Him We Proclaim

Here's an update on the Hunter bunch: Patrick turned 22 months on the 18th! It's hard to believe he'll be 2 so soon. His favorite things in the world revolve around BALLs: basketBALLs, basketBALL hoops, footBALLs, drawing basketBALLs and footBALLs, drawing basketBall hoops, playing BALLs with Mommy or Daddy, or imagining he's playing a BALL sport. It's amazing his continued love and focus on sport (he's been hooked on Basketball since June). His favorite food is pizza or anything with marinara sauce. He also is excellent at speaking and today said "Wow Mommy, the bubble landed on the bubble wand." He now sleeps in a big boy bed and loves sneaking into our room in the morning. He's also still potty training, which goes well until other things are more appealing then the Elmo potty. He's such a bundle of energy, joy, laughter, and imagination! Jonathan turned 25 this month. He has now entered the realm of true adulthood since he can r...

We recently started hosting Pie and Movie nights where we watch a short film entitled The Road Home.  This is an amazing tool as it depicts Pico (the son of an Indian diplomat who spent his childhood in England and is then placed in a boarding school in India) as he struggles to make since of his unsorted identity. He runs away from the boarding school and hops in a cab to head back to England. Through his encounters with a funny Indian cab driver and a french woman who wishes to be Indian, Pico tries to make since of his Indian looks and British "insides."  We follow up the 20 minute film with a discussion on TCKs and what it looks like to grow up somewhere other than your parent's passport country and one day plan to return to your parents' "home." We talk about culture, culture shock, re-entry, and the excellent advantage TCKs can have. It is really neat to watch people begin to understand half of the students we'll be ministering to in Costa Ric...

Surrounded by political tensions and division among Christians, I find that our main goal in life is unchanged: Love God, Love People. Whatever God is doing in your life and wherever he is leading, the individual circumstances do not change the driving force in the life of the Christian. If we aren't pouring our lives out for God and others, what are we doing? What are you doing in life that really matters? Francis Chan has said that  “Our greatest fear should not be of failure but of succeeding at things in life that don’t really matter.”  It is easy for me to get caught in a Christian bubble. Church becomes a social club and I can cease to interact with the world around me. One of the principal reasons I've taken a job at Starbucks is that even while Maggie and I follow the leading of the Spirit to go to Costa Rica, we still have the ultimate call of the Christian to love people. My job allows me to love hurting people in a purposeful way that opens doors for talking ab...

Yesterday we completed our ReachGlobal Pre-field Training! Our 8 week online training culminated in an 8 day classroom setting training. We covered everything from cross cultural communication to world view to culture shock. We had a great time catching up with RG staff from prior training as well as getting to know other new missionaries. This was our last ReachGlobal required training session. Afterwards we spent time with ReachGlobal's MK person. Four and a half hours of going through resources and hearing her insight on Third Culture Kids and MKs in particular was extremely encouraging for Maggie and I. It was very confirming for us that we are doing what the Lord is having us do. We have such a heart for working with students, especially globally nomadic ones!

Last week we got to take a day off and go have some fun outside! Here are a few pictures!  That's right--sliding down a waterfall! Miami Baby! Photos taken by Jean-Marc Dinghin

I recently had a conversation with a friend that brought to light one of the biggest dilemmas we're facing in preparation for Costa Rica: humanitarian aid vs. spiritual support Honestly when you think about it, our ministry has got to be one of the most non-humanitarian fields to raise support: - We're going to a second world country (not third) that is known for its beaches, tourism, and adventurous activities -We're going to work with missionary kids. Yes, kids who's parents love the Lord, teach His Word, and are in full-time ministry. -We're not specifically working with Costa Ricans-- though an increasing number of Costa Ricans attend the youth group because it's a great place to work on their English -We're not going with the intention of training a Costa Rican to do the ministry-- we're working with mostly TCKs, who want someone who can relate to the cultural tension they face. (side note: we have an incredible Costa Rican adult ...

