Learning english, Tijuana, Mexico, 2010.

Between downtown Tijuana and Las Playas on the pacific ocean lies a small colonia called Cañon Carretas. Hidden among the scrap wood and plastic dwellings sits a one-room building that serves as a youth center, school, and simple gathering place. On August 6 of this past summer, I visited this small Mexican community with Kathy Saracoff, a missionary with Latin American Mission. For a few hours that Friday morning I watched as she led a small group of kids in some gospel songs, and then spent time educating them in english.

Employment in the community used be a short hike over to an adjacent valley where fathers, mothers, and those old enough to work dug through an immense mountain of refuse in one of the Tijuana-area dumps. Eventually, land-fill activities ceased at the site and dump activity moved closer to Tecate. Since then, the members of the community have had to commute, any way they can, to the new dump site where they earn a meager living digging for recyclables hidden in the tons of refuse dumped there everyday.

The children who come to the one-room school are the children of this community. Many of these cannot go to the public school because they cannot afford to buy the uniforms needed to attend the state schools. They are essentially barred from free education due to a lack of funds to buy the mandated uniforms.

Mrs. Saracoff started a small, handcrafts enterprise where the children produce bracelets that are then sold to help fund the children’s need for school uniforms and supplies. For these children, there are few options. Their parents spend the entirety of the money they earn on the basic needs of life.

In nearby San Diego, there are those who could easily afford to buy the supplies and clothing needed by these children, and thus they could be allowed to enter the public schools. Unfortunately, these connections, between the children in this dusty valley and those who could supply their needs, are not made.

“And who is my neighbor?” Luke 10:29

The increasing violence has been an added pressure to their struggle for existence over the past few years. Not only is this an increase in the level of danger associated with living and working in Tijuana, but it is also restricting the river of help that once flowed south across the border with the many Christian groups that would come to help, build, teach, and love the people of Mexico.

During the writing of this post I learned that, just across town from this community, supposed members of the Mexican drug cartels murdered 13 people at a health clinic,. This horrific event was barely reported on the US side of the border. If the cultural filter of la linea can muffle such a human tragedy, how much more will it silence the voices of these children living in the shadow of this violence? The violence is deeper than the 28,000 murdered in these cartel wars, there is another violence in that we, seemingly, are now no longer listening.

Reference:
(1) http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-latin-america-11617353
(2) http://www.nytimes.com/2010/10/29/world/americas/29mexico.html?ref=americas

© 2010 A Mission Proclaimed

Your support is greatly appreciated! A Mission Proclaimed is a federally recognized 501(c)(3).

The Leatherwoods, Artajona, Spain, 2006.

It is hard to believe that it has been four years since I first went to Spain. In 2006, I visited three missionary families in three various locations around the country. This photo has always been a favorite of mine for its metaphor of beginnings and of new opportunities. This family, the Leatherwoods, walked through this archway located in the 11th century Cerco de Artajona. I suppose that in comparison to the 900 years this structure has seen visitors come and go, my four-year absence has been hardly noticed.

Yet, for my friends in Artajona, I am sure that the past four years have brought countless changes in their lives as they watched their five children grow. For me, those years have passed by in a blur as I have changed careers and embarked on founding and building my media mission, A Mission Proclaimed.

It was a year after that trip I started A Mission Proclaimed (AMPProductions and AMPPhotos). Greatly inspired from that spring and summer I spent visiting my church’s missionaries as a media emissary for my church in my position as Director of Video Services. The intent was to gather stories of what was happening on the mission field and bring them back to the church to create interactive,  multimedia “kiosks” for creating a greater connection between the church family in the states and those overseas. That project fell apart along with other church projects in the harsh reality of cutbacks and reorganization due to the faltering economy. The blessing of those factors, however, was that they were the impetus for my vision and creation of A Mission Proclaimed, to continue bringing the stories of God’s work in missions back to the people here at home.

The revelation of having so much time pass brings some guilt that I have not kept in communication with the missionaries I visited. Being in constant “catch-up” mode and busily starting a new career while simultaneously building up a ministry takes a toll on the cultivating of friendships.

I suppose it is out of guilt that I vow to reconnect with those friends and to cultivate those friendships that I started over the last few years. Priorities, priorities, priorities. Get them straight.

