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about these sorts of things as we are trying to train up leaders and see them released into ministry their sets of circumstances are just so very different from most of the folks rolling into suburban local churches bible colleges or missions agencies the precedent has been set based upon the life experience and set of conditions you are dealt i know people in our neighborhood who have been unable to see their family in 25 years because they were working for the bhutanese government at the time their relatives were kicked out of the country i work with friends who had no place to sleep for several years at a time because refugee camp life was so bad at home i ve watched families breakdown almost overnight as people move to the us and the pressures are just so great and substance abuse becomes the answer just last week in vermont a man who grew up in the camp with some of our friends snapped he had just gotten out of mental health treatment when he lost it on his wife and killed her in the driveway with a butcher knife and nearly killed his mother in law when his daughter came home from school everything had changed will she survive to adulthood so what then does ministry training and leadership development look like for those who barely just barely survived to adulthood i don t see my friends rolling up to the most prestigious christian college with their parents helping them unpack all teary eyed i don t see them going to churches and mid to upper class churches individuals and becoming supported missionaries they have survived to adulthood and the conditions are just so incredibly different two weeks ago we had a big celebration for 15 nepali church leaders who went through a 12 month leadership and discipleship training that i was honored to facilitate they asked me to be the main speaker for the gathering local nepali pastors from other congregations were there members from other churches came a local american pastor who is well known in the nepali community was present there were probably more than 100 people there and the atmosphere was electric to those who have access to this sort of thing we say so what s the big deal it is such a minimal length of study for someone who survived for people who have survived hell it was something with few words to describe i will never forget that weekend it was perhaps the most meaningful thing i ve ever been part of and i m humbled by all that transpired but i know that this is just the start of something bigger for a couple months now i have been dreaming with others what a yearlong training program could look like with the privileged and those who survived to adulthood what would it earn to have a strong robust training program that is both theoretical and practical that includes both crowds not just an immigrant thing or white guys thing but truly a time where 8 10 folks move into the neighborhood and work their tails off to become the kinds of leaders god has called them to be we are looking at next fall as a launch to start such an internship where the holistic gospel is embraced and celebrated and where the playing field is leveled we dream of the day where people do care when you die where surviving to adulthood is not laughed at where suburban servants of jesus come with all their access and say yes we too bring something to the table but it is so very different now because we are learning with our nepali brothers and sisters we dream of an even playing field where nepali students who have survived to adulthood would say yes this is awesome to be part of this together with those from different circumstances we are not better you are not better we all are after this jesus who has so changed us as we continue to move things along around here pray with us that we honor one another with the utmost respect and remember that we are all simply servants in god s vineyard he is the king who has conquered but he is also the god who has struggled with us pray that this would be expressed in our every word and deed as we announce the kingdom october 18 2017 ty m 1 comment categories uncategorized world refugee day staying attentive yesterday was world refugee day an internationally designated remembrance of the story of forcefully displaced people around the globe in 2001 unhcr set aside june 20th to help us reframe the conversation and take time out to reflect yesterday cultural dances songs and bazaars filled city centers around the us as people took time to remember the journey of those who have been resettled and millions still stuck in limbo i didn t go to any of the big celebrations this year but i found my way into an unassuming 6 unit apartment building where my family hung out with a bhutanese nepali family who has been in the country just shy of 3 years it is only the second time i had been in their home but i found everyone there to be most welcoming uncle opened the door and we had never met he was deaf and unable to speak so the blind guy talking to the deaf guy was miraculous to say the least why do these things constantly happen to me i had charity get out the phone and show him some pictures and uncle had a grand time playing with amos throughout our visit i have been teaching the eldest son in the family english for about a year now and know him well because of that foundation the relatives were pretty cool with entertaining us yesterday the father of the home eventually got home and we began discussing life america and our past journeys he was speaking broken english with me and i was encouraging him to speak when his wife walked into the room and said in nepali what are you doing he knows nepali i interjected and said this was a good opportunity for him to practice his english laughter followed as we chatted father became much more comfortable with me and his thoughts went back to bhutan without any prodding or encouragement he began to share about bhutan and his siblings that remained there they somehow stayed during the ousting and remain there to this day father said he was 26 when he left and we discussed the farming lifestyle that is true for most people in the country contrasting that with the urban life he has come to know in pittsburgh at one point father said we left and we had nothing no citizenship no green card nothing i said in disgust they only gave you a red card now the conversation was fully in nepali as father was very comfortable with me well once we got to the camp in nepal we got a rice card maybe the rice card was the good card we had we both about fell over laughing as one of the only things you can do when reflecting on the crazy situation is to reflect and chuckle at the pain by the end of the conversation i learned that the man sitting across from me was extremely sharp he spoke broken english as we first started the conversation and to some it would have been assumed that he may not have a good handle on what is going on in our country or the world quite the contrary he knew the political situations of bhutan nepal and the united states very well this guy has had to navigate three very different systems in three countries three countries three systems three lives he knew them all he knew what was fair and what was not in the us his last day at his first job in the country will be today and he will start another job on friday that will hopefully be a step up i asked father about how safe he felt in his apartment complex and he did not give me real