The Application of Youth With A Mission’s Foundational Values Through Different Cultural Lenses

7 CHAPTER ONE Introductory Overview If asked why I would pursue writing my thesis on the Cultural Application of our values, I would have to share my story with Youth With A Mission (YWAM) and my relationship with the values.

I was born and raised in the United States. When I was in Bible school, God led me into long-term missions and directed me to the Philippines. After I graduated in 1996, I flew to the Philippines for my Discipleship Training School (DTS) and ended up living and serving with YWAM in Asia for 20 years.

In 2002, Patti Lee, with a team, came to lead the first Foundational DTS Workshop in the Philippines. During that time, she spent one morning talking about the importance of YWAM's Foundational Values. She asked us to sit in small groups based on the locations we served. Once we did, she asked us to list the top three values that our location was strong in implementing and the three values we were weak at applying. After that, we shared our strengths and weaknesses in the whole group and then shared how to strengthen our weaknesses. This was the first time in YWAM I realized the importance of our mission's values in the way we functioned and lived.

From there, I began to look at YWAM through the lens of our values. In the process, I began to see some of the strengths and shortcomings in applying the values in every location and how I applied them in my own life.

In 2007, Darlene Cunningham spoke in my Leadership Training School (LTS) and spent one day teaching how our values need to align with our location's guidelines, rules, and policies.

During that time, she challenged us to look through our base policies one by one. She