The tree keeps growing.....

   Thanks for your prayers for Jenn and and for me during our time at Young Life’s Cross Cultural Orientation training and then for me in the DR in January. It really was great to be at both events.
YL CCO 2014
CCO is always refreshing. We get to be with missionaries who are going to be sent all over the world to minister to teenagers. This year ranged from Mexico to Singapore to Armenia and beyond. The training we offer is meant in big part to prepare for the great challenge of ministering in and transitioning to new cultures and languages, but it’s also always a great reminder of how God calls and specially equips imperfect people like us to be part of His great plan.  We were able to look at 2 Thessalonians 2:13-17 together and be reminded of how we’ve been picked, called, ‘surprised’, invigorated and enlivened by the Lord to do this work. What a privilege.

      I was also able to spend a few days at our camp in the Dominican Republic for a training time with our staff and student staff there. There’s a short video from YL in Africa that I’d love for you to check out here-- https://vimeo.com/59980049 that I think helps show what we're excited about in Latin America.   In it Alexis explains our ‘tree’ model for doing leadership training. We use the same tree paper he shows in Latin America (makes sense since the Mango trees are common J). The tree really is all about living out discipleship. It focuses our leaders on feeding into 
Our Young Life DR staff and student staff
a few others, and then those leaders also feed into a few others, and so on. This does take time—a lot of time spent praying for and with your 3, walking in ministry with them, modeling leadership and training them in what it means to be leaders. But it’s also the reason Young Life in the DR keeps growing. Rafa disciples Fernando who disciples Zurdo who is now discipiling university students in Bonao who will be leaders at camp this summer discipling new believers.  It was great to be here with this group and see how God is still calling and equipping leaders I worked with while living there—and also with leaders from whole new generations that have been raised up since then. So thanks for partnering with us to train and support these leaders and let God use the growth of this tree for the good of his kingdom.

Two other quick notes I want to get to here. First, I'll be speaking at Brookside CRC for a few minutes for a missions update this Sunday, February 9th at both the 9:00 and 10:30 AM services. Love to see you there if you'd like to hear a little more about what's happening in Latin America. Second, Jenn and I and our kids made a big announcement on facebook this past week.  Caroline and Jack are both excited to be welcoming a little brother or sister in early August! (Jenn and I are excited too.)  Pray for Jenn's health and energy during these coming months!

 

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Flat tires in Bogota

Image
The first flat tire isn’t a big deal—it’s the second one you need to be worried about.     A good friend once told me this Flat tire #2 while we were traveling over some extremely rough roads in Haiti. We only had one flat tire on that trip ( below average actually for those roads ), so no problem.   I hadn’t thought about that for a while until traveling in Colombia a couple weeks ago. Our bus there had a flat tire on our way to a leader’s retreat we were holding outside of Bogota.   A 2 ½ hour ride turned into 5 hours, but no real trouble, just more time to laugh, hang out at a gas station, play with some stray dogs and sleep on the bus. The second flat tire though (same bus, different tire) happened on our way back to Bogota, it shouldn’t have been too terrible except it was on a curvy mountain road…. with no shoulder.…at night….and the old tire wouldn’t budge….and I had to catch a redeye flight late that night. It’s the second one you need to be worrie...
Read more

Dominican Training Camp and Emilio's story

Image
How many campers would you put at a camp that has a capacity of 95? For most of us, that answer is pretty clearly 95 or less. But at our training camp for leaders in the Dominican Republic in March the answer was 157! It was our largest training camp ever and it meant people were sleeping in every available space-- on mattresses, sleeping pads, sleeping bags or whatever we could find. I ended up with a lovely space on our camp manager’s office floor. But it also meant a great deal of fun with a big group of potential leaders who were excited to learn and grow. The amazing thing about this is that well over half of that 157 are teenagers who accepted Christ in the last two years through Vida Joven and they’re now desiring to learn to share what they’ve come to know with their friends and classmates. This is the fruit of a lot of outreach and discipleship by our leaders in the Dominican Republic. They’ve really dedicated themselves to walking with these kids the last two years and helpi...
Read more

Scars and Grace

Image
Dear Friends,     The picture you see here is of my friend Noyo in Haiti. A recent visitor to Haiti wrote a great blog entry about Noyo and his experiences as Young Life leader in Haiti that you’ll be blessed to read. Click on  Scars  that tell of the good life   to read an amazing story of faithfulness, grace and a God-centered mission.      I’d love for you to be praying for the Haitian YL team especially this month.   Soon I’ll be spending 5 days in Haiti with Noyo and our Haitian leadership team as we’ll celebrate what God is doing through them and then evaluate and plan and pray about training more Haitian YL leaders. Pray God would give a lot of wisdom and insight into how to best support these amazing leaders. Right after that I’ll be in the Dominican Republic to get some time with key staff and be with a work team from Brookside CRC’s youth group. It’ll be a full and exciting month, thanks for praying for these trips an...
Read more