"What the Bugger Matchett's!"

"Annetta! We're moving our whole family to Dallas to live at a ranch and help train college students to work with refugees and develop a theological construct in a gap year program! What's more we're raising our own funding!"

I checked my facebook in-box a few months ago and find this absurd anouncement from some dear friends. Somehow it didn't surprise me. I mean, they're always doing things "led by His Spirit." I mean, this is the same couple who adopted 2 children from Russia. The same couple that used to be the college pastor at Saddleback only to accept a position as a lowly associate pastor in a church plant in Katy Texas. It seems that my friends the Matchett's have developed a pattern in shunning the normal "step up" the church chain in the realm of "successful ministry"...

I got updates every now and again: "We put our house on the market four days ago and it SOLD today for more than the asking price!"; "We'll be there on a Thursday if you wanna' find folks to help us move in!"; "The kids are loving riding horses and playing on the ranch year round!". All the while that I'm getting these invites, well, I'm also getting the feeling that I'm supposed to respond somehow.

And I'm starting to get annoyed.

BUT. I love Rob and Misti. And they've never been too pushy before. If anything, they've simply helped me go my own way and been incredibly supportive of my less-than normal life choices. I mean, they were the ones who brought me to HBU in Houston. They were there when I left Tallowood. I worked for Rob for a few months after I broke off my engagement last year. They've seen the best and worst parts of Annetta.

Finding myself driving to the Ranch a few weeks ago, I was cautious, guarded and belligerent. You're getting this email because you know me. And knowing me, you know that if I arrive in a place with such a poor attitude, it's usually because I know it's something the Father has for me...and somehow, I'm not thinking it looks as rosy as the plans I have for MYSELF! But going out there...well...we're on to story Number two.

The Birthing of a World Changer

Arriving at Sabine Creek Ranch, Ben (a friend from Dallas who had accompanied me for the ride) and I were greeted by a chorus of raucus barking when we knocked on an unmarked door, searching for the Matchett family. Instead of familiar jolly Rob answering, we got sweet-spirited, entrepeneur Eddie. Walking back to some recently positioned temporary buildings, we sat down over ice-water for a chat with Eddie and Rob. We'd finally located Rob, pacing and chatting excitedly on the phone about this crazy SEGUE story.

Eddie told me his story first...: "About 18 months ago, I took a trip to China. I'd always had a sort of heart for missions and have been to China several times. As a minister over the years, I've been blessed to do inumerable international mission trips. But on this trip, heading back, I started to calculate up the number of dollars we'd spent on airfare for our small group to travel over there. After racking up in excess of 30g's, I started to think "there's GOT to be a better way to reach these people!" Arriving home, I stumbled across a program the UN was involved in bringing refugees to the states. I found out that most of these refugees, averaging the arrival rate of one new family in the Rockwall area every day, lived in apartments not too far from where I lived. The UN currently pays for 4 months of food and housing for these individuals. Generally, the refugees originated from Somalia, Burma and Muslim countries in the Middle East. All of these are countries that missionaries are trying to get into, but being denied based on religious reasons.

I started to show up every Tuesday night with my guitar. I'd play a few songs and tell a story of Jesus. Then I'd love on these beautiful people. I realized that most of the refugees were coming straight from the jungles of Butan and Sudan or from extended stays in refugee camps. This meant that most of them didn't know how to find a job and speak English, much less how to turn on hot water or how to work a light switch. To say they were remedial in survival mode in a big city was an understatement. They had virtually 4 months to learn the skills for survival in the states. I know it'd take me longer to develop survival skills in the jungles of Africa. How are they supposed to learn how to survive here? And most of these people are so desperate for anyone to help them that we're finding Hindu people open to the Gospel simply because we've offered them a lifeline of help. I started to pray about what God would have for these people using myself and the camp/.ranch He'd provided for my family to use as a ministry. I realized we only use the ranch to full-capacity in the summer. This left the ranch virtually empty for 9 months of the year. I mean, what if we could get a load of college/post-college age students to come live at the ranch and minister to these refugees? What if we offered them a theological foundation all the while?"

That is the birth story of SEGUE. Eddie called Rob (they had reconnected on facebook of all things!) and they began talking and praying...and within weeks, Rob's house was sold and the money raised for Rob's family to join Eddie on the Ranch.

The Deets
Segue: A musical interlude, leading to the next portion of a musical piece.

The Vision: Missions, Worship, Theology and Community forged into the lives of interns, students in a "gap" year of college or recently graduated.

In brief: On teams of 6, interns spend...

* 10 hours serving the refugees
* 10 hours in seminars - one weekly seminar on worship, one weekly seminar on missions, and one weekly seminar on spiritual formation
* 10 hours in worship and prayer = prayer room, recording studio, corporate and personal
* 10+ hours in a part-time job - hopefully in the field they want to pursue.


The 10 hours of classes a week will cover theological/spiritual formation to marriage/divorce/women's roles to Christian History to Calvinism v Arminianism to...you get the drift.

The part-time job will be outside of their normal SEGUE activities. We provide them a list of employers and they go for it! We want them to be plugged into the outside world while dialoguing with their teams of opportunities to witness, be Jesus-with-skin-on in the workplace.

We are passionate about helping these students develop a heart for missions, an entrepreneurial spirit for tentmaking (Eddie will provide classes on writing up business plans, etc.), a heart for passionate, free, creative worship, and an openness to authentic, vulnerable, accountable Christian community.

OK. SO this is the vision.

I'm putting together a few fundraising events to raise my salary. If you want to give or be a part of organizing an event, I NEED YOUR HELP. I'm extremely overwelmed with the thought of raising support. But when I realize I'm not asking for money for myself, I'm asking for money so I can minister to refugees, then I am hard-core passionate about BEGGING for support!

I'm also uber-active in recruiting high-capacity students interested in giving 9 months of their lives before going to law or medical school...or the mission field...or to seminary or the business workplace. We're praying for cream-of-the-crop students to minister to these refugees who will be the leaders of their countries when they return.

We want future world changers to love on the future world leaders of Bhutan, Napali, and all these countries that current missionaries have no access to.