An American Christian's Response to the Refugee Crisis

Photo Credit: Brandon Stanton, "Humans of New York"/ http://www.humansofnewyork.com/

"We survived but we’re dead psychologically. Everything ended for us that day. That was our destiny. That was our share in life.” That is a quote from a Syrian man, talking about himself and his children after the death of his wife during the civil war, and their escape to Turkey. One of the many stories shared by humanitarian and photographer Brandon Stanton (known for his ongoing social media photography project, "Humans of New York"), this particular photo grabbed me for reasons I can't quite put into words. 

You can read the rest of this story here (it is part 4 in a 7 part interview with the man in the middle). It made me tear up. It filled me with rage directed towards the perpetrators of this civil war. It gave me some complex feels. But, more than anything, as I started to think of the reactions of some of my American friends, family, and acquaintances towards the plight of these humans, I got really, really angry.

Hey, Christians? Yeah, you who claim to have something more to share with the world? The ones who say that everyone has a greater destiny than they can possibly imagine, because of a God who created them for greatness? Are you offering compassion of any kind? Are you showing love in some way? Here's a great way you could show the love of Christ to families like this: practice the Biblical virtue of hospitality and let them come to a place that is safe and where they can be shown the love of Christ that you supposedly have to give.

"When I offered a blanket to a man in the name of Jesus, the man said, 'Who is this Jesus? Since I left home he has given me food, a place to stay and now a blanket. I want to know him.'" 

Photo Credit: YWAM Madison. To donate to their upcoming outreach to Greece, go here.

At first I wasn't sure about how we as a nation should respond. As grieved as I was about the situation of these human beings, I was still unsure as to how I wanted my country to act in response. After all, isn't a government's first and only responsibility towards the welfare of it's citizens? 

But I'm currently enrolled in a Bible course that is all about how to take the teachings and principles of the Bible and use them for a revival in our culture, and I was starting to feel pretty freaking hypocritical about even hesitating to offer a helping hand. I believe that was the Holy Spirit working on my heart, moving me towards a more Biblical response.

I cannot in good conscience stand by and let the greatest opportunity to show love to the destitute that has happened in my entire generation to happen without trying to take part. If there is something my country can do I want it to do it, supposed national security risks be damned. All we do by rejecting relief opportunities is breed further resentment towards our nation by the rest of the world anyway, so in the long run it is, from a purely selfish standpoint, in our best interest to help these people (although I do realize that looking at what's best for it's citizens in the long run isn't exactly what the current generation of leaders excels at). 

In the words of Uncle Ben, "With great power comes great responsibility", and in the words of John the Disciple, "But if anyone has the world's goods and sees his brother in need, yet closes his heart against him, how does God's love abide in him?"

Photo Credit: christmasforrefugees.org

Compassion doesn't mean to feel bad for someone on the other side of the world and pray that they'll be okay. That's a great starting point, but if that's all you've done, you haven't actually shown compassion. Compassion means to suffer with them, or, to use a biblical phrase, "to bear one another's burdens, and so to fulfill the law of Christ". It's not just a suggestion of Christ, but a command, to show compassion, which means actually doing something to show that person that you are walking with them in times of strife.

Now, I'm in no way suggesting we just let the tax payer dollars pay for these people's needs until they (if they can ever) go home. If the general, non-Christian population of this country doesn't want to help, I'm not expecting them to. They have a right not to. 

All I'm asking of the U.S. government is to let these people into our nation. From that point onward, I'm calling out American Christians to put their considerable amounts of money, time, and resources where their mouths are and to step up in an act of faithful obedience to our call to serve the poor and needy (I'm not assuming that every Christian in America is in a place to do this, but I do think every Christian in America should be trying to figure out how they can).

I spent just a few weeks working with Afghani and Pakistani refugees in Rome last year, making friendships and hearing heartbreaking stories, and just that little bit of interaction has brought this current crisis very close to home for me. I met some truly extraordinary men who had simply been put in circumstances more extraordinary then they could handle. 

A group of Afghani refugees in a park in Rome that we helped serve a meal to with a local church.

