inter::mission

It's been a while since I posted here about the sub-plot to the campus ministry work I'm a part of at the University of Washington. For the most part, we're just being simple and relational with college students for now. Trying to explore ways of incarnational approaches.

But much of my personal focus of late has shifted down the road a year. We've finally named the effort: inter::mission. Here's what we're hoping it looks like:

We have begun to invite students/participants to come and live in community in the University District of Seattle, beginning in September of 2006. While here, they will participate in about 15 hours per week of "classroom" teaching - all centered on mission and Kingdom (missional theology, missional worship, spiritual formation, understanding culture missionally, etc.). The teaching will be done by actual practitioners in each of these areas. An additional 20-25 hours per week will be spent in direct ministry practice - with college students on local campuses as well as in urban ministry opportunities.

This will take place from September through May. During the month of June, we will take the whole group of students to a country overseas for a cross cultural practicum. They will serve local missionaries and people while there, but again receive some education and ask questions about mission, mainly dealing with how mission and culture interact in that place. After this experience of cultural immersion, we will bring the students back to Seattle for about a month of debriefing. The culture shock that our students experience coming back into the North American context will be the starting point to again ask questions about mission and culture here with a fresh set of eyes.

We're still working out the economics of the program, but we're thinking that it will cost $8,000-$10,000 per student. This will cover the coursework, all living expenses (including some walking around money), and travel costs for the overseas trip. We're currently working with a seminary nearby to offer course credit for participation, so that our students walk away with some academic gain should they pursue seminary/grad school later.

It's an exciting time for us as we connect with possible partners that will help us pull this thing off. Anyone out there in the blogosphere that's interested in learning more can e-mail me. We're working on a web site now with more info.