STINT Survey and the Christmas Conference

I've been thinking alot about you stinters scattered around the world. I know that the Christmas season is often a great time for sharing the hope that you have in Jesus, and I pray that you have seen God revealing Himself to friends that you have been making over the past weeks and months.

I'm sure you are all praying as well for the 10,000+ students who are attending Christmas Conferences beginning tomorrow. Did you know the Bridges Conference has over 800 international students attending, their largest conference ever. Imagine the impact of that as they return to their campuses, and to their nations in the years ahead.

As you pray for all of those who are attending conferences, I know you are hopeful that God will touch the hearts of hundreds and thousands of students with a passion for God and His heart for the nations. You might remember that the first night of the Briefing Conference I shared about Moses and his encounter with God in the burning bush. Well, your surveys about why you came on STINT were evidence of the reality of the burning bush experiences of which you shared that night. 93% of you said that one of the most important factors in deciding to come on STINT was hearing from God in His word and prayer. A friend's counsel, a summer project trip, and vision for your campuses' partnership location were all very significant as well.

It seems to me that the Christmas and Winter conference environment is where a lot of these factors intersect. Meeting with God, hearing about the mission, encouragement from friends, and a chance to go overseas for a summer are all part of the conference environment.

But here is what the stint survey also revealed; only about 5% of you made the decision to STINT while at the conference. 28% made that decision after the conference in January and February. At first I was surprised, but then I realize how good this really is. It shows a reflective process is occurring. There is also the fact that 65% of you said the challenge of raising support was one of your biggest barriers to stinting. The specter of raising $40,000 in 3 months tends to cause one to check a few times if that was really God they heard in the bush, or was it just passing emotionalism.

I pass this along though so that we put our hope in God for what He wants to do in raising up additional stinters. No doubt your experience is proving what Jesus told his disciples 2000 years ago: "the harvest is plentiful but the laborers are few." Wherever you are on STINT, and regardless of the current results, one message always cries out: We Need More Help!

Jesus' solution was to "pray for the Lord of the Harvest to send out laborers into His Harvest." Put into the example of Moses from Exodus, let's pray that 10,000 students will be "turn aside" to see, listen to, and respond to God as He reveals Himself, and His heart for each one of them to be fulfilled in His Kingdom purpose for their lives. If that happens, I'm sure God will call many to labor alongside of you as STINTers this coming year. (And the rest who don't can support you!)

And my prayer for you is that you will experience God's refreshing touch upon your life in the days ahead, with hope in your heart for how He wants to work in your life this coming year.

Lessons from the Wild II (Devotion)

The rhino, as any fan of The Gods must be Crazy, knows is the self-appointed fire prevention officer of the jungle.   But maybe there are a few facts of the Rhinoceros that you might not be aware of and can apply to live & ministry on STINT. 

A group of Rhinos is called a crash.  The reason is because a Rhino runs 30 miles an hour but can only see 30 feet in front of them.  (Props to Erwin McManus for this insight.) This propensity for running into things is perhaps why God created Rhinos with thick skin and gave them one or two horns depending on the species.  

Paul in 2 Corinthians 4:18  says, 'we fix our eyes on what is unseen rather than what we can see' and in the next chapter adds 'we live by faith and not by sight'.  What if we charged through life like Paul and his buddies, like a crash of Rhinos - full force, break-neck speed, by faith, not worrying about what we can see with our limited eyesight?   We don't have a horn and we're not pachyderms (though some of us are thick-skinned & some thick-sculled) but we have the same promise that enabled Paul to live & minister this way.  It's a promise of the coming resurrection; a promise that while this measly aging body will waste away its not the end.  

We can be pressed down but we are not crushed.  We can be perplexed but we are never in despair.  We might be persecuted but we will not be abandoned.  We possibly could be struck down but we will not be destroyed.  Life, eternal life, real life is guaranteed so we can charge ahead like Rhinos - full of faith.

Another little tidbit about Rhinos is their symbiotic relationship with the oxpecker.  The oxpecker feeds off of parasites that live on the Rhino.  And it seems like they get the best of them because they get a little of the Rhino's blood when they remove ticks or whatnot.  But with the Rhino's myopia, he knows that danger is near when the oxpeckers fly away.  (The rhino also has amazing sense of smell and hearing but those facts blur my analogy so ignore them.) 

It's teamwork in action.  Where the Rhino is limited, the oxpecker is strong.  When the Rhino might not even know there are little guys beneath the thick skin slowing sucking life away, the oxpecker shows up for a groom and a snack.  For the Rhino, while sacrificing a little blood in the process, this relationship saves his hide.  For the oxpecker he gets lunch and a free wild ride.

