Decompression with Emily.

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Mad Respect to Adventures

Well surprise, surprise, Emily is home. More about her later.

When we left her in Ecuador, at the very end of February, leadership at Adventures told us that they were watching the Coronavirus and Emily's squad in particular very closely, since her squad would be leaving the next day to fly to Cambodia. Just about two weeks later, Adventures started moving certain teams home. As I'm sure you know, the virus is moving, countries are closing borders and airlines reducing flights. Here's some notification timelines:

14 March 15:00 - Some Adventures teams coming home.
14 March 21:00 - All Adventures teams are coming home including Emilys.
15 March 12:00 - Itinerary sent for Emily's squad, including two day debrief near LAX.
17 March 12:00 - Debriefing cancelled, parents, please fly all Racers home from their gateway cities ASAP.

The team at Adventures worked 24x7, getting over 20 teams and 500 people home - an incredible feat. I had an incredible amount of respect for Adventures before this - this situation only multiplies it. Not to mention everything Emily experienced on the Race.

Adventures - thanks for taking care of these kids through this situation and contending for this generation to follow Jesus.

PVT - Quito, Ecuador

Deanna and I got to visit Emily last week in Quito, Ecuador as part of a Parent Vision Trip organized by the organization that runs The World Race Gap Year, Adventures in Missions. We had a great time with Em and just said goodbye to her again last weekend when we left Quito. PVT is structured so that you have a lot of time with your racer, while serving with them and the orgs that they have worked with, staying near them - in our case we were all on the campus of a seminary together, and having one full adventure day off to do as you please, all over about seven days.

I loved our time serving with partner organizations in and around Quito, including Camp Hope [a day center for disabled kids and young adults], Pan de Vida [poverty alleviation], Covi [an afterschool program] and Dunamis [trafficking rehabilitation - mutual connections with The Samaritan Woman in Baltimore.] Adventures also has a base in Quito run by the incredible Fabi and his wife, really phenomenal hosts. If you have a thing for Quito, these would be great places to start to think about partnerships - all run by native Ecuadorians. Also, Mosaic Ecuador [like from Erwin McManus] opened their doors the weekend before we got there. Emily went and took 2 friends - Shengs represent!

Quito is a beautiful city, sitting at 9350 feet above sea level with a population of about 2M people spread out over 207 square miles surrounded by mountains. I was a little sick from the altitude our first day here - we landed a few days early because we thought at least one of us would need to acclimate. The currency is the US dollar, the electrical current and plugs are the same as the US, and no one is really interested in practicing English here, which is different than a lot of places I have traveled to. Taxis and Ubers are dirt cheap. Food and lodging is moderate, depending on your taste. It was the rainy season when we were there so there was a lot of rain at some point almost every day.

For our adventure day, we visited a little town in the Andes mountain called Mindo. Mindo is advertised as the cloud forest and is about 2 hours outside of Quito. We visited a butterfly and hummingbird garden and went on a chocolate factory tour [adventure!] Interesting side note: One of the relatives of a team member on a team that we have partnered with in Italy pinged me after seeing on FB that we had been in Mindo. He worked on a well project there 10 years ago and a church community started out of that work.

We had a weekend stopover in Bogota on the way home, which was probably too much. Deanna and I were so exhausted so we spent a lot of time at our hotel. But Bogota is a beautiful city with a mix of very modern and a classic old town. We tried to go up Monserrate but it was way too crowded so instead just hung around Bolivar Square for a few hours.

As you can imagine, we loved our time with Em and had so much fun exploring Quito and seeing a glimpse of her life on the Race. The Race has definitely stretched and grown her, we chatted about things she would have never talked about had she gone right to college.

To SquadAyyee - we love you and are praying for your last 3 months in Cambodia and that the Lord makes you strong and a force to be reckoned with for the Kingdom for your whole long lives. To the parents of the squad - job well done, you have some amazing kids that have the admiration of many. But you already knew this. Loved hanging and getting to know you.

PVT only encouraged our absolute joy with the Race.

Country 25

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50

Dear Deanna,

Some say it's all downhill from here but I don't think so either. Instead, now that we are both in our 50s, I think you are going to pick up the pace on all the things that you are so good at and the things that give you life. Things like: caring well and having fun with your family and pushing them out the door for adventure, exploring wonder and mystery at places you haven't been yet, and challenging the next generation to create something so amazing for the rest of us. And of course all of these things because the Lord has seen to bless you so that you can bless others.

Happy 50th - I am expectantly praying that this year God shows us even more of His exceedingly abundance.

Hey, let's get on a plane!

Feb Update

Emily is almost finished with 5 months on the Race and is currently in Ecuador and we will visit her at the end of the month, which we are looking forward to. I think her experience on the Race has been full, meaning she and her team have experienced a full range of life - days that are easy and fun and days that are difficult. Ministry is joyous and tedious, people get sick, new food is fun until it's not, travel days are fun until the 24th hour. But we are very excited to see her and spend a few days with her and her team. Overall, it is what we desired for Emily - a time before college when she grew in intimacy with the Lord and grew in life experience.

