When the team from Christ Church of Orlando visited Honduras last week, Allen made the trip back to the U.S. with them. He didn’t travel to Orlando, though, even though he would probably look great in a pair of Mickey Mouse ears. Instead, he flew into Maryland, where he was able to spend a few minutes with Boo, rent a car and head off for Ohio.
Allen’s Itinerary
Do you remember Life Community Church? They’re those fun people who turned a Super Bowl party into a way to stuff backpacks for children in Honduras. Allen will be setting up a Sister Church Program, while in Ohio. Life Community Church is no stranger to Sowers4Pastors. Besides the backpacks, they’ve also raised money for the 2 cents a meal drive and Pastors’ Training School. Now, they’ve decided to adopt a Sister Church.
Life Community Church is made up of small cell groups. Allen will be spending time with around eight of those cell groups this week. He’ll be talking about their ministry and trying out a snazzy new Powerpoint presentation Trish made. (He’ll also be speaking to a missions class at Malone College in Canton, Ohio.)
Kim Hall is flying in on Friday night. On Saturday, Allen and Kim will be setting up sponsorship cards in preparation for Kim’s presentation on Manna 4 Lempira on Sunday.
When all of that fun is over, Allen will be hopping into his rental car and driving to Canada. While there, he will spend a few days meeting with some Canadian businessmen who have expressed interest in Sowers4Pastors ministry. Allen contacted the president of Foundation for Missions Canada, who thinks this is a worthwhile use of time, so Allen will be heading toward the Niagara Falls area. If it would be a worthwhile use of time and help grow the ministry, Allen would probably be going over Niagara Falls in a barrel!
In true Allen fashion, he acknowledges that his itinerary is subject to change if a new opportunity arises.
An Imperfect Analogy
Allen contemplated that he and Trish will be doing a lot more of this sort of traveling in coming years. He doesn’t mind being on the road and was marveling at the fact he only hit one pothole all the way from Maryland to Ohio. He insists that in Honduras there is more pothole than road. But he isn’t in North America to marvel about the quality of our transportation infrastructure.
He’s here trying to help people gain a better understanding of what missions is. Allen understands that the mission field is different than what most Americans think it is. He shared an analogy about people on a sports team going to practices every week, but never playing a game. He wants to get more people off the practice field.
Before we hung up, Allen got a little contemplative and said, “The thing I don’t like about that analogy is that it’s a sports analogy and this isn’t a game. This is war! It’s spiritual warfare and I don’t want to downplay how serious this is.”
I can honestly say the only thing I’ve ever heard Allen downplay is the amount of work he and his family put in and the lifestyle they’ve chosen to lead. They’re definitely in the game! (Even though that’s an imperfect analogy.)
- posted by Christi
- Trish apologizes that there are no pictures, but she has no pictures of Allen's trip
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