After three decades of training missionaries and sending them out into the world, Youth With a Mission Montana-Lakeside is celebrating with alumni and the community.

On Aug. 22, the Lakeside missionary training site is welcoming past students and those who have supported the facility at its 30th anniversary celebration.

Keith and Mariska Buzzard, the directors of the mission, actually met as young people in Lakeside. They fell in love, married, had three children and eventually became the directors.

“We are inviting all the alumni over 30 years,” Mariska said.

“We want this time to be a celebration,” Keith said.

Youth With a Mission Montana was founded in Bozeman, but the Lakeside chapter came about in 1984 when a group of businessmen founded a missionary office in Kalispell. The group trains young people who “want to know God and make him known” — to be evangelical missionaries in countries around the world. Current “target” countries include Ukraine, India, Cambodia and Taiwan.

John Briggs, one of the founding members, told the story of how the group came to reside in Lakeside.

“The Air Force was disposing of excess property. This excess property,” he said, gesturing to the former air base. “On June 5, 1985, the base was acquired for our purposes.”

The ramshackle air base was difficult living for young people looking to spread their word of God. Fuel oil burned like oil wells in Kuwait and the missionaries struggled to stay afloat.

But through “miracles” and faith that what they were doing was correct, things began to happen. A minister and expert welder fixed leaks. The costly and inefficient fuel-oil system was replaced with a much cheaper wood pellet/biofuel system and buildings were upgraded to become more livable.

“Our first year we literally had no way to afford a Christmas celebration for the few students and their children,” Briggs said. “The owner of Lakeside Grocery called us and just told us to clear out his shelves. We had more food than we knew what to do with.”

Small circumstances like that have reaffirmed the faith of those running the mission, and the complex has grown and been updated as the years have passed. A large cafeteria, student dorms, a student center, workshop, modern recording studio and dozens of other buildings make the place akin to a thriving college campus.

The classes students take are about understanding the Bible and how best to relate that understanding to those who don’t follow Christian faith or even any faith at all. These Discipleship Training Schools are several month programs which students must pass to be considered official Youth With A Mission missionaries, but there is a volunteer program — Mission Builders International — that goes abroad to work alongside missionaries. Another program, the School of Biblical Studies, uses the inductive method of learning and subsequently interpreting and teaching the Bible.

Since 1985 when the school opened, the 40-acre campus has been home to more than 10,000 students and children.

“These 30 years are a celebration for us,” Briggs said. “Just to remember the variety of things God has done for us.”

On hundreds of “crusades,” thousands of people in typically non-Christian countries have been converted to Christianity.

“We’re honored and blessed to be part of a ministry which has literally reached around the world,” Briggs said. “There is generally a very passionate group of people here and that can look odd to some, but we are all normal people. We want to know God and make him known.”

The open celebration will be held at the Youth With A Mission campus at 2 p.m. Saturday, Aug. 22, at 501 Blacktail Road with a family-friendly event including sports and children’s activities. Guided tours of the facility will start at 4 p.m. and food trucks will arrive for the dinner hour. At 6:30 p.m. a  prayer and speech led by author Floyd McClung will be followed by a dessert reception.

For more information on Youth With A Mission or the event, visit www.ywammontana.org or call 844-2221.

Reporter Ryan Murray may be reached at 758-4436 or by email at rmurray@dailyinterlake.com.