As I was laying out on the beach this weekend, basking in the sunshine of the Costa del Sol and soaking up the spray of the Mediterranean, I suddenly realized the urgency of communicating what exactly I'm doing here in Spain. I know I've mentioned G42, but most of you are probably still pretty much in the dark as to what it is and what I'm doing and learning, so I'm hoping to shed some light on that today :)
First and foremost, G42 is a leadership academy for young adults (at 23, I'm the youngest one here) who are yearning to bring life and freedom to a world where we too often see poverty, destitution, and bondage reigning. God created the earth with the desire for his beloved creation - human beings - to fill it, subdue it, and bring LIFE. Our goal here at G42 is to share this abundant life of hope, joy, and excitement by building God's kingdom here on earth and acting as Christ's hands and feet to make dead things come alive and to restore the earth to what God originally intended it to be - full of life! This ambition may be worked out in a variety of ways in each of the interns' lives. For some, it will mean planting churches around the world. For others, it may mean starting a non-profit organization or ministry to provide help, love, and stability to troubled people. For others still, it might mean venturing into the corporate world or starting a business of their own to change their community from within. Whatever or wherever it may be that each person ends up, our goal at G42 is to equip and prepare ourselves to reach the potential of who God created us to be and to accomplish on earth the vision he put in each of our hearts!
We start by attending classes in a building down the road (the Epicentro) four days a week, Monday through Thursday. In the mornings, we begin class at 9:30 and go until 12:00 when we break for lunch. The interns all usually head back to our house to make lunch, nap, read, or hang out until 2:00 when we go back for our second session of class for the day. At 4:00, we finish and are free until dinner at 7:00. Dinner time is one of the best parts of the day, because all ten of the interns, plus whatever guests we have over for dinner that night, gather around our table out on the patio and eat, laugh, and chat for as long as we want. Dinner here is never a short affair, but rather we linger, take our time, and relish in good company and great food. While classes and teaching are important, G42 has recognized that some of the most influential times and conversations of our lives happen around the dinner table, amongst community and friends, so we make sure to enjoy and delight in these times.
Fridays are our cleaning and grocery days, and we all split up the chores around the house so that it gets cleaned at least once a week. Throughout the week, we are paired up with a partner (the same person for the whole semester) and assigned the nightly duties of cooking, taking out the trash, or doing dishes. Since we have four teams but only three tasks, that means each team gets one week a month off :) The cooking team always has the most work for the week, since they have to spend every evening cooking for 10-15 people, but preparations are made well in advance - the menu is planned out and the grocery shopping is completed on Friday morning - so things actually go quite smoothly. Most of us don't have much experience cooking for ourselves, let alone for fifteen people, but we enjoy the adventure and the learning experience, and somehow we always end up with delicious food on the table!
Dinners are every night of the week except Saturday (and sometimes Sunday), since most people are usually doing their own thing (which oftentimes involves the beach!). On Fridays the house has dinner together and then everyone involved with G42 comes over for tapas (Spanish tradition) around 8:00. That includes the founder of G42, Andrew Shearman, and his wife Mo, and all of the G42 staff and their families, plus whichever guest teachers may be in town for the week or whatever friends we may have invited that we met on various outings or in town. It's a great and relaxing time - everyone just gets together and hangs out on the terrace enjoying the tapas and drinks everyone has brought over.
As you can see from our schedule, we do have quite a bit of free time, but somehow living with 7 other people and being in Spain leaves me busy almost every minute of the day. In between and after classes, we spend lots of time hanging out with each other, reflecting on what we've learned, talking, watching movies, reading together, having dance parties, or wandering around Mijas. During the summer months here in Mijas, you can get tapas and a small drink at any restaurant for only 1.50 euro, so several nights of the week after dinner we hop from restaurant to restaurant to sample a little taste of everything. Some nights we'll worship together, some nights we'll play card games, some nights we'll work on assignments for class, and other nights everyone is in bed by 10:30 (except me of course!). On the weekends, we interns spend a lot of time catching up on life - contacting family members, writing blogs, responding to emails, journaling, and sleeping. When we've had enough time inside, we like to go out to nearby towns and find whatever festivals may be going on that weekend, go shopping, go dancing, and of course.... go to the beach!
Last week all the girls from the house took the bus down to Benalmadena, a town we hadn't been to before, and walked around near the beach. We found a company offering hour-long boat tours for only ten euros a person, so we all hopped on and sailed out onto the Mediterranean for the afternoon. It was such a beautiful day! We even got a chance to stop the boat and jump out into the water and swim around for a bit. The water was freezing, but it was totally worth it :) That may have been the farthest out I've ever been in the open water before! After our boat ride, we walked around a little more until we found a beach that was packed with people and staked a prime spot right in front of the waves. Three or four hours later, completely sunburned and waterlogged, we packed up our things and headed back home on the bus, exhausted but thrilled by our long sunny day at the beach.
