International aid groups have been “focusing on supplying food and shelter,” says Daniel Jean-Louis, a business professor at the State University of Haiti and Quisqueya University who also works as a consultant for local business groups in Port-au-Prince. “Nobody has talked yet about businesses resuming and people getting back to work.”

We’re talking about it.

Sermon for January 24, 2010 at City Hope Ministries, Grand Rapids, MI.

Following the January 12th earthquake in Port-au-Prince, Partners Worldwide sought to verify the safety of our Haitian network businesspeople and their families. After three days, we learned that our Partnership Manager, Daniel Jean-Louis, was safe and uninjured. In addition, the leader of each of our three business affiliates is alive, yet we still await news from a number of members of our Port-au-Prince affiliate.

Since 1999, Partners Worldwide has worked with Haitian businesspeople to create jobs through small and medium enterprise development. In the wake of this disaster, Partners Worldwide established the Haiti Business Recovery Fund. Through our Haitian business partners, we have identified urgent needs that can be met by skilled professionals to help restore local businesses that supply critical goods such as clean water, food, medical supplies and temporary housing.

Six businesses can meet high demands in the relief and recovery of Haiti:

Sylvie Theard, ITALA Pasta
STATUS: Assessing operability
Sylvie owns ITALA, the largest pasta manufacturer in Haiti with over 200 employees. Her pasta is typically distributed through street vendors and grocery stores. She is needs-assessing her production site to ensure it is operable.

Marie LeFevre, popsicle factory
STATUS: Assessing conversion to Clean Water production
Until the earthquake, LeFevre’s factory and 18 employees produced 40,000 popsicles a day, supplying goods for more than 250 contracted vendors. Now LeFevre seeks to package clean water into popsicle packets for distribution. Repair to her factory’s water filtration unit is needed.

Joshua _____, bakery owner
STATUS: Restarting baked goods production
Joshua’s bakery employs 14 Haitians. Two are unaccounted for. The price of his supplies has risen 150%. They desire to dive back into production, especially since donor food distributions cannot meet needs in all pockets of the city.

Evelien de Gier, Maxima Manufacturing
STATUS: Assessing conversion to housing provider
MAXIMA is a manufacturing company specializing in furniture, cabinetry and caskets. They are in operation but awaiting word on safety of some of their 65 employees. In response to immediate needs for housing, they are pursuing a collaboration with a North American business to create temp housing units.

Jean-Ronel Noel, ENERSA Solar-Panel
STATUS: Assessing provision of solar-powered lighting
A solar-panel manufacturer employing 22 men from Cite Soleil, ENERA has installed solar-powered streetlamps in 10 Haitian cities. All employees are accounted for. Their new plant was destroyed.

Ralph Edmond, Laboratoires Farmatrix
STATUS: Assessing damage to production site
Edmond employs over 60 people at this pharmaceutical production company, which he started in 1989 to meet the demands of the Haitian market. His factory houses a HPLC unit (High Performance Liquid Chematography) and has a damaged water filtration system that must be replaced to resume production.

Our Haiti Business Recovery Fund is receiving donations toward these efforts. For information on helping Haitian businesspeople rebuild their country, visit www.partnersworldwide.org or call 616.818.4900.

About Partners Worldwide: Since 1994, Partners Worldwide has encouraged, equipped and connected businesspeople in global partnerships that grow enterprises and create sustainable jobs, transforming the lives of all involved. In 2009, our 46 partner affiliates around the world created 1,141 new jobs, helped member businesses and farms retain 22,016 jobs, and utilized the volunteer services of 160 North American individual mentors and 552 in-country mentors.

Prayer

As you have heard from news reports, for so many people the situation is very desperate. Pray that rescue workers and victims alike do not lose heart in their rescue, salvage, and care efforts. Pray for strength, courage, and the wits to trust God on a constant basis.

World Vision

WV has a 30-year presence in Haiti and is one of the largest NGOs operating in the country. Over 370 staff were already on the ground, as part of their regular ministry of child sponsorship and community development, when the earthquake struck.

There is a conference call for churches (but I encourage anyone interested to listen in) today at 11 a.m. PST. Go to WorldVisionChurches.org for info on connecting via audio, web mtg, or iPhone.

World Vision has an excellent record in regard to effective relief and development as well as stewardship of resources. For examples, you may see their follow-up reports for the Asia Tsunami Response (2004-07) and the Myanmar Cyclone Response (2008-09). I serve on the board of directors of World Vision US and would be happy to connect you with information or help you get questions answered.

Black Veterans for Social Justice

This Brooklyn, NY-based nonprofit is collecting funds for Haiti relief. – link – My father-in-law, Job Mashariki, is the executive director. For information on their efforts, call (718) 852-6004 or email admin-at-bvsj-dot-org.

