Casual Friday Missionary Care Resources

Feb 24, 2017 | Casual Friday, Fundraising, Transition

I was out of town last week, partly to attend the MC2 conference in Minneapolis. (My next e-newsletter will be a report on that. If you are not yet a subscriber, contact me and I’ll add you to the mailing list.) This week’s batch of missionary care resources was compiled before I left, but no worries…it hasn’t grown stale.

EVENTS

Novella Retreat

Hosted by Servant Care International in beautiful Millstatt, Austria, September 21-25. Who do you know that works in that part of the world? Let them know about this.

MK ReEntry Seminar 2017

Hosted at Biola University in LaMirada, California, USA, July 16-28. Re-entry events like this are highly recommended for older teens returning to the States.

CareGivers Forum

An excellent opportunity to meet and interact with people like yourself—missionary care providers. To be held at Ridgecrest Conference Center near Ashville, North Carolina, October 29 – November 1.

Interlude

“A debriefing retreat for global workers. A time to process your story.” Provided by Barnabas International. June 13-16 in Carmel, IN, USA and July 31-Aug 3 in Littleton, CO, USA.

Thrive Conferences

Held at various places around the world for U.S. and Canadian women who live and work cross-culturally. Check out the upcoming event to be held in Colorado July 18-21. Not only can you pass this information on to missionary women you know who will be in the U.S. this summer, you can volunteer to help at the retreat or help sponsor someone who is going.

Becoming One: Skills for a Lifetime of Love

Hosts Geoff and Kriss Whiteman teach skills that will help couples connect deeply. Missionary couples benefit greatly from periodic marriage enrichment. Contact the Whitemans to see how you could facilitate that for some couple you love.

FUNDRAISING

Paul Olmsted has offered his materials for Ministry Partnership Development to anyone who might benefit from them. Contact him directly for a free PDF.

MKs/TCKs

MK ReEntry Seminar 2017

Hosted at Biola University in LaMirada, California, USA, July 16-28. Re-entry events like this are highly recommended for older teens returning to the States.

LIFE ON THE FIELD

Many missionaries are requested to send videos of their work to their churches and supporters. But many of them are unfamiliar with how to produce good videos. Professional Phil Cooke offers these tips.

Marriage requires effort no matter where you live. But the stresses of mission field living can make that difficult. Alexis Kenny has written an excellent book to help couples nurture strong relationships. Read this interview with her to get the background.

TRANSITION

Jerry Jones, one of the most humorous experts on transition that I’ve run across, offers 10 tips for those who may be returning to the U.S. and the radical changes that have occurred since they were last here.

EQUIP YOURSELF

Planning to visit your missionary friends on the field? Tsh Oxenreider provides six helpful travel apps that you may want to investigate. Travel Math is a handy calculator of sorts that can assist you in planning the details of your trip. Conde Nast tells about eight airports that will arrange mini city tours for those with a long layover. (You may even want to plan on a layover just to take advantage of these!)

“You just can’t imagine what they must be going through. You don’t know what you could possibly do to help. You have no idea what to say.”

There are always meaningful things you can say or do.

Erin Wathen has just described what you may well encounter when hearing your missionary friend’s story. Prepare yourself with these 10 gems of advice.

You might want to sit down for this one. Shepherd of missionaries Scott Shaum continues his series on key issues affecting field workers with this piece on relationships in crisis. You need to heed this advice.

Do you provide  care for single women missionaries? You will want to connect with our coworker, Lori Morley. She is launching Converge: Cultivating Community for Single Women of the Harvest and you will want to be a part of it.

Are you a serial expat? Do you fit this description? Could you help this person with their research project?

“You live in minimum the second foreign country and have been abroad for at least 8 years? Would you have 15 minutes to answer easy questions in my survey about the culture of serial expats? I am trying to discover more about how we adjust our culture when we stay abroad for extensive times and in different countries for my masters thesis. There aren’t that many serial expats and your answer would be important.”

FOR YOUR LIBRARY

Missionaries Carl and Jolynn Krause have penned “an honest sharing of personal struggles and joy through fifty years of ministry.” This is the kind of stuff that will provide you with empathy as well as information as you minister to your missionary friends.

Ivan Liew has pulled together this guide for providing “practical guidelines for good partnership practice when joint decisions need to be made about foundational issues such as crises, candidature, and conflict on the mission field.” You may want a copy for yourself and/or your missions committee.

That’s it for this edition. Looking forward to connecting with you again next week.

What I’m reading this week:

  • You Are What You Love, by James Smith
  • Rejoicing in Christ, by Michael Reeves
  • Life of the Beloved, by Henri Nouwen

Just finished:

  • Accelerate, by John Kotter
  • Seven Days That Divide the World, by John Lennox
  • Delighting in the Trinity, by Michael Reeves
  • Called to be Saints, by Gordon Smith

Up next:

  • The Golden Sayings of Epictetus
  • Running on Empty, by Fil Anderson