strong affirmation in that direction he simply said we have to stay busy and mind our own business and we will be fine again cultural knowledge that is completely contradictory of all he has known has been learned an applied we have to stay busy and mind our own business and we will be fine what a sobering testimony i was likely the first american that father was able to tell his story to we find over and over again that for anyone who grew up in bhutan they simply want to reflect they simply want someone anyone really who could possibly understand and maybe that person may never understand but the generation of former bhutanese refugees who clearly remember their exit from bhutan 27 years ago simply want their story to be heard their kids have often grown weary from listening and can t relate so on world refugee day i can t think of a better thing than to sit to listen to reflect and the whole rice card comment was definitely worth the visit the story of jesus undoubtedly intersects with this story jesus was a refugee he was unwanted in his humility though he laid his life down served and gave his life so all would live again i can t help but to think that god the spirit too longs for his story to be heard a story of grace acceptance and redemption i m eager in the coming days to tell this story with father and his family june 21 2017 ty m leave a comment categories uncategorized tags refugee ministry urban ministry world refugee day phone calls on your day off reframe things i just got off the phone with a dear friend who has been doing urban work for nearly three decades for both of us it was our off day and we were sitting around the house sipping coffee unwinding from pretty busy weekends of ministry i called to ask nancy a bit about developing ministry in the city and the tension that i ve been feeling between building relationships versus starting ministry programs three or four days a week charity and i end up visiting families in the neighborhood deepening trust and friendship many of those days visitors pop in at our house at random times keeping us pretty well surrounded by continuous relationship building during our call i was venting a bit on how to best establish collaborative ministry amongst different groups how to get people to work well together how long to wait to pull the trigger on larger ministry projects and nancy reminded me that sometimes sitting on the porch and chatting with neighbors is the most strategic and necessary thing we could possibly be doing with our time we have all seen ministries that charge ahead with program after program but in the end are left wondering how deep rooted relationships slipped from their grasp the tension of walking between both of those worlds is real my weekends find me teaching four different groups of students with initiatives ranging from sunday school to youth group to conversational english we have some very big projects in the planning phase and these are the sorts of things donors and people on the outside get excited about but man it is really us showing up at neighbors houses in the evening and staying for 2 3 hours at a time that brings the most joy encouragement and energy to our neighbors sometimes the best thing we can do in ministry is to block out all the noise block out the need to be recognized by those from the outside block out the buzz that comes from the intoxication of power and ministry success evidenced by big donations and fancy programs thinking through what those all around us really need or want are questions i never want to pass over we ve planted churches started community centers run esl programs all of those are extremely necessary in urban work i m not against those things especially the establishment of local multiplying churches but our neighborhoods will probably survive without those programs i m not sure our neighborhood will survive though without friendship rooted in the beauty of the gospel without relationships there is simply no foundation for anything else we say or do i m wondering today if start up ministries and churches should advise a much more extensive requirement on building relationships before rushing into anything else they do in ministry the complaints i have often heard are that mission donors and churches are expecting results more bang for their buck so we need to start initiatives quickly i can t say how representative that is or if that pressure is real but if relational focus is short circuited what will really come in the long run so today i rest i rest in jesus and his friendship in my life i will start afresh tomorrow to again continue to deepen trust and relationship with those around me sometimes a phone call on your off day reframes things and the pieces come together thankful for this monday of rest june 13 2017 ty m 1 comment categories uncategorized tags relationships sabbath urban ministry 17 years of marriage and mission together today marks the day 17 years ago when charity walked down an aisle at a small south dakotan church and agreed to marry me what on earth was she thinking we both knew we were kind of signing up for a life of unknowns and we took things in stride a missionary call a college education to finish failing eyesight that would lead to blindness zero experience in marriage ministry or education we bit the bullet and went for it these last 17 years have taken us to savannah ga the philippines northern mariana islands minneapolis st paul nepal and pittsburgh some transitions were planned most were not the strand that runs through all of these years is god s faithfulness to us and our attempts to really hear his voice and follow him wherever he leads us as we have gotten older pioneering new ministry and starting over in each context gets a little tougher there are days we sort of wish we were not pioneers and god would ask us to roll into town with a nice and tidy established ministry where we wouldn t have to make things up as we go to date we have never been given that assignment so we did our heels in the ground and do the best with what we have been given charity has taught me what it really means to thrive in situations that are less than ideal i remember several years ago when we lived in minneapolis and she went to a library alone we lived in a rough patch and some guy started yelling at her and chasing her as she approached her car she jumped in the driver s seat and sped away once she found out she was pregnant in nepal it was never a question of whether she would have amos in nepal under nepali doctor supervision she has watched me go full circle with my eyesight we met and i was extremely independent showing few signs that my vision was fading fast the disease sucked my sight away and charity got the brunt of my frustration demands to complete tasks and a bantering of excuses on why i couldn t do things she never suggested i get help go to blindness training school or anything of the sort from independence to dependence back to independence again she has never complained once as i ve made those adaptations to sight loss she continues to thrive in less than good circumstances somehow this marriage though has produced something in us that pushes us to do things that we would not be capable of without each other christ plus each other allows us to play at a level that seems impossible at times so i go to blindness training school and obtain the independence i need we transition in ministry and start over we learn nepali or move i...