Home and Family
Prayer and Bible Reading
Generally speaking, I start each day with a time of personal prayer and reading the Bible. Then, during the week, Monday through Friday, our family will typically read the Bible, and pray for about 30 minutes while we are in the process of eating our breakfast. Then finally, also during the weekdays, we meet as a team for about 1 hour of prayer time, whether it is a time to meet at our team’s Center or through a prayer walk that we typically do on Friday afternoon.
I think that the primary wildcard in my time with God is in my personal reading and prayer. I am generally consistent in having the time, but the amount of time can fluctuate. In this first quarter, I want to develop a practice of reading and praying for approximately 45 minutes prior to starting my day.
Exercise
I need to find consistency in taking time to exercise. At this point, I am 47 years old, and while I am generally “fit”, I can feel in my body that I have less room for being nonchalant about even a relatively moderate amount of exercise. My goal for this quarter is to develop a routine that I can do at least 3 times each week.
Sell First Bike
In the latter part of 2021, I proposed to Evan that he learn how to have a business. He has shown an interest in having a business in the past and I have wanted to teach him some of the basics.
At the same time, Evan is also good with his hands and likes to learn how things work. He has shown some interest in helping at the bike shop in the Help Center, so we bought a used, but nice, mountain bike and then bought an electric bike conversion kit and have mounted the kit on the bike, creating a very nice e-bike that we are hoping to sell for about €2,000, which would give us about €500 profit to split and then put back into the business for the next build. My goal is to help Evan to sell this first bike in this first quarter of 2022.
Date with My Daughters
I want to continue to develop my relationship with my daughters. It isn’t always easy to do so as we have differing interests, but I want to continue to pursue them. My goal is to have a date with each of them in Q1.
Rough sketch the calendar for the year
As usual, there is already a lot being planned for the year, and I can feel the pressure of the mounting requests coming, so I need to soon start “calendaring” the year, looking at those things that I already know are priorities for the year and placing them on the calendar early in Q1 so that I know how each of the priorities will be assigned time and will take priority in my life.
Below are some of the items that I already know need to go on the calendar. I’m sure that there will be additional items!
- Northern Italy church planting network retreat
- Search Party Italia retreat – early Q4
- Fundraising trip to USA
- Trip to Rome
Take test for patente
I have been working on my patente – “driver’s license” in Italian – over the last year using an online app. It has been a challenge to learn both the terminology and the laws in Italian, but I need to finish my theory test and move on to the practical driving exam. I want to complete the theory test in Q1.
Making Disciples
In addition to regularly scheduled meetings with individuals, both believers and non-believers, as well as scheduled training and coaching meetings, here are my goals for Q1:
Complete Italian translation of Four Fields training course
Last year, in conjunction with my teammates, I was able to develop an online Four Fields disciple-making training course in English. We now need to translate the course to offer it in Italian. It is underway already after having finished the previous course. My goal is to complete the translation and post the course on the Italian training site in Q1.
Search Party website Italian translation
Similar to the above goal, my desire is to begin writing in both English and Italian, posting the articles on the Search Party website. To start, though, I need to translate the existing site into Italian so it can be more easily accessible to Italians who don’t read English. I want to complete the translation of the English-based website into Italian in Q1, setting myself up to continue writing in both languages afterward.
Meet with each of the pastors in Missione Agape churches
Missione Agape is an Italian non-profit organization based here in Catania. As a team, we have become a part of the organization, allowing us to be in relationship with multiple churches in the area. Our desire is to mobilize more people within the church to share the Gospel, make disciples, and even plant new churches. We have already shared the overall vision for making disciples and planting churches in a recent board meeting, so now my goal is to meet with each of the pastors and leaders in each of the churches to share the vision individually, offer the Finding Your Purpose in God’s Plan course, and ask them to consider starting a new group to go through the Four Fields Training course.
Start new regular rhythms for Tuesday evening training group
We have had a Tuesday evening training group over the last 6-8 months that we have been meeting with on a regular basis. There seemed to be interest among the group when we last met in mid-December to continue to meet, although with those in the group either bringing along others or taking what they have learned each week to another group.
My goal is to start a weekly rhythm of meeting once per week on Tuesday as a 3/3rds Group and then have a separate time during the week to go out for Gospel sharing and disciple-making work.
Start first mission in residence group
I have been working with some members of a church in Tremestieri Etneo who have expressed an interest in starting their own group like the one above. My goal is to start this first group in Q1.