How did I get here?

I'd like today to share how I ended up with TEN3 in the first place. I sure didn't plan it out!

My story starts with deciding on a college. I was rather anxious about it, as I anticipated that would determine the course of my entire life. Or rather, that it had to be the perfect preparation for what I would do with my life. Except I had no idea what that was. Part of me wanted a career, but doing what, I didn't know. A larger part of me wanted my future to center on marriage, children, and homeschooling, because I saw growing up how precious that is. I was comforted in realizing that, regardless, I would want to go to college just to learn, but again, where to go?
Long story short on that, God told me to go to Wayland. I argued with Him about this-- "I don't want to go to that sheltering local Baptist school my whole family went to! I want to go somewhere to be challenged and spread wings, to really be a light!" Arguing with God is quite an unforgettable experience if you're willing to hear the reply. It came ever so gently, yet still hit me with the force of a speeding cement truck: "I'm God, you're not. You are telling Me how to use you. So I would rather hear you say, 'not my will but Yours be done,' than 'use me.'"

But what was I going to study? Again, I had no idea. I'm very good at almost every subject. I went a year and a half undecided, and finally when the deadline was getting really close when I would have to declare a major, I chose English with a physical science minor. Why? I like them. That's the whole reason. I still didn't know what I wanted to do for a career, so I figured I might as well prepare for it studying something I liked. So whenever I told people my degree, the response was almost always, "so are you going to teach?" My reply was always "no." It was as if there was a wall between me and the education building. There was no explicable reason why, but there was an unavoidable sense that teaching was the wrong way for me to go.

In the next two years I discovered I am particularly gifted at writing, and wanted my job to involve writing somehow. So I thought about working for a periodical, and checked some into freelance and technical writing. Then my senior year, grad school was making a lot of sense. But the more I thought about it, the more frustrated I felt. I didn't understand why, because I loved school, but I did not want to continue on to grad school. Finally, in a conversation with my Mom, I realized why: I couldn't bear the thought of spending the rest of my young, free years pouring more into myself. It was time to serve. I was meant to. The moment I thought I'm going to the mission field was one of the happiest in my life.

Originally, I planned go go with IMB as a Journeyman, but that was 2009, thus the economy had closed that door. I consulted with Dr. Shaw, the missions professor at Wayland, who advised me to look for a way to write for missions. The search tools God gave led me to TEN3. I read one of their job descriptions and thought, I could do that. As I began volunteering with TEN3, I fell in love with the vision. God had been putting long-term service for long-term transformation, detailed evangelism, discipleship, and meeting human needs all on my heart over the previous years, all of which TEN3 does. And all of that I can contribute to with my writing skills and love of learning.

Please pray for my younger sister. She's facing a similar crossroads. Ask that she seek the Lord, and walk in the good and true paths He has for her. May we all trust and not be afraid (Isaiah 12:2).

To make disciples is to tell stories

I wonder sometimes if, amid all I tell about operating systems and curriculum plans and the pictures of a zillion computer cords, I fail to share the real spirit of our workshops--they are very much discipleship events. We talk about what transformation really means, and what it takes to see that transformation happen. It only happens as we walk with Christ, and we won't see transformed society unless the individuals are transformed. And "it begins with me."

For instance, our second day I think in Ndola, Anthony spent nearly the whole morning talking about sharing the Gospel. He talked about how Jesus taught with stories, because our minds don't work like Greek logic, they work with stories. He talked about how it's important to have the whole story, because psychology studies have shown that if the mind doesn't have the whole story, it fabricates. Anthony told the story of the New Tribes mission, which was trying to share the Gospel with as many new people groups as possible. So they would go in, learn the language and gain enough entrance to tell them that Jesus died so that their sins could be forgiven before God and they could have eternal life, and then quickly move on to a new tribe. Well, they would come back and find that the converts weren't living at all as Christians ought to. They had made up the rest of the worldview they hadn't received. So New Tribes sought the Lord, and He replied, "Tell them My story. All of it."

