Mission, Vision and Values

Today was the first Kenya team meeting at Mariners Church.

I appreciated the way the leader framed this trip - not as a missions trip, but as a faith adventure. We were encouraged to see it as a narrative rather than an event. An event happens once and is over. A narrative is an ongoing conversation, one where we keep listening for how God is speaking.

He also spoke about the importance of relationships - with one another as a team, and with the people we'll meet in Africa. We were reminded that God works through relationships: when God sees a problem, He sends a person. That's exactly what He did when He sent Jesus to address our sin problem. This trip, then, is ministry with people, not to people.

We were encouraged to view this faith adventure through a global lens rather than an Orange County one.

Our leader, Christian Mungai, is an African missionary to Orange County - a reversal of the direction we usually picture missions moving. He talked about how we are all equal in our poverty before God; every one of us needs a Savior. He shared that when he first arrived in Orange County, he encountered a kind of poverty he hadn't understood before: the poverty of having all the money in the world, yet being relationally poor.

Two more trainings are ahead - one on spiritual warfare, and one on cultural sensitivity and engaging the global world.