In my hope to realize the metaphor pictured by the Leatherwoods as they walked through that stone arch four years ago, I commit to treating each day as a new beginning, a gift from God, and an opportunity to greet each new day as a blessing to enjoy friends and cherish friendships that God has given me.

© 2010 A Mission Proclaimed

Your support is greatly appreciated! A Mission Proclaimed is a federally recognized 501(c)(3).

Sculpture, Grand-Leez, Belgium. 2009.

I have spent the last three months dealing with one computer problem after another, the most time consuming being two complete operating system installs and a complete system build to replace a dead and un-resurrect-able machine.

This has been a grueling and frustrating process, but it has also caused me to rethink technology reliance in general. I have come to the conclusion that for what I do, technology is crucial. I could do without, but my job description would change drastically, and I’m not making a judgment whether that would be good or bad. It just is a fact.

Couple that with the recent events in Europe where the Icelandic volcano, Eyjafjallajökull (best of luck on the pronunciation) has put the continent’s airline industry in a tail-spin. The economic disruption of this event is being felt throughout Europe and is even sending waves of financial loss around the globe as the flower growers of Kenya were quick to understand as they were forced to throw their yields onto the compost pile for lack of any sustainable method of getting their products to the European market. How fragile are our system because of our reliance on technology.

So, how do I connect the above image to the thoughts of this post? Two connections; we are people of stone, of the earth, and we are creatures of stone habits. The former refers to our connection to God’s creation and our mandate to tend to it. The latter refers to what I observe as human-kind’s plodding ahead to a fate of our own design, descending a stony path, stony-eyed, whistling out-of-tune to our long-prophesied coda.

As people of stone, of the earth, we arguably live a more stable existence the closer we live to the earth we are to tend. For five millennia we lived such agrarian lives. Yet, in the past 150 years we left this simple existence with staggering velocity. Imagine the following scenario, a person from the time of King David is magically transported to the opening days of our present republic (roughly 2,700 years). I would premise that it would not take them long to become accustomed to their new setting, a familiar land where power is in water and beasts and oceans are still navigated by wind and stars. Conversely, think of your great-grandfather being transported to our present day (a mere 100 years or so). I don’t think their acclimation would be as easy. Knowledge is increasing exponentially as is our reliance upon it. It was estimated a couple years ago that this year we will create nearly 1,000 Exabyte’s of digital information this year(1) (that is roughly equivalent to 18 million times the amount of information in all the books ever written.) YouTube states that they are receiving 24 hours of new video content every minute!(2)

All this is not worrisome. The fact that our entire manner of life and subsistence is now entirely dependent on technology does not concern me. God is in control. It does worry me, however, that we are people of stone habits. The vacant stare of the mossy-browed men in the above photo very appropriately illustrates my view of human-kind peddling vacantly into oblivion, not due to its reliance on technology, but because of its ignorance of scripture (read rejection of God’s Word).

So, does hardness of heart cause hardness of head or vice versa? Regardless, only the softening of the heart by the Spirit of God and opening of eyes by the Word of God offers any hope for people, not human-kind in general, that fate is sealed, but of individuals with whom we have conversation. With whom have you had this conversation (and flicked a little moss from their brow)?

References:
(1) Sharon Gaudin, InformationWeek, March 7, 2007. http://bit.ly/bL9YZZ
(2) YouTube Fact Sheet. http://www.youtube.com/t/fact_sheet

© 2010 A Mission Proclaimed

Your support is greatly appreciated! A Mission Proclaimed is a federally recognized 501(c)(3).

Dancing Roma man, Skopje, Macedonia, 2009.

I walked the narrow streets of a Roma enclave in Skopje, Macedonia and came upon this man who greeted me with a smile and a small spontaneous dance. What a wonderful introduction to the Roma people in this extremely poor community. Macedonia is among the poorest countries in Europe and the Roma are the poor among the poor. Yet, this man seemed to have genuine joy and expressed it to me, a total stranger roaming his streets.

You have turned for me my mourning into dancing: You have put off my sackcloth, and clothed me with gladness; - Psalm 30:11

Surely we Christians should express such spontaneous joy. That song comes to mind, I Hope You Dance. This secular song can present us with a challenge.