 In the same way of God's created order in the wild, He has placed you together as a team for a purpose.  It's no accident you are together. Everyone has a role.  Sometimes the role is defined: team leader, person who handles finances, team prayer leader, buyer of snacks for socials, etc.  But sometimes the roles are undefined.  Maybe one of you is the team encourager speaking life into others.  Perhaps you are the one God has gifted with humor who brings light moments to heavy ones.  Perhaps you are the team servant joyfully serving others and not wanting to draw attention to yourself. Maybe you're 'the team mom' caring for others when they are sick or 'big brother' looking out for others and making sure folks are safe.

Do you really believe that God has uniquely made everyone on your team and brought you together for a purpose?  Everyone!   Do you just accept each other's differences or do you appreciate them?  Or maybe you are just still back at the stage of being aware that you are not alike or acknowledging these differences but just trying to tolerate one another.  How often do you say, "God I am so thankful that this person is on my team and that you made them different than me.  They might even bug me at times but I need them... I need those who are thick-skinned.  I need the bloodsuckers, too.  I need every person on this team and they need me."   

We need each other to forge ahead by faith as a crash of Rhinos.

Another Resource

There is a new on-line resource for evangelistic materials in several languages.  It's Gospel Translations and already has articles in French, German, Italian, Spanish, Russian, Chinese, Japanese, etc.  It's set up like a wiki so if your translation skills are worthy you can add to the tool or maybe a student you are discipling would like to contribute.

Happy Thanksgiving

There’s nothing like holidays overseas to make you feel isolated, creepy and angry. It’s weird that no one on your team does them the same way you do (“What do you mean you eat cranberry sauce out of a can?”). I remember my first Thanksgiving at Krista’s family’s house when I discovered they were about to throw away the dark meat of the turkey. They insist it was a joke but I was pretty scared for a minute.

These feelings are intensified overseas, and the next five weeks--Thanksgiving through New Year’s—can be the most difficult part of a stint year. You are experiencing culture shock, miss your family, and your team seems suddenly to represent another culture, too… a culture that opens gifts on Christmas Eve instead of Christmas Day. WHAT IS WRONG WITH THESE PEOPLE?

Then you start looking at the culture. They think it’s bizarre that you celebrate a day of thankfulness by gorging yourself on over-sized birds and cranberries and smashed potatoes. They don’t understand why you want Christmas Day off from your classes. They don’t see why missing your family on this Thursday is different from any other day of the year. You feel out of place, out of sorts and out of strength.

Here’s a scripture I hope will encourage you:

“…they admitted they were aliens and strangers on earth. People who say such things show that they are looking for a country of their own. If they had been thinking of the country which they had left they would have had opportunity to return. Instead they were looking forward to a better country—a heavenly one. Therefore God is not ashamed to be called their God, for he has prepared a city for them.” (Hebrews 11:13-16)

Remember, you are not only a stranger to this culture you are living in now, but to the culture of the entire world. A day is coming when you can be “home” at last, when you will be with the Most Beloved One, in his home, celebrating every holyday together with him. In that day we won’t feel alone anymore, won’t be worn out from life in this world and won’t find ourselves adrift and without hope ever again.

So, take a break here and there, make sure you are rested. Give your family and friends a call for the holidays. But don’t forget that you are a stranger where you are in the same way that you would be a stranger in the United States… you are a citizen of a greater kingdom, the Heavenly one. In the meantime, celebrate with your teammates or other believers; that’s a pretty good preview of the New Jerusalem to come.

Homothumadon: Jesus, Fired up!

Acts 4 is a great scene in the early church.  In the chapter prior, Peter & John were on the way to pray and end up healing a 40-year old crippled beggar.   Peter turns it into and evangelistic event so the Sadducees arrested them but the number of believers blossomed to about 5000.   So Peter & John are brought before the high priest and his whole family.  Peter filled with the Holy Spirit gives a rocking testimony of who did the real healing – Jesus: the one you crucified but rose again, the rejected stone that is now the Cornerstone, and the only one under heaven of whom salvation is found.   They threatened them and tell them to stop speaking in Jesus’ name and of course the P & J have now of that, "Judge for yourselves whether it is right in God's sight to obey you rather than God for we cannot help speaking about what we have seen and heard."

But the part that intrigues me is what happens when P & J go back to their team and give a report.  Luke writes that when the church heard this “they raised their voices together in prayer to God.”  The prayer is an awesome one of acknowledging that our Lord and Creator is calling the shots.  And the supplication is simply for God to consider the threats and enable them, His servants, to speak the gospel with great boldness and to continue to display His power through

 the name of Jesus.

