2021 June Newsletter

Greetings from The Keystone Project and all our disciples in the nations!

We are in the midst of our busy summer season and experiencing an overflow of God’s blessings and presence. A key core value for us is to trust God in everything. As the Scripture says in Proverbs 3:5-6,

“Trust in the Lord with all your heart And do not lean on your own understanding.
In all your ways acknowledge Him, And He will make your paths straight.”

These verses have been significant in my life and in the ministry of The Keystone Project. The Lord has taught us to walk by faith and to trust Him for everything. His goodness to us comes in so many ways. He has especially blessed us with the best staff. I am amazed to see their commitment to the mission of the Great Commission and their desire for the Lord Himself.

The hotel has been full most of this summer. Most of the hotels in the area do not have sufficient staff to operate and are only partially open. We have 15 interns in addition to our staff and volunteers. The interns are reaching out to the international students who have come to Keystone to work for the summer. Pray for them to have much fruit among them.

In May, we conducted a five-day training event which was attended by 42 students. The Lord moved powerfully, transforming all of us through His Spirit and His Word. We baptized 14 of these students! It is amazing to see how God can bless His children in such a manner.

It is exciting to see the growth of our international outreach. Despite the limitations of the pandemic, we have been able to reach even more people than ever before. Under the leadership of our Director of Global Ministry, David Saldivar, our training distribution capabilities continue to grow through our Online Academy. We are beginning to see the emergence of remote training hubs. The modality of such training hubs varies from country to country. Basically, a host opens their venue to receive students, and we have them go through the Online Academy together as a group, while still providing some level of coaching in smaller groups. We believe God will continue to open doors simultaneously for us to have hundreds of students trained to fulfill the Great Commission. Please help us pray for committed leaders who can host and coach in this type of setting.

We are planning a 21-day trip to West Africa in November of this year! We are in the process of making arrangements in Nigeria, Benin Republic, Ghana, and the Ivory Coast to hold small vision-casting trainings and special trainings for local leaders, in order to leverage the Online Academy as a training resource. Please pray for us, the team, financial resources, and God-connections through this preparation process.

Locally, we continue to seek ways to bless our community here in Keystone. Currently, we are volunteering at the museum in town, preparing lunch for senior citizens, and helping to distribute food to the needy. All of this is made possible through your generous support and prayers.

Please continue to pray for our disciples in the nations, especially in Nigeria, Myanmar, India, and Pakistan. Pray that there will be no new surges of the pandemic in these countries and that the US embassies will open up, allowing students to travel here for the training. Let us continue to pray for local churches to reopen and to come out of this pandemic stronger than ever.

Ask the Lord to choose and prepare those students He wants to attend our month-long International Leaders Training in October of this year. Pray for His anointing on us as we continue the work to which we have all been called.

Thank you so much for allowing us through your prayers and support to impact the nations with the life-saving good news of the gospel of Jesus Christ. We give Him all the glory and honor that is due. God bless you all, in Jesus’ name!

Richard W. Greene
President, The Keystone Project, Inc.

Pray for us!

Dear friends and family,

Fulfilling God’s will in this generation will require raising up visionary leaders who will take ownership of the vision that God has given to them and calling them to sacrifice for that vision. Pray for us, that we might be faithful and committed to raising up these college-aged interns that God has entrusted to us and that we might impart everything that they need to go and make disciples of all nations and fulfill God’s will. We thank you so much for all your prayers, love, and support. We are in the middle of another busy season working hard at the hotel and ministering to the many international college students that have come to Keystone, SD, to work.

We see so many people pouring into Keystone every day, and it seems like every day God is bringing someone new into our lives that we get to minister to. Just the other day, we hired someone from Kazakhstan to work in the mornings at the hotel; please pray for opportunities to share the Gospel with him and for an openness to receive it. The other night, some of the interns and leaders in the community had the opportunity to pray for a girl who is a believer from Columbia. Her wrist had been hurting her, and it was healed. Please pray that God would continue to work in her heart and raise her up to be a light to those around her, so that she might lead many others to the Lord.

We have been so blessed with such wonderful interns this summer; please continue to pray for them, that they would be able to connect well with these international students and that they would be strengthened in their faith to carry on the mission of the Great Commission.

Thank you!

James Greene
Internship Coordinator

Our First Training This Year

Last month, The Keystone Project conducted its first training of 2021, a weeklong training for students across the US. We had a total of 42 students join us for this training over May 17-21; these students traveled from 10 different states/regions: North and South Dakota, Minnesota, Wisconsin, Oklahoma, Missouri, Kansas, Iowa, Pennsylvania, and even the Pacific Islands. Fourteen of these students – one third of the entire class – were returning students who came back for a refresher course and received additional insight from the training. For the other two thirds of the class, this was a first-time introduction to the vision, mission, and core values of The Keystone Project. For all of these students, whether this was their first, second, or third time attending, they all received a vision to glorify God in every nation and a passionate call to make disciples who make disciples by the power of the Holy Spirit in the communities around them.

From the feedback we received from many of our staff and volunteers, this was one of our best weeklong trainings that we’ve ever had. We were blessed to work with an outstanding team of coaches and volunteers who came alongside our staff to help make this training possible. Not only did our coaches invest their time and guidance into our students, helping them process what they were learning and envision it in their own context, but they also served selflessly and sacrificially in a variety of capacities. Our staff and volunteers worked diligently at both the Ministry Center and the hotel, even in the midst of the busy summer season, serving the Lord as they served these students. In addition, the class we had at this training was an excellent group of students; they engaged in the training intently and passionately, going home with a burning desire to reach the lost and establish God’s kingdom through the multiplication of disciples. The training concluded on a high note as we baptized 14 of these students, each rededicating their lives to following Jesus and making Him known to those who do not know Him.

Having completed our first training of this year, we are now especially looking forward to our International Leaders Training in the fall! This next training, which is scheduled for October 4-29, 2021, is our full month-long training program for participants in the US and around the world. We already have several students who have confirmed their attendance that month, including a few international students from Uganda, Kenya, and Guatemala. Many others have been applying for visas and preparing to make their travel arrangements to attend the training. We are looking forward to another full class of students, and we’re excited to see the students that God brings from the nations in October. If you would like to register for this month-long training, please visit the Training Events page of our website and complete the “Training Application Form.” For those of you who are interested in attending one of our training events next year, we will finalize those dates shortly and have them posted on that same webpage within the month of July. Please monitor that page later next month to see what our training calendar will look like next year. We are excited to continue moving forward, as the Lord leads us and as He continues to empower and equip His laborers for the work of the Great Commission.

Dustin Stuckey
Training Coordinator