I’ve been fortunate to have done a bit of traveling, so I thought I would share my top ten rocks, in no special order.
1-3 I heard that the three largest ‘stand alone’ rocks in the world are the Rock of Gibraltar, Haystack Rock on the Oregon coast, and Beacon Rock on the Washington side of the Columbia River. I’ve been to each of these locations. In 1966 we took a ship to Ethiopia, and passed by the Rock of Gibraltar. In 2007 I made a special birding trip to Haystack Rock, though I had seen it before. Lifers at the time were the Black oystercatcher, the Harlequin duck, and the Tufted puffin. In 2002 I drove (paved road and freeway) from St. Louis to Astoria, Oregon, following the Lewis and Clark trail. They stopped at Beacon Rock. Last week I visited Beacon Rock again. There is a path to the top, and someday I will walk that path.
4. Petra, Jordan. A fantastic place to visit. You go through a narrow path between two cliffs of rock, and when you arrive at the main area, you see wonderful buildings carved out of rock. The visit was also in 1966 on the way to Ethiopia.
5. Mt. Kilimanjaro, Tanzania. Africa’s tallest mountain, and I climbed to Gilsen’s Peak, 18,595 ft., with my good friend Greg Johnson, in 1983.
6. Rift Valley, Kenya. One of the largest fissures in the earth, stretching from the southern part of Africa all the way up into Israel. Outside of Nairobi you reach the escarpment, a gorgeous view of the valley. Then you drive down the escarpment to get to the valley. Spectacular.
7. Pompei’s Peak, Montana. Not a large rock, but famous because William Clark (of Lewis and Clark) carved his name on the rock, and it is still visible two hundred years later. The sign says that this is the only place along the entire trail where such documentation occurs (and remains). They stopped lots of places, like Beacon Rock, but only here is the evidence that they were really there.
8. Big Bend National Park. Lots of rocks here. The scenery is fabulous, probably to me because I’ve not spent that much time in this sort of desert. Wonderful plants all over the park, and great birds too, including the Colima warbler, which took a long walk.
9. Yosemite. What is there to say. You’ve seen the photos. Beautiful, and John Muir too.
10. Diamond Peak, Oregon. I have to put this one down for sentimental reasons. Robyn and I climbed this mountain when we were engaged, and no, I did not propose when we got there. We had not gone a mile before Robyn developed blisters, but she gamely kept walking for many more miles. The mosquitos were terrible. We were basically in tennis shoes, and no special clothing. On the way down we met some “real climbers” (with all the trimmings). I am sure it ticked them off that we got to the peak before they did, that we were just novices, and that we spoiled their pristine adventure. Loved it!
Not long ago I posted an entry under the title of May I Rant a Bit in which I raised some questions about the ‘unreached people groups’ paradigm in missions. Today I came across an article, “Metrics of Missions: Measuring Faithfulness and Fruitfulness” by Justin Long (The Mission Exchange 2010:3:4-5). The following quotes are related to how we set our priorities in mission, and come under the heading “Measuring Obedience” in the article.
“Yes, the whole church is to bring the whole gospel to the whole world, as effectively as possible. Yet no organization can do this on its own, and we shouldn’t expect them to. Every organization has some level of specialization: a specific task or calling. I call this an organization’s “plausible promise,” and no statistic, no piece of research, no factoid will tell you what it should be.
What makes orphans any more worthy of ministry than seniors? or atheists in Europe any less deserving than Muslims in North Africa? I argue people in Europe have more opportunity to hear, but that shouldn’t determine the plausible promise of a specific ministry. It can only be determined by listening for God’s voice and obeying it.”
For more on this subject, see the last issue of Mission Frontiers. The entire issue focuses on the current validty of the ’unreached people groups’ concept, partly in reaction to some questions raised by the late Paul Hiebert. (As an aside, I was fortunate to have Dr. Hiebert on my doctoral dissertation committee more than twenty years ago).
 We have a ministry in an urban poor area of Mexico City, and we recently received the following report. Community transformation happens when people get together for a common purpose, when it is their vision, and importantly, if they can see a spiritual value to what they are doing. Hope is a strong motivator.