Partners Worldwide

This Christian nonprofit (where I presently work) is not a relief agency. But we have been, and will be, involved in development in Haiti through business creation. Our Haiti affiliate is Haitian Partners for Christian Development. As of this writing we have heard from some but not all of our HPCD associates (those we have heard from are well; we eagerly await word of the others). You may keep up with HPCD via the Partners Worldwide web site.

and finally…

A Verse

“Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for you are with me; your rod and your staff, they comfort me.” Psalm 23:4

Here are some thoughts regarding future directions:

(a) Youthworks has apparently run a profit-making enterprise for years. That’s a very good thing. Earning income is different from soliciting donations, and for the diffcult work of funding youth ministry, I’m glad that folks with experience earning a profit are steering the ship.

(b) Strategic alliance #1 — Connect with Larry Acosta and Urban Youth Workers Institute. While I have not attended any YS events in a while, I’ve been a regular at, and have consistently sent people to, the UYWI national and regional events.

(c) Strategic alliance #2 — Do a joint event with the Christian Community Development Association (maybe a mini-conference inside the big national conference, like World Vision’s community transformation division did at CCDA 2009 in Cincinnati).

(d) Strategic alliance #3 — Joint leadership development with the New York City-based Coalition, with Jeremy Del Rio and Dimas Salaberros and them.

(e) Strategic alliance #4 — Build off of an internal evaluation done by the DeVos Urban Leadership Initiative wherein DVULI graduates came out with very high satisfaction and effectiveness ratings. The DVULI has data and facts that point the way for how we can support urban youth workers in the future.

(f) How about, for every conference workshop speaker, etc., require them to submit an article, or a query at least, for publication at Youthworker Journal (this is something I haven’t run by Steve Rabey yet; maybe he doesn’t need an avalanche of submissions from not-yet-proven writers; hmm).

Ok! It’s amazing to see the love that so many have for YS, Tic, and the broader movement. Here’s looking forward to some creative innovations from the new team.

In an industry where 15-20 tons of apples per acre is considered a good yield, Jerry’s numbers are outstanding.

TREASURE IN HEAVEN
Jerry didn’t grow up on an orchard. His father owned a mid-size dairy farm, but due to Jerry’s ankylosing spondylitis, a painful and chronic arthritic disease, it was impossible for him to follow his father’s footsteps. So he went to Dordt College in Iowa, got a degree in agricultural business, and took a job writing and collecting farm loans. He used his problem-solving skills and his gift of mercy to help restructure debts so farmers could stay on their farms. In the next six years he learned that though he loved helping others solve their financial difficulties, what he most wanted was to work for himself.

In 1986 he decided to try his hand at apples, despite having “absolutely no idea how to grow fruit.” His strategy was simple: “I targeted four or five very successful farmers in the area and gave one of them a call every month with a long list of questions.” To his surprise and delight, the farmers would spend almost an hour per month “giving away their trade secrets” to this young, inexperienced, but highly motivated fruit farmer. “It is because of their help that I have succeeded,” Jerry says. He now has 25 full-time employees and 70 seasonal workers.

Rosie, Jerry’s sweetheart since the sixth grade, was the valedictorian of her graduating class at nearby Sunnyside High School. In her graduation address, she spoke about the New Testament story of the rich young ruler and Jesus’ call to store up treasure in heaven rather than on earth. As a result of her speech several of her class members committed their lives to Christ. When Rosie and Jerry branched out into tending orchards, they carried with them the determination to lay up treasure where it matters most.

They eventually decided to dedicate the profits from a portion of their ranch to God. The first year they set aside four acres. After harvest time, they discovered that the yield from the “firstfruits” acreage exceeded that of all the others. Now they set aside twelve acres, with a profit of around $10,000 per acre.

Jerry explains to his children and his employees that since God is the one who blesses their crops every year, this is their way of saying thank you for his grace in their lives. “Whenever we plant a new orchard, we go out to the barren field and ask God to bless the work we will do there,” he tells me. “I can say that God has blessed me more than I could have ever imagined.” Today, through their work with Partners Worldwide, Jerry and Rosie are passing that blessing on.

“Whenever we plant a new orchard, we go out to the barren field and ask God to bless the work we will do there.”

FARMER TO FARMER
Jerry’s relationship with Doug Seebeck goes back a long way. Their families attended the same church in Sunnyside, Washington. When Doug returned to the United States in 1996 after 18 years in Bangladesh, and East Africa, he began sharing the vision of creating partnerships between North American businesspeople and African entrepreneurs.

“Doug is very persuasive,” Jerry smiles. Though he suspected that Doug’s idea was a fundraising gimmick, he agreed to get involved in Partners Worldwide’s work in Zambia. The Zambian “Farmer to Farmer” program was what intrigued him most. The purpose was to help farmers move from subsistence to food security. A three-year program would teach principles of crop rotation, irrigation, nitrogen-fixing, and raising fish. The end goal was for each farmer to have a food surplus, which could be sold to purchase necessities for their families.

