Waking Up

Yesterday we woke up and there was this incredible color shining through the window onto our walls... i got up and, well, it was fantastic so I grabbed the camera a snapped a few pics (click here for 4 more).

This Saturday we will be waking up in row 38 of a plane somewhere over South America on our way to Argentina for the 7th annual International Youth Leadership Convention. They're expecting around 3000 youth workers from over 15 countries and we'll be leading 3 workshops and a forum. Our goal is not to fill them up with more information, but rather to awaken something in them. If you think about us, please pray that these young leaders would lead a Christ-centered transformation in Latin America that - one person at a time - changes whole nations.

Home, Home on the Range

Enjoying the new location for the Keeper of the Plains statue.

Oh, give me a home where the Buffalo roam
Where the Deer and the Cantaloupe play;
Where never is heard a discouraging word,
And the sky is not cloudy all day.

When I was growing up in Kansas I thought these were the words to our state song. I was perplexed when I was told the proper lyrics were "where the Deer and the Antelope play" because I had eaten a lot of cantaloupe but I'd never seen an antelope.We're nearing the end of a good week in Wichita, Kansas, visiting with friends and spending time at my home church, Eastminster Presbyterian. They have supported us faithfully and generously for over twelve years, so we are full of gratitude as we try to fill them in on what God is doing around us.

Full

We just finished a two week Personnel Enrichment Program (PEP) in Colorado Springs. After spending long days with over 40 OC workers and staff, I have to tell you there is only one way to describe life within our mission organization, OC International: full.

Laughter and tears, purpose and change, networks of friendships that span continents, constant goodbyes…our lives overflow with amazing relationships and experiences while we move toward our goal on a path full of potholes and perils.

To give you a glimpse into our 15 hour days during PEP, here’s an excerpt from my journal. (For the complete entry click here.)

In the morning devotions this week pastor Ralph is focusing on remembering. Today he led us through an exercise in which we put our last term of service in the context of all God has done for, in and around us throughout the whole of our lives. Because this has been such an interpersonally intense past week and a half, I was kind of bleary and didn’t track with Ralph as much as I would have liked, but I think the exercise will form a backdrop for all that we’re processing this week.

As Tim and I move into our new project in Argentina, it is good to remember that God really has done more than we asked or even imagined in the past so we can trust him with the future.

Eggs and Sausage and Bears

Annette and I were eating breakfast when some of our colleagues' kids ran into the cafeteria saying there was a bear and her three cubs up in a tree next to the cabins. Leaving my sausage and eggs I ran outside and spotted a group of fellow bears-in-a-tree-ophiles pointing toward some brown fuzzy clumps 30 feet off the ground.

Apparently they had been scavenging in a dumpster when someone drove by in a loud diesel pickup truck which scared them up the tree. As you can see in the bottom-right photo, they finally climbed down the tree about 2 hours later. It was a fun interlude to an already rich time during our required once-every-four-years PEP (Personnel Enrichment Program).