Sleeping on Gym Floors

Filming at Fisterra, Spain, which during the Roman Erawas known as the end of the earth

The training time on the "Camino de Santiago de Compostela" in Spain was excellent. This year we did training with the 21 participant during the daily 15 to 20 mile hikes as well as afterwards. Walking, talking, carrying a big backpack and sleeping on gymnasium floors is fun but exhausting. We walked 6 days for a total of 140 kms/86 miles.

A matt on a gym floor... this is how we slept most nights

celebration dinner at Santiago de Compostela
after finishing the 140 km walk

The 21 participants of the discipleship training gave us great feedback and we felt it was a worthwhile investement of time, energy and funds. These photos plus the ones you can see on our "Spain 2012" album on Facebook will give you a sense of our experience walking, training and eating in and around the city of Santiago de Compostela and Spain in general. As you will see in the pics, we were also filming a series of 8 videos during and after the training event. It was something new for us and we got to enjoy lots of beautiful scenery and great fellowship.

Part of the training was something called "Life Maps"
that we did individually with all 21 participants

Filming a video about the effects of the Fall
on our relationship with God

there were blackberries all over Galicia, but
not so much now that I ate most of them

In 24 hours we leave Spain, where we are currently with our team director and his wife, and fly to Buenos Aires for the month of September where we will be helping the Argentine film maker, Sebastian Pasquet, do post-production work on the videos. Annette will also be doing some writing, and we hope to finish the latest version of the ParaLideres.org website that a team of us has been working on for over 2 years. 

Staff, trainees and pilgrims at the "Fuente del Peregrino"
hostel which is run by Agapé-Spain

In October we go to California for our twice annual team retreat plus the 60th anniversary celebration of our organization, OC International. Then we're in Orlando, Florida for the Internationl Youth Ministry Convention where we will be teaching and working as chaplains for the 1500 youth leaders who will be participate. We will also be launching the video series we just filmed during the convention as well as the book Annette, Felix Ortiz and I wrote
.

Thank you for your prayers, love and encouragement.

Why We're Back in Mexico

When we lived in Mexico we got together with Veronica every Thursday, sometimes over pizza with the whole team who worked with us on the ParaLideres.org web site, sometimes to work on plan for Sunday’s “youth church” meeting, and sometimes just to catch up over a cup of tea. Then we left Mexico and we didn’t see each other for two years until she attended the Roots level three training event in Costa Rica (Level one is basic principles for youth work; level two is how to train others in those principles; level three combines a look at "new challenges in youth work" with personalized mentoring for people who have proven faithful with the first two levels). 

The first night in Costa Rica as she introduced herself to the group she broke down and cried inconsolably. She was tired, discouraged, disheartened. She had a vocation to work with teenagers but was burned out and ready to quit.  At the end of the ten day event she was refreshed and recharged. Four years later she is still working with teenagers and is a role model for others in youth ministry in Mexico. 

A happy reunion with old friends on our first day back in Mexico

This July, Veronica, together with a team that includes her husband, Diego, has organizing a Roots III in Mexico and we’ll be facilitators. So for the first time since we moved out of Toluca in 2006 we’re back in Mexico. We’re enjoying seeing old friends and eating great food: pozole, tacos, hand-made corn tortillas… the list goes on.  

Ruben & Sylvia and their little girl, Keyla

We’re excited about the event, which we will lead with Ruben and Sylvia, colleagues from Seville, Spain. Experience has taught us that events like this are high impact and therefore incur increased “resistance” so we would love your prayers to accompany ours for: the participants, the logistics (both for the event and for our visit), the team (sensitivity to God’s spirit as we prepare and lead the sessions and mentor the participants), as well as for safety and health.

You may be aware that violence is rampant these days in Mexico and our bodies are no longer accustomed to the altitude or the food. We would love for ourselves and our colleagues to be protected from these issues so we can be freed up to enjoy and accomplish what we think we’re there for. (Though we know God may have other things in store for us). Thank you!

Homeless but not Purposeless

click image to biggie-size and make it legible

Our eyes lit up and we looked at each other with barely suppressed glee when the head of Youth Specialties, Latin America asked us to be the spiritual directors for their youth ministry institutes. That was 5½ years ago and now our part in this project is coming to an end. (Click on timeline)

the very moment we were invited to help start the institute

We accepted the challenge of helping launch these two university-level institutes with a written agreement that we would part of a team of 5 -10 other staff from Argentina and Guatemala, that we would not need to do fundraising, and that we would not have administrative responsibilities (it's what we are worst at and most dislike). If you're familiar with startups you'll smile knowingly at the fact that there was no other staff for the first 6 months and then 2 unpaid and very part-time staff for the next year. So we did a lot of administration and nearly all the fundraising.

