PERSONAL EXPERIENCES
I want to tell you about some personal things that happened to me on the South African venture. The second day I was in South Africa was May 6, and the US consultants met the South African consultants in a conference room at Feathers Lodge, which is where the USA team stayed for two weeks. Towards the end of this meeting I asked a question to everyone gathered about South Africa. I can't remember what I asked, but afterwards a man named Louis came up to me and said he thought God had spoken some words to me that he needed to share with me. Louis said...
"I felt that the Holy Spirit was saying that while you are here in Cape Town, He will put the buidling blocks together and He will add to your understanding the revelation to solve and tackle some of the work challenges that you had at work. In fact, before you leave this place, He will let you get on the plane with the basics of the answers (I thought that I saw 3 problems/challenges). The Lord will do this for you as you invest in the life of your client."
I had no idea what he was talking about, but I did have three big projects at work that were a bit of a headache. Within the first 30 minutes of my first day back at work on May 29, my manager told me I was being reassigned to a new project and the three projects I had before would be passed onto another team!
The last day of venture when the clients gave their presentations (May 18), I was talking to Louis about a new potential job opportunity at Pay Pay for a mobile designer (similar to Hannes's South African company, which offers mobile banking solutions via mobile phones). Here are some things Louis said that I've taken to heart...
"Pray unlimited prayers"
"Pray for God to open up my career ceiling"
"Pray for me not to worry about finances (money)"
"Pray for wisdom in what you pray for and then adjust your prayers"
"Pray big prayers"
On May 19, Louis wrote these words in my notebook while we had a rēp team meeting (venture debriefing)...
"In order to grow into a greater understanding of what the calling and ministry in Japan could hold for the two of you (Richard and Noriko), visit http://www.plumblineministries.com/home to understand more about the "Redemtive Gifts" of cities, nations, and countries -- then, when you know what God has called that nation to be, then you will understand your assignment."
On Sunday, May 20 I had the opportunity to visit a small church in the African township of Atlantis with my co-consultant Johan. This was truly one of the highlights of the trip for me. This group of people was so on fire for the Lord that it really pushed my views of what a church could and should be. They were so gracious and loving to me and after I shared with the congregation about the purpose of my trip they asked if they could pray for me. Of course I said "Yes." A group of people gathered around me and laid hands on me. I bowed my head and closed my eyes and could hear people praying in English, some sort of African language, and in tongues! The a few minutes into the prayer I felt a hand on my stomach. It was sort of moving up and down a bit and I sensed this feeling of energy or movement separate from the hand moving. It's really hard to describe what I felt, since it was so new, almost like a flow of energy. Then after everyone stopped praying and they moved back to the chairs and the service ended a women came up to me and said...
"I felt your burden when I was praying for you and laid my hand on your stomach. You are free from it now."
Then she said she had some words from God for me...
"You fill the gap. You are in the middle."
This didn't make sense to me at the time. I asked Johan to explain this to me. He said he believes it means that God will use me to fill the gap between people and Him. I had been praying since I was in Africa for God to reveal to me my purpose in His plan for restoring the world. I've always enjoyed bringing people together and next working. I think I get this from my dad. :) Anyways, this made perfect sense to me, since I often see myself as a connector of people. Perhaps this means I have the gift of evangelism. Lord knows I've brought many people over to the Macintosh from the darkside (Windoz)... ;) In all seriousness, I am praying about having more clarity about this revelation and to find ways to build on top of this potential gift.
I also want to mention that my mom suffered from pneumonia the whole time I was in South Africa, and her sickness began right before I left the USA and she was healed as I returned. We prayed daily for her recovery during the venture, as we did for many other concerns. It's not uncommon for people on ventures to get really sick during the venture or someone in there circle of family or friends to suffer. One of the consultants on the India trip this spring developed Bells Palsy during the trip! Thankfully he recovered within a month, which was another miracle!
Speaking of thanks, I want to thank the staff of Feathers Lodge for being so gracious to us. If you're ever in the Cape Town area, I would highly recommend this Christian owned and run establishment. They are truly a first class operation!
This was one of my favorite quotes from the venture:
"God really does care about the little things!"
This trip was truly LIFE CHANGING for me, on a completely new level. I really felt God speaking to me during my trip to Japan last September, and I felt like God really showed me a whole new set of things on this trip to South Africa. WOW! I can't wait until my next (ad)venture! I will be posting more on this in the months to come. :) Stay tuned...
