Category: Youth World

Emaus Mission Team

This weekend I had the opportunity to go to Shell with a group from Emaus to work at La Casa De Fe. I won’t give the history I could on either group, I’ll just skip to the part about what we did this weekend.

It was pretty amazing to see the “Promised Land” after having been absent from the property for two years. When I was last there, it was a patch of tall grass, a stream, and a backhoe. Now there’s a completed water tower and bodega, and a significantly constructed multi-purpose building. The entire concrete framework of the building is done, to the point that we were able to camp out under tents and misquito nets on the top floor as we worked on the first floor.

I’ve been saying today that this weekend was probably the most work I’ve ever done in my life. I’m trying to think of a time that could beat it, and I haven’t come up with one yet. We shoveled out and leveled the dirt under the first floor, dumped in bigger rocks that won’t hold water, covered it with a layer of plastic and rebar-like metal grate material, then mixed and poured concrete for the real floor of the ground level. Part of that involved carrying around 50-kilogram bags of cement to mix concrete.

Now, being your typical kid from the United States, the only metric conversion I know how to do in my head is miles to and from kilometers, and I only know that because of a minor road trip I took to Canada with my grandpa during which I sometimes drove. It wasn’t until after I’d staggered around carrying three or four of those bags that I discovered that it’s more than a 2:1 ratio of kilograms to pounds. I don’t even weigh very much more than 50 kilograms.

Needless to say, between that and the shoveling and pushing wheelbarrows of concrete and sleeping on a constantly deflating air mattress on more concrete, I’m more than a little sore right now. But since I don’t plan an exercise regimen of shoveling concrete and rocks every weekend to keep up these muscles that I didn’t know I had, I’m glad about some other things with which I came away from this weekend.

At certain points it was hard being out at the new property basically all the time and trying to think of it as a ministry site and not just a work site. But when we did finally have the chance to go over to the orphanage, and then to have a bunch of the kids come out to the property to have a worship service with us this morning, it drove home one of those things that I did come away with. Twice now, after having seen the property when it was a piece of land indistinguishable from the rest of the jungle around it, I’ve gotten to be a part of building a place that’s there only because of people acting out God’s love, and which will soon be not just a building, but a home full of that love.

First Office Days

Yesterday was my first official day doing one of my real jobs, now that my continuous chunk of language school is over. I’ll be splitting my time between doing PR in the form of writing for and about the different ministries of Youth World, and teaching guitar at some of the ministry sites, and yesterday I spent the day at the office doing a lot of reading and talking to people.

Even by the time I met with Brad last week to go over my black-and-white job description for the first time last week, I had two projects in the works. So yesterday morning I came down to Mundo Juvenil to make some notes and put together some semblance of an idea for a couple of interviews. While I was here planning for my conversation with Ivet about La Red, Casey came in and I got to set up a tentative interview time with Miguel and Boris, two of the guys from Casa Gabriel.

This morning we have a Short-Term Department meeting, and afterward I’ll be heading out to Iglesia Carmen Bajo with Laura so I can get a feel for where I’ll be (not that I’ve had any shortage of time at Carmen Bajo before) and check out the guitars that they have out there. It’ll also be nice to actually know how to get there, since I’ve always been on a bus full of gringos with a driver who knew where he was going for my previous visits.

So basically, this week I’m in the deep end.

Weird Skill Set

One of the coolest things to me about Youth World is how open the organization is as a whole to new and different ministries. Some of the first new branches of Youth World seem completely logical for any Youth training-oriented organization: Hacienda El Refugio, a training and retreat center; Casa Gabriel, a discipleship program and home for former street kids; Ingles Student Ministries, formerly Expat, which mostly consists of the Chaplains’ office at the local English-speaking school.

But recently, some even more unique ministries have come up here: a soccer ministry, art classes, and even a skateboard ministry. Each of these were started because someone had a passion and ability for it, and saw a need and/or an opportunity to reach out to people.

