Saturday, April 26, 2014

Bridging Cultures and Meeting Minds in Vietnam

by John Coffey

Earlier this month Jamielyn and I were honoured to represent IT Tender at the 6th IT East Asia Conference in Saigon, Vietnam. Hundreds of missionaries serving across East Asia travelled to the conference to encourage and teach one another. As one of the speakers, I had the opportunity to share what God has been doing through our programs in Manila. I taught a session on community transformation, summarizing much of what I've learned over the past few years regarding long-term empowerment through education and skills training. Thanks to the mentoring of much wiser and more experienced leaders than myself (such as Pastor Joshua & Anne Benavidez, Pastor John & Gela Basiwa, and Hart & Ginny Wiens), I can't overstate the importance of passing on our experiences and effective practices to others.

I'll keep this post brief so you can catch a glimpse of the inspiration and encouragement we experienced at the conference from this video:


In other news, please pray for the following upcoming events:

-April 28 - May 1, "Leader Mundial Summit" in Atlanta, Georgia; I will attend a training for global leaders from various organizations

-May 1, "Family Day"; IT Tender will host a family outing at a swimming resort for over 250 people (children and families from each of our education and nutrition programs)

-May 24, "Museum Field Trip"; IT Tender will bring children from our sponsorship and nutrition programs to a world class science museum in Manila

Stay tuned for updates and stories from those events.

Take care!