Saturday, June 16, 2007
South Africa Report Back - Part 1
REPURPOSING HANNES
I want to thank you everyone for their prayers, encouragement, and financial support, which really helped me move forward with this journey to South Africa. During the trip, I sent out updates regularly and posted many things that happened to the rēp blog we maintained for our venture. With this post, I'll focus on the highlights of the venture.
For the folks who didn't get the background on rēp (formerly called "equip"), I'll give a quick overview into what rēp is all about. rēp is a non-profit organization that was founded by Brett and Lyn Johnson, who are originally from the Cape Town area of South Africa and now call the San Francisco Bay area their home. Part of what rēp does is to train Christian business consultants in a framework that is commonly called "Marketplace Ministry." The rēp framework uses the Bible as the foundation for thinking about how God views the domain of business and how He wants to use businesses for further renewal of society and His kingdom on earth. Every rēp consultant has completed over 100 hours of training to prepare for a venture (missions trip). This spring, consultants from the USA, India, and South Africa traveled to four cities (Chennai, India; Jakarta, Indonesia; Gauteng and Cape Town, South Africa) to work with Christian business people to help them repurpose their businesses and often their lives to serve God more effectively within their local community, countries, and spheres of influence. A big part of what the rēp framework does is help people integrate their faith with their work life, which is truly a transformational process! During a venture, a traveling consultant and a local consultant team up to work with a local client in the host country for ten business days. On Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, we would all met as a large group in a conference center at a church to learn about the 10 "Ps" (i.e., Purpose, Product, Positioning, Presence, Partnering, People, Process, Place, Planning, Profits) and how God views these concept within the context of business. On Tuesdays and Thursdays, we would spend time with our clients in their place of business observing them in their daily work life and praying for them.
It was so amazing to watch God operate in the lives of the clients and consultants during the venture. God regularly performed small to large miracles daily on this trip, as well as, answered so many prayers. Typically, the ventures are about repurposing a company to serve God better and have a larger impact within the world. My experience with my client was a bit different. My client (Hannes) was personally repurposed during the venture, which was such an awesome testimony to the power of change in a person's life God can bring about. Johan, who was my South African counterpart, was such an instrumental part of making this this happen too. Most days I felt like I was learning as much as Hannes about how God works through Johan's deep knowledge of scripture and how God works. It was an honor to go through this journey with these two Christian brothers! Now on to the story...
The first day of the venture (May 07), Hannes was on the verge of being very sick and his doctor told him over the weekend that he needs to rest and not work (potentially needs to be on oxygen!). If he wasn't careful, he could catch pneumonia and end up in the hospital. He almost did not come to the first day of the rēp consulting. We prayed for Hannes to heal that day and he visited the doctor later that afternoon. He also told us he didn't know why he signed up for the consulting, but he knew he was suppose to be there. Prior to the venture, he would often pray to God when he needed help with a problem in his life. While driving down the highway a few weeks before the venture Hannes was praying as he drove. He was in a tough spot with the company, so he prayed for God to send some help to address his problem. Within a few minutes Jodene (a friend and rēp consultant) called him to inquire if he would be interested in joining the May consultations in the Cape Town area. He didn't know why he said "Yes", but he knew that he needed to do this and he signed up to be a client without hesitation.
May 08 (TUE) - Hannes was almost cured from his sickness and the rest of the week he was fine. Johan and I met Hannes at his office and we began to learn that Hannes's company was running into financial trouble, partially because one client had not paid a huge invoice. He mentioned that this wasn't the first time they had faced this sort of issue and the company has always survived these financial challenges. Hannes related how he has always been able to figure out how to solve theses issues in the past, just relying on his own business skills. He laid out the many financial options that he saw now and the crossroads that he felt he was at this time with different investment paths. Johan started to share with Hannes that he doesn't have to carry this burden on his own. Johan started to talk about how Hannes could yield his heart to God, and let God guide him in these business decisions though prayer. Hannes's mind and will are starting to slowly be repurposed to serve God at this point.
May 09 (WED) - Hannes tells us he feels like he has been in the desert for the last 7 years. Johan talks about Deuteronomy 6 and the reason for the desert phases in our walk with God. We started to talk about "Purpose" and how Hannes is well positioned for God to use him to further the Kingdom in Africa. We talked about ownership of his company verses stewardship of the company. In reality, it is God's company and Hannes is the steward, much like everything we think we own is actually God's. He cares about how we use the resources He provides to us. This is big stuff for Hannes and things start to change now in both Hannes and the company's situation! Potential takeover offers for his company are starting to surface at this point.
