Founding of the YMCA in England with Mike Bussey and Greg 10.2.24
Founding of the YMCA in England with Mike Bussey and Greg 10.2.24
Yesterday, we talked about the founding of the YMCA in England, so today, Greg will continue his talk with Mike.
It’s a Wednesday. I’m still here with Mike Bussey. It’s Greg Asimakoupoulos, your host for today’s My Rhymes and Reasons edition. Yesterday, we talked about the founding of the YMCA in England and how it developed worldwide outreach, including in Israel. Mike, I’d like to talk about something that’s near and dear to your heart today because of its location in the Holy City but also because you were intricately a part integrally a part of the YMCA in Jerusalem for the better part of 10 years.
How did that develop? Well, first of all, Greg, the YMCA in Jerusalem has been there since 1878. Sometimes people say, is there a YMCA in a Jewish country? It started in 1878 under the automation rule. It transitioned after the First World War to the British mandate and then in 1948 Jerusalem became a part of Israel so the Y has been there a long, long time before the state of Israel was created.
When it began, I was thinking in my head, doing mental math. We talked last week about Horatio Spafford, who wrote ‘Is Well with My Soul’. His family resettled in Israel at about that time. So, his desire to see people living together in peace, Christians, Arabs, and Jews, kind of in parallel with the YMCA’s beginning, was at the heart of their mission then; it was the heart of the Spafford mission, I think.
They were looking for a Ministry after tragedy in their family, and they found it came to Jerusalem to find their Ministry in their mission, but what about the start of the YMCA? The Y was started by Christian leaders who wanted to bring to Jerusalem precisely what they had seen in London, England, where the Y was founded. You can hear the rest in the video above.