I hope you still feel small
When you stand by the ocean
Whenever one door closes, I hope one more opens
Promise me you’ll give faith a fighting chance
And when you get the choice to sit it out or dance; Dance
I hope you dance (1)

I see it as a special challenge to get involved, to step out, to live life, and to do so with joy and in step with God. In so many ways life is like a dance. You either dance with careful, stiff and stuttering steps, carefully regarding those who watch and self-conscious of how your steps are received. Or, you dance without regard for how you are perceived, with abandon to that music which fills your heart from a higher Source.

Regardless of how your song starts or what changes in key you find as you move from verse to chorus, when you final reach the coda I hope your dance inspired others, but like David’s dance was intended for God alone.

Reference:
(1) © 2004 MCA Nashville, a Division of UMG Recordings, Inc. Artist: Lee Ann Womack

© 2010 A Mission Proclaimed

Your support is greatly appreciated! A Mission Proclaimed is a federally recognized 501(c)(3).

Futebol, Patacas, Brasil, 1996.

As I begin to write this post there are a mere 107 days, 14 hours, and 32 minutes until the start of the 2010 World Cup in South Africa (I owe the exact timing to the ESPN FIFA World Cup iPhone app). The actual number of eyes to view this sports event is widely debated. Some say half to three quarters of a billion and others say tens of billions (It has been stated that the total viewership for the 2002 World Cup was 28.8 billion. There were 64 games at the World Cup giving an average of 450million viewers per match). There is really no way to determine how many will be watching.

This year when the whistle blows on the pitch at Soccer City Stadium in Jo’burg to start the first match it will usher in a transformation in the way people view television in the home. (1) The 95,000 people in the stadium may not have the best seats; that may be reserved for the home viewers equipped to watch the game in 3D, yes 3D!

ESPN announced it will use the starting game between South Africa and Mexico to unveil a dedicated 3D network. Home viewers will now be able to view the event à la Avatar. Granted, this immersive experience will be limited to a wealthy few who can afford the HDTV equipment to take advantage of this new technology.

Yet as in years before, most of the world will watch this event crowded around shared, communal TV sets, peering through the snowy reception just as I did while visiting Brasil in 2006; the last occurrence of the World Cup. As I watched, there were about 30 green, yellow, and blue painted faces crowded into a school room in Patacas, a small Brasillian town on the north east coast of Brasil. The spotty reception did nothing to dull the joyous exuberance each time the Brasillian national team scored.

When it comes to the number of viewers of such global events and estimates of the percentages of the human populace engaged in such a singular purpose, I don’t compare it to other sports or cultural events. I think rather of one of the last great spectacles of mankind, the ministry of the “Two Witnesses” described in Revelation 11. No other spectacle can compare to the vast numbers of viewers of that event.

I suppose ESPN will have the bugs worked out of their 3D experience by then, but it won’t matter. Much of the 1,260 day ministry of the “Two Witnesses” will be all too 3D for the hapless inhabitants of the earth as the rain ceases and waters turn to blood. As plagues of every sort strike the earth, people will not need technology to feel immersed in the event.

It is when these two witnesses are killed in a beastly manner and lie in the streets of Jerusalem that the number of world-wide viewers peaks. The celebrations over the murder of these emissaries of God will far surpass the celebrations of sporting victories, carnivale, Mardi Gras, or other human celebrations . This will be the celebration of the “world’s team” defeating God’s. Or, so they think. You see, there will be a quick severance of the celebrations when these witnesses arise after three and a half days. It will literally shake man’s shoddy foundations.

Granted, there are readers of this blog who may differ in their view of the message of the book of Revelation. The exegesis of scripture is outside the scope of this blog, but the point can be well taken regardless of your view of Revelation: A time of accounting and judgment is promised and God keeps promises.

Don’t take this particular post as an attack on the World Cup, soccer (futebol in Brasil), or other like events. It is not. I enjoyed the three games I saw while in Brasil in 2006. Even more so because we used these games as a gathering point for the youth in the community and a time for ministry and fellowship. The games were secondary to the goal of ministry. We used these games for a greater purpose and it made an eternal difference.

Reference:
(1) http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2010/jan/06/espn-3d-world-cup-ces

© 2010 A Mission Proclaimed

Your support is greatly appreciated! A Mission Proclaimed is a federally recognized 501(c)(3).