On Labor Day weekend, Jonathan and I were finally  able to celebrate our anniversaries-- yes that was supposed to be plural and with the emphasis on finally! Our first anniversary was celebrated in the hospital with a 2 day old, and our second anniversary had a dinosaur theme (Patrick's 1st B-day party)... so we finally set aside time to celebrate and do something fun together: We took white water kayaking lessons! It was such a blast to learn this new sport and to now be able to go out and do it ourselves. We spent one day learning how to roll (or I spent it trying to learn) and the second day we went out on the Tuckaseegee River in North Carolina. Our coach/guide, Roger Huff, did an excellent job. We learned so much and had a blast playing in the rapids. They were a fun 2 days! Our 2 1/2 years of marriage have been the farthest thing from easy. We started our first 2 months of marriage living in Ecuador. Two months later, pregnancy hormones kicke...

Everything has been going well here down South. Yesterday I had my first day at my new job: A barista at Starbucks! We don't receive any type of salary yet from the gifts you send, so the main purpose of getting a job is to be able to eat and to continue in our giving. It is also an excellent way to connect with lost people. So far I enjoy my co-workers and supervisors, and the work is fun. Tonight I'm helping with a ropes course at Perimeter church here in Duluth, and I'm pretty excited about that as well. Patrick started potty training this week (some of you readers will be interested to know), and has an Elmo starting potty. As Elmo is one of Patrick's favorite things, he always gets super excited to go.  At the end of this week Maggie and I will be celebrating our 1st and 2nd anniversaries. We were in the hospital for the first one, and the second one was squeezed out by Patrick's 1st birthday celebration, and our move out of our apartment.  So we're pret...

In accordance with the Deuteronomy 6 commands and exhortations to keep the Word on my mind at all times, I try and listen to a lot of sermons during the week, where a Bible passage is exegeted and applied. My favorites remain John Piper , Alistair Begg , and James MacDonald  (although I'm going to start listening more to Tim Keller as well). But I hadn't listened to a lot of worship music. Part of this is because of when doing my internship at a camp back in '09, worship music was played as background music during meals, and pretty much during any part of the day. I'm against this, as I've found that it became easy to "tune out", and inevitably even "zone out" even during church while people are worshiping God. What a tragedy! Recently, however, decided that I needed new music with which to express my worship for God. I bought, and recommd the Passion 2012 White Flag album. It's reviving to worship with sing new songs. It's so important ...

Are you in transition of any sort? Is the Spirit leading you to a new place, in or out of a relationship, starting or leaving a job, starting of finishing school, having a child or losing a loved one? If you followed our blog over the last year and a half, you know that we are well versed in transition. To sum it up, it looks something like this: 12/09 Finish School 1/10 Jonathan to Ecuador for 6 wks 2/10 We got married 3/10 Back to Ecuador for Maggie's internship 5/10 Back to the US, start temporary jobs 6/10 Move to GA for a month, work on my father-in-laws campaign, Find out we're pregnant 7/10 Back to Ohio, start training for new job w. University 2/11 Patrick born, my grandmother has a stroke, my mom comes back to the US 3/11 Sense that God is leading us out, start application with the mission 5/11 Move out of duplex, not sure how long missions application will take--live with friends 8/11 Travel to Costa Rica--accepted as youth leaders by AMCA 9/11 Move into...

I haven't watched much of the Olympics this year. But I was recently able to watch Track and Field's 100m race. The speed of these Olympians amazes me. What baffles me is that they spend 4+ years training for a race that only last 10 seconds. In a fraction of a minute, they either won gold or lost. They don't have a chance to do it again. All have to wait 4 more years to get the opportunity to prove themselves as worthy of the gold. It made me think of this temporal life in light of eternity. I know Jonathan shared a video on the blog a while back about  this , but I was reminded of this again. Olympians have one purpose, to win the gold, and they push themselves towards it. They spend hours at the gym and restrict their diets. As Christians, we have one purpose: to glorify God. You either love Christ or you don't. You either glorify God with your life or you don't. It isn't just 4 years, it's a whole lifetime that we strive for just this...

We recently went to visit Country Christian EFC in Scotts, Michigan. They warmly welcomed us to present in 2 services and gave us a great opportunity to share during their Sunday School hour a biographical history of missions and the 8 shifts in missions. It was wonderful in every way to see a church that understands their responsibility in missions and is genuinely excited about the ministry we're a part of in Costa Rica. Here is a really cool story from our trip: During our presentation, we showed our short video that defines a Third Culture Kid (TCK): someone who grew up in a country other than their parent's passport country. TCKs fit into a neither/nor culture.... they are neither fully a part of their parent's culture nor the one in which they were raised. We do this so that people can identify with the importance of the youth group as being a place where TCKs feel like they belong. Belonging-- one barrier down, now we can work on the other struggles of teens. A...

Some friends invited us out to ride horses this morning--how could I say no?! We were trail riding in Hueston Woods State Park!  Matt (grey horse) was always ready to go.

It's hot. Just putting that out there. The temp in the car read 103 today. But that's news to nobody. Some of you have been praying that we would make a deadline the beginning of this month of 50% of our monthly support--we were accepted into the October conference with 47.5%, a lot of relief, and a some guilt on my part for worrying about it so much. Overall, I actually was relaxed about the whole thing, but there wasn't a total dependence on God. I prayed that He would hear us. I asked for His favor, I placed everything in His hands--but then I think in some way, I took it back right at the last minute. Some of you will be thinking, 'now, don't be so hard on yourself, we're not all perfect!' Agreed. But we all know that there are different kinds of guilt. This wasn't me being hard on myself; it was one of those conviction-in-the-form-of-guilt moments. I know it was from the Holy Spirit. And I was actually really grateful for it. It was gentle. It ...

Last week we attended a conference in Minneapolis that focused on planting churches cross-culturally. Though this is is not what we'll be doing in Costa Rica, there were still several concepts that are applicable to our ministry to the students. First off, the idea of multiplication. In church planting, there are 3 different kinds of churches. One is where a pastor stays at the church and is eventually replaced when he retires. The second kind is where the church plants another church. The third kind is where the church plants a church, and then the church plants another church that plants another church. See this diagram to get the idea... For the youth group, the idea of multiplication is in discipleship. If we equip the students to disciple others, and then have the discipled student disciple another student and the discipler another; an unstoppable force is created where students are maturing in Christ! The second application from the conference was the "3 Greats...

I recently heard about the discovery of the largest diamond in the world. It was discovered by the inspector towards the front of the mine. The workers had walked past this 3016K diamond everyday! Diamonds are made when pure carbon is put under extreme pressure. Diamonds aren't found in a form that you would want to wear on your finger or propose with. It takes a skilled cutter to get the diamond just right. We'll I'm not here to teach you about diamond, but I am here to tell you about our happenings. We're under a great deal of pressure to have 50% of our monthly funds pledged by the end of the month. Achieving this goal would allow us to be in Costa Rica by the end of the year. Not reaching 50% means we wouldn't be able to be with the students until late next spring. We feel this pressure because we love the students, and we want to be with them ASAP. We also feel the pressure because our lives seem to be on hold as we wait for this next phase. We've s...

Chasing Bubbles First Contact At the end, he kept trying to bath himself with a clean wipe.

On Monday I had the chance to speak at a camp that I first attended 20 summers ago (wow, I feel old)! I started out as a day camper, worked as a counselor, and eventually was over all the program directors. I dedicated every summer either learning the person and character of Jesus Christ or teaching others about Him. It was a blessing to be able to return to a place that holds so many memories. I spoke on John 15:4-8 where Jesus gives the analogy of the vine and branches. I focused on verse 8: " My  Father is glorified by this, that you bear much fruit, and  so   prove to be My disciples" (NASB). Three points stick out: we can glorify God; we glorify God by bearing much fruit; our fruit proves that we are His disciples. I was able to give a very clear gospel presentation with 1 John 4:13-14 which  describes  how we know we abide in Christ (what it takes to bear fruit): " By this we know that we abide in Him and He in us, because He has given us of His...

Life has been pretty crazy around here recently. Final shifts at work, final meetings with Oxford friends, family, and partners, and our final night's sleep in our incredibly lovely bed for the next month. Tomorrow morning we take off to Georgia in a final push to raise our support percentage to 50% by the end of the month. We'll drive down for a two week sprint of meetings and visits before flying up to Minneapolis for about a week. There we'll take a class given by ReachGlobal: Multiplying Churches Globally. We're reading the book for it now (as time permits, and other interests don't interfere), "Global Church Planting" by Gene Wilson. The first chapters were a little dull and filled with 'Christianese' (made up words and terms relevant to the select few who knew what was meant by them to begin with, because their usual definition is not usually what was originally meant anyways), and some of the scripture references were textbook eisegesis, b...

We were bad at taking pictures... so sorry Pamela you missed out on the only one! I just returned from a great weekend with my girlfriends from Samford. I attended Samford from 2005-2007, but I absolutely loved my time there because of my friends. In fact when I was applying to Moody, I stated that I did not want to go there because I loved where I was and what I was doing. We visited my friend Pamela who lives outside of DC. We went to the National Zoo, George Town Cupcakes (which has a show on TLC), worked on our tans (ok, I connected my freckles), and spent most of the time catching up. So much has changed in my life over the past 5 years, yet I've still remained close to these girls. I'm not always the greatest at calling and catching up, but we've persevered. Though we haven't been geographically close in a while and definitely won't be when I move to Costa Rica, I know that these are relationships I want to maintain! A big thanks to ...

I've been really resonating with this. To be painstakingly honest, it's hard to think of spending time developing ministry partners as building into eternity. All I can do though is follow where the Lord's leading, and live as passionately and boldly as I can. I just feel like I need to do something. I'm not saying (and I don't think Francis is either) that we can't enjoy our time here on earth--take a vacation, or enjoy His creation. That's not what I'm saying at all. But to spend the majority of our time and money for that end?? To work hard to make sure that I'm comfortable in my latter years of this life, and relying mainly on a portion of money that I put away to meet my needs?.... I just really, really want to be using the time that is given to me in a way that requires faith , and in a way that clearly points to Christ! And I really want to hear those words: Well Done. I'd love to read your comments and hear where you're at.

After spending a week in Chicago meeting up with old friends, watching Jonathan's sister graduate from Moody Bible Institute, and telling people about our ministry in Costa Rica, we headed up to Portage, WI. A friend from Oxford moved up there to be the senior pastor of an EFCA church, and he invited us to speak about the ministry in Costa Rica. We gladly took him up on the offer to speak with his church and to see our good friends. Little did we know that the weekend would turn out to be so exciting! Our friend ended up going into labor in the middle of the night and had a home birth that morning before we left for church. Welcome to the world  beautiful baby girl! Since our friend couldn't preach, the church asked Jonathan to give a message. Thankfully, he had the notes from the message on Philippians 3 he gave at the youth's campout. All of this turned out to be a huge blessing because the congregation was able to see our love for Jesus and how He's...

We arrived safely in Chicago last night and are staying the first two nights with an old moody friend who I knew back in Ecuador. Today we're at our Moody Bible institute meeting with old professors and friends. Patrick is taking a nap right now in the commons propped back in his umbrella stroller :) Super excited about all of our meetings this week!

Been praying a lot about really loving Jesus. Not just loving who he is or what he's done for me, but really loving the person of Jesus Christ. I find myself in a place of discontentment working on raising support. Like I should be doing more with my life. I don't think this stems from a desire to achieve goals or to prove myself to Him. But rather a genuine desire--a yearning--to really be more like Christ. A Christian. A "little Christ". To spend my time and life in a way worthy of the one who bought it. Because thats what I *want* to do. And I honestly question that much of the time spent making phone calls, writing emails, and just figuring out what to do next is how Christ would spend his time if he were here now. I say "much" because there have most definitely been times of speaking into friend's lives and being poured into be God, but they seem like a minority compared to the months logged under 'support raising'. I just want to live li...

