July 2008  
 
A beautiful Nigerian woman bursting with vitality, humor, intelligence and purpose caught my eye during the workshop I attended in Switzerland. After several years of staffing and leading with UofN, Patience was finally able to take the film school we run once a year through my college here in Kona. Her goal is to see nations transformed with God’s truth; since film is an effective way to influence a lot of people in a short time, she’s decided to start a film company! With her faith, determination and experience (including years as a "pop star" in her nation), I have great confidence she’ll do exactly that! Patience and her crew were one of four teams who used our home for their student film project; we were delighted to serve these young filmmakers. I have been meeting with her to help open doors for her future leadership and training within the college. This little "slice of life" is a glimpse of the work we do to equip and release missionaries into their unique destinies.

There will be six weeks of training and international leadership gatherings coming to the campus in August and September; Scott and I have roles in each of them: We'll have a training event like the one I went to in Switzerland; I'll facilitate for several teachers, and teach a module on how to create interactive learning environments. Scott will co-lead a module on academic advising. I'll help lead 3 days of meetings with our College of Communication; our group in Kona will connect by video conference with 3 other locations. I'll help facilitate an international 5 day prayer and strategy conference with 200 established and emerging leaders to seek God about the many words He's spoken to us about future growth. We will be part of a 5 day leadership gathering for the University of the Nations, followed by 3 days of processing that time within our leadership teams for the colleges we work with.

I'm also bible storying with two of our secondary schools each week and preparing a curriculum manual to present to the UofN leadership team. For our campus cooperative school, I'm training parents as teachers and planning the curriculum for our science and history units this fall. Eeek!

RYAN: The last couple of months I have been pretty busy. At the end of the school year I played golf for Makua Lani, which was a lot more fun than I thought it was going to be. I also have been playing guitar more than ever. I play for two youth groups and occasionally my church, and our school chapel times. It’s one of the best things God has blessed me with in my life. A year ago I had never even played a guitar. Now I am over my head in learning songs and all the other things that come with playing in a worship band. I am going on a mission’s trip to Cambodia and Thailand this summer. I am looking forward to this a lot and expect God to do some crazy things while we are there. (Ed note: Ryan is in Asia now and returns July 28 after 3 weeks).

MATT: Wow, so much has changed for me over this past year. The Discipleship Training School I attended in Australia was a huge turning point in my life. It just opened my eyes to things I never really knew about God and realize all the things I took for granted. It got me focused on God and God alone, and ignited me to share my faith and pursue God. I’ve now started a fellowship group for people in their 20’s here in Kona. It has been amazing so far, God is just so tangible at the meetings; it has helped me to continue to grow and mature. I'm working construction this summer and I'll return to Australia for another six months of training and outreach that is focused on evangelism and missions. So there’s me in an acornshell