In my Bible this morning, I found this depressing reflection on the meaning of life:
For a person may labor with wisdom, knowledge and skill, and then they must leave all they own to another who has not toiled for it. This too is meaningless and a great misfortune. What do people get for all the toil and anxious striving with which they labor under the sun? All their days their work is grief and pain; even at night their minds do not rest. This too is meaningless. Ecclesiastes 2:21-23
One of my key responsibilities as the head of SEND U (SEND International’s training department) is to champion lifelong learning within our organization. One of the things we have been promoting, first of all with our team leaders, and now with the entire membership is the importance of every missionary drawing up their own personal growth plan. This growth plan (sometimes called an Individual Development Plan or IDP) would be put together every year (maybe in January after or as part of a day of prayer). To help our members with writing this plan, a few of us have been working on a short road map or guide, including a self-assessment tool and a template for creating an individual growth plan. This road map is still a work in progress but you can download the latest version here. But I think that before we can expect our members to work on their growth plan, we probably need to answer a couple of questions.
In my personal Bible reading and journalling over the last few weeks, I have been working my way through the books of Acts. In God’s providence, I am also reading a fascinating book about church planting movements in South East Asia —T4T: A Discipleship Re-Revolution: The Story Behind the World’s Fastest Growing Church Planting Movement and How it Can Happen in Your Community! The authors of the book and developers of the T4T process (Training for Trainers) have based many of their principles of rapid church multiplication on what happened in the book of Acts.
Another post from Philip Jackson, a colleague and friend of mine from Macedonia. Phil serves as the field leader and church planting team leader in the city of Skopje. Phil also runs marathons, and his first full marathon was the Athens Classic Marathon.
No truth of Scripture was illustrated to me more powerfully by participating in a marathon than this simple expression by Solomon in Ecclesiastes 4:9-10…. “Two are better than one, because they have a good reward for their toil. For if they fall, one will lift up his fellow. But woe to him who is alone when he falls and has not another to lift him up!”
Clothing shed by runners lays near the second mile of the course during the New York City Marathon Sunday, Nov. 7, 2010. (AP Photo/Craig Ruttle)
Those who travel internationally know that you can’t even count on two free pieces of luggage anymore. After 50 pounds, every pound will cost you. Those extra pounds actually cost you when you’re running a marathon as well. If you’re 10 pounds overweight, it’s just like putting a bowling ball in a backpack and hauling it for 26 miles. No thanks! Even the weight of an extra sweatshirt, especially when drenched with sweat, will slow and weigh you down.
When I ran my first marathon, I was surprised to see how many people were throwing off outer layers of clothing in the first 10 km. They were literally taking them off and throwing them away. I didn’t know that some people deliberately wore old clothing for the outer layers as their bodies warmed up and then threw them away when no longer needed.
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