We've learned from this story, which is why the first course we developed along with the computer course, and require to be taken with it, is one that goes through the whole Bible as the story of God's redemption. God works His way past the defenses of our minds, shows us who He is and how He redeems us, with a story. Let's tell the story.

2000 Laptops

I never thought I'd need to know how to tell a computer to commit suicide. But that's the way we described the command to write zeros over the entire the hard drive. Apparently John 12:24 can also apply to machines! After wiping the hard drive, we installed Puppy Linux, the operating system we base our computer training on (see Puppies and Gnomes and eternal Truth for Africa as to why). Now that laptop, and the thirty others we took to Africa, will be used to give practical skills and the word of God to a new student every six months with the Computer Training Outreach. The old laptops that someone no longer considers useful now have new life, and give new life to those who through it learn the whole story of redemption God offers through Christ.

So part of our focus this year will be to raise laptops. And the cool thing is, as teachers make disciples and become discipled themselves by TEN3, more laptops will mean they will be able to spread even more. For instance, we have a contact in Rwanda who wants our CTO there. TEN3 doesn't have the people and resources to send somebody from the US to get things started in Rwanda. But Christie could send one of the people she's training in Nigeria to reach villages as a missionary, with a mobile lab, to do just that.

So that's why we're praying for 2000 laptops to be donated to send to Africa this year. Laptops alone won't make much of any difference in Africa. But laptops with accessible curriculum that gives desired skills as it presents the gospel powerfully, as tools in the hands of people who are growing in the Lord and taught by Him to make disciples, can indeed be the tools by which Christ transforms lives and communities across Africa.

I, Gilbert, Anthony, and Christie setting up the systems

Christie, Fanny, Gilbert, and Beevern practicing with our systems and materials

GLO with hope

If I were a follower of this blog, I would wonder why it takes two weeks for that missionary to post anything after she gets back from a trip. I hope I would understand when she apologized and pleaded that when one gets back, there are family things to see about, stacks of mail and e-mail to deal with, reports to type, receipts to submit, pictures to share and sort ... it goes way beyond that jet lag thing!

But, enough excuses. JennyBeth, here reporting. A good initial overview from our trip can be found on my newsletter, which I also just finished today (see my newsletter archives page). 

We basically held five seminars in the two and a half weeks we were in Zambia. First was an intro seminar in Lusaka. An "Intro Seminar" is how we acquaint people with TEN3 and how they can offer a CTO to make disciples using computer training. (If you're confused by the acronyms, see my FAQ page.) Then we headed north to Ndola and stayed there for a week and a half to do two intro seminars. Over the weekend, we went to a city called Kitwe where Christie and I gave our first-ever Mothers and Media seminar. The last few days were spent back in Lusaka, where we did some computer setup, meeting with potential partners, and a second Mothers and Media seminar. I'll try to explain more about all those (with stories and pictures!) in separate posts in the upcoming weeks.

But where I'd like to start is the ministry that housed us in Ndola. In the midst of the polluted and historically exploited Copperbelt, there is a ministry that GLOs. GLO stands for Gospel Literature Outreach. It is a seven-month program for students who just finished secondary school. It teaches them servant leadership, Bible, and other topics to prepare them for university and adult life. I really enjoyed eating and worshiping with those kids. They reminded me so much of my own teen years in youth group.

Some pictures from around GLO:

The cabin where Christie and I stayed. We shared the left-hand side of the duplex with Rachel, a lady from Australia.

In addition to classes, morning runs, and service projects, laundry must also be done--by hand!

This is where the guys stayed. That van took us and the 31 laptops everywhere!

Anthony and Christie, the evening we arrived at GLO

These little guys, Ezra and Micah, belong to David and his wife Nana, who administrate GLO. Yes, I am up in a tree with them :)

Dinner was eaten with our hands that night.
Clockwise from left: David, Ray, Gilbert, I, Christie 

GLO didn't just host us. The administrators, David and Samuel, came to our workshops because they want to give their students the CTO. These two really understood our ministry, probably because discipleship education is already what they do. Samuel is eager to help me with material development--he has such a heart to see practical education integrated well with biblical understanding. I pray I'll get to work with him on this. A cool thing is that GLO is basically ready to start the CTO--they already have a computer lab, and they want to be a model for other interested ministries like Youth For Christ and churches to follow.