This simple and inexpensive idea has been a resounding success, surpassing the most optimistic projections. Jerry tells me that, “to date, the Zambian Farmer to Farmer Program has helped close to 22,000 families become self-sustaining. It has been so successful that the Canadian Food Resource Bank has even joined up as a partner, contributing $100,000 per year.”

To date the Zambian Farmer to Farmer Program has helped close to 22,000 families become self-sustaining.

The Christian Reformed World Relief Committee also wanted to encourage orphan care in the farm community, so they provided incentives (seed, fertilizer, or food) to families that would take in orphans. As a result of this assistance, more than 1,600 children robbed of parents by HIV/AIDS are now being cared for by their extended community.

Jerry’s father, Henry Haak, did his part to help Zambian farmers too. When he visited their country he saw that the land was remarkably similar to Washington’s Yakima Valley. He also noticed that the Zambians had irrigation difficulties. In order to provide water for their crops they were relying on the ancient and inefficient method of hauling it up by hand, one bucket at a time. So Henry designed a simple water pump that could be produced from cheap local materials. Its components were a few feet of PVC pipe, rubber from a bicycle tire tube, and a plastic wafer with holes drilled in it. It cost around $15 to make, and is still referred to as the “Henry Pump.”

The Washington farmers also encouraged a revolutionary new farming paradigm: don’t wait for the rainy season to plant. Instead, plant before it rains and irrigate the seedlings by hand. The theory is that it takes only a little water to get a seed to germinate, and when the rainy season begins the plants are sturdy enough to survive the downpour. By pre-irrigating the crops, the farmer hastens the harvest by one month. In a survival context that can be the difference between life and death. And in a commercial context, that means your crops are ready for market four weeks before those of your competitor.

LOCAL NEEDS, LOCAL SOLUTIONS
In 2005 Jerry was anxious to visit Zambia to see the work he had been financially supporting for more than nine years. However, when he showed up for his travel vaccines, the doctor explained that the regimen he was on to control the ankylosing spondylitis could cause him to become infected with the very diseases he was being inoculated against. In other words, getting the vaccines could kill him. Jerry returned home, realizing he would never be able to visit the farmers and children he had been helping in Zambia.

Instead of allowing the physical barrier to stop him, Jerry recruited his friend Don Weippert to go in his place. At that time Benedict Schwartz (see previous chapter) was considering the construction of the Village of Hope for Zambian orphans. Don put his experience as a businessman and farmer to use by helping Benedict evaluate the quality of the soil at three possible locations and providing counsel that resulted in refining and clarifying his orphan-care vision.

Partners Worldwide’s Washington affiliate also brought two Zambian farmers to the U.S. to learn farming techniques firsthand. Eventually Justin Kadyeni became the local leader of the project overseeing thousands of farmers in his own country. Ernest Lusampa returned to Zambia with an expanded vision and encouragement to start a private for-profit school. Though the Washington affiliate was tempted to provide the funding for the school building, equipment, and materials, Lou Haveman of Partners Worldwide strongly encouraged the North Americans not to “lead with money.”

They followed his advice, and chose instead to carefully investigate and encourage local solutions. Eventually they provided an interest-free loan of $15,000 to build a four-room schoolhouse. In 2006 the Chipata Primary School began with six students. In less than two years the school has grown to approximately 100 students. Del Dykstra, superintendent of Washington’s Sunnyside Christian School, spent six weeks in Zambia with his family to provide mentoring help to the teachers and administration.

Not everything has been a success, however. In 2003 Ernest Lusampa led the way in initiating the Chipata Savings and Loan. It was modeled after CHESS in Kenya, which matched the members’ savings along with another matching grant from the Partners Worldwide Global Fund. In the Chipata Savings and Loan’s first year, the Washington affiliate provided $18,000 in startup funds, and eventually $54,000 was loaned out. But Jerry explains that “there have been repeated violations of the loan-making policies.” A substantial amount was lent for short-term, personal, non-business reasons—and those funds were never repaid. To date, $34,000 of the initial loan moneys have been paid back and there are about 25 loans outstanding. The default rate is hovering around 70%.

The Henry Pump Jerry’s father designed is another source of frustration and disappointment. “There have been very few takers. Though it is efficient and cheap, it is human-energy intensive.” (This means that it can use up more calories than are available in the Zambian farmers’ current diet.) But what proved most intractable was the cultural barrier to new technology. So, for the time being, Zambian farmers continue to draw water out of wells using wooden or plastic pails. Not all innovations have been ignored, though; many farmers are benefitting nutritionally and financially from early planting and pre-irrigation.

The failures have taught Jerry and others in the Washington affiliate a crucial lesson: there is great wisdom in allowing local needs to initiate local ideas that sprout into solutions that the Americans can partner with. “Imposing American solutions to African problems just does not work all that well.” He shakes his head; it is still a hard pill to swallow. “What took the least money and the least work on our end [the Chipata school] has accomplished the best results.” Jerry shrugs his shoulders. He’d love to see the Zambians irrigate more efficiently. “The pump was our idea,” he says, “but the school was theirs.” That, apparently, makes all the difference in the world.

