Sabbaticals are something that have long been reserved for academics and clergy. In the last two decades, business and other fields of work have begun using this tested, tried and true practice of rest, renewal and research for workers.
My answer was that I would like to be in a Spanish speaking culture like Central America and enjoy learning more Spanish language, observing the post-colonial impact of the Evangelical (Central American Code for Protestant) Church and, of course, doing some deep sea fishing, golf, tourism and scuba diving along the way. So, after delaying the sabbatical for a year to allow Mark and Summer Mohrlang to ease into life with a new baby, Amelia, I am just about out the door. I am excited to have a four month paid sabbatical. I am a little frightened about being lonely…and I know after 10 years of starting Sanctuary, the 5 locations of the Green Bean, working for our Classis PNW as Home Missionary and also working for Christian Reformed Home Missions as a church planting specialist and for Fuller Seminary as a professor in the Doctor of Ministry Program, it’s time for a wee bit of a rest. I aspire to get relaxed. I aspire to pray without prayers attached to church, ministry or sermons. I aspire to play hard. I aspire to get fresh legs for the rest of my careers. I aspire to create deeper relationships with partners in Central America and hoping to connect them to Sanctuary and our other partners in the Seattle Cluster of churches and our Classis Pacific Northwest.
So, here’s the my schedule while away:
Feb 3-5 Peer group of Pastors in Phoenix
Feb 6 Awesome FAITH and WORK meeting in Seattle with Cascade Fellows.
Feb 7 Celebrate 61 Birthday with Family and Friends
Feb 8 Fly to Panama – Transit Canal, rest, visit historic sites, go to Bocas del Toro where Columbus visited just a few years before me 🙂
Feb 21 Costa Rica with Jim and Ruth Padilla DeBorst whom you all know from preaching at Sanctuary. Accompanied by Mark R. Larson, Assistant Deputy Prosecutor, King County (I’ll be good, honest 🙂 Also, scuba, surfing, fishing
Mar 3 Managua, Nicaragua heritage tour with Sean Hall, planting partner from Bellingham’s Fountain Parish.
Mar 10 Association for a More Just Society (AJS) Tegucigalpa, Honduras. Learning visit on societal transformation
Mar 21 Andy Rowland joins me on Roatan Island, Honduras for scuba and exploration of the world’s second largest barrier reef
Mar 29 El Salvador for Seeds of a New Creation with Elibero Juarez to partner and explore their work.
Apr 9 Havana, Cuba. Joined by former business partner Jim Angelo of Dialogue Motion Pictures to explore a once forbidden country and soak up crazy-beats at jazz clubs.
Apr 17 Guatemala City and Antigua. Visits with friends, Easter Mass in Antigua and work with some of the most notorious gangs in the world, known as dies y ochos and mara salvatrucha. Pray for safety.
May 2 Fly to Belize City and meet my favorite person in the world, Nancy Rowland for 12 days on Ambergris Cay in the Bay Islands. We are staying on a Youth With A Mission training base near the Great Blue Hole and very close to the home Jimmy Buffett (Margaritaville and more)
May 14 Return Home with Nancy and travel to Spokane with Nancy and Rachel to see Andrew Kyle Rowland graduate from Whitworth University with degrees in Drama and English/Writing.
May 18 In Seattle for a couple weeks to get back in the swing of things.
The first two Sunday’s in June I will preach Biblically based sermons on what I learned from Sabbatical.
From the bottom of my heart, I love you all dearly and am deeply grateful and honored to have this opportunity. Love each other boldly in my absence. Build up our staff of Darrell Waddell filling for me and honor the hard work and devotion of Mark and Summer Mohrlang, Joey DeYoung and Denise Jackson at church and Jason Groenink at the Green Bean while I am away.
I am the luckiest and most blessed man on the planet because of Jesus and each of you!
Much Love,
Randy Rowland
0 Comments