The nearest guy is Samuel

I think what told us that there's going to be something special about this partnership is when David showed us what a disciple he is himself. At dinner one evening, he came up to Anthony, who had been teaching with stories all day, and told him "You have a very special way of communicating. Very quiet, and yet shouting to the soul."

Technology - good, bad, and ugly

I remember the first online scam I received. It was from a recent professional acquaintance. It said Bill Gates was giving away his money; Microsoft was testing technology that tracks e-mails, so all I had to do was forward that e-mail, and I would get $125,000 for every person I sent it to. And I confess (hey, give me a break, I was in my mid-teens), at first I could hardly contain my excitement, thinking of all the troubles that money would solve for me. But by the time I finished reading the e-mail, I was thinking waaaait... this is too good to be true. I mentioned it to my Dad, who immediately scoffed, "That scam has been around as long as the Internet."

I also remember my first sexual solicitation online. I was even younger then; just twelve or thirteen. It came straight to my inbox, not the junk folder of the account my parents had just recently let me have. Fortunately, the subject line from the stranger was creepy enough that I didn't open it; I just told my parents, who even though they had known this stuff was out there, were troubled to see it reach me.

If you do anything online, you know how much trash is out there, of many kinds. Trash that can destroy your files, steal your identity, scam your friends in your name, addict you to the LED screen, and worse. Technology with all its implications is coming quickly into Africa too, and the parents are largely unprepared for it. Christie, our Nigeria director, has told us several stories to this effect:

An elderly woman came to my house in tears. “Welcome Mama”, I greeted her with concern, “what is the problem”? She narrated her story:
"We have been experiencing this problem of money disappearing in my family for about seven years now. Recently, the problem extended to our bank account. Somebody stole almost all our money in the bank, but after few days, the person texted us confessing that he has been the one stealing our money, even in the house. Christie, How? He said, he has been using spiritual means, using our son’s face to do the stealing. Christie, how possible it is to steal using somebody’s face?"
The woman does not know how ATM cards work because she is ignorant about technology. Apparently, their son stole the money in the bank using their ATM cards, since he was the one that activated the cards for his parents. He later sent this false confession to confuse his ignorant parents that it was somebody using his face in the spiritual realm to steal from his parents. It broke my heart to know that many parents are trapped by their children's knowledge of technology to practice evil. They are watching a lot of junks from the media and are taking advantage of their parents' ignorance to engage in evil acts.

Another incident was when a student stole my colleague's daughter’s cell phone and texted to all the contacts on the phone pretending to be the owner asking people to send him credit. Many people responded by sending credits to the thief, not knowing it was not the real owner that was asking for help.

Parents buy expensive technological gadgets for their children without knowing the uses, some use their expansive smart phones to watch porn movies, and some use theirs for one evil or the other. We were in the church service one day and a young lady was busy watching some dirty movies on her cell phone. Because I have knowledge about technology, I knew what she was doing. I rebuked her and reported her to her parents. They did not know she has been doing that, because she always told them she reading her Bible through her cell phone.

Women in Africa need to know to some extend how technology can help and destroy their children. They do not need to go to school to acquire some qualifications to do that.

With the Mothers and Media seminar, that is just what we hope to do.

New frontier!

Big news ...