There is great wisdom in allowing local needs to initiate local ideas that sprout into solutions that the Americans can partner with.

WHAT THEY GIVE AWAY
In 2006 Jerry attended a Partners Worldwide conference where two speakers affected him profoundly: Ed Silvoso, an Argentinian evangelist with an international ministry to business leaders, and Cheryl Broetje, an extremely successful fruit farmer from Pasco, Washington, about 80 miles from the Haak farm. They both spoke about the connection between work and worship. According to Jerry, “The Broetje farm is the best example of seamless integration of faith and business I’ve ever seen—anywhere.” During these seminars Jerry heard a challenge that would drastically change his perspective as a business owner.

Cheryl Broetje had spoken with a boldness that was unexpected but convicting. “She suggested that we were just using the partnership model as a hobby,” Jerry remembers. “She told us flat out, ‘You don’t want the poor mingling with you. You don’t want anyone to mess with your social clubs.’ And then she challenged us to ask ourselves, ‘Is this international partnership work really my lifestyle, or is it just something I do on the side?’” Jerry returned to his farm with a commitment to run it as his mission by following the model developed by his neighbors, the Broetjes.

“She told us flat out, ‘You don’t want the poor mingling with you. You don’t want anyone to mess with your social clubs.’”

Ralph and Cheryl grow about 5,300 acres of apple trees and 50 acres of cherries. Theirs is the largest family-owned apple orchard in the world. They pack an average of 20,000 boxes of apples per day—enough to fill 25 trucks. Collectively their orchards are a $60 million business. But the money they make is not what is most significant—it’s what they give away. Each year 50-75% of the orchards’ profits are donated to the family’s Vista Hermosa Foundation and to related ministries. In 2008, the foundation distributed more than $5 million in grants to international partners.

THE BROETJE WAY
Broetje Orchards employs around 1,100 people, but during harvest-time this number swells by another thousand. Because many of their employees are migrant workers, the Broetjes were challenged to learn about the roots of systemic poverty and how to address the needs of the poor.

In 1986 the Broetjes opened the Center for Sharing, which promotes hope by encouraging marginalized people to begin dreaming dreams for their future. The Center provides an environment in which they can explore God’s call on their lives and consider, within a small group context, how to apply that call in ways that heal, reconcile, and free others for service. Out of these groups at least a score of local and international ministries have either been birthed or are currently being served.

The Broetjes also developed a residential community named Vista Hermosa (“Beautiful View”). It includes comfortable and affordable rental dwellings for 126 members of their orchard “family.” The Orchard View Market provides the residents of Vista Hermosa with basic-need commodities, and some of the workers’ older children have the opportunity to work at the market and learn business skills.

The Vista Hermosa community also offers ESL and GED courses along with computer learning, summer camps, youth programs, parenting training, athletics, counseling services, women’s support groups, and WIC programs. To provide better care for their employees’ children, the Broetjes built a preschool and an elementary school. A scholarship program provides college tuition for their employees’ children.

THE CHERRY COMMITTEES
Because Ralph and Cheryl are also committed to developing the leadership gifts of their employees, they created an opportunity for employees to participate in funding projects. The Broetje Orchards Cherry Committees are managed and directed entirely by Broetje employees.

The Committees’ main funding source developed almost by accident. Hidden among the hundreds of thousands of apple trees is a 50-acre parcel devoted to cherries. In 1990, after seven years of losses on that parcel, Ralph had lost hope that it would ever become profitable. He decided to cut the cherry trees down and replace them with apples. But one day, while reading the gospels, he was forced to reconsider.

In the book of John there is an unusual parable about the owner of a vineyard with a dilemma just like Ralph’s. In the midst of his productive orchard was a lone fig tree that had not borne fruit for three years. The owner’s patience was finally exhausted. So, arms waving in the air, he barked out orders to cut the tree down. In the story, a field worker advocates on behalf of the miserable fig tree, begging the owner to give it one more chance. The owner responds, “If it bears fruit next year, fine! If not, then chop it to the ground.” (John 13:9). The story leaves us hanging. We are not told whether the fig tree got its lifetime reprieve, but the implication is that it did.

As far as Ralph was concerned, he had received direct instructions: he was to give the recalcitrant cherries one more year. If they produced well, the proceeds—all of them—were to be given away. The beneficiary Ralph and Cheryl selected was Pimpollo, the neediest orphanage in Mexico. It was little more than a decrepit warehouse filled with a hundred severely disabled and maimed orphans.

He was to give the recalcitrant cherries one more year. If they produced well, then the proceeds—all of them—were to be given away.

