It’s Friday afternoon here in the suburbs of San Jose. The sound of the birds mixes with the rumble of traffic and voices of kids playing soccer nearby. Just a few hours ago, the dozen and a half students and staff of the Youth With A Mission (YWAM) Discipleship Training School (DTS) shared their experiences from our week together. People from Canada, Holland, Brazil, the US, Mexico and here in Costa Rica (take a tour of the base here) spoke about what they had learned and fe

It’s another hot day in southeast Texas, and I can picture my new friend and I walking into my house, the steel screen door slapping closed behind us. I’m embarrassed that my mom’s rehab equipment is hanging right there between the den and entrance to our galley kitchen, and I’m going to have to try to explain it or, more likely, try to quickly dismiss it so I don’t feel so weird. Looking a lot like a Johnny Jump Up, it’s a device made of metal and heavy canvas that Mom sits

Anyone in my family and hers would know where this title comes from: a movie my best friend Kennedy and I made when she came from Little Rock to visit one chilly November of my eighth grade year. “Finding Friendship” we called it, our film production debut. Kennedy claimed the title of director and production manager so she could say that “Weezy Works” made the film. “Weezy” was her nickname, and it fit her perfectly. Memories like these that once I held so dear, that were ti

Emily Linn is deceptively engaging. She is petite, seems to have unending energy and looks you straight in the eye when she speaks. Even her eyes seem to smile. The deceptive part is she’s usually talking to you about some of the most tragic things you can imagine. Emily is the head of Canopy NWA, our local refugee resettlement effort, and was masterfully conducting volunteer training a couple weeks ago when she commented in her usual upbeat way, “The average refugee spends s