food donations from Millerville (and more great volunteers) and then lots of help from our Calgary friends/family. We could not have had that evening work out in such an amazing way without all the support, encouragement, donations and prayers that came our way that night! We had two of our team members share their stories as well as one of our youth sing a song for the community. Then after everyone ate and had their coffee and great dessert, there was lots of volleyball and visiting. We heard lots of positive feedback about the evening from members of the community and those who helped us organize and run it. We are very thankful to all of you who were involved in any way!

Anchored Warriors Team! 

Song/Testimony/Gospel @ Community Feast 

Off we go! 

More youth games

Youth Art Project

Youth Games - "Buck Buck"

Kids Day :) 

The Community Feast

The last day was a short visit at the rez as most of the youth were gone to a culture camp. And then we packed up at the church and prepared to head back to Calgary the next day. We had a fun day at Calaway Park and then the next day everyone headed home and back to their own adventures.

We as a team have all been so encouraged by the amazing way God has been working in the lives of not only the youth/young adults we have been connected with this year through our different events, but also through the way God is working THROUGH these youth. They are the ones that will change and make a difference in their home communities, and we can already see this happening. We are so proud of all of them because they are facing their own fears and struggles and in that process they are also showing other Aboriginal youth that they can make a difference and that their lives do matter! They are being the example to not only the youth in their communities but also the the adults and elders. It is so amazing to see God work and encourage them in that way! We love you guys! :)

THE REST OF THE SUMMER

After the outreach event I (Amy) was blessed to be the main speaker at the Jr.High Camp (2) at Camp Nakamun. It was a great opportunity to practice my teaching/speaking skills and get to catch up with old friends and make some new ones. It also was a week that reminded me that God uses people of all ages and He believes in the next generation!

We all wrapped up the summer this past weekend as we all attended the Southern Alberta family camp at Camp Gladstone. It was a good, relaxing way to end the summer and enjoy the company of people we love.

YEAR TWO

This is officially the beginning of year two for Anchored Warriors. It is so crazy to think that a whole year has gone by already and that God is allowing us another year with this project. We have not recieved any grant funding for this year and so we have been working at raising our funds with lots of help and advice from Interact Ministries. Kim is going to be starting a part time job next week as her funding through the last grant has ended, and I will continue my part time work as a nanny. Tristan and Leslie are waiting to hear back about some potential jobs and are in transition right now. Please be praying for all of us as we figure out how this next year is going to work. We are trusting in God for doors to be opened and closed where they need to be so that everything will work even better then we can imagine for this next year full of adventures. Please pray for us as we are taking steps of faith. Also pray for us and the people that are helping Anchored Warriors (like Josiah and many people in Interact that are helping us get our footings with this ministry). We already have some new roads to walk down and new people that are interested in working with Anchored Warriors.

We appreciate all your support and prayers and encouragement so much. I know I've said that alot, but I really don't think we would be where we are today without it! So thank you for being a part of our team as we continue seeking and serving God through loving and building up solid Aboriginal leaders!

We will try and keep you all updated as much as possible! Keep checking our facebook page and this blog. Also keep posted because we will be having a website up and running sometime in the next couple months!