Loved the IG experience. So much fun and the privilege of seeing what the Lord is doing around the world is always stunning. Here are a few of the highlights - I'm writing a report with more details, ping if interested. Also note that locations of travel are not posted online.
:::Italy
The long term team and their work keeps growing and flourishing and it is really fun to be a part of. They have had tremendous momentum since 2016 and this year is no different. Like last summer, they had a strong group of college aged interns there all summer. The interns started a weekly football game at one of the local parks and that grew into a consistent thing. There is a community center that was recently acquired that used to be a government building and that now serves as a gathering location, weekly soccer and the location of the community garden. There are at least a few other social enterprises that are in flight. The city remains strategic to the refugee and migrant global issue and this team is a good model of serving and befriending that community. This team is also modeling the concept of Disciple Making Movements. Some of the most interesting principles include replication - 'who will you share this right after this?' and 'the Scriptures teach themselves.'
::: Greece
The context for the work in Greece was one of the most dense and culturally diverse neighborhoods in Europe, maybe the world, which makes for an incredible place. Walk out of your apartment and run into the nations. The leader of the org that we worked with, P, is one of the most catalytic leaders I have ever met. He has a style that empowers, a focus on identifying and developing leaders and a strategy to build the community and having these young people help him. The work looks like efforts with media, arts, music, English classes and street festivals along with a partnership with a refugee drop in center, where we served for one morning. Two of P's team were our Greek guides all through the city for 5 days and these guys modeled what they do and why and how they do it. I trusted them wholly with our team and they were 16 years old. We did lots of street festival type of stuff in the square, many nights until very late. The Greeks don't really sleep. Special thanks to
Andrew Jones for connecting us.
::: Decompress
We decompressed on the Aegean Sea for two days. There was a lot of attention spent on this phase, including doing it at a neutral location, 4 sessions of retrospective questions with journals, and a relaxed schedule. Most leaders just want to go home by the time their team gets to this phase, trust me I know. But if you are a missions team leader that has ignored decompression, I would fire you. Ignore helping your students process this and it will be like the experience never happened. I also had the privilege of baptizing most of our team. We had some team drama.
::: Misc
+ Every trip, we host a missionary roundtable discussion, inviting partners and long term workers to a discussion where they share some wisdom. This year was no different - some incredible pieces of wisdom.
+ We had a few issues with smartphones and social media and before the trip, I believed that we could/should model the right way to handle these powerful tools. I'm not sure now that it is anything less than a total disconnection - just about all of us are addicted and much of it is for the wrong reasons. There was some mindless scrolling at the cost of real life engagement.
+ Three people lost bags and never got them back until we returned to the US. We are glad they got all their stuff back but not having all their stuff was super frustrating for all of them. There were also a number of people that were sick here and there. I spent more energy on those things than usual.
+ We overspent a bit by probably around $1500, still landing on finances.
More pictures
here.
The Ember Cast facilitated one of our culture service learning experiences this past weekend with a group of 8th grade girls - we loved every moment working with them. This came about from a request from one of their small group leaders and they desired an exposure to global issues, an opportunity for this group to serve in a community and hearing from someone doing some pretty neat things. Elements included:
