Happy New Year! So much happened in the month of January that this is an extra-long update, with lots of pictures. Hang in there!
As you know, we serve nationally with Cru’s short-term mission department, called the Mission Trip Team. Every January our team hosts a conference to train the coming summer’s mission trip leaders (mostly Cru staff). This year the Summer Mission Team Leaders’ Conference was in New Orleans.
260 of our Summer Mission team leaders came together to get vision, training, resources, and to rub shoulders with others who are doing the same. In addition to giving overall direction and leadership, Scott lead or co-lead five seminar times on the following topics: “Start Here” (an orientation for first-time leaders), Risk and Crisis Management, Reviewing Summer Mission Applications, Mental Health, and Sexual Wholeness. As you can tell, Scott focuses on the people care side of mission trips.
It was wonderful to be able to help and resource so many trip leaders, and to meet them in person. One fun connection was with a student named Clare who attended one of our Thailand trips last year, and was attending this year as a student leader. Last summer Scott received a call from Clare’s trip leader at 4:30 in the morning! She had lost her passport while on a layover in Switzerland and was desperate for help in what to do. Scott invested the time for the situation to be adequately resolved. Apparently she was looking forward to meeting Scott the whole conference to say “thank you” in person!
Scott, Becky, Ethan (and Sarah) were so excited to be back at our annual SoCal student Winter Conference in mid January, especially after not having one on the West Coast for the last three years. It’s a four-day, three-night conference for college students from all over the west. 500 students attended for worship, teaching from God’s word, sharing their faith, and connecting with other students.
As the representative from Cru’s national Mission Trip Team, Scott shared about Summer Mission trips at the main meeting. He also helped with the Festival of Opportunities, where students could explore all the opportunities Cru has for them, from one-week mission trips, to year-long internships, or long-term roles on staff with Cru.
Scott also met with students during the conference that had questions about Cru opportunities. Jonah, a Cal Poly San Luis Obispo student, went on a Cru summer mission trip to Central Asia last summer. He wanted to learn more about an opportunity to go back to Central Asia as a teacher. Cru has a partnership with a missions organization that equips teachers to be evangelistic in their teaching around the world. Scott connected Jonah with the director of Teach with Cru and prayed with him for his future. We love helping students seize opportunities to use how God has made them for His purposes!
Becky really enjoyed the opportunity to connect with other staff moms! One last highlight was the joy of having our own college student, Sarah, bring a few friends from BIOLA for some of the conference!
Thank you for partnering with us to see the name of Jesus glorified among college students in every nation!
Praise & Prayer Requests!
- Praise God with us for the wonderful work he has done through both the Summer Mission Team Leaders’ Conference and SoCal Winter Conference this January!
- Pray for the nearly 300 trip leaders who will take about 1,500 students on faith-filled mission trips this summer!
- Please pray for our sabbatical plans as we prepare for the summer. We want to use the time wisely.
Special Request!
We have been cleared to take our first 90-day sabbatical this summer! We are very excited to recharge, rest, and refocus on Jesus and his purposes for us for the long-haul. We would love to be able to spend some of that time away from home and normal distractions of life. We would like to start planning for our time. If you have access to homes or vacation rentals that you would be willing to share with us, would you please let us know. We would greatly appreciate it!
“All this is from God, who through Christ reconciled us to Himself and gave us the ministry of reconciliation; that is, in Christ God was reconciling the world to Himself, not counting their trespasses against them, and entrusting to us the message of reconciliation.”
– 2 Corinthians 5:18-20
THE SLAMERS 