Arrivals and Departures

We're driving back and forward to Malaga airport more than a couple of dozen times this month. After a fun and fruitful coaching seminar, we took that group of people (photo on the left) to the airport last weekend, and began to welcome the seventeen staff who were arriving to work with us during the Leadership Development Course. Over the past week we've had a time of preparing and praying for the LDC. The photos on the right show us praying for the 30 delegates, their families and nannies who will be arriving this weekend from places as diverse as Austria and Australia, Vietnam and Cambodia, Norway and Northern Ireland, Thailand and Holland, Romania and Albania.... and several more besides. The next six weeks will be a stimulating time of teaching and coaching, mentoring and encouraging.... seeing these leaders grasping hold of all that God has for them in this season of their lives. Thanks for your prayers.

Gone with the wind...

Well, the good news is that our internet is working again, and that we've also finally solved the problem of being unable to send emails. I'm very thankful for that, as there are always lots of last minute emails from delegates preparing to come to LDC and sending their flight information so that we can meet them at the airport. We'll have a lot of airport runs this weekend, as we take the coaching seminar people for their homeward flights, and welcome the LDC staff who are arriving for the week of staff training and preparation.
Meanwhile the intensive coaching seminar is going well. Wolfgang is doing most of the teaching, while Stephe and I are having fun doing the demonstrations and debriefing in the sessions where the participants practise the different kinds of coaching skills that they're learning.
After the wonderful sunny weather that Jacqui and I enjoyed last week for our "holiday" days, this week has been much cooler and strangely overcast. This morning we awoke to strong winds of more than 45 kiometres per hour - so strong, in fact, that the garden furniture was being blown all over the place, and one of the green plastic tables that we use at lunch time was lifted right off the terrace, flown over the wall, and deposited a little bit down the road in a nearby fig tree. We had to send out a rescue party to recover the table in time for lunch!!

Climbing to Cordoba... and coasting home

As the countdown begins for the coaching seminar and leadership development course, I've faced an unforeseen challenge this week in the area of communi-cation with the many people who are making their way to Spain for these two events. You may have seen on TV that there have been "outages" with some of the larger email service providers... and I've unfortunately been one of the millions who've been able to receive emails but totally unable to send any for the past week. I'm praying that the problem will be resolved soon, as this is an important time for me to be able to communi-cate with the eighty or so people who'll be arriving here over the next couple of weeks. Yesterday, however, Jacqui and I did take advantage of our last "break" day to take a trip to the city of Córdoba. It's a two hour drive at the best of times but, with much of it being uphill, my little car sometimes couldn't get above 60 kph on the motorway, and we had to laugh when we found ourselves needing to use the "slow lane" that is normally designated for 18-wheeler trucks! We had a lovely time there, though, and thoroughly enjoyed wandering round the narrow streets and floral patios of the old town, as well as visiting the famous "mosque" (which is now the catherdral), the old roman bridge and the alcazaba fortress. Our homeward journey included more downhill stretches than uphill ones, and so we felt like we were cruising home to Alhaurin again.
We have a ladies retreat at Villa Rehoboth today, and people have also already begun arriving for the coaching seminar which begins on Monday. So we're also busy with lots of trips to the airport this weekend. The coaching seminar lasts for a week and then, next weekend, the LDC staff begin arriving for our week of prayer and preparation. Finally, during the weekend of 15th - 17th April, all the LDC delegates and families will be arriving for the six weeks of the Leadership Development Course. I'll share more in my April newsletter; you should be receiving it soon.... but, thanks to this email problem, I've been trying in vain to send it for several days now.

Going to Granada...

Although I've lived in Spain for a couple of years now, I'd never had an opportunity to visit some of the Andalucian cities that are the main tourist attractions of this region. The busiest season of our year lies ahead (during the intensive coaching seminar and the LDC, we leave home at 8 am, have classes, small groups and other activities for most of the day, and sometimes only get home at 9 pm or later) and so I decided it would be a good idea to take a short break before that busy time began. A friend who is also involved in the seminar and the leadership course arrived from England this week, and we planned in three days to visit some of the "highlights" of this part of Spain.

Yesterday we went to visit the famous Alhambra in the city of Granada. We left early and the weather was still rather misty as we drove into the mountains. In fact, even when we arrived, the sky was grey and overcast, so it was amazing that it later turned out to be a very hot and sunny day. Looking at these photos, you can easily tell which ones were taken in the morning and which in the afternoon. The other main place we want to visit is Córdoba, and so that will be our destination for tomorrow.