That is what happened last Saturday in the Eagles neighborhood. The community center sponsored a street cleaning event for the residents living along the Eagles Avenue and part of Halcones (Hawk Street). At one point there were nearly 80 people out sweeping the street and visiting together. Many of them were children with mom in tow. Later we had a meal for everyone and shared with them briefly about the Community Center’s vision to help bring the community together through service projects. Although the numbers were down for the meal we praise the Lord for this small beginning to what we hope and pray will have a large impact on the neighborhood in the future.
 We have just released a brand new book in time for this year’s North American Christian Convention at which missionary Mary Kamau will be featured. Mary is the Director of the Hope Partnership project in Nairobi, Kenya. The Birth of Hope is a coffee-table book with great photographs and a compelling fictional account of a boy from Mathare Valley named Peter. The author is Carrie Lassiter, daughter of long time Kenya missionaries Garry and Linda B. The book’s subtitle is “CMF International Ministry in the Slums.”
The initial idea for the book was mine (my thought was a regular book with a few photos), but my very wise colleagues fortunately overruled me, and the end result is much better. That is one of the many benefits of working with a team.
You can order the book through the CMF website: www:cmfi.org. Incidentally, our child sponsorship program for this part of Kenya now includes 4000 children, and is soon expected to be 5000. All of these children are from the Mathare Valley and all are in school where previously they were not. Many of these are AIDS orphans. But that is a story to be told another time.
Here is what I learned from the book, Ordinary Man, Extrordinary Mission: The Life and Work of E. Stanley Jones, by Stephen A. Graham (2005). I was totally unaware of this, and perhaps it will be news to you too. E. Stanley Jones was a missionary in India for many years. He had a strong friendship with Indian leader Mahatma Gandhi. Everybody knows about Gandhi’s stands on non-violence and peaceful resistance, and how these were instrumental in the waning days of colonialism.
In 1948 Jones published a book about Gandhi. He is what Graham writes: “I would be remiss if I did not emphasize what an enormous debt the American civil rights movement owes to E. Stanley Jones. Almost entirely unknown today is the fact that Martin Luther King, Jr. learned about Gandhi’s theory and practice of nonviolent civil disobedience from Jones. ” Jones writes in one of his later books, “When I saw Dr. Martin Luther King, he said, ‘It was your book on Gandhi that gave me my first inkling of nonviolent noncooperation. Here, I said to myself, is the way for the Negro to achieve his freedom. We will turn this whole movement from violence to nonviolence. We will match our capacity to suffer against his physical force; and we will wear our opponents down with goodwill.’ ” (p. 373).
In a footnote Graham goes on to add: “King’s acknowledging his reliance on Jones’s Mahatma Gandhi: An Interpretation is confirmed by an exhibit in the Martin Luther King Museum in Atlanta. An upstairs display shows King’s copy of Jones’s book, which is marked in King’s handwriting.” (p. 423).
It is only people who are uninformed who unilaterally lament the work of missionaries.
Our long time family friend, Sarah Sykes, is graduating from the School of Leadership and Development, Eastern University. Her MBA is in International Economic Development. Sarah has helped Christian Missionary Fellowship by producing the movie, One in a Million, and by serving as an Associate Board Member for the past two years. Sarah and Brian will be moving to New York City where Brian will be starting his new role as the worship leader for the Apostles Church. Sarah hopes to be an intern with the United Nations doing international advocacy and policy work.
Sarah represents a new kind of evangelical — one who is socially conscious, one who loves the Lord deeply, one who is not afraid to speak out against injustice, one who is doing something about poverty while being a great witness, and one with a global vision.
Congratulations Sarah! You go girl!
Environmental Missions Consultation –
Ed of Care of Creation and Lowell of Restoring Eden would like to invite you to spend five days with them in Manhattan KS this summer discussing the concept of Environmental Missions. Among the questions to be considered are: What is it? What are appropriate theological and biblical foundations? How can we integrate evangelism, discipleship and church planting into creation care projects? The dates are July 12-15 – Agenda
Contact Ed ed@careofcreation.org or, Lowell lowell@edenvigil.org for information or an invitation.
