Vision Trip - the final edition

Vision Trip to Rome and Marseille

This past weekend I returned home here in Germany after Upstream's vision trip.
We had a great week. Learned a lot. It was really cool to be around a group of pastors and mission leaders who are serious about keeping "missions" in "missional". It is encouraging to listen to people who want to connect globally as well as in their own communities.

I need to say some thank you's for I am very grateful for the help on this trip.

A thank you to Ed Stetzer who came a long with us. He is a good friend and I always learn much when I get to hang out with him some.

I also have to say thanks to Caleb Crider who really did an outstanding job on this trip with his talks about missions and posting on our blog.

I want to thank Scott and his team in Marseille and Jason and his team in Rome for hosting us and making us feel welcome and giving us a great glimpse of these two cities.

We had a great group of people who came along for the journey.
Check out this blog and some cool videos here.

Next on the stop is Asia in September. It looks like we will be going to Taiwan.
We will be in London and Paris next May 2010.

If you have an interest in either trip fill out the application form at our website.
You can also sign up for our free e-newsletter to get a glimpse on future events or trips.

Go Conference

When I returned home I spoke via skype at the Go Conference hosted by Greater Europe Mission. Check out this blog. We are looking into co-sponsoring one of these in the Southeast this August as we search for people who want to live and work in Europe, on Purpose.

Next Up
I am continuing to formulate some thoughts on partnerships. Thanks for those of you who have sent me some information and material on the subjects of mission partnerships.

In Rome

Our Upstream Collective vision trip began last night. We had our first gathering last night at a local café and got to know each other a bit. We come from diverse background but connected in that we all want to see the church involved in missions. Several conversations that I had revolved around how we feel the Great Commission was given to the church. What does this look like in a day where it is so east to pay organizations and networks to do it? How can the church fully express itself in the Great Commission.

This morning we are headed to St. Paul’s here in Rome. It is the second largest church. We will have more conversations and lots of café. Have I mentioned that the café here is great.

I am going to talk this morning about being “invited” in. I will look at the story of Phillip as he went up to the Chariot as the Spirit led him on the road out of the city. As he obeyed the Spirit the Ethopian official invited him in. We see this again with Paul as he was in Athens. I will actually be in that city next month but that is another post. Paul was in three spaces as Erwin McManus says. He first went to the religious place where there were God fearers present and he engaged in conversation with. As often the case he would work in the marketplace for he was a tent maker and the marketplace was his second place. I believe as Paul was in this second place it gave him opportunity to be invited into the “third space”. He was invited into the group to be able to explain these things that he believed in.

Ministry in Europe today is a lot like that I think. We have to live amongst the people here. We pray for opportunities to join them. We seek to follow the leading of the Holy Spirit. We hope to be invited into their spaces. It is then when we have awesome opportunities to share Jesus and see people’s lives changed.

More later,

Larry

Doing Business With Mission

This past week has been real exciting for me regarding an area that I am quite passionate about; "Doing Business with Mission".

First, I was extremely encouraged by some potential opportunities for people to either move to Bulgaria to work or even start a company or do an internship. Some of the business people there who are followers of Jesus are really desiring to see people come over and work in the marketplace. If you are interested email me at larry@theupstreamcollective.org

Take a look at a video we shot in Bulgaria. Click Here!

Second, we have had several new members for our Skybridge Community. We typically have people who are either looking for a job in Europe, already working in Europe or with a church who is interesting in sending this type of worker to the field. Our community is growing!

Third, two of our people who have been seeking jobs in Europe found places of employment. I think I mentioned this before but hopefully my repetition will simply emphasize my enthusiasm for them.

New Article Out
I wrote an article for Paul Cox who works with OMS International this week. He will be posting it on his blog over the next several days. Take a look. The article is for people who are going on short term trips and is about "Items that you need to be sure to pack on your trip".

The Week

About Sofia, Bulgaria
What a city of opportunity. I hope some people will read this and begin to pray about getting involved here. I think something great is going to happen here spiritually. Here are three things that you can do:

1. If you would like to connect with a missionary in Sofia please let me know by sending me an email. We have several teams that we are working with both with the imb and Greater Europe Mission They need prayer support. They need some strong partnerships to help them plant churches and they need churches that will send business people to come there and work.

2. We talked with several people who think that finding business internships in Sofia would be a possible way to connect here. We talked with one business guy who thinks they can bring a new person on. If you want to live and work in Europe, on purpose then check out www.skybridgecommunity.net and drop me a note.

3. I have been working with John and the Business as Mission group at Greater Europe Mission. They have an event coming up called GO MARKET GATHERING on May 29 and 30th to help people discover more about this idea of business as mission. I will be doing a Skype interview from Germany as a part of the conference. If you can get to the Colorado Springs area I think it would be worth checking out. Click here for the link.

The Upstream Collective Vision Trip
I am anxiously awaiting the arrival of Ed Stetzer. Okay maybe that was an overstatement (smile) but we are excited about him being a part of this trip next week. I really appreciate his passion to see the nations come to Christ. We read much about his conversations of missions and church planting in North America but he also has quite a heart for the world. Thanks Ed!