Several months after conveying this decision to Padre Pancho, the priest who directed the orphanage, the Broetjes received a letter from him. It read, “Ever since the children in our home heard about what you planned to do with the proceeds, they have been praying for the orchard. But they have no idea what a cherry is. Could you please send them pictures so that they can see what they are praying for?”

The Broetjes obliged, and pictures of the small red fruit were posted on the orphanage wall. The orphans prayed all through the fall and winter, and kept up through the harvest in July.

God heard the prayers of those little ones. In late October of 1991, the orphans at Pimpollo were informed that a draft in the amount of $350,000 had been sent to them from the profits of a fruit they had never seen or tasted. The Broetjes’ 50-acre parcel of cherries had yielded the greatest per-acre profit in their entire orchards’ history.

That’s how the Cherry Committees project got its start. Recently, the Committees donated almost $400,000 to World Vision’s work in Africa, and last year their total distributions topped $900,000. In the past 17 years the once-unproductive acreage has seen bumper crops in all but two seasons.

TRANSFORMATION
This is the model that Jerry Haak decided to emulate following the Partners Worldwide conference in 2006. He returned to his cherry and apple orchard having embraced the calling to be a change agent committed to transforming not only his business but his community.

Echoing Cheryl Broetje’s words, he says, “Transformation has to be a lifestyle—if it is only helping out the poor domestically or internationally, it is just a tithe or a hobby. We have to take Jesus into every facet of our life—our business, our workplace—every area.”

“We have to take Jesus into every facet of our life—our business, our workplace—every area.”

Rosie joins the conversation again. “We tell ourselves, ‘When I retire I can serve,’ or ‘When my kids are out of school I’ll have time.’ No! We have to serve God now with all that we are. Jesus has to weave through all our life. It all has to be about him.”

Jerry adds, “I tended to focus on church, home, and school—what I call the ‘three-legged-stool.’ But I think we often forget that the purpose for the stool is milking the cow.” It’s clear he has decided not to pull any punches. “I was good at building stools and shitty at milking the cow,” he admits. “My business was completely disconnected from my Christian life.”

Jerry continues, “Transformation needs to take place here [in North America] maybe more than it needs to take place there [overseas].” This is the first interview I’ve conducted in which that particular sentiment has been shared. It is humbling and refreshing. And after visiting five of those “places over there,” each trip more convicting and provoking than the last, I could not agree more. Jerry continues, “Over here, our time is our god. That needs to change. We need to give it all to him: our time as well as our work.”

“This is kingdom work,” Jerry explains as he points outside to the cherry trees that flank the spacious yard. “I don’t work anymore so that I can give money to extend the kingdom. I am doing it in and through my business.”

All this talk about transformation has had a very real internal effect on Jerry. His self-concept has been radically changed. “I see myself now more like a pastor than a business owner. And while my ‘parish’ begins on my farm, it extends out to Sunnyside.”

“I don’t work anymore so that I can give money to extend the kingdom. I am doing it in and through my business.”

BUILDING RELATIONSHIPS
This new perspective led the Haaks to become more deeply involved in the struggles faced by their employees. The neighboring town of Sunnyside is a rural community of approximately 15,000 people. Seventy-five percent of the population is Hispanic, and racism and prejudice run deep. Gangs are on the rise, and the teen pregnancy rate is well over 25%.

The Haaks decided to bring their neighbors’ struggle to their church and school communities, which were homogenously white. They invited Cheryl Broetje to speak at their Christian school’s annual dinner. “She began asking some direct questions,” Rosie explains. They were pointed and hard to ignore. “Is your Christian school a reflection of your community, or are you nurturing a Christian ghetto?” She did the math for them. “If 75% of your area is Hispanic and your school is 90% Anglo, what is that saying about you?”

Following this challenge, Jerry and Rosie decided to address the soaring high school drop-out rate by initiating a Christian school scholarship program for the families of their field workers. This program would provide incentives for graduation as well as assistance with college tuition. The goal of the fund was to put Christian education within the reach of Hispanic families.

But their involvement in Zambia with Partners Worldwide had taught them an important principle: “You don’t just throw money at people—you have to build relationships.” So they paired each scholarship student with a strong student-mentor. As it turned out, one of their own daughters was selected to be a mentor. When the mentoring relationship turned into a friendship, Rosie recalls how odd it was the first time the cultural/relational line was crossed. “I had never before had an employee child swimming in the family pool,” she admits. Transformation can be a bit of a shock to the system.

MARKETPLACE MINISTERS
Spurred on by the success of the scholarship program, Rosie and Jerry wanted to do more. Herm TeVelde, a retired farmer and a member of their church, had been to Zambia twice. He and Jerry decided to team up to teach a series of Sunday school lessons written by Ed Silvoso titled “Anointed for Business.” The message was straightforward: as a Christian you are called to be a “pastor” of whatever area of responsibility God has given to you in the world. At the end of the class, the challenge was simple: “Will you commit to seeking spiritual and social transformation for our city?” Twenty-five individuals took up that challenge, and an initiative called Transformation Sunnyside was born.

As a Christian you are called to be a “pastor” of whatever area of responsibility God has given to you in the world.

After the class Jerry and Herm distributed copies of Silvoso’s book and sponsored city prayer meetings with local pastors and businesspeople. A core group of 14 leaders developed, and in November 2007 a city-wide meeting was held at the local high school. In the auditorium were 400 to 500 people representing about 30 churches. At the commissioning service Ed Silvoso brought forward pastors who were prayed over by the congregation. These pastors then blessed the businesspeople. It was a prayer of commissioning for scores who were dedicating themselves to be “market place ministers”.

Jerry says, “The goal of Transformation Sunnyside is to bring substantial change through asset-based community development. The focus is on local assets, not local needs.” Their aim is to encourage, develop, and demonstrate servant leadership that “empowers others to serve and succeed” in business, education, and in government.

Thanks to Ed Silvoso and his long-term involvement with revival in Argentina, Transformation Sunnyside also became a catalyst for prayer evangelism. Rosie and others prayer-walk the halls of most of the area public schools. Every week Christians pray at City Hall for the mayor and at the police station for the officers. At restaurants prayers are offered for the servers and the owners of the establishment. It is becoming commonplace for Christians to offer to pray for others in public settings.

While this prayer movement is bringing transformation to the community, it has transformed Jerry as well. His face lights up with an expression of delight and amazement. “What I discovered is that I can serve my employees by praying for them! I can evangelize on my own farm.” He laughs, “I never knew evangelism could be so easy!”

OUTWARD FOCUS
Although Jerry’s lifelong arthritic disease, which has required replacement of two knees and one hip, has kept him from traveling to the “mission field,” God used his medical condition to prepare him for a mission field in his own orchard and in his own hometown.

At the age of 20 the pain in Jerry’s joints forced a choice upon him: would he become self-absorbed, or would he choose to focus his attention outside of himself? “To distract myself from the pain I decided to think about others.” Rosie says that this decision shows in Jerry’s life. “It made him walk slower, take a longer time, and build better and deeper relationships. He listens more instead of charging ahead, because his body can’t keep moving at that pace.” And then she says something beautiful. “It forced him to rest so that he could dream dreams to bless others. It forced him to be quiet and hear God’s voice.”

Jerry’s arthritic thorn in the flesh has been a tool that God used to turn him outward, and the fruit of it can be seen all around: in the lives of his 70 employees blessed with an employer who is also their pastor, in thousands of Zambian families who are living better lives, and in a racially-divided, fragmented community that is being transformed.

As our visit comes to a close, Jerry sums up the ministry to which he and Rosie have dedicated their lives: “We want to see the perspective of Christians changed so they recognize that business is a gift of God, and that they are called to be servants who bless their employees and their community.”

“We want to see the perspective of Christians changed so they recognize that business is a gift of God, and that they are called to be servants who bless their employees and their community.”

He then shares a private conviction: “The next spiritual revival will be among businesspeople who recognize that God has called and gifted them to be in business for the purpose of transforming their communities.” Since they have both been exceedingly clear on the issue, had I pressed them I know they would have added, “. . . and the entire world—for Jesus’ sake.”

Joseph Vijayim is from Hyderabad, India, the only son in a prominent Indian Christian family. His grandfather, one of the first Anglican Bishops in India, was prominent and revered throughout the country. His father, a geology professor at India’s largest university, was named Scientist of the Year by India’s government – at the same time as he was starting and running a major parachurch ministry.

For most of his youth, Joseph’ surname constantly reminded him of a faith he did not share with his family. At home and with his friends, he was rebellious. Early on, though, he learned that strong academic performance earned him latitude in other areas of his life that were not so exemplary. At St. George’s Grammar School, Joseph was a top student and “chief prefect.” He always gravitated toward mathematics.

Right after high school, Joseph took his first computer course. Hyderabad, on the verge of becoming a leading global city in information technology (IT), only had four computer institutes at the time. Today there are thousands of them. Like many bright children of Indian leaders, Joseph went to the United States to pursue his education, and he decided to study computer science. Around that time, he also embraced his parents’ love of Christ, as his own.

I first met Joseph in 2001 in Hyderabad, and it seems that we have reconnected every few years since then – when he visited my office in Richmond, at a conference in Thailand, and then at his U.S. office in Colorado Springs. He has always struck me as thoughtful, purposeful, and gentle.

Joseph’s background is extremely traditional and so is his preppy wardrobe of khakis, button-down shirts, and loafers. His glasses are the kind that accountants wear, and not the hip, black-rimmed ones of marketing or media-types. He looks nothing like Debbie or James, but then theirs is not a one-size-fits-all generation.

It was during his undergraduate years at Biola University and subsequent MBA studies that Joseph began to experience the generational pull toward Mercy. For him, his evangelism-then dream was to combine technology, business and ministry in an emerging field called “business as mission” (BAM).