Besides our awesome days soaking up the sun on the beach, we also spend a lot of time soaking up new information in class as well. Each week, we have a different teacher or guest speaker that comes in to share with us their stories, knowledge, and advice, gained from years of practical experience in their specialized fields. G42 is structured into four three-month semesters per year, starting in January, April, July, and October. The full program is six months long, or two semesters, and an intern can start at the beginning of any one of the terms. January and July are identical terms, focusing more on the business side of things and trying to build up our entrepreneurial skills. Likewise, the April and October terms are the same, really concentrating on personal spiritual growth and developing the vision that God has put in our hearts.
 |
| Andrew and Brook, one of the interns, playing a game of cornhole |
Over the past three weeks that I've been here, we have had three different speakers, two of which live in Mijas and are full-time staff at G42. The first week, we were taught by Andrew Shearman, who introduced to us the basic vision and premise of G42. We talked about core values of G42, what God's point is for us on this earth, our inheritance as children of God, and what exactly the 42nd Generation is (be watching for a future blog on this). His teachings are radical and thought-provoking, and I left class every day overwhelmed by the all the new information I was taking in. He absolutely blew my mind with his interpretations and life-giving attitude, stretching me to think about things in a way I have never even thought of before.
For more information on Andrew (and David below), you can read their bios on G42's website
here.
The next week, we had David Fredickz, originally from Holland, teach us on the topic of leadership. He started by discussing leadership roles within the church and then moved on to cover Christian leadership and servant leadership (flashback to my DBU days!), leading in difficult times, character, attitude, communication, and leadership development. We had several great discussions in class about each person's opinion on church structure and what works best, and we also got a chance to practice our public speaking and communication skills by giving a ten minute presentation in class on any subject of our choice.
This past week, we had a guest speaker named Steve Holmes come in from England. Steve is an entrepreneur in every sense of the word and has begun dozens of different businesses and organizations over the years, all for the betterment of his community. After pastoring a church for several years and starting a charity, Steve pursued a dream of bringing free dentistry to the people of his hometown in the East Midlands, England. Now, several years later,
Genesis Enterprise Foundation offers everything from dentistry to a family and community center, a resource center, and a Hall that serves as an event venue, only to name a few. Steve was able to share his story with us and offer us advice and tips on how to present a business pitch or get going on starting our own business if that is something we desire to do. After two days of lecturing in class, we were split into groups and assigned a project: develop a plot of land that had been "donated" to us (all hypothetical) into a probable business plan and then present that plan to a panel of judges that would decide which of the three groups they wanted to support by offering grants, loans, and the opportunity to actually develop the property into our plan.
Needless to say, it was a slightly stressful day or two as each group worked to come up with a creative and unique plan that would be more likely than the other groups to receive an offer of a grant or loan (still hypothetical). Unfortunately, my group didn't win, but we all definitely learned a ton about what it takes to actually start up a successful business!
Next week, Andrew is teaching us again, and I'm really looking forward being challenged and stretched by his teachings once again.
Hopefully that gives you a little better idea of G42 and what I'm learning and doing here. I am so excited for how God is working in my life and heart and for where He is going to take me in this whole process. At the end of this semester, in September, we have to present a vision project of what we want to do to bring God's love to life on this earth. At the moment, I'm still pretty unsure what exactly I'm called to do and where I want to end up, but I know that as we seek to hear the voice of God speaking into our lives over the next few weeks and months, it is going to become more and more clear. After all, my vision is just a part of God's vision anyways, and there are so many different ways I can jump in and help it to come alive!
Tragically, Herman's friend went on to commit suicide that weekend, but Herman continued on, looking at his life with new vigor and passion. Thirty five years later, Herman Haan has now lived a full and abundant life, doing more things than I thought were possible for one person to accomplish in a lifetime. After marrying one of the girls in the group he met on the street, Herman went on to attend Bible school and later become the director of his own Bible school specializing in the creative arts. At 24, he started pastoring a Pentecostal church that saw huge revival and complete life-change of over 200 drug dealers from the streets and surrounding areas. As a talented singer, songwriter, and guitarist, Herman was also a member of a Dutch band that toured across Europe with much success and fame. In addition, he has become a wine sommelier and owns and runs his own vineyard, as well as working as a chef, restaurant owner, and TV host of his own cooking show. If that's not enough, Herman has also written five books and is presently working on his sixth. He currently works as a video journalist, filming documentaries for HBO and one of the biggest TV networks in Holland, which has sent him traveling all across the world to places like Pakistan and Haiti. Along the way, he's had the opportunity to interview some pretty important people and be in some pretty important places, like being the first European journalist on site at Ground Zero on September 11. Overall, Herman has created over 400 programs and 40 documentaries, several of which have won national awards and acclaim. 
