GoMission
From Running to Planting
What happens when a young man determined to build his own future is confronted by the God who called him years earlier? In this episode, hear how the Lord turned Will Esayenko from pursuing comfort to planting churches across the Canadian Yellowhead. His story shows what Christ can do when someone stops running and starts multiplying.
In this GoMission episode, Mark Gillmore interviews Canadian church planter Will Esayenko, whose story traces a dramatic path from resisting God’s call to embracing a life of gospel multiplication. Will shares how he ran toward comfort, career, and security—until God used a late-night car accident to shatter his trajectory and bring him back to the call he’d received as a child. Today, he is planting and multiplying churches across the Yellowhead region of Alberta, driven by a simple conviction: when you abide in Christ, He leads you into the work He wants to reproduce.
Topics Discussed
- Growing up in a Christian home and being saved young
- Receiving a clear call to ministry as a child
- Choosing a career path over surrender in his teen years
- The car accident that exposed the emptiness of living for things
- How Bible school clarified God’s call and burden for Canada
- Restarting a struggling church in Hinton, Alberta
- Planting a second church and embracing multiplication
- Sending out your best people and the cost that comes with it
- Finding identity in Christ instead of success metrics
- Abiding in the Shepherd as the core of guidance and courage
- Training hesitant men for ministry and pushing them forward
- Walking with Christ through uncertainty and loss
Key Takeaways
- Running from God’s call never brings peace; God has ways of turning you around.
- Real guidance begins with a clean heart and an abiding walk with the Shepherd.
- You don’t need your future perfectly mapped to step into obedience today.
- Multiplication always costs something, but sending is the pathway to greater fruit.
- Your identity must rest in Christ rather than ministry success or comparison.
- God uses surrendered people to reach entire regions, not just individual churches.
Do you have a story of gospel advance or a burden for a specific people group? We’d love to hear it. Whether it’s a few sentences or a detailed update, send it to gomission@theegeneration.org.
GoMission, hosted by Mark Gillmore, is a monthly missions-focused program that introduces young people to the people, stories, and opportunities God is using around the world to build His church.
If this episode encouraged you, please take a moment to leave a 5-star rating and review on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or YouTube Music. Your feedback helps others discover the Thee Generation and be challenged to live a life of total surrender to God.
Mark Gillmore is missions pastor of Falls Baptist Church, faculty member at Baptist College of Ministry, author of The Obedience Pathway discipleship series, and strategist for world missions. He and his wife, Joanna, have 9 children.
