I have been in Colorado for three weeks. X-track is a 6 week course to prepare cross-cultural missionaries to live and minister in a foreign country long term. I am planning to live in Chile until 2010 or 2012. My desire is to help establish a ministry that raises up young men and women who will go to the world with this good news of abundant life in Christ. This training has been helpful in processing the experiences of my past year and a half in Chile. I have also enjoyed the fellowship and fun times with the other staff.
This past week we learned about language acquisition. The language learning method we learned is comprehensive, covering the process of learning a new language from beginning to advanced stages. I learned my first 20 words in Mandarin during our first meeting with a language helper. Xin Ching had been in the U.S. for less than a week. He helped me learn by listening; saying the words as I pointed to the object they referred to. My Spanish is pretty good. But I am excited to now have a plan and some methods to help me continue to improve when I get back to Chile. In a few years perhaps we will be training our first team of Chileans this method as they prepare to go to a country that does not speak Spanish.
This summer 4 Chilean students will be at CM2007, a global missions conference with 18,000 students from 105 countries. I am encouraged by this and hope that in a few years we will see not just a few students but a movement of students going and sending to the nations from Chile. The conference will expose our students and new national staff to the global campus movement and give them vision for their part in helping fulfill the Great Commission.