 CMF has long been blessed with the ministry of Naomi Kouns. In fact, she has worked at CMF for 34 years! Practically every missionary we’ve ever had knows her and has been supported by her. She has worked in Church Relations, Services, and for the past decade, Globalscope (our international campus ministry arm). She is probably the one person best known in CMF’s history (we’re 61 years old).
At our recent Board of Directors meeting we feted Naomi, and Milligan College (Tennessee) made known through their President and CMF Board Chair, Dr. Donald Jeanes, their decision to confer upon her an honorary doctorate. Well deserved! Few women have had such a wide and respected reputation in our movement’s recent history.
Last week the CMF home office staff honored Naomi, and she will be honored at a dinner with our CMF Leadership Team.
I say, “Honor where honor is due!” If you want to write something to Naomi, leave a comment, and I will pass it along to her.
We are happy to announce that Naomi will be available to CMF to assist in special assignments.
FAME and CMF have jointly sponsored a conference for the past three years entitled “Your Church and AIDS.” The first two conferences were held in Indianapolis and the latest one in Turner, Oregon at the request of the Oregon Christian Convention. The attendance was not what we had hoped for, but the quality of the conference was outstanding. The main speakers were LeRoy Lawson and Mary Kamau.
There were 8 different workshops offered. I led one of the workshops and got to participate in three others. Subjects included AIDS in America, ministering to the urban poor where HIV/AIDS affects 25% of the people, introduction to AIDS and how the church can be involved. The workshop that I most appreciated was the one led by Michelle, counseling professor from George Fox University. She had surveyed those with AIDS whom she has counseling, asking them to share comments for a group of church people such as would be attending the conference. Her comments to us were directly from a high school girl who developed AIDS. The girl’s parents also share their insights. This personal touch was very moving and each attendee learned so much.
HIV/AIDS effects a relatively small percentage of the population in America. Unfortunately, this means that many now view the problem as “something of the past.” It most definitely is not that, especially if one sees oneself as a citizen of the world. It is arrogant and unfeeling to think that AIDS doesn’t effect me when our very lifestyle keeps many people of the world in poverty where AIDS thrives.
In a week or two several of us from FAME and CMF will debrief, and one of our questions will be if we should continue this conference into the future. I invite you to submit an opinion on the question. Please, help us decide.
Terry O’Casey is the minister of the High Lakes Christian Church in La Pine, Oregon. He is also the President of the 2010 Oregon Christian Convention. Terry knew I would be driving from Califorina to Oregon to participate in the Spring Rally for the Convention and he invited me to spend the night.
I jumped at the chance, because I sense Terry and I are kindred spirits. It was Terry who let me know that John Muir came from a Restoration movement background and who was a solid believer in God’s amazing work in Creation. As I result, I read a couple of books on Muir; one a biography and the other some samples of his writing. Of course anybody who has been out of doors in California is well acquainted with Muir.
Terry also is an avid student of the Bible and taught me quite a bit in the one day we had together. I met one son, Isaac, but the rest of the family was away, including his wife who was working up in Willapa Bay in Washington. She is an avid outdoors person herself and I hope to meet her some day.
We went birding soon after my arrival and I was able to see two lifers within an hour — Barrow’s Goldeneye and the long sought American Dipper, also known as the water ouzel. The ouzel was John Muir’s favorite bird. The dipper was building a nest, going after moss along the river and swimming/flying it back to the nest construction under a walking bridge. We crawled down almost into the river to see the nest under construction.
The next morning we went into the woods and sure enough, another two lifers for my list: Jameson’s Sapsucker and the Northern Saw-whet owl.
Central Oregon is a beautiful area with lots of different geographical features: lava flows, Ponderosa pines, Cascade lakes, mountains and waterfalls, pumice, obsidian, bluffs and tufts. Well worth a visit in the late spring. It was a week or two early for the songbird migration to be fully underway, but a joy to see what we did.
|
Doug Priest, PhD my take on missions, missiology, creation care, ministry, and anything else
of interest.
 Search this Site |