Lots of planning, organizing, administration,
and staff training during the first two years

We imagine it's like raising a baby; it pushes you to the edge of your sanity but you end up loving it. So now that we've accomplish what we set out to do –help get things started, create a prototype and then work ourselves out of a job– it is hard to let go of what we have grown to love: the staff, the city, and especially the youth leaders into whom we've invested our lives. But for the last few years we've been phasing out of our various roles here and as of May 28th we're done.

Some of the youth leaders of the Instituto E.J.

At this point, we don't know where we'll be based next. But we do we have a full schedule of projects for what is left of 2012:

• Manage the ParaLideres.org and blog.paralideres.org websites
• Youth work training events in Mexico and Colombia
• Leading a seminar on coaching in Colombia
• Discipleship school in Spain
• Co-writing a year-long, youth group curriculum book for Harper-Collins/Youth Specialties
• Developing a video series and accompanying curriculum about communicating the truths of the Christian faith to postmodern, post-Christian youth

All of these are within the mandate we've been given: to providing resources and training for youth leaders in the Spanish-speaking world. But none of them define where we will live.

It will be interesting to see how God guides us to the next where... and, as always, we need your prayers towards that end.

Love It When This Happens

We were trying to find the address of Annette's home church and were surprised to find this video me:



We'd forgotten that her home church had recorded it, but it was a treat to be reminded of this God story.

Three Reasons We’re Happy

Here are a few reasons I got teary during the orientation for new students at the EJ Institute last week:

1) We love our highly-committed students
Because Tim and I are no longer doing the school’s admission interviews, new student orientation feels like Christmas morning. This year we have new international students from Chile, Colombia, Mexico, and Brazil as well as whole group from Buenos Aires. We look forward to getting to know them as we teach our classes this trimester, as well as anticipating reconnecting with others we’ve known for years but who are just getting around to taking our classes.

During the orientation we asked everyone how long their commute is to the Institute. The most common answer was about hour and a half, one way. That means they make a three hour trip for a three hour class!

2) We’re grateful for the fantastic staff
It’s fun to watch the staff in action with their enthusiasm, love for the students and the academic and administrative gifts needed to keep the institution healthy especially when I think back to the days when Tim and I used to open the door for the students before class, lock the doors at night after class and do much of what happened in between.

During the orientation I kept having flashbacks to the chaos, uncertainty and exhaustion of the first year of classes, for example when students and professors alike were confused because we had three different documents circulating about how students should do their projects. (Now we have a professionally produced video that explains each step but even more importantly both the teachers and the students have assimilated the process.) I think everyone is happy to have those days in the past.

3) We’re pleased with the school’s DNA
Holistic care for students, which models the type of relationships we hope they have with the teenagers they work with, intellectual stimulation as a result of the academic rigor, immediate application of principles learned in class to teenagers through class projects, and the development of a long-lasting community are some of the core values we have worked to include in the EJ Institute.

As the academic director interviewed a number of older students, some on site and others who joined us from their home countries by Skype, their comments revealed the extent to which these elements characterized their experience. Here’s a sampling:

Don’t miss out on really getting to know your professors and classmates. They are your new family and will be there for you in the hard times that might be ahead.

The Institute made my brain explode. I’ve learned so much that I’m not the same person I was before I came here.

The best part of the Institute is the Desafio – enjoy it!

Insider Trading

In ministry, unlike in the stock market, past performance is a very good indicator of future performance.
We’ve known the Stiff family for the past decade. During that time we’ve worked and played with them on three continents, we’ve shared joys and sorrows, we’ve seen their ups and downs… and we want you to know that they’re the real deal. In fact, we’re so excited about their new work in Southern Spain that we’re going to be supporting them ourselves.

Here are some of the reasons they’re a great investment:

1. They love God and love others well.
2. They have proven themselves adept at cross-cultural living.
3. They already know the language.
4. They have been involved in the Latin American mission’s mobilization movement for a decade.
5. Their gifts and passions are well suited for their upcoming roles.
6. Their ministry will have exponential impact.

So, if you want to invest in something that we believe will yield returns, we recommend Kyle and Nell Stiff. For more info about them, you can click here to see their blog (NellandKyle.blogspot.com).

Impact: the numbers for 2011

click image to BIGGIE-size it

Whenever we’re tempted to shy away from numbers in our ministry reports we remember what Tim’s father says: Each one of those numbers is a person. So with the help of our brother-in-law Eric Linares, we prepared the infographic above to help you visualize the reach of the resources and training that *we personally provided last year.

This graphic doesn’t include everything we’ve been involved with. For example, we didn’t put in it how many people used things we have written (textbook, journal articles, ebook, blog posts) because we do not have accurate numbers for that audience. It also does not include projects that your donations have allowed us to support; for example:

• Scholarships for students at EJ Institute in Buenos Aires
• Scholarships for 17 individuals at a Life-on-Life training in Spain 
• Creation of courses for the online version the EJ Youth Ministry Institute
• Translation of Coaching training materials into Spanish
• Partial salary for an director of another online youth ministry school
• Creation of 23 videos for youth leaders

These accomplishments are made possible by colleagues, donors, friends and family who also invest time, talents, prayer and/or money in youth and youth leaders.

