Carney's preparations for serving in South America

Thanks for checking out our blog! Here is where we'll chronicle the "learning opportunities" God provides for us as we seek His will in partnering full-time with Christian Veterinary Mission in Bolivia

04 September 2012

The fishermen's sheep

At CVM Shortcourse >100 veterinary and related folks gathered for worship and learning about long-term, short-term and workplace ministry.  Wow!  Always a great time.  There was also a workshop on some tools used in poverty alleviation by Dr. Ravi Jayakaran-great speaker and man!
One of the teachings that stuck with me though is about Peter with Jesus after the resurrection. You know, "Feed my sheep...take care of my lambs...feed my sheep." What did Jesus ask at the beginning of His ministry?  "Come, follow me and I will make you fishers of men."  Jesus met them where they were, at the sea and spoke in metaphors they understood (fishing) and then developed them into the men he wanted them to be--shepherds.  If He had started talking to them about sheep in the beginning, would they have listened? 
Take-home message? Meet people where they are and find a redemptive analogy that applies to their lives (this applies to our neighbors in the US as well as a new tribe).  Don't speak churchese to them!  Fishermen don't understand sheep!
Wow, I have been terrible at this blogging thing this summer! It has certainly flown by. To recap our adventures, we spent 4th of July at Yosemite, the rest of July and August working like crazy while Dr. Oller had a beautiful baby girl, then a quick trip to Kansas City to visit Hollie and attend CVM Shortcourse (more about that in a minute). Tomorrow we head to Seattle to the Christian Veterinary Mission home office for a board meeting and our psych eval. We'll be home for a week, then off for a month to CIT in NC for cultural training. Whew! Oh, we are getting some homeschool done in that timeframe too.