Austin, Texas | A Church for Special Needs

Gail, who had worked as a special needs educator for her whole life, and Amy, the director of a special needs ministry at their church in Austin, joined Novo on a vision trip to Egypt. Witnessing Egypts dynamic ministry to special needs families, “The Sweethearts of Jesus,” had a big impact on them. They saw 3,000 people in one gathering, and Gail heard God whisper, “You need to have a bigger heart for special needs.” When they returned home, they started experimenting with a Discovery Bible Study (DBS) with five special needs young adults, because DBS was how the Sweethearts of Jesus multiplied their ministry. They made more visits to Egypt, both teaching and learning, and every time God would give them new ideas for how to serve their special needs’ community in the US better.

In the fall of 2023, they launched “DISCOVER” for young adults with special needs and their parents, where they offered worship and DBS. They sent out a mass mailing and there were 70 people at the first gathering, only half of which attended their church. The five special needs young adults from their first DBSs each took on leadership roles. One young man, Sam, who wouldn't make eye contact or have a conversation with you, knew every word to every worship song. He stepped up to lead worship, and another young lady joined him. One became the sound engineer, another the greeter, and the last one, who was a prayer warrior, prayed. After the worship time, the parents would move to a separate space to have their own DBSs and the special needs folks would have theirs.

Now in their second year of DISCOVER, Gail has been empowering these special needs young adults in more and more ways. Over the summer, she selected five special needs adults to train in DBS so that they could become DBS table leaders. These five have joined the original five young adults on the ministry leadership team. They call themselves “LIT” for Jesus (Leaders in Training)! They’ve started having a time of listening prayer (“tuning in” to God like tuning into the right frequency of a radio station) during the Discover time, as well as blessing one another during the commitment time of making their “I will” statements (at the end of the DBS), and using more creative materials for the DBSs (pictures of the story, video clips, acting it out, etc.). For Gail, seeing these young adults step into their spiritual authority as leaders in their church, hearing the voice of God, and blessing each other has been amazing. And bringing in other young adults as volunteers, teaching them to love and serve this population, has been incredible as well. Gail can’t wait to take some of them on another vision trip to Egypt, to expand their hearts for special needs people and the beautiful things God is doing in and through them.