What's new?

Well, it has been some time since we last posted. Much has been happening, which is why it has been a while. In the last four weeks I have travelled for two weeks, once to Reno NV and once to Washington DC, and school was out the week of Thanksgiving, putting me further behind with various campus responsibilities. What that effectively means is that in the last four weeks I have been away from campus for three of them.

Reno was a mix of two different conferences. One was a training on how to effectively coach students and ministries from a distance...basically, how to use technology to allow us to build ministries even if we are unable to be present all the time. Then I was a part of a two-day retreat for other campus directors from around the Northwest, getting updates on events in other places, and having some small input into the direction of things in our part of the world.

Then Thanksgiving happened. It was quite enjoyable, as our family spent the day with a woman from our church who made a tremendous dinner. I regret that I only have one stomach at times like that. Good food always makes me sad that I can't eat more!

But the week of Thanksgiving was a hiccup in the schedule. Students and staff pretty much disappeared for the whole week, so it was difficult to make any contacts.

Last week I was in Washington DC for a national conference with CCC. The theme of the conference was a roundtable discussion of other leaders in my position, leading ministries across a whole city or large geographical area. We talked about unique challenges we face, and what things work well to address those challenges. Some topics were how to utilize volunteers, how to keep a staff team connected to each other when they are on different campuses each day, how to provide ministry for faculty on campus, and the changing nature of youth culture that will necessitate different ministry tactics.

Now I'm home, and have a couple weeks until our Winter Conference. Time will be spent catching up on some details that are way behind completion, meeting with my staff team to process their semester so far, and making some changes and adjustments to the overall function of things and the specific campus mnistries in Portland.