We had an interesting incident recently. I was working a high ropes course out in 'back country' of our town (aka, in the woods behind the park). I was belaying students as they climbed up to the 40ft platform before zipping back down(...on a zipline). About a quarter of the way through the program, a Sheriff's helicopter flew by, low to the ground. Interesting. Normally the only choppers we see in this area are hospital choppers, medivacing severe patients to more sophisticated hospitals and ORs. By the time it circled around, now flying lower, I stated out loud, 'looks like there's a manhunt,' half joking. Everybody laughed. Sure enough the University's emergency text came through that police were hunting an armed gunman (redundant?) and cautioned noble citizens to stay away from that certain part of town, which was about 5 miles away from us. But the helicopter kept on circling the high course. It passed over once, twice, and a third time--now lower than ...

Support raising seems to be a very slow process. You make calls, leave messages, and wait for people to call you back. You send out emails and facebook messages while planning trips, and then you have to wait. How long do you wait before you can call again? How many emails can you send a person asking to get together before you're a nag? It's a waiting game. However, little by little our monthly pledged support keeps rising. It's really encouraging that we're now a quarter of the way there! Jonathan wrote in our last newsletter a way YOU can help us raise the funds to get to Costa Rica by simply searching the internet. Every time you look something up online, one penny gets contributed to our fund by Goodsearch.com. It doesn't sound like a lot, but we've effortlessly generated 50 cents ourselves in a couple of days. If we had more people, that 50 cents could turn into $20 a month and get us one step closer. If you follow these 4 steps, you'll be  contri...

Jonathan belaying a climber on our outdoor trip For the past 4 semesters, Jonathan and I have managed Miami University's Youth Climbing Team (YCT). This is basically an after-school program where climbers, ranging from kindergarten to seniors in high school, come once a week to rock climb and learn new techniques. We've worked with over 50 different climbers over the past 2 years and have been impressed with their climbing ability... many of the climbers are better than the university students we also taught! Today was my last day of coaching, and I must say that I am quite sad to be finished. It's one of those bitter sweet things. I'm sad to stop something I enjoyed so much, but I'm glad for it to be over because it means we're one step closer to going to Costa Rica (or really having more time to work to get there). It wasn't until I had this job at the university that I realized how much I love teaching. I love the moment when students are able to ...

This is Patrick's new favorite word. Hands down. Any time he sees a ball, he exclaims with fresh delight in a high-pitched voice--"Ball! Ball! Ball!" We'll hand him the ball, and he'll toss it, and proceed to point--"Ball! Ball!" If possible, he is even more excited than before. He continues to get more and more excited as he plays with whatever ball he's got. He'll walk around holding the ball, going up to everyone in the room letting them know what he's got--"Ball!!" But it doesn't stop there. Anything round is deserving of the exclamation: Ball!!! Whether it be a wheel, or a Frisbee, they're all balls. He'll stop whatever he's doing just to point and tell you that he sees a ball. Even if he's screaming and crying, balls get first priority. He'll stop, briefly compose himself--"Ball!" But it doesn't even stop there. He'll spot a ball 50 yards away. It gets the same level of attention a...

I wanted to tell everyone more about out time in Costa Rica--specifically about our time at La Cumbre with the Youth Group Campout. On Saturday 3/31 we woke up early: Campout was today!! Students started arriving, and chaos promptly ensued. We loaded all the luggage into an oversized pickup, secured with a tarp, and without much hassle we were off to the IYG's bi-annual campout at the beautiful camp/retreat center, La Cumbre. We had around 80 campers and 10 adults! We loaded in small buses and took off for camp! After a couple hours, we stopped for snacks at a local restaurant called "Chespirito's", a favorite stopping place for many headed to La Cumbre. Fifteen minutes down the road from Chespirito's, most of the kids got out of the buses. The long standing tradition is for them to hike the 7 km (about 4.3 mi) down the steep road, into the valley. At the bottom of the valley, La Cumbre sat serenely inviting the now-sore pilgrim to a hot most desi...