A concerted effort...

Last night we held a special concert in order to raise money to help tsunami victims in Japan. Church members and friends, including the youth group and our pre-teen girls group, presented a varied programme of songs, instrumental music, dance and drama - ranging from folk songs in Swedish, French and German, to gospel songs in English and Spanish, and even numbers from the well known musical, Les Miserables!  The concert may be one of the last things that we do in our present building, as the house has recently been sold and our church is moving to new premises, a former restaurant property, within the next month.
Since returning to Spain a few days ago, my week has been very full. Ada and Gabriela had been in a car crash while I was gone in Switzerland; they're both okay, but the car was a write off. So I've been driving Gabriela to school in the mornings, then heading off to visit hotels in Torremolinos (to book a venue for our November KKI conference) or to attend meetings where we plan and pray for the Leadership Development Course or the upcoming Intensive Coaching Seminar. Stephe and I are also busy on the computer this week - preparing the manuals that we'll give out during this year's LDC. Ten different manuals for more than forty people adds up to around twenty thousand photocopies!! And then we'll need to bind them when we get together for our staff training week. I'm trying to get almost everything finished by the beginning of next week, as my friend Jacqui will be arriving from England and we're planning to take two or three days break to visit some of Andalucía's famous cities that are not far from where I live. If the weather stays reasonably dry (at the moment, more rain is forecast) we're hoping to visit Granada and possibly also Córdoba.

Chocolate and cheese

After another morning of meetings, we took some time yesterday afternoon to drive into the mountains and give our international group of leaders a taste of Switzerland. At the beginning of the week we had watched a video which explained that Switzerland is "more than chocolate and cheese," and told us a little about the nation's Christian heritage. Yesterday, however, our experience of Switzerland was very much about exposure to its chocolate and cheese. We visited a well-known chocolate factory, where we heard and saw how chocolate is produced, and had an opportunity to sample different kinds of chocolate at the end of our tour. Then, after visiting the picturesque medieval village and castle of Gruyères, we were joined by some Swiss KKI friends for a traditional dinner of cheese fondue - made with the famous Gruyère cheese (my favourite!) that is produced in that region of Switzerland.

Today, after worship, we took time in the morning to consider initiatives related to the importance of the family, and had a session in the afternoon to evaluate some of the training courses that we offer around the world - to consider ways that they can be improved or offered in different formats. This evening we heard about different areas of ministry with children and young people at risk, and took time to pray about issues like human trafficking, and the plight of the girl child in many nations. Tomorrow we be our last full day of meetings, and we will be praying into various leadership issues and roles in our international ministry. Thanks for your prayers.

Our week in Switzerland...

After some rainy days at the beginning of the week, we were blessed with crisp sunny weather today in Switzerland. I began the week staying at friends' home near Yverdon; then the four of us in the KKI European leadership team drove into the mountains for two days of meetings in a little Swiss chalet with a stunning view over the valley and down to Lake Neuchâtel. Now we're in our third home of the week - in a local church property consisting of a small conference centre and old people's home in the historic centre of Yverdon. 

We'll be here until next Tuesday for the annual meetings of our KKI international leadership team. One of our tasks this week is to consider some refinements that we're making in our international purpose statement - some rewordings that reflect the things God has been saying to us about the importance of our families, our generations and our lifestyle in the way that we express the Kingdom of God and serve Him together. We're also looking at some of our current strategies for mobilising young people in making God known and being a blessing to the nations - such as the Gateway strategy in Asia and Africa, and our new Planting Together (tree project) vision partnering Europe with Africa. One evening we took time just to listen to God in prayer and to write down the things He spoke to us about ourselves and our ministry in the years to come, and this evening we had a time of praying for each other and for our different needs.
Today I had a trip down memory lane, when a few of us took a short drive to see the YWAM training centre in Lausanne - the place where I did a school of evangelism in the 1980s before going with an outreach team on my first trip to West Africa. Tomorrow, after another morning of meetings and prayer, we'll be taking time out for an outing together. Although rain has been forecast, we're trusting the day will be nice enough for us to enjoy the beautiful Swiss scenery. We'll be visiting a chocolate factory, going to the "cheese" village of Gruyere, and then ending the day with a meal of Swiss cheese fondue.