May 10 (THU) - Back at Hannes's office, Johan explained further about how God speaks to us. Johan was such an awesome teacher! He really has a gift for taking complex concepts and making them so easy to understand. Hannes is ready to pray about surrendering his heart to God fully. He asks us to come to his home after work to pray for him to yield to the Lord. We went to his home that evening and prayed for him for about an hour, and afterwards left Hannes to pray on this own. Hannes YIELDED to God this afternoon! When we were all praying, Hannes and I both saw clouds. I had this vision of Hannes rising with angels into the clouds. Johan felt that Hannes had made a shift, but perhaps there were more layers of yielding that needed to happen.
May 11 (FRI) - Hannes came to training the next day very tense and said he didn't feel that he could sit there all day. I asked him if he wanted to pray. He said that he wanted to pray later in the day. We started the training off that morning by sing the song "Open the Eyes of My Heart Lord" with the whole consulting group and this song really hit Hannes hard. The music was from a worship DVD and a video was projected up onto the screen that we use for the daily training. The song contained many scenes of flying through the clouds. Right after the song was over, Hannes's phone rang and it was a coworker calling to say the bank had pulled the funding to keep their company running and the debtor had still not paid. Hannes said he needed prayer now, so we went to see the intercessors and to pray over Hannes. Natchi (a prayer warrior from India) read scripture about the borrowed axe that floated. This seemed to imply that the Lord will keep Hannes's company afloat during these challenging times. Hannes said he didn't know what is happening to him, but it is good. At this point, it seemed that he had yielded fully, but he said his mind was still fighting his heart. In the evening, Hannes heard from his business partner about a very good offer to acquire their company. Things we looking up on all fronts!
The second week of the consultation was full of ups and downs and Hannes's met with the board of directors for his company and they reviewed several offers to acquire or invest significantly in his company. It was like roller coaster, but even through all this you could see a new calmness in Hannes. He had a new understanding of God being the chairman of his company and a new kingdom-centered vision for beginning to repurpose his company. The last day of the venture was a Friday, May 18. All the clients gave a presentation about their new visions for repurposing their companies to serve God and the strategies they would employ to carry out these visions. Hannes got up and gave the most powerful testimony of the day. His was a story of personal repurposing. You could tell it was really from his heart! Everyone in the room had tears in their eyes as Hannes shared his story. I saw big, rugby-player, sized men with tears streaming down their faces. It was so awesome to see this transformation in Hannes and hear this powerful testimony!
I want to thank you everyone for their prayers, encouragement, and financial support, which really helped me move forward with this journey to South Africa. During the trip, I sent out updates regularly and posted many things that happened to the rēp blog we maintained for our venture. With this post, I'll focus on the highlights of the venture.
For the folks who didn't get the background on rēp (formerly called "equip"), I'll give a quick overview into what rēp is all about. rēp is a non-profit organization that was founded by Brett and Lyn Johnson, who are originally from the Cape Town area of South Africa and now call the San Francisco Bay area their home. Part of what rēp does is to train Christian business consultants in a framework that is commonly called "Marketplace Ministry." The rēp framework uses the Bible as the foundation for thinking about how God views the domain of business and how He wants to use businesses for further renewal of society and His kingdom on earth. Every rēp consultant has completed over 100 hours of training to prepare for a venture (missions trip). This spring, consultants from the USA, India, and South Africa traveled to four cities (Chennai, India; Jakarta, Indonesia; Gauteng and Cape Town, South Africa) to work with Christian business people to help them repurpose their businesses and often their lives to serve God more effectively within their local community, countries, and spheres of influence. A big part of what the rēp framework does is help people integrate their faith with their work life, which is truly a transformational process! During a venture, a traveling consultant and a local consultant team up to work with a local client in the host country for ten business days. On Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, we would all met as a large group in a conference center at a church to learn about the 10 "Ps" (i.e., Purpose, Product, Positioning, Presence, Partnering, People, Process, Place, Planning, Profits) and how God views these concept within the context of business. On Tuesdays and Thursdays, we would spend time with our clients in their place of business observing them in their daily work life and praying for them.
It was so amazing to watch God operate in the lives of the clients and consultants during the venture. God regularly performed small to large miracles daily on this trip, as well as, answered so many prayers. Typically, the ventures are about repurposing a company to serve God better and have a larger impact within the world. My experience with my client was a bit different. My client (Hannes) was personally repurposed during the venture, which was such an awesome testimony to the power of change in a person's life God can bring about. Johan, who was my South African counterpart, was such an instrumental part of making this this happen too. Most days I felt like I was learning as much as Hannes about how God works through Johan's deep knowledge of scripture and how God works. It was an honor to go through this journey with these two Christian brothers! Now on to the story...