*Disclaimer: To God alone goes the credit and honor for any actual impact

Surprise!

"So what do you think about El Salvador?"  Our first few days in the country I struggled to answer this frequently-asked-question because we split our time between the classroom where we were leading a training event and the home where we slept. But by the end of our time there, my answer centered around unexpected surprises like the following:

• Spending quality time talking about the situation of the youth ministry at the church which sponsored the Raices event with everyone from the pastor, the elders, and the youth ministry team to parents and teens. We rarely have the chance to develop such a comprehensive understanding of the context we're teaching in. As a result of this unique opportunity we were able to be more helpful to them as individuals and as a community.

• Catching up with our EJ Institute student from El Salvador.We try to visit our students in their ministry context, but we never dreamed we would have the chance to see her world, meet her family, etc. Our relationship deepened more in 36 hours than it had in a year in Buenos Aires.
 
• Dreaming of exciting future projects with our co-worker and friend, Felix Ortiz (stay tuned for details).
• Counseling a newly married couple trying to mesh their lives and ministry styles as they pastor a church in a marginalized part of San Salvador. They are on the front lines of bringing Good News to a broken community and it's a privilege to become part of their support system.

• Viva Espresso (link). The first morning of the conference, the organizers brought us lattes from this local coffee store. One sip told Tim that this was no ordinary coffee. It turns out that this coffee shop has groomed the 2011 world barrista champion, serves amazing coffee, and quickly became our "meeting room" since it was five minutes away from the conference site.

10 Days 6.2 Million People

When Marta from El Salvador taught a new youth group game to the other students at the Buenos Aries campus of the EJ Institute for youth leaders, the game needed to be played in a shopping center. At first I was surprised; most youth group games are designed either for a room or for outside. Then I remembered that El Salvador is a unique setting: the violence of twelve years of civil war has been replaced with gang and drug related violence.

This matters more to us right now because we're on our way to El Salvador.

We're looking forward to seeing Marta again and to eating pupusas in their country of origin. But we're most excited about having 10 days to train youth leaders from Central America alongside our friend and partner, Felix Ortiz. No country likes to be defined by its darkest moments, nonetheless, as we were reminded by Marta, as we teach Biblical principal of discipleship, we cannot ignore the difficult realities of life here.

El Salvador is the smallest, most densely populated country in Central America and is in particular need for youth ministry because the largest segment of the population (6.2 million people) is between 10 and 14 years of age.

We appreciate your prayers as we head into this new chapter of our adventures.

Pilgrims But No Indians (this time)

The Camino de Santiago pilgrimage trail passes right by the Pilgrim's Fountain Hostal in Galicia where we spend 17 days helping run a training program for new staff with Agapé-Europe. Those who make the trek on foot, horseback or bicycle are called peregrinos (in English: pilgrims) and they walk the camino for a wide variety of reasons from religious, cultural, health and recreational.

You can see captioned photos from this unique training time on our Facebook page (click here). They will give you an idea of what the experience was like. But Annette is publishing a great collection of reflections from our time as pilgrims which you can read at her blog Gaudi's Cross, or by simply clicking here.

Why we were in Duncanville, TX

What do you love so much that you are willing to spend 10,000 hours doing in order to reach a high level of proficiency? 

For weeks after I came across the “10,000 hour rule” (which claims that the key to success in any field is, to a large extent, a matter of practicing a specific task for a total of around 10,000 hours) I asked myself that question. 

Training is on our short list.

We haven’t yet trained others for 10,000 hours yet but we've done enough to highlight our need improve our skills, as we wrote about back in February of 2010. After that post, a friend of ours from our days in Mexico recommended a workshop called Learning that LASTS. In June we were finally able to attend one, along with the academic director of the youth leadership institute here in Buenos Aires, Walter Bongiorno. The training was well worthwhile. We've already been putting it into practice here in Argentina and shortly will also be using it in Madrid and Northern Spain.

Everyone at the "Learning that Lasts" training had experience in training and
were wanting to maximize the impact and application of what they teach. At the core of what we learned is this concept: Do not tell what you can ask. Do not ask if you know the answer; tell in dialogue.

During a break in our training we went to the Fort Worth stockyards.
Now that's a real Texas experience

This foto above was taken on June 16th, 2011... Annette and my 20th anniversary. I'm still trying to figure out how I could have made this dinner more romantic (ja ja). Tim did some calculations that showed that we’re in the proficiency zone when it comes to time spent loving each other: 20 yrs x 365.25 days x 22 hrs/day = 160,710. So that’s something (smile).

The participants in the training workshop came from all over the world.
(click here for more pics on Facebook)