“I did not want to be like so many students from poorer countries who pursue higher education in the United States and end up staying for the money and comfort. I had always vowed that I would fly back to India on the very same day as I took my last MBA exam in the U.S., and that’s what I did, with my wife and our baby.” This was not just national loyalty, but Joseph’s lifelong commitment to a people and place – India.

That was more than a decade ago, and ever since Joseph has consistently placed a high value on community, relationships, and fellowship. One major commonality of all members of the Mercy Generation is their zeal for community. Joseph and his Christian peers are committed to acts of Mercy, and they believe that those acts flow most naturally and efficiently from strong communities.

Upon returning to Hyderabad, Joseph began Olive Technology in 1996. “My company,” he said, “is designed to be one hundred percent business and one hundred percent ministry. Our mission statement is a vivid example of BAM: Olive exists to provide human, technological, and financial resources to grow God’s Kingdom in India and worldwide.”

Olive now employs eighty people, and I asked Joseph how a profit-driven, competitive computer company could exemplify Mercy. The topic clearly energized Joseph, because I could barely write down his examples as quickly as he rattled them off.

“Most obviously,” he said, “Olive releases other employees and me to do Christian ministry in India and abroad. Olive pays for travel and other needs incurred by employees who travel for ministry purposes. One Olive employee has started a church specifically for technology people in Hyderabad.

“Olive launched two websites, www.mahalife.com for pre-evangelism of non-Christians and www.mahajesus.com for discipleship of Christians.

“At Olive we take every possible opportunity to bring people closer to truth. We have daily devotionals and, although about seventy five percent of Olive’s employees are non-Christians, several of them attend. We host programs on Republic Day, Independence Day, Christmas, Easter, and more. On Valentine’s Day, Olive invited other tech companies to a program called “Reality Check on Romantic Relationships,” and four hundred people attended. The invitation carries much more weight when coming from another tech company, and not a Christian ministry. Next year, we hope to have a thousand people at the event.

“We really try to support Christian ministries in Hyderabad and throughout India. We provide free web hosting for sixty Christian ministries. Olive invites about ten different ministry leaders to our annual Christmas party, and we make a financial gift to each of them.”

As it relentlessly takes risks, the Mercy Generation encounters many impediments: public disapproval, friends’ confusion, untested financial models, uncertain future paths, and even physical danger. Joseph acknowledged to me that Olive had to sacrifice higher profits by diverting money into ministry. “Olive hasn’t grown the way a typical IT company does, especially one that has been in business for twelve years. Most of those companies, if they’re still around, have gone through initial public offerings and have grown ten times, so there is a cost.” Debbie Walker continues to compromise her career trajectory by chasing her calling. James lives under the specter of harassment or detention by government security in his country, while facing skepticism among Christians about the effectiveness of his evangelistic-then efforts. Debbie, James, and Joseph have all counted the costs of innovation, of sharing the yoke with Jesus.

Joseph was also quick to point out to me that the Mercy Generation is not restricted to Christians. “After an earthquake in 1993 when 35,000 people died, India was reliant on foreign funding. When the tsunami hit in 2004, the Indian government told the world that we did not need funding from outside. Software companies and call centers raised eighteen million dollars within a couple of days. Almost the next day after the tsunami, twenty Olive employees asked for time off to go to the tsunami-affected areas with blankets, food and money. And this isn’t unique to Christian believers – it’s the younger generation around the world. In India, younger people are in workplaces where they interact with people from the United States, and they see your belief that all men are created equal. Then the upper-class IT Indians begin to treat the lower-caste Indians that way. Spreading values through commerce just happens naturally, which is one reason why BAM is so powerful.”

Three generation of Vijayim men portray the evolution of ministry in the marketplace. “My grandfather the Bishop and my father the professor shared a common approach,” Joseph noted, “separating business from the workplace ministry. My grandfather’s ministry was all in the church. My father’s ministry was also outside of his job, as he poured himself into parachurch organizations. But now, Olive Tech and hundreds of other “kingdom companies” around the world are the logical next step in this progression: the merging of business and ministry.”

Mercy: mercy in emancipating, mercy in mountaineering, mercy in the marketplace – and yes, mercy in ministry. The concept can be perplexing to Christians with dualistic visions of vocation and ministry as fundamentally separate. But the Mercy Generation leans away from either-or, and toward “both/and” solutions. Debbie, James, and Joseph have all taken innovative steps to reshape their worlds so that their passions merge: for Debbie it’s justice and law, for James it’s mountaineering and discipleship, and for Joseph it’s business and ministry.

By the way – I dig Fritz’s book. For years Fritz was a program officer for an East Coast-based family foundation that focused on Christian missions around the world. Program officers are among the most knowledgeable people I know, and I often wish they would share more of what they know with the rest of us. That, my friends, is this book. Many of Fritz’s global contacts that are described in this book came, or were nurtured, through his foundation work. As I mentioned, the book should be out in the spring. If I can, I’ll do one of those wetoku interviews with Kling.

