Preparing for a Life in Missions

Facilitator(s):
Mitch Duininck, MD and John Cropsey, MD

Room:
The Chapel, 3rd Floor

Description:
Veteran healthcare missionaries share their wisdom on how to best prepare for a life in missions.

Sessions:

• Session 1: What Not to Do if You Want to Do Missions
• Session 2: Sin, Failure and Unbelief: Prerequisites for Medical Missions
• Session 3: Misconceptions about Missions and Missionaries
• Session 4: Transformation through Teaching Teams

---

 

Serving the Great Physician in Disaster Zones

Facilitator(s):
Elliott Tenpenny, MD and Kelly Sites, RN

Room:
Mission Control, 3rd Floor

Description:
This workshop is an introduction to Samaritan’s Purse and its Biblical basis for disaster response. We will cover the Disaster Assistance Response Team (DART) mentality, the sectors we primarily work in, and focus specifically on our medical response capabilities.

Sessions:

• Session 1: Overview of Disaster Response
• Session 2: Disaster Response Mentality
• Session 3: Emergency Medical Response

Serving God with Open Hands

Speaker(s):
Kelly Sites, RN

Room:
Main Sanctuary

Description:
Often times we hold those we love, our passions, goals, dreams and skills, our future, our professions, and serving God, with clenched fists. We want to maintain control and keep a firm grip on it all. Learn how serving God with open hands sets you free and takes you on a wild adventure of knowing a bigger God and a fulfilling life of service.

---

 

It is God Calling You

Speaker(s):
Martin Nkundeki, MBChB, MBA

Room:
Main Sanctuary

Description:
Christians around the world come face to face with people in difficult situations, many times we may walk away, offer a hand and go on, or we think it’s for someone else, some other group, or for the government, but when, like Moses, we stop to look closely at the situation, we see ‘’God in the burning bush”, we see more, feel more and realize we can do more. This is a story of a Ugandan doctor at a mission hospital in the outskirts of Kampala, Uganda’s capital. Stepping out of my office in the new clinic to go out and visit, and see. The plenary session will discuss how being involved in a community led to a decade long relationship with nearby slum communities, working with them to create solutions to their problems, and using a medical outreach team of Village Health Volunteers to spread health information, change lifestyles and bring hope. It’s about discerning the stirrings and opportunities, and recognizing it is God calling you. God needs you as a conduit of His grace, an ambassador of His dream, to bring hope and courage, and an exodus of His people to a higher quality of life.

---

 

Closing the Culture Gap of Medical Missions

Speaker(s):
Greg Seager, RN, MSN

Room:
Main Sanctuary

Description:
Understanding culture in missions is foundational, but do we understand missions culture? There is a culture gap in medical missions but it is not the culture gap we usually consider. The biggest culture gap in medical missions is often the one that exists between short-term and long-term medical missions. This plenary will look at these two cultures and the importance of closing the gap between these two worlds.

---

 

When the Will of God Feels Scary: How do we follow Jesus when it’s not safe?

Speaker(s):
Gary Haugen, JD

Room:
Main Sanctuary

Description:
We want to follow Jesus wherever He calls us, but how do we follow Him (and lead others well) in a fallen world of brokenness, lies and pain? Let’s explore what Jesus taught about following God with joy and power in a dangerous world.

 

Breakout Sessions are held on the 2nd, 3rd and 4th floors.
2nd Floor Map | 2nd Floor Map Key | 3rd/4th Floor Map

Top Ten Do’s and Don’ts of Medical Missions

Speaker(s):
John Cropsey, MD

Room:
The Loft, 4th Floor

Description:
We will explore the heart-level adjustments required to productively engage in cross-cultural relationships and medical care. We will review common pitfalls made by short-term and long-term missionaries.  We will examine how one’s faith informs the missions experience in which one will be faced with advanced presentation of pathology in the setting of severe resource limitations and crippling poverty.

---

 

The Nutritional Value of a Stone: A Christian Perspective of Global Food Security

Speaker(s):
Dan Haseltine & Amy Fogleman, RN