Most had fled from the Taliban, and most had left their families in the relatively safe country of Iran to go and try to find work in Europe. Whether that was the most loving thing for them to do for their families or not is not what I want to comment on, but rather I'd like to highlight how brave and self-sacrificing they were to attempt a journey like that. My heart broke for each man I met, and if I felt free to do so, I would go back tomorrow and spend more time with them, trying to learn their language and culture and trying to help them help themselves and their families. 

However, with where I feel God calling me in my life right now, I can't just hop on a plane and go to Greece or Turkey to help out like I want to, and like many of my friends are. BUT, if these human beings, made in the image of God, have the chance to come to my neighborhood, you can bet your britches I will be trying as hard as I can to help them to feel welcomed and loved in this time of overwhelming transition.

"Do unto others as you would have done unto you" is a really simple guideline for showing love. All it requires to utilize is a small amount of empathy, and then you'll know if you're actually showing love in a Biblical way. If you can put yourself in someone else shoes, then you know how to treat them and how best to serve them.

So, to summarize my rant, I really really really want to help and I am pissed off that there are so many people who claim to share the same God and the same values as me that are asking our politicians to keep me from being able to help. 

To those people I have only this to say...please, shut up and let them come. 

"Let the little children come unto me."

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This was mostly copied from a Facebook rant I made, only to realize it was pretty long and that I hadn't posted to my blog in awhile. For a brief update on how my missionary schooling is going: It's hard but almost over. Over Christmas break I'll probably finish my update about my outreach in Africa. I haven't had time to finish that because of my current business with my coursework. After that I will hopefully have some exciting news about where I am headed next in my missions work.

Biblical Principles for Transforming Nations: One Last School

Hello, dear friends and supporters. I have returned home from my BSN outreach in Africa. It was a very challenging and life changing experience, and unlike with my DTS, I will actually write a full blog post summarizing my Africa trip, because it was shorter and less personally transformational. It was personally transformational, just not on the scale of my DTS outreach (I think that's pretty common for YWAM secondary schools).

However, this is not that blog post. This is about my immediate future. My extremely immediate future.

On Sunday, September 27th I am returning to Madison for one last Bible school before hopefully joining staff with YWAM there. The school is called Biblical Principles (or Perspectives) for Transforming Nations (heretofor referred to as BPTN).

The BPTN 12 week course that focuses on how the Bible has affected the world throughout histroy, and what the Bible has to say about each facet of society, such as education, science and technology, civil government, media, and more. It requires having done a BSN or another YWAM Bible Core Course, such as the School of Biblical Studies (SBS). It has an optional 3 months outreach to a location that is as of yet undertermined, but as of right now it does not look like I will be doing that for various reasons.

One of the reason I think God has called me to do this school (I didn't just decide to jump into another intense school 10 days after BSN, that was His decision) is because long term I believe I am called to staff DTS, and I think that the BPTN will have answers to many worldview questions many DTS students have, especially in terms of the Bible's relevance today. How can a collection of ancient documents, some of which are over 4000 years old, have anything to do with modern life? Well, I intend to find out so that I can help other people find out the same things.

"So, how can I help?" That is a great question! Well, as of right now, I have 505 dollars to my name, and the school costs 3500 dollars (that's including the 8 books they are ordering for me that I'll be reading during the school and then getting to keep forever after that). However, I believe this is the first time I am publicly announcing that I'm even doing the school. I can't remember if I ever even made a Facebook status about it. Bascically, I applied months ago, but was only accepted a few days before I left for Nigeria, so I was very busy and forgot to announce on here that I'm doing the school, and that is why I am so behind in finances.

So, time for the prayer requests...

- Finances: I need 3000 dollars, ideally in 7 days. It sounds impossible, but I've seen God provide a lot more in a lot less time. I'm not worried about it at all, becuase I am 100 percent sure God has called me to do this school, so I know He will provide. I just don't know how. So if you cannot support me financially, please be praying that others will, and that opporotunities for me to share my ministry goals and needs would be opened. 

- Focus and Patience: The BPTN sounds like a very hard school. As I shared, there are 8 books we'll be reading, plus daily homework, research papers, and a big research project where we will come up with a specific area of society we would like to see changed, and then come up with an actual plan that we will inact after the school is over to start to make that change happen. All of this is happening in just 12 short weeks, so I imagine it will be very fast paced and very stressful. I'm excited, but apprehensive. Please remember to occasionally pray for me to have focus and patience over the course of the school. 

