A mission report by Benjamin Behnke on the occasion of the ASI-CH conference on November 14th, 2020
Rather, seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these will be added to you! Matthew 6:33 SCH2000 I just couldn’t get this text out of my head. He kept coming back to my mind.
At that time I had more than 12 years of experience as an international urban planner. I was allowed to work for and with the best and most well-known clients, urban planners and investors. So my “career” seemed to be going in a good direction. But God had very different plans. When my wife and I moved to Switzerland, this all gradually fell apart. Working as a city planner frustrated me more and more, because who or what was I planning these cities for? When Jesus comes again, none of that will remain.
Always interested in sports, I found CrossFit. A sport that combines strength and endurance training in a very effective and efficient way. At first this was a welcome hobby to promote my health, but I soon realized that this would be a good opportunity to introduce our health message to people. The desire to open my own CrossFit Box (that’s what the studios call themselves) grew in me. But I deliberately only wanted to do this if I could use it to reach people for Jesus. However, there were some difficulties: On the one hand, I had hardly any financial means to open such a box (material, rooms, rent, etc.) on the other hand, you can complete the trainer’s license in a two-day course (with some home study), the but always only takes place on the Sabbath and Sunday.
So here were wonderful opportunities for God to put the brakes on if I was doing this for myself rather than for Him. So I gave this and much more into God’s hands with the request that if I am to do the box and the associated mission for Him, He must take care of opening doors. And He opened more doors than I ever realized. I was able to do a course during the week, got support from my family, found space, etc.
I’ve had my box open for a little over a year and a half now, I’m the only one in Europe to offer a special course for cancer patients, and I’ve had more conversations about my faith with clients than I’ve had in years. I can distribute a tremendous amount of reading about our health message and even work with the Hope Bible Study Institute. A couple who train with me came to the service with their two children and they are very interested and have also started the Bible correspondence course.
God has also protected “His” CrossFit box through the last six months and I now have even more customers than at the beginning of this year. In this whole process I have learned more to trust God and to wait for His timing. If we rely on him, he will give us opportunities to be tools for him.
Sincerely, Benjamin Behnke
