When I was 18 I decided that I wanted to pursue a career in youth ministry and went to Grace College and Seminary for one year majoring in Youth Ministries. In 2003 I came back to Dallas got married to the beautiful Diane and got involved in a church putting to practice the things that I had learned. In 2006 I started working as a volunteer with the youth group I am now serving with full time and I also started doing short term mission trips to Thailand serving missionaries by putting on youth conferences for them during their annual meetings. For the last 10 years I worked at a Courtyard by Marriott to help meet my financial needs, recently God has called me to step out in faith to fill this position where I rely on the support of others like you.
One of my goals in working with Wycliffe is to be a part of Bible Translation around the world. You may be wondering how I fit in to that doing youth ministry, that is a good question. One of the reasons Bible Translation projects are put on hold is because the translators families are going through turmoil (my family had to leave the mission field twice due to civil war). Families are brought back from the mission field quite broken sometimes and are unable to return until healing has taken place. We all know how stressful it is when our kids get sick or are just sad and hurting and we don't know how to help them. I'm here to be used by God to bring healing, where I can, to these children and so help the entire family be involved in the work God has called them to do.
I'm also passionate about helping missionary kids understand their role in Gods kingdom and their identity in his family. While kids are in my youth group I want them to have a place where they can also process the sometimes stressful transitions they go through traveling back and forth between two worlds and not knowing how long they will be in each.
I'm so grateful for your interest in partnering with me in what God wants to do with the Dallas MK's and ultimately how that fits into His great commission the spreading of the gospel to all people.
Blessings!
Caleb