In the meantime, empty nesting has been very quiet and a tad boring. But we knew it would be slow and wanted to lean into this and let this time run its course. I've been pondering three concepts of late: 1 - Residency, how when people do a 'residency,' it's a deep commitment to learning a craft and how Jesus takes up residence with us. 2 - Pilgrimage, the act of spiritual pilgrimages and the slight shift from traveling as a tourist to journeying on a pilgrimage. 3 - "to contend for" - to fast and pray and pull out all the stops for someone for something. I'm thinking about all three of these when it comes to cross cultural service with young people but not sure what it means yet. And I'm having lots of fun with my Toyota 4Runner.

[#1 and #2 from above are influences from The World Race and #3 is from the This Cultural Moment podcast.]

Maybe another update in March.

Assateague OSV beach.

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19

Happy 19th Emily!

As you know, it has been quite the change not having any kids at home. It has been super quiet, no gatherings of kids just showing up and your dog has been super needy. But we are thrilled at what you are doing this year.

It is a year of firsts - first holiday, first birthday, first loss of a family member - all of these away from home. We believe that all of that is difficult and worth it - it is a year where you grow up a bit, grow in community and grow in your capacity to serve and be served. Remember that sometimes, rewards are on the other side of difficulty, sometimes that is life. We believe that your reward will also be a bigger heart for the world and the things of the Lord.

Have fun celebrating at 10,000 feet. Proud of you, you are loved!
Love,
DAD

2019 in Cities

01 - Atlantic City, NJ, USA
02 - New York, NY, USA
03 - Fairfield, CT, USA
04 - Laugarvatn, Iceland
05 - Skógafoss, Iceland
06 - Jekyll Island, GA, USA
07 - New York City, NY, USA
08 - Venice, Italy
09 - Pula, Croatia
10 - Zadar, Croatia
11 - Šibenik, Croatia
12 - Trogir, Croatia
13 - Dubrovnik, Croatia
14 - Ancient Corinth, Greece
15 - Spetses, Greece
16 - Athens, Greece
17 - Capetown, South Africa
18 - Touws River, South Africa
19 - Nanticoke, Maryland, USA
20 - Cambridge, MD, USA
21 - Atlanta, GA, USA
22 - Atlanta, GA, USA
23 - Punaluu, HI, USA
24 - Waikiki, HI, USA
25 - Oakland, CA, USA
26 - Lexington, NC, USA
27 - Gore, VA, USA
28 - San Jose, CA, USA
29 - San Rafael, CA, USA

Standing goal - get outside the US at least once a year. Fantastic travel this year, which included 23 flights and around 54K airmiles. More than ever, travel was framed this year around 'pilgrimage.' Let me know if you are interested in a little travel hacking guide I wrote.

2019 in Books

1 - Double Blessing, Mark Batterson
2 - Microchurches, Brian Sanders
3 - Talking to Strangers, Malcolm Gladwell **
4 - Reframation, Alan Hirsch
5 - Underground Church, Brian Sanders **
6 - Kingdom Journeys, Seth Barnes [gift from World Race launch]
7 - People to be Loved, Preston Sprinkle ** [via Jon Tyson, Church of the City NYC podcast]
8 - Securing the Oracle Database
9 - Columbine, Dave Cullen [gift from Ben Arment]
10 - What You Do is Who You Are, Ben Horowitz ##
11 - Faith for Exiles, David Kinnaman
12 - Disappearing Church, Mark Sayers
13 - Winners Take All, Anand Giridharada ^^ [via Kt]
14 - CompTIA Security+
15 - Love into Light, Peter Hubbard ^^
16 - Leading a Church in a Time of Sexual Questioning, Bruce Miller ## [via Greg St Cyr]
17 - Reboot, Jerry Colonna ^^

** - Best reads of the year
## - Need to get back to because it is good
^^ - Didn't finish. Sometimes, it just isn't the right time for you to read it.

22

Dear Kt,

From the time you were little, one of our family mantras has been 'you are blessed to be a blessing.' Even typing this now, it is as much of a reminder to me as it is to you, that our lives are meant to be poured out for the service of others since we have been given so much privilege.

I think it's a good reminder as you get ready for another round of big life changes: graduation in May, leaving good friends from school who will return to far flung home countries, and navigating the next season of life as a university graduate - if you move home, I may charge you rent. But we hope that mantra continues to inform your intention and direction. We need the reminder too.

Immensely proud of you,
Love,
DAD

[Photo by Jakob, somewhere outside Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, Nov 2019]

Visited Axis Church to hear @trevinhoekzema guest preach this morning.

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So many seats. @southwestair

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Flight #22 in 2019. Because modern air travel is still a miracle to me.

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Free books. DM what you want and a mailing address in the USA.

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