The Greek word that is translated here in the NIV ‘together’ is homothumadon.  It shows up several places in Acts: the 120 were gathered in homothumadon – Acts 1:14; after Pentecost the 3000 continued daily homothumadon in the temple and homes – Acts 2:46; the church ; used to met homothumadon in Solomon’s Portico – Acts 5:12; and the council homothumadon choose some men to send with Paul & Barnabas to Gentile believers – Acts 15:25.

Eugene Peterson writes that “of one mind” or “together” or “of one accord” all seems too tame.  Homothumadon is a compound word.  Homo means the same.  The don on the end signifies that it’s an adverb.   But the middle thumas is a word surging with energy.  By itself it means ‘flying off the handle’, ‘losing your temper’, ‘going ballistic’.  In the context of this movement of young believers there is nothing negative in it, no malice, no revenge, no violence.  Instead the energy is love, peace, community, unity, with one voice, a oneness in spirit and purpose.  It’s a unanimous response of a large group of individuals with different gifts and ideas from the soul based on what God has done and who He is.  It’s not just some byproduct of playing nice or walking through steps of resolving conflict.  It’s a holy passion.  It’s the fire of the Spirit.  It’s Jesus, fired up!

In Acts 4, when threatened the early church could have cowered in fear or just decided to be nice little compliant Christians content with their holy huddle.  Come on 5000!  That’s a lot to be satisfied with why rock the boat?  Instead there is this wonderful powerful harmony, this homothumadon fueled by the fire of the Holy Spirit that calls them to cry out in one voice that God rules and to plead with Him not to take away the threat but it give them as His servants boldness and power to declare and display the gospel in the midst of the persecution.    They didn’t resort to trying to overthrow the status quo.  They didn’t grumble.  They didn’t loose heart.  They didn’t cower.  They humbly asked that the gospel not be tamed because God cannot be tamed. 

That’s what unity is.  That’s the kind of power the world has rarely seen. That’s a power that launches transformational movements that can’t be stopped.  That’s what being united in spirit and purpose can do.  That’s Jesus, fired up!

RIP OFF!

One of the hardest things for me to deal with on STINT was when someone totally ripped me off. A few of you may have heard my story about the Overpriced Potato that caused me to go insanely off my rocker and yell at an entire market full of people that I was being unfairly treated.

Here's a little news item that caught my attention: A couple on vacation in India was charged TWO HUNDRED bucks for some street food.

In other news, Mmmmmmm, samosas!

How about you guys? And good rip-off stories this year?

Lessons from the Wild I (Devotion)

The Wildebeest (or Gnu) is one strange animal.  It's really an antelope with an ox-like head.  But two crazy traits  stand-out as lessons to us.  

One is that in the dry seasons millions of wildebeests will travel hundreds of miles in search of grass & water. They can cover 30 miles in a day.  They often travel with zebras and gazelles following rain clouds and lightening in the distance knowing that the clouds will lead them to the water & green pasture.

This reminds me of the Children of Israel in the desert who were depend on God leading them with a cloud by day and fire at night.  Nehemiah writes that it was out  of God's great compassion that God lead them providing manna and water for them.  And that God sustained them in such miraculous fashion that their clothes didn't even wear out in 40 years of camping out.

For a generation, they knew that when the cloud of God's glory would come down that they were to pitch camp.  His glory would come down over the Tabernacle tent.  Later, when the temple was built by Solomon, God's glory again came down in a cloud.  And one day our Messiah will come again on clouds.   

The other interesting thing about wildebeests is that the males will do something that no other antelope does.  When hunted, they will stay behind the group or even stumble to act hurt to get the attention of a hungry lion or laughing hyena.  While the male wildebeests fain injury, the rest of the group has time to run to safety.

Jesus said that there was no greater love than laying down your life for your friends.  When know that verse.  We like that verse.  What we may forget (or just don't like) is that verse is sandwiched in between these two Jesus' statements.  "This is my command: Love each other as I have loved you" and "You are my friends if you do what I command."

Jesus calls us  to live and love like Him.  That great love, that amazing love, that sacrificial love for others is what separates those of us who just say they know Jesus and those who experience a friendship with the Savior.

Two crazy wildebeests traits.  One is an act of dependence trusting Him for our daily bread.  Looking for Him to show up and guide us.  To dwell with us.  To come to us and to come for us.  The other is a call to a life of sacrifice, out of love to lay it all down.  To consider others more important than ourselves.

Who gnu?