Getting 'Dusty': Youthworks College in the Pilbara
Meaghan’s heart is now set on rural ministry after Dusty Boots mission
In late June to early July, a group from Youthworks College partnered with Bush Church Aid and Norwest Anglican Church, Baulkham Hills for the annual ‘Dusty Boots’ gospel mission to the Pilbara.
Working alongside local ministry workers, including the Goscombe and Warth families, the team spent two weeks ministering to Indigenous youth and children, taking gospel hope to many who had never heard it before.
Youthworks College student Meaghan Gates shares how God works through Dusty Boots mission, now in its fifth year, and how cross-cultural ministry in the Pilbara has been a life-changing experience.
“For mission we lived amongst the Indigenous community and ministered to them with breakfast clubs, afternoon kids’ clubs in the park, partnering in church each Sunday, providing a community dinner and space for conversation every evening, and various other ministry opportunities throughout the week and a half that we were there. Not only is the physical landscape so vastly different, so too is the social one. As I learnt more from Richard Goscombe and Matt Warth, who live and minister in Wickham with their families, and talked to Indigenous people, I began to understand the great suffering still experienced by many Indigenous people in Australia today.”
”Despite this heartache, God continues to amaze me in how he works through all situations.”
“For example, this young girl called Lisa* was so hesitant to accept us at first. She watched the activities from a distance, afternoon after afternoon, slowly becoming more involved in what was going on. One afternoon her and her brother showed up wearing the same clothes that they had come in the day before. I resolved in my heart to show her as much of God’s love as I could so Amanda (another Youthworks College student) and I ran over and greeted them both with a big smile and off we went to play. After about 15 minutes of pushing them on the swing Lisa began to giggle uncontrollably in pure joy. It was such blessing to see her smiling face. The next day her and her brother and a couple of other children came without hesitation to hear Tim Beilharz preach the gospel using M&M’s as gospel beads and they all understood!”
“The Dusty Boots mission has changed my life. It has been an incredible witness to me of the need for the gospel to be preached faithfully in rural and remote Australia, and God has revealed to me that perhaps I am built for that sort of ministry work! At this point, I can’t think of anything else he’d prefer me to be doing with my life.”
Please join us in thanking God for the way he has revealed himself to young Indigenous people through the Youthworks College Dusty Boots mission. Pray also for Meaghan and other College students who are now considering future ministry in rural and remote Australia.
*Not her real name