Looks like I'm going to Zambia in April! :D

A long-time SIM missionary to Zambia has followed TEN3 for some time and has even attended one of our workshops. He now has told us he has people ready for our teacher and administrator training, to start offering our Computer Training Outreach. If you're new to my blog, the CTO gives students comprehension-based, multi-platform computer training, and a study through the Bible as a story, outlining God's plan of redemption with an explanation of how to be saved personally. So Anthony prepared to go in April. Then he asked Ray and me if we would consider going. He said it would likely be worth it for me to go just to meet the people, get a feel for curriculum needs there, and record their stories for TEN3. But then I asked if with that I could advance my main job, curriculum, by training writers. So Anthony asked Gilbert, the missionary there, if he knew of people who may be suitable to help us with this. For helping with computer curriculum, he said no, but for Biblical Health and Life Management curriculum, a whole host of people cam to mind.

We just added to that the idea that we could do a test run of Mothers and Media, which would be a technology awareness seminar for mothers in Africa. This is needed because while technology is flooding Africa, especially the youth, their mothers are largely ignorant of technology's capabilities and dangers. A Nigerian colleague has shared with us some heartbreaking stories that I'll try to relate in later posts about mothers being taken advantage of or unaware of what is happening to their children. So, with this seminar, we hope to give women valuable information to be more discerning about the technology that's quickly surrounding them. We anticipate this will also greatly increase demand for the CTO because they will realize they need to be powerful and discerning users of the computer. I am sooo excited about all of this!

Which means that before I get on the plane April 12, I need to republish the Curriculum and Material Writers Guide, get some copies printed, set up any laptops I get to take to the teachers in Zambia, put together curriculum for the Mothers and Media seminar (fortunately, I can draw from some stuff we already have), prepare for the writers training sessions, get anti-malarial medicine, paperwork and travel insurance, continue to seek regular supporters, and of course pray a lot!

Please join me in this:
*Pray for the administrators, teachers, and writers who will join us at the seminars
*Pray for good communication--we'll have an American and Nigerian team coming in to a Zambian audience, and even when everyone speaks English, you're still not quite speaking the same language...
*Pray for me to manage my time well as I get all this ready, and for my support to reach 100% so that part will become a lot more manageable

Confidence learned through suns and soccer balls.

I wondered last Saturday if any other missionaries use WolfRam Alpha to do their work. If they do, they're probably not asking it if the sun were the size of a soccer ball, how far away Neptune would be.

How the heck is that mission work?

Glad you asked.

In the past few months, the TEN3 curriculum department has decided we need to start writing BHLM materials ourselves. We ultimately want it to be owned and managed by Africans, so we were hoping most of it would be written by African educators. But thus far the unusualness of the program, our inability to pay writers, and severe difficulties keeping up communication with Africa have severely limited progress. So, we've decided that George, Anthony and I will write as much as we can, sending it to African volunteers for review, in hopes that as we students and teachers who go through our CTO catch the vision for transformational education (and communication with Africa improves), we will be able to give more and more of the work to God's people in Africa. We're also hoping to get a grant to have a long "writers retreat" in 2014 to focus on getting the BHLM done. (If you're confused by my acronyms, see my FAQ page.)

So, I decided to work on writing the topic of confidence. That is an important area to me because America has messed it up so much. Our schools and psychologists promote this hollow "self-esteem" concept that cannot give security and confidence, because it's based on self. Confidence comes from knowing God's love for us, and the fact that God wants us to serve Him, feeble as we are. I was using Psalm 139 and Nehemiah 1:9 to explain how intensely and constantly God cares for us. Science actually helps me put those passages in perspective, because when you really think about how big "the heavens" are, how hopelessly lost one could be in them, it's amazing to realize that God has promised that wherever we are, He will guide us. So, I used WolfRam Alpha to look up if the sun were the size of a soccer ball, how far away Neptune would be. The answer is 711 meters, or about 1/2 mile! Imagining being on a little planet in that size solar system already makes me feel small. And then to think that the nearest star is 4.4 light years away, that there are over 200 billion stars in our galaxy, each of which could have a solar system as big as ours, and then that there are around 170 billion galaxies in the observable universe, shows us that we are just in a tiny speck in a solitary star's tiny space, in a tiny corner of the universe. And those verses tell us that if we were lost in the farthest reaches of the heavens, from there God would still be with us and bring us where He desires us. Now that's some blessed assurance.