Here are some interesting tidbits:

“The data’s kind of fuzzy.”

Buffett tells Fast Company that one of the reasons he is giving these gifts is because he doubts he’d be skilled at philanthropy himself. “I don’t think being able to allocate capital means you’re good at anything else,” he says. He offers a metaphor to illustrate how he thinks about financial investing versus philanthropic investing. When evaluating whether to buy a stock, he says, he’ll wait months or even years until he feels comfortable “swinging at easy pitches.” But in philanthropy, “you’re really trying to swing at balls other people have been missing,” he says. Plus, “the data’s kind of fuzzy.”

About nonprofits:

Buffett’s gifts propelled his kids’ small foundations into the elite of philanthropy, immediately endowing them with new prestige and influence, but also introducing added risk. “You get a lot of people who have big hearts but don’t have business skills,” says Trevor Neilson, president of the Global Philanthropy Group. “That leads to a lot of ineffective nonprofits.”

Learn the Word “No” … and Then Learn It Again:

Not long after Warren Buffett announced the gifts to his children’s foundations, a friend of Peter Buffett’s said, “Peter, let me put it to you in simple terms: You’re the hot girl who walks into the party with big boobs.”

In the months after the announcement, Peter and his wife, Jennifer, who works full-time as president of their NoVo Foundation, learned how true that was. Suddenly, there were tons of people knocking on their door — especially those from Milwaukee, where the couple had lived until 2006, and those interested in Native American causes, which had previously been one of the focal points of their NoVo Foundation’s giving. “After the increase, we had people calling us and saying, ‘Can we get on a plane and come see you?’ ” Jennifer recalls. “No.”

and then there’s this: Look for Needs, Not Wishes:

Most of the educational projects that Sherwood is now funding are systemic. For instance, it is spending $8 million to modernize all 83 school libraries in Omaha; go into one of the renovated facilities and “you’d think you were walking into a Barnes & Noble,” says Omaha schools superintendent John Mackiel.

Many of the projects view education holistically — it’s not just about when the kids are in school or what they learn from books — and address often-overlooked needs. For instance, the school district is receiving about $300,000 a year for an emergency fund to help the poorest students and their families address critical needs, whether it’s paying a long-overdue electric bill or buying new winter coats. Sherwood has also committed to pay college tuition and subsidize child care for classroom assistants and other lower-level school-system employees who want to become teachers; this effort is focused on training minorities, who are underrepresented among Omaha’s educators.

Much of what we learned in grade school about the New World encountered by the colonists at Jamestown turns out to be wrong. In movies and textbooks the colonists are often depicted as arriving in a pristine forest of ancient trees, small bands of Indians gliding, silent as ghosts, beneath the canopy. But the idea that the English were “settlers” of land that was unsettled before they arrived is complete nonsense. In fact, three English ships landed in the middle of a small but rapidly expanding Indian empire called Tsenacomoco.

Three decades before, Tsenacomoco had been a collection of six separate chiefdoms. By the time the foreigners came from overseas, its paramount chief, Powhatan, had tripled its size to about 8,000 square miles (21,000 square kilometers) and more than 14,000 people. Wary, politically shrewd, ruthless when needed, Powhatan was probably in his 60s when the English landed—a “goodly old man, not yet shrinking” with age, according to colonist Strachey, “well beaten with many cold and stormy winters,” but still “of a tall stature and clean limbs.” His sphere of influence stretched from the Potomac to Cape Henry.

Most of Powhatan’s people (known by the colonists as the Powhatan Indians) lived in villages of a few hundred inhabitants surrounded by large tracts of cleared land: cornfields and former cornfields. Except for defensive palisades, the landscape was unfenced. By a quirk of evolutionary history, North America had, except for dogs, no large domesticable mammals; its native species, such as bison and deer, could not be tamed. With no horses, cattle, sheep, goats, or chickens to tend, villagers had no need to enclose their fields.

Between the villages was the forest, splendid with chestnut and elm but hardly untouched. “It was touched, and sometimes heavily,” says Donald Young, an ecologist at Virginia Commonwealth University in Richmond. In the fall, Indians burned the underbrush, keeping the forest so open and parklike, colonist John Smith wrote, that “a man may gallop a horse amongst these woods.” With Indian villages dotting the region’s many riverbanks, the Chesapeake Bay was a jumble of farm fields, marshes, deep forest, and secondary forest (young trees growing on abandoned plots). Jamestown peninsula was an example of the last; it had been cleared, perhaps for farm fields, a generation or two before the English arrived.

Mann’s book, 1491, is one of my top ten all-time books, regardless of category. The book’s thesis is that the Americas prior to Columbus were more advanced, populated and sculpted (“terra-formed,” in Mann’s terms; “strip-malled,” using my own) than the primitive, romantic, wild jungle in our popular consciousness.