Our trip will begin in Rome and end up in Marseille. Our guides who will be leading us through these cities are quite awesome and have some great venues in store for us. We will be doing Jet Set blog updates so be sure to follow.

If you are interested in coming on one in the future check out our site at www.theupstreamcollective.org .

Confused - Let your "Yes" be "No" and Your "No" be "Yes"

I told you yesterday that I am in Sofia, Bulgaria. It is my first visit here. I really like being here. Very interesting culture. I like the people here. The coffee is also good!. On the plane from Germany to Bulgaria I sat next to a guy who lives in Minnesota. He is from Bulgaria. He has lived in the States for almost 8 years. He has lived in Atlanta, New Jersey, New York City and Orlando. He now lives in Minnesota. He likes the opportunity to work in the states though he misses home and family. He did not know one word of English before he arrived 8 years ago (I know how he feels). He was coming back to his home for the first time in 2 years.

We were able to talk about many things. I was reading the book "Re-Jesus" by Alan Hirsch so we had a really good spiritual conversation. He comes from a Bulgarian Orthodox background but is not connected to a church now. He wrote down a few words for me in Bulgarian and I still cannot pronounce them. I am not really a linguistic expert. smile. He also gave me an interesting tid-bit. He said that to shake you head like we Americans shake when we say "no" means "yes" and if you shake your head like you are shaking "yes" it can be "no." I needed to try this out. You have many opportunities to shake your head when travelling. So I did not have to be real intentional about it. When you are asked something you usually go with a natural response.

Yes, I want a coffee.
No, I do not want to buy that. etc..
I also found that you rather naturally shake your head or use non-verbal gestures.

We had some Gypsies who were asking for money near our hotel. We see them each time we go out the door. They were following us all the way down the street. Then it occurred to me as I was shaking my head "no" that they may be thinking I was saying "yes". So I found out that I needed to watch that and reverse my thinking and my gestures. It works much better this way. Understanding your culture is important. I have much to learn here.

Changing topics

Skybridge - You know one of the initiative that I am involved in with The Upstream Collective is something called The Skybridge Community. It is where we want to see people come to Europe and work in the marketplace and live out their lives missionally here in these cities. We have people who are part of this community who are already working here. We also have some who are trying to get jobs or opportunities to be here in business, internships or Study Abroad programs. What has been really cool this week is that two of the people who have been looking for work here in Europe found jobs this week. Yea God!!

In my next post I will talk about some opportunities here in Sofia. They could really use some churches to sense a calling to work here. I also sense that this could be a good city to work in as a business professional and also make a huge impact as a follower of Jesus. Let me know at larry@theupstreamcollective.org if you want more information.

Sofia, Bulgaria

I am in Sofia today. It is quite an interesting city.
We are staying downtown. As we were walking around some last night I was able to see this statue of Sofia. There is one place in the city where you can literally see a Jewish Synagogue, a Mosque, an Orthodox church and a Roman Catholic church.

Today we have several meetings with people as we talk about doing business as mission. I am working with some International Mission Board workers here, some Greater Europe Mission workers and some local church leaders. I love collaboration. I think it is good when we can work together for the same purpose.

I learned an interesting culture tid-bit yesterday. I need to try it out today before I blog about it. Maybe tomorrow. ALSO - You know if you read my blogs that I love coffee. I have been quite impressed so far. The hotel where we are staying has possibly the best coffee for a hotel that I have tasted in a while. Of course for me that translates to be a strong cup of coffee.

More soon.

The Chat Project in Spain

You have got to check out this really cool work that is going on in Spain. These are some really good friends that we have known for several years. Please remember them as they work there but also it is a great opportunity to connect with and work along side of them.

The Chat Project ...
is a program that connects people around the world through intercultural exchanges. We are based out of beautiful San Sebastián, Spain, and working through a non-profit foundation that serves our area by providing quality English conversation with NATIVE English speakers.

The idea...
was developed over several years, beginning with the desire to be a contributing, valued part of the international community in order to have a voice in the global conversation. We are Christians intentionally engaging people in conversation, cultural events, concerts, exchange programs, and sharing the transformational truth we have experienced in Jesus. We love God, we love people, and we love to TALK!!!

The details...
We believe in the principle of “doing unto others” and have developed a program that treats people and language learners like we would LOVE to be treated. In our years of living overseas, we know what it is like to learn a second and third foreign language. Having time to practice with patient, native speakers is the ONLY way to improve your verbal proficiency. So, knowing that ENGLISH is the global language, we wanted to give Europeans, and especially those in the beautiful BASQUE region of SPAIN, the opportunity to do just that - practice with patient, native English Speakers whenever they want at our English Lounge.

But it gets even BETTER!!!
The other side of the program lets us “do unto others” for our US volunteers and partners. So many people want to be a part of the global community and share the love God has put in their hearts for the world. The CHAT Project provides the opportunity for all our volunteer partners to connect with internationals in meaningful ways even on short-term trips. In addition to 1 or 2 week volunteer trips with groups (English speaking travelers) who help us with special events and English immersion weekends, we rely on semester and year long volunteers to supplement our career staff. Our longer term volunteers have the opportunity to learn Spanish or Basque in the mornings and serve our community with The Chat Project in the afternoon.

If you want to learn more about this check out their site and get in touch with them here.