correction/addition
actually, john bechtel (jb) is writing a book with ravi (!!) zacharias right now. he told us many stories during our time with him and some of them are going to be in that book. when ravi first started out with the christian and missionary alliance, no one wanted him because he was indian, so they sent him to southeast asia under jb. at first jb sent him to the villages, "not knowing that he was the biggest brain we had." his sermons were so complicated that the translator didn't know how to translate the messages. so jb told the translator to just make up his own sermons for now until the trip was over. jb's also taken billy graham across a river near hong kong as a boy.

[ edit: this post was made in phnom penh, cambodia ]

[ edit2: see here for john bechtel featured on ravi's 'let my people think', telling one of his many remarkable missionary adventure stories. ]

closer
seem to be finding answers.

what i'm doing at speculator
let me take a moment to list some of the things i have been or will be doing at lift (leaders in further training) discipleship at camp-of-the-woods:

on friday afternoons we volunteer at methodist youth fellowship, an after-school program for elementary school kids.

on friday nights and saturdays, we help out with food service. depending on the weekend, i do one of: dish, wait, and bus (transport between kitchen and caf).

on sundays, we visit churches of various styles/denominations and meet with their leadership to see how their church is run and why. these few weeks we've been going to terra nova church in troy, new york. they're part of the acts 29 network, headed by my latest favourite author/speaker mark driscoll.

on mondays we do housekeeping. that means cleaning toilets and making beds and such in the conference center suites, after the weekend guests have left.

every other saturday i help out in the front office or checking in/out cross-country skis, skates, and snowshoes.

we go hiking (on snowshoes) on mountain terrain and do a bit of cross-country skiing. there will be on a several-day hike in a couple weeks.

every couple weeks, we volunteer doing odd jobs (like cutting out pipes of an old office building so they can refurbish it) and run chapel service for the capital city rescue mission (a homeless shelter) in albany.

over the course of the term, we are memorizing the book of philippians.

over the course of the term, we are doing an in-depth study on the book of galatians, based on material prepared by pastor tim keller of redeemer presbyterian church.

we spent three days learning about the christian worldview from dr. david naugle from dallas baptist university (a side note: this 50+ year-old guy is a big fan of switchfoot frontman jon foreman, citing his work a lot during lectures, and got him to do a private concert at an upcoming dbu conference).

we'll spend three days learning about developing the christian mind with national radio talk show speaker and author kerby anderson from probe ministries international. he's co-authored a book with norman geisler.

we'll spend four days learning about living life with god with joni grace powers and robert pyne, both former faculty at dallas theological seminary. based on their newly released book, lifespace: the practice of life with god.

we'll learn about the bible as a drama. our text will be the drama of scripture: finding our place in the biblical story by craig bartholomew and michael goheen, both of whom are faculty members at redeemer university college.

we'll learn about church history. our text will be christian history made easy by timothy paul jones. foreword by mark galli, managing editor of christianity today, and endorsed by j. i. packer.

we'll be lectured on various theological topics such as postmodernism, arians, judaizers, gnostics, pelagians, reformation, enlightenment, calling.

we'll be reading parts of st. augustine's confessions.

between march 17 - april 4, we'll be on a short mission trip in various parts of asia, including hong kong, thailand and cambodia.

generally speaking, we get one full day off per week.