We had a medical team this past month of May, from Bring Good News.  Many of you know that for a few years now, we have been changing the format we use for such groups, and trying to use them more effectively...just better, in a way that makes the most long lasting impact for Christ, both physically and spiritually.  We don't claim to have nailed that yet, but each time we make a tweak, it seems to go well, in different ways, and just leads us to discuss more ideas and ways on how to use these to help the Church, evangelize, and as well provide long lasting physical impact for the families and the community.  

This particular trip was also unique because of the partnership with BGN, and some of the resources they brought to the table.  We were able to take Valerie with us every day to do optometry exams and have readers with us, do ultrasound exams with the new portable unit, and our dentists organized several students to do different dental work.  

​One of the biggest things to juggle is how to balance spiritual outreach, imparting teaching information useful for education/prevention with seeing as many people as we can mostly in areas where the need outweighs what we can do one day a year (for those curious, we saw just under 200 patients average for each day between all the areas.)  All this while not requiring six hours attendance for everyone that comes. We want this to be something that is seen as a value for anyone that comes as well, not something just where we think we are doing it a better way.  

BGN also brought funds to do a leadership/pastoral training seminar for one day.  It was expensive, but we were able to gather 50 people from at least six different Churches.  We look forward to more opportunities to do these kind of events in the future as well, they are so helpful in impacting so many that in turn impact many more.  

How do we use resources, teams, seminars...all questions we continue to wrestle with, in a good way.