The first day of the venture (May 07), Hannes was on the verge of being very sick and his doctor told him over the weekend that he needs to rest and not work (potentially needs to be on oxygen!). If he wasn't careful, he could catch pneumonia and end up in the hospital. He almost did not come to the first day of the rēp consulting. We prayed for Hannes to heal that day and he visited the doctor later that afternoon. He also told us he didn't know why he signed up for the consulting, but he knew he was suppose to be there. Prior to the venture, he would often pray to God when he needed help with a problem in his life. While driving down the highway a few weeks before the venture Hannes was praying as he drove. He was in a tough spot with the company, so he prayed for God to send some help to address his problem. Within a few minutes Jodene (a friend and rēp consultant) called him to inquire if he would be interested in joining the May consultations in the Cape Town area. He didn't know why he said "Yes", but he knew that he needed to do this and he signed up to be a client without hesitation.
May 08 (TUE) - Hannes was almost cured from his sickness and the rest of the week he was fine. Johan and I met Hannes at his office and we began to learn that Hannes's company was running into financial trouble, partially because one client had not paid a huge invoice. He mentioned that this wasn't the first time they had faced this sort of issue and the company has always survived these financial challenges. Hannes related how he has always been able to figure out how to solve theses issues in the past, just relying on his own business skills. He laid out the many financial options that he saw now and the crossroads that he felt he was at this time with different investment paths. Johan started to share with Hannes that he doesn't have to carry this burden on his own. Johan started to talk about how Hannes could yield his heart to God, and let God guide him in these business decisions though prayer. Hannes's mind and will are starting to slowly be repurposed to serve God at this point.
May 09 (WED) - Hannes tells us he feels like he has been in the desert for the last 7 years. Johan talks about Deuteronomy 6 and the reason for the desert phases in our walk with God. We started to talk about "Purpose" and how Hannes is well positioned for God to use him to further the Kingdom in Africa. We talked about ownership of his company verses stewardship of the company. In reality, it is God's company and Hannes is the steward, much like everything we think we own is actually God's. He cares about how we use the resources He provides to us. This is big stuff for Hannes and things start to change now in both Hannes and the company's situation! Potential takeover offers for his company are starting to surface at this point.
May 10 (THU) - Back at Hannes's office, Johan explained further about how God speaks to us. Johan was such an awesome teacher! He really has a gift for taking complex concepts and making them so easy to understand. Hannes is ready to pray about surrendering his heart to God fully. He asks us to come to his home after work to pray for him to yield to the Lord. We went to his home that evening and prayed for him for about an hour, and afterwards left Hannes to pray on this own. Hannes YIELDED to God this afternoon! When we were all praying, Hannes and I both saw clouds. I had this vision of Hannes rising with angels into the clouds. Johan felt that Hannes had made a shift, but perhaps there were more layers of yielding that needed to happen.
May 11 (FRI) - Hannes came to training the next day very tense and said he didn't feel that he could sit there all day. I asked him if he wanted to pray. He said that he wanted to pray later in the day. We started the training off that morning by sing the song "Open the Eyes of My Heart Lord" with the whole consulting group and this song really hit Hannes hard. The music was from a worship DVD and a video was projected up onto the screen that we use for the daily training. The song contained many scenes of flying through the clouds. Right after the song was over, Hannes's phone rang and it was a coworker calling to say the bank had pulled the funding to keep their company running and the debtor had still not paid. Hannes said he needed prayer now, so we went to see the intercessors and to pray over Hannes. Natchi (a prayer warrior from India) read scripture about the borrowed axe that floated. This seemed to imply that the Lord will keep Hannes's company afloat during these challenging times. Hannes said he didn't know what is happening to him, but it is good. At this point, it seemed that he had yielded fully, but he said his mind was still fighting his heart. In the evening, Hannes heard from his business partner about a very good offer to acquire their company. Things we looking up on all fronts!
The second week of the consultation was full of ups and downs and Hannes's met with the board of directors for his company and they reviewed several offers to acquire or invest significantly in his company. It was like roller coaster, but even through all this you could see a new calmness in Hannes. He had a new understanding of God being the chairman of his company and a new kingdom-centered vision for beginning to repurpose his company. The last day of the venture was a Friday, May 18. All the clients gave a presentation about their new visions for repurposing their companies to serve God and the strategies they would employ to carry out these visions. Hannes got up and gave the most powerful testimony of the day. His was a story of personal repurposing. You could tell it was really from his heart! Everyone in the room had tears in their eyes as Hannes shared his story. I saw big, rugby-player, sized men with tears streaming down their faces. It was so awesome to see this transformation in Hannes and hear this powerful testimony!
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