About
Brett & Karen Curtis - YWAM Ships
Brett and Karen Curtis are Co-Founders of YWAM Ships Orange County, also known as YWAM Ships Kona. This organization was started June 2011, is a part of an ever-expanding larger global network of ships with a mission within Youth With A Mission. 27 vessels are operated by these various ministries are spread around the world’s waterways, working among some of the most difficult to reach and isolated communities. The vessels operated by YWAM Ships Kona are targeting isolated islands, usually not serviced with airports and therefore difficult to access.
YWAM, also called Youth With A Mission, was founded in 1960 by Loren and Darlene Cunningham and has now reached into every nation on earth (www.ywam.org). As a missions movement, YWAM encompasses evangelism, training and mercy ministries. It is manned by more than 20,000 full-time staff from 200+ countries and a wide variety of denominations and Christian traditions who serve at more than 2,000 YWAM locations in 191 nations. Some five million participants in YWAM programs as students, short-term volunteers and full-time staff have served with YWAM since its inception.
YWAM Ships Kona runs university courses at their training facilities of Port YWAM Kona, and Outpost Panama. The University of the Nations (UofN), is a global ministry of YWAM (www.uofn.edu). Since the university was established in 1978, the UofN has grown to offer more than 500 different kinds of courses and hundreds of seminars (some of which are offered in 97 languages), held at more than 600 locations/campuses in 160 countries. Hundreds of thousands of students have registered within the global UofN system and have taken at least a Discipleship Training School (DTS), the entry course and prerequisite for all other UofN courses, for pursuing UofN associates, bachelors or masters degrees, and/or for becoming YWAM staff. UofN also offers certificate courses and online e-learning.
Brett and Karen, joining with many other global leaders, have a burden to make the Bible accessible to every person in the Pacific in their mother tongue, thereby ending Bible poverty in the region. Wherever the Bible goes, the Spirit of God brings transformation! Brett’s personal goal is to make at least an oral translation of Scripture available to the Bible-less languages on the 900 isolated islands without airports in the Pacific.
Brett, born in Te Awamutu, New Zealand, and Karen born in Hamilton, New Zealand have been involved in missions since 1983 beginning on board the Mercy Ship m/v ANASTASIS. They directed the Training Schools on board and then went on to be the Directors of the m/v GOOD SAMARITAN and the m/v CARIBBEAN MERCY.
Brett has a Master of Arts in Leadership from the University of the Nations with his thesis being in Crisis Management. Karen is a registered Nurse from Rotorua, New Zealand.