I’ve talked and written before about how I don’t feel like I have a skill set that’s particularly tailored to the traditional idea of a missionary. And yet here I am in Ecuador working with International Teams, getting ready for ministry in the form of writing, working on a website, and playing guitar.

Another skill that I basically take for granted at home is my experience with sound equipment. After eight or so years as the sound guy/radio tech at my home church and three years working in a music store, I’d like to think I’m decently versed in sound equipment. And for the first three out of three weekends of this stay in Ecuador, I have run sound for a Spanish Christian Rock band, Gedeón.

I have been friends with Roberto, the guitarist/leader of Gedeón since I first came to Ecuador in 2007, and met singer Christy Stumbo last year. The first week I got here, the two of them were both “super-duper” excited that I was around because (aside from my good looks, irresistible charm, and general awesomeness) they were totally lacking in the sound operator department and had a bunch of concerts scheduled. I was pretty immediately enlisted, and have gotten to go to some sweet places because of it (even Otavalo and Esmeraldas so far).

Until I got back here, Gedeón has had to just grab whoever was around to watch the sound board. If you do a sound check beforehand, and don’t run into any major problems, this is doable, but not in any way ideal. And while I’ve pretty much sat and stared at the sound board, increasing the monitor volume, cutting out feedback every once in a blue moon, I’ve realized just by everyone’s gratitude how useful it is to have someone around who at least has some idea what they’re doing. Even if all it does is save Roberto from running to the back of the room in the middle of a song, that makes a pretty big difference.

It’s been a slightly strange experience to run into people here at the office or around the neighborhood and have them say “Oh, I we have this need at such-and-such a ministry site and it’s exactly one of the things that you do.” Especially since I still feel like I have a weird skill set. It’s been fun. It’s been enlightening. But it’s still slightly strange. Some days I get the feeling that God is saying “I told you so.”

T-Minus 3

It’s officially Monday, now, which means the day after tomorrow I’ll be on a plane.

I’m excited to go back to Ecuador, to see friends, to join ministries that I’m passionate about, to see what God has in store for me for an entire year and to begin to discover how He is going to use me. But most of the time it hasn’t really hit yet what a big deal it is. I just feel like I’m going to a familiar place for a short little while, and wondering why all these people keep hugging me and trying to cry.

One of the side effects of not doing lots of writing this summer has been a lack on information on my blog about the ministry that I’ll be doing. I think another may be that I haven’t fully processed it like I’m used to doing, so I’ll try to rectify that right now with a brief summary of what (I think) the next year has in store for me.

I will be headed back to work with Youth World, where I will be serving in a couple of ways that are right up my alley. I will be teaching music/guitar at at least two of Youth World’s partner ministry sites, Iglesia Carmen Bajo and Mision Emaus. I’ll also be doing some PR for Youth World, which will be in the form of writing for the organization’s web site (linked above) about the ongoing ministries at various partner sites.

When people talk about serving as a missionary, what comes to your mind? I have to say, until very recently, writing web pages and playing guitar would not have been my first answers. It’s fascinating to me that God uses my abilities for His work, no matter how strange a combination of skills I may seem to have, and how unimportant they seemed even to me before I thought about them in the context of ministry. But that’s the thing. Ministry is about people. It’s about relationships, and connecting people, and connecting with people, and God connecting with people.

Music is inherently social. I don’t believe I know anyone who builds, plays, and writes music for guitars. Maybe a couple people who do at least two of those things, but not everything that’s necessary for a beautiful piece of music to eventually get played for the first time. And I certainly can’t think of anyone who would bother to do any of those things if there wasn’t anyone else to enjoy it. I’ve found a love of playing for God, and I’ve even found (despite nerves and lack of talent) the joy of playing for other people in being part of worship. Something I picked up for my own enjoyment turns out something God uses for the benefit of other people, and a way for me to give back to him in a form that’s more personal to me than many others possible ways.

Writing is similar. We wouldn’t need the written word if we didn’t communicate with other people. And God has given me the opportunity to connect with people in some completely different places through things that I enjoy to begin with. How might He use the gifts He’s given you?