Greetings from my new mission location in Norristown, Pennsylvania! It seems that every few months or so I find myself writing about transitions in ministry. Now, two years into my missionary service with International Ministries (IM), change, exciting change, is here again!

As many of you already know, American Baptist missionaries and Salvadoran leaders have partnered on and off over the years in countless efforts to prepare generations of Christian leaders for service in their congregations and communities. Changing global economics, political history, and the current social context mean that the demand for leaders with passion, integrity and vision becomes increasingly necessary, yet the traditional models of preparing and sometimes even discovering leaders are no longer meeting these needs. During my first two years of ministry I have been leading this assessment process in El Salvador asking the questions: What works? What needs to be changed? How do we become more effective? How can IM and the Baptist organizations in El Salvador become better partners in mission? Two years later, I’m nearly done!

As the El Salvador phase draws to a close, I have begun to look forward to the next country to be assessed.....Cuba! As a mission supporting and sending organization, our goal is to use the template of questions and contextual issues that I have been piecing together in El Salvador to look at how context, leadership training, and economics of development in partner countries come together to influence how transformative ministry being carried out successfully or unsuccessfully through the church. In many ways Cuba has been through a polar opposite experience from El Salvador, thus delving into this next assessment will bring many new challenges. Since I can’t live in Cuba, Norristown, PA will be my home for a period of time. After Cuba, the hope is to carry out the same process in Nicaragua and perhaps Costa Rica.

As I am adjusting to life on this side of the border, please keep me and the transition of my ministry in your prayers.  I’ll be taking some vacation time in Oregon at the beginning of August before I buckle down to writing, revising, editing, and planning for what is to come in partnership with Cuba. Thank you for your prayers and hope to see you soon!

The pictures attached are some of the friends and colleagues I will miss the most. Please keep them in prayer as they continue to serve and minister in El Salvador.

Abrazos (Hugs!)  Kim