- More Students: As of right now, there's just 4 students, and two of them are current YWAM Madison staff. I believe this school has a lot to offer, and I know there a lot of YWAMers out there who have done a BSN or SBS and have things in society they wish they could change, but they don't know how. Well, if you're out there and reading this, please pray hard about doing this school. I've talked to a lot of people who did the last one, and others who are familiar with it, and it sounds like a really transformational school. I know there's only a week left, but doing crazy reckless things for God is kind of the name of the game in the missions field. So please pray, you never know what God might have you do. 

So, there's that update. I leave again in a week. Until then, I hope to see as many of my friends in the Twin Cities as I can, and I hope to do as much fundraising as I can. Somewhere in there I will try to squeeze out a blog post containing a summary of my BSN outreach, but until then, thank you so much for reading and praying!

God's Blessings,

Chris Hickey

The Last Post Before Outreach

If the title didn't clue you in, this will be my last post before outreach. I won't be bringing my laptop with, so I probably won't be doing any blog updates in the 7 weeks I'm there.

HOWEVER, I have made a Mail Chimp e-mail list, which will allow me to send out mass e-mail updates to specific groups. If you would like to be added to an e-mail update list, send me your e-mail address on Facebook or e-mail me at christopherpaulhickey@yahoo.com (because of some weird Yahoo policy, the first update I send may show up as spam and you'll have to un-spam it or something, according to Mail Chimp's website). The updates will be shorter than my average blog post, and may just be a prayer request, or a short story of something cool I saw or did, or something I recently learned. I'll still have this blog for a bigger update every once and awhile though.

Now that that's out of the way: We leave for Nigeria this Wednesday (tomorrow). As I write this, it is less than 48 hours away. I've paid off all my outreach fees, the visas arrived yesterday, and I'm mostly packed. I am at this point extremely excited and ready to leave ASAP!!!

I spent all yesterday deep cleaning the kitchen (wiping and scrubbing every surface, organizing pots and pans and oils, cleaning after dinner) as one part of our massive "Leave the building looking better than we found it" movement. It was actually pretty fun, even if it was suuuuuuper grimy. The building is looking pretty spick and span, but we're finishing the last few projects today.

It's starting to feel kind of empty around here. Quite a few people who were living here are not going on outreach. Some are going to college, some back home to work for awhile before their next big move in ministry, and some aren't sure what's next. But it seems every day someone else leaves. That's another reason I can't wait to leave for outreach...this unusually quite building is a constant reminder that the lecture phase is over, and people are moving on.

I really don't have a lot of time to add much more, other than some prayer requests. On every outreach team, mine included, we still have some students who don't have all their money yet. Some are still trusting God for thousands of dollars (although not everyone is leaving this Wednesday, some teams don't leave till Saturday). Please pray for God to release those finances for those who are still in need. Prayers of thanksgiving would also be appreciated for our visas finally arriving and for the money that has come in already would be appreciated. And lastly, one of my outreach team members, Glori, is headed back home to Tanzania today with her sister Asifiwe. It was cheaper for them to go home for a few days and then get flights within continent to their respective outreach locations (plus they wanted to see their family again before their next big adventure). Please pray for safe travels for them, and that all the money they need would arrive in time for them to join us on outreach.

Other than that, please just continue to pray that the hand of the Lord would be over our whole team as we travel about a country that none of us know much about, and we prepare to carry the intense responsibility of teaching God's word to hundreds of people! I'm sooooo excited!!!

If I had more time, I'd go on and talk about the last few weeks of the school. However, I will say this: We made it! We read through the whole Bible in 4 months. None of us are experts, obviously, and each teaching left us with more questions about the book than we had beforehand. However, I think that's kind of the point. They wanted to make us into life long learners, and they succeeded. I want to keep studying the Bible and continue to learn all I can from it's pages.

I have learned so much already, but it's just a sliver of what each of the 66 books has to offer. And now I'm ready to go share what I have learned with others, who will in turn share it with others, who will in turn change their nations! That's the beauty of Word.

God's Blessings,

Chris

URGENT PRAYER REQUEST: Battle With Us For Our Nigeria Outreach

Hello all! This is not a full update. We just had an outreach team meeting, and I just wanted to share some of what came out of it and ask for prayer regarding our preparation process for outreach.

Basically, we are still applying for our Nigerian visas, and the process has been much, much more complicated and upsetting than it needed to be. There has been a ton of communication error, dropped calls, unclear instructions, that sort of thing.

Also, while none of us have all of our money yet, we have multiple team members who have been seriously struggling financially, and who feel like there is something God is wanting to show them or reveal to them before He releases funds to them, but that they are unable to see clearly what that thing is He is trying to show. They feel like it is being obscured from them somehow, and there's a lot of frustration.

After talking and praying through the situation, we felt as a team that there was a lot of spiritual warfare going on surrounding this outreach. It seems like the enemy is trying really hard to end this outreach before it even begins, because this is a pioneering outreach. No team from our base has ever been to Nigeria. We don't know what to expect, but we do know that when we do go, we'll be laying the groundwork for future BSN teams, either from here or other partner bases of ours.

That scares the enemy a lot, because Nigeria is already in the midst of a huge revival, and in the ten days we're going to be there we have the potential to change THOUSANDS of lives, not just ourselves, but also through the people we will be teaching, who will pass on our Biblical instruction and disciple other new believers, who will in turn disciple others, and so on and so forth.

Basically, we could start another huge wave of Biblical discipleship that goes on for generations.

We're really excited. There's so much potential here. We're running a program that is so influential and useful for changing nations, there's certain countries who have had high up government officials ask YWAM for BELT training for themselves. So the fact that we'll be running the first seminar in Nigeria of many is really exciting, but also a TON of responsibility, and the enemy knows that, and is trying to frustrate us and get us to quit before we make a beachhead in that nation.

So I'm turning to you for prayer. I'm asking that you'll partner with us and pray for a few specific things. Here we go...

- Prayer for finances: All 8 of us in total need about 28,400 dollars for the whole outreach (as well as some that are still paying off lecture fees). Also, many of us have plans immediately following this outreach that will require funds as well, so we'll need those finances now or very soon. On top of that, we'll need to pay for the visas in the next few days, and the plane tickets shortly afterwards. Please pray for that specific amount of 28,400, as well as a more general prayer of future provision for the stuff after the BSN.

- Prayer for confidence: We talked about how we don't have doubts at all that God can and wants to provide for us, but that many of us are for some reason still worrying, which we realized probably has something to do with the enemy sowing seeds of doubt and worry. Many of us have been feeling discouraged and that is not a good place to be in when you're about to pioneer a new ministry. Please pray against any condemning words from the enemy against us, and that God will fill us with confidence and assurance and peace about what we're about to do.

- Prayer for unity: As I've shared before, we are the most diverse team on the school, not only in terms of race and nationality, but of personalities as well. In a high pressure environment, like our outreach will be, it is easy for personalities to clash and for cultural sensibilities to be offended. Please pray against disunity and that we'll be able to love each other, and the people we're teaching, well.

Hopefully I'll be able to put out a bigger update on how classes are going soon. For now I can say we've been going through the Epistles the past few weeks, and it's been REALLY amazing. My theology has been challenged in a lot of ways, and while I haven't made any radical changes, studying the original intent of why Paul wrote Romans or 1 Corinthians has forced me to rethink why I believe what I believe, and if certain verses I've always read as one thing can really mean that, if that makes sense.

Sorry if that's a bit rambling. Like I said, a proper update will hopefully come sometime next week, as my family is coming to visit me this weekend, and the rest of my free time will be going to preparing for a teaching on 2 Peter next Tuesday (the outline is due on this Friday, and yet here I sit writing this update).

Okay, that should be good. Again, prayer for those specific things. Also, for my finances in particular, I have 1500 dollars in my outreach fund here, as well as 500 dollars that was recently pledged to me that should be coming in soon. Praise Jesus! So I will soon have near to half of the 4200 I'll need for outreach.

Thank you so much for reading and praying, and as always, please feel free to contact me on Facebook or e-mail me at christopherpaulhickey@yahoo.com (although I don't check my e-mail very often...Facebook is a MUCH better way to contact me) if you have any questions or encouragements to share.

God's Blessings,

Chris

Halfway Through June

I meant to do a halfway through the school post, but time gets away from me. Sorry.

Here's my outreach team!!!

 From left to right: Arne, P.D. (aka Dad), David (his hair is black now), Yours Truly

Amy (aka Mom), Allie, Kissy, and Glori. We are the largest, as well as the most ethnically and culturally diverse team on the school. David is Chinese-American, Kissy is Korean and black, Allie is from England, and Glori is from Tanzania.

We are a little more then halfway through the school. We have finished reading the entire Old Testament, and in between the Old and New Testaments we had a few days of cross-cultural training and outreach preparation, and a very long but informative day on the Jewish Intertestamental history, with a focus on the Maccabean (Hasmonean) period, and the Roman period.

We read 1 Maccabees 1-10, and it was AWESOME. I'm a little sad it's not in the Protestant Bible's. While I understand it doesn't fit some people's requirements for what qualifies as the inspired word of God, you can clearly see God moving to protect Israel again and again, and you can't really understand the average Jew's worldview in the New Testament if you don't know that part of history. Most people, upon realizing Jesus was claiming to be the Messiah, would have assumed He'd be the next Judas Maccabeus, except without the whole dying in battle thing. 

There's a lot more in 1 Maccabees, and I would assume 2 Maccabees (which tells the same overall story from a less zealous perspective, or so I'm told) that adds to the New Testament story. I would highly recommend finding an Apocryphal Bible and reading that middle chunk that young Protestant children are told to stay away from because it's from the Catholic version of the Bible and therefore isn't really the Bible. 

It's still history, and while some of the other books are slightly less believable (I'm looking at you, "Bel and the Dragon"), they are all still important Jewish texts, and will add to your understanding of the Jewish mindset at the time of Jesus.

Class time!

Let's see, what else have I done the past few months...oh yeah, prophet study! We were all assigned a minor prophet to study in depth and eventually give a 30 minute teaching on. I was assigned Habakkuk. At first it seemed a daunting task. The longest speech I'd ever given was 10 minutes back in Speech class senior year of high school, plus Habakkuk is only 3 chapters, that's a whole 10 minutes per chapter! However, I quickly discovered it was going to be difficult to summarize what I wanted to say in just 30 minutes (it was ONLY 10 minutes per chapter).

My original outline was 4 pages long, and had literally everything I could possibly find about the book of Habakkuk. There's probably enough information on that thing to give a 2 to 3 HOUR teaching on the book if I had enough time to prepare. Seriously, if you haven't recently (or ever) read that tiny, short, funny sounding book sitting snugly between Nahum and Zephaniah, go do so now. I fell in love with it. 

We also went camping! Our cross cultural training week was supposed to be during our camping trip, but we ended up leaving 2 days early because there was a storm that destroyed half our tents. However, the Friday - Monday that we were there was a ton of fun! I got the worst sunburn of my life (I could not even reach my own shoulders the next day to apply my own Aloe Vera, I had to get friends to put it on me because it was so painful) for spending to much time shirtless on the beach on a sunny Saturday, but it was worth it, because we had a ton of fun.

Credit for Camping Photo's goes to my dear friend Laura, who photographs everything now that she has a smart phone for the first time. We've all been there Laura, it's okay. 

 Lunch around the campfire!

 Worship around the campfire!

 Class under the pavilion at the beach! A few hours later we'd see THE storm role in, wait for it to pass, and then head back to camp to find everything busted. We headed home that same afternoon.

The "WeatherMaster" got mastered by the weather. 

The Tuesday after we came back (we were still supposed to be camping) was declared The First Annual Madison BSN Ugly Day, as a way to continue the fun and games in spite of having to come home early. I will share a class photo here. 

WARNING: MAY CAUSE GAGGING AND/OR WEEPING. VIEW AT YOUR OWN RISK. VIEWER DISCRETION IS ADVISED. 

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Here you go

Pretty bad, huh?

Our winner was Meagan, the girl on the far right next to me. She clipped off some of her own hair and glued it to her armpit as an added affect. The runner up was Noah, on the far left, who throughout the day continually splashed water on his crotch, rubbed charcoal on his face, and waxed his beard, so he'd look more feral. 

You can't tell in this picture, but I actually shaved off half my mustache and drew in a new curly one with eyeliner. After the competition was over, I shaved off my whole mustache and sideburns, and a few days later my whole beard. I am now (relatively) clean shaven. 

Just this past weekend we did a fundraiser/local outreach at the Madison farmers market by the capitol building. We made a ton of homemade Arnold Palmer Ice Tea (Ice Tea and Lemonade mixed), and handed out free cups to thirsty passers by. We all made Facebook events and asked for people to pledge a certain amount of money per cup (we put a limit on handing out 1000 cups). Some of my friends made over 2000 dollars in one afternoon handing out free lemonade! 

 Some of our lovely servers!

Meagan was on fire. I think she must have handed out half of our cups by herself!

I didn't get any pledges per cup, but I did get a few people asking how they could donate in other ways, and besides, it was a lot of fun and we got to bless a lot of people, so it was super worth it! I got to chat with some homeless people and it made me miss San Francisco :') Plus I think I may have signed up for a local philosophy club while talking to these two older guys about what I was doing. They had some kind of a sheet, and I put my email on it to get back in contact with them. We'll see.

That's all for now. As always, thanks so much for reading and please consider donating towards my outreach with either the GoFundMe button on the side of the blog, or by contacting me on Facebook or email (christopherpaulhickey@yahoo.com). Our outreach budget is being finalized, and with tickets it's looking to be between 4000-4500 dollars, and we leave in a month and a half. I have at least a thousand dollars in donations already, and little bit helps! Thanks again!

God's Blessings,

Chris

Where Am I Going For Outreach?

First things first: I am going to Nigeria and Tanzania!

Now that that's out of the way, here's everything else that's been going on.

The past month has been jam packed with Biblical knowledge and spiritual goodness. After our week on hermeneutics, we dove in to Genesis for a week, which was the longest we've spent on a book since then. Job, Exodus, and Leviticus were the next week (Job is thought to have lived at the time of Abraham, which is why we did that one so out of order), and after was a week on Numbers and Deuteronomy.  We then did Joshua, Judges, Ruth, and First and Second Samuel. That's right, we did a book a day (kind of: Ruth we did in one class period because of time constraints). And this past week was spent all on 1 and 2 Kings.

On our own we've also read through Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, Song of Solomon, Isaiah, and most of Psalms. We read through each book ahead of the time we study it in class so we have time to figure out what we don't understand about the book and are ready to ask questions and be engaged in class.

A big part of how we do our studying is with our reading groups. We all have groups of four students that read through our daily Bible assignments together. There's usually an hour and a half to two hours worth of reading. We have these cool Bibles that have God's text in red, the narrator in black, the main character of each story in green, and all the supporting characters in blue. So we each pick a part and read it as a narrative, instead of a wall of text. It's been fascinating, especially for the more story oriented books like Joshua, Judges, or 1 and 2 Samuel. We try to have fun and do interesting voices (we tried to rap a couple of the Psalms as well), and we often get sidetracked talking about the motivations of the characters. It makes it feel so much more real and understandable when you do it like this, and I'm enjoying it immensely.

My daily schedule goes like this. Shower, breakfast, class, break, class, lunch, class, reading group, homework, dinner, dinner cleanup, finish homework, and if I have time I socialize a bit before going to bed. So the only reason I am having time to post this update is because I have a long weekend and I am sitting in a coffee shop. I actually started writing this update almost 3 weeks ago, but I kept getting sidetracked.

So...Africa! Long story short is they revealed a few weeks ago that for outreach we'd be splitting in to 4 teams. They would all be going to different places in Tanzania for the second half of outreach, but there were 3 different countries and 4 different locations for the first half. Two teams would be going to two different villages in The Democratic Republic of Congo - DRC - and doing teaching seminars. 1 team would be going to Swaziland to do a different seminar. And then the last team would be going to Nigeria.

Nigeria instantly stood out to me. For one, they speak English there. Another thing is that our ministry will mostly be in big cities (I have had a heart for city ministry since my DTS in San Francisco). There was lots of other things that seemed cool, but the last one I'll mention here is that we'll be heading a revival (at the time I just knew we were participating, but I recently found out we'll be the main speakers). After much prayer, and some trusted individuals confirming to me that Nigeria would be an excellent fit, I declared to my leaders that I would be going to Nigeria.

So that's exciting.

The estimated cost for the outreach is looking like four to five thousand dollars. It isn't finalized yet because the teams were just decided a few weeks ago, but I will try to keep everyone updated on here or at least on Facebook.

I want to express my immense gratitude to everyone who has supported me thus far with money or with prayer. I've been having an amazing time, and I wouldn't be able to be here without you.

Thank you, and God's Blessings

Chris

I AM SO BUSY

I AM SO BUSY

Seriously though, this BSN thing is nuts. They have to keep reminding us that, yes, it is a college course, because we constantly have homework.

Let me back up.

This place is really nice. We're in the middle of a bunch of farmland about 20 minutes outside of Madison at the TC (Training Center...YWAM loves their acronyms), and while it is beautiful and relaxing, it also makes me feel very isolated, especially in comparison to my DTS. In San Francisco, I was in the heart of the city. It was impossible to get away from people. Here? The only people are the people I live with, and if I need to get away, I have headphones and a big backyard with a nice swing.

The city of Madison is gorgeous. I've gone in a few times now. The first full day here, the Saturday before Easter, we all bused in to town to do a bit of a photo scavenger hunt and to see the YWAM Madison downtown base (they have an acronym for that too, but I can't remember what it is). I also went downtown to State Street, which is between the UW campus and the capitol, to watch the NCAA championship match. It was raining and the streets were packed with drunk college students. It was a wild night right up until the saddening end (GO BADGERS!).

But about the school: We will be going through the whole Bible once in 4 months. However, the first week of teaching was all about worldviews. We learned about the lenses with which people (including ourselves) see everything in life, and how those can affect, specifically, their understanding or approach to the Bible. This week is all about exegesis and hermeneutics, e.i. how to study the Bible in it's original context and then how to apply what we learn from that to our lives in modern times.

When I said I was SO BUSY, it was because I had just gotten assigned a word study on Timothy and Ephesus. So all last evening I was using a concordance to find and list every time Timothy is mentioned in the Bible (far more than I thought) and any time the city of Ephesus or the Ephesians are mentioned. The goal was to get a better understanding of Paul and Timothy's relationship, and since 1 and 2 Timothy are addressed to Timothy while he's in Ephesus, we also wanted to learn about the state of the church there.

It took awhile.

We've been told to expect at least 3 hours of homework due the next day each night, with week long assignments that will take a bit longer. After this week, we'll be going chronologically through the whole Bible. I'm a little apprehensive, but extremely excited.

Prayers for focus and self control would be greatly appreciated. This is my very first college level course (not counting Psych 101 and American History 101 my senior year of high school, which were pretty easy), and if I'm honest with myself I never developed a great work ethic high school. I have a hard time sitting for hours at a time pouring over one topic. As much as this will be a time of gaining knowledge, it will also, hopefully, be a time of character building.

Well, I should go now. We have a relatively light workload tonight - we are trying to find a one sentence summary of the purpose Paul had for writing 1 Timothy, and then finding half a dozen major points and summarizing how they relate to said purpose - and I want to take advantage of that by getting it out of the way now so I can relax and socialize a bit after dinner. My guess is it'll only take me a little over and hour.

As always, please share this link and the link to my GoFundMe (on the left side of the page!). Outreach locations won't be decided for awhile, so I'm not sure exactly how much I'll need, but I'd guess at least a thousand more dollars, especially when I have to find plane tickets.

The focus is still on The DR Congo and Tanzania (we have two students and one staff from Tanzania who want to start up a BSN in their country when they finish this school!), but because we have so many people, Uganda is another place I heard we might be going. I will update on here the moment I find out where I'm going!

Okay, that seems like a pretty good first update! Thank you all so much for your interest and support!

God's Blessings,
Chris

Just To Clarify...

So I'm not going to beat around the bush, as some of you have already heard about this and the rest should just hear it from him: Mark has left the BSN. He went home late on Easter night, and so I asked him to write something about it so I didn't have to run the risk of misrepresenting the situation.

Without further ado...

***

In the past few months I had been gearing up to do the YWAM Madison BSN I do feel that I was led there and I know God had things to reveal to me in that time I was there. When I arrived I felt that something was wrong, I didn't just feel it I experienced it.

I felt as if I wasn't wholly there. I was afraid to admit to myself that I wasn't sure if I was supposed to be there anymore. So I began to seek God and find what else he had for me, he pointed back home and at this point I came to a cross roads.

On looking back home I saw my relationship with my girlfriend, a relationship I believe has been set by the Lord. I saw my current situation in the BSN not as a danger to my relationship but more as a hindrance. God gave us each other to peruse Him more powerfully and to minister to those around us in a more complete picture of who Christ is.

I believe I didn't feel complete because although I can grow in Christ alone I also had the opportunity to grow together. Put extremely simply it was up to me what I would do with God. Grow with Him in the BSN and get everything he had for me there or return and nurture my relationship with my future wife. He wanted me to prioritize and fully follow whichever path I chose, both with trials and rewards. So I chose togetherness over self-development.

I think all too often we as Christians seek for some sort of voice from heaven to tell us exactly what to do next and although there’s nothing exactly wrong with that it can breed uncertainty and it’s easier to worship the plan rather than the planner. I think Christ gives us free range to pursue things we love and he blesses our actions and our boldness.

Even if we make the wrong choice Christ doesn't abandon us. Even when Adam and Eve sinned Christ did not immediately destroy them, he picked them up, clothed them, blessed them with children, and long life. As I had said before Christ had things to show me at the BSN, and to be completely honest I don’t know if I did the right thing or not. However, I am confident in the goodness of Christ, and I just have to trust that in my efforts to follow His will He will continue to reveal Himself to me and bless me with a deeper understanding of His word.

I am also genuinely sorry for any confusion about what I’m doing. I’m acutely aware that I do not live in a vacuum and whatever I do will affect others. I pray that any trust that has been broken down in me or Christ can be rebuilt over time. Thank you all so much for the support and prayers in this confusing time.

- Mark

And We're Off!

In less then an hour Mark and I will be one our way to Madison, er, Columbus (the location was changed because the Madison facilities didn't have enough room for all the students!) Wisconsin.

Instead of written updates, Mark and I are planning on doing video updates. I wish I could say they'll be weekly, but I don't trust either of us to be that on point with our scheduling, especially at the beginning. I'll be posting the videos on my YouTube channel and linking them here, and then putting this blog link on Facebook.

PLEASE be praying for us on this trip, but especially this weekend as we are adjusting to a whole new group of people and as we are away from our family's for Holy Week (again). I don't know where Mark was last Easter, but he was either in England or Amsterdam, and I was in Rome.

Anyway, I have to go over my packing list one last time and then my dad and I are off to pick up Mark and his father for a double father/son road trip!

Thanks so much to everyone who has supported us thus far with finances and prayer. Please remember to share the link to our GoFundMe, which is on the left side of this page.

Thanks again.

And again.

I'm gonna go now...

God's Blessings,
Chris

My Next Big Thing (Plus DTS Outreach Video!)

It's been a few months since I last posted on here. Oops. How time does fly! I apologize for that. I really did intend to update more frequently, but life keeps happening and I'm so easily distracted...

Example A: I intended to write this big long post about how I was accepted into the Bible School for the Nations (BSN) with YWAM in Madison, Wisconsin, but I can't really think of what to say other than that. If you want to know how I decided to do this school, you can ask me, because there's a lot of personal experiences that led up to it, and I can't really put it all in writing very well. All I'm going to say is I very strongly felt the call of God to go here, and now I am going here, and it's all very exciting!

So I'm just going to explain what the BSN is and then I'm going to put a link to a video I made of my DTS Outreach in Italy. I could have sworn I posted this video on here ages ago, but it doesn't look like I did. So, two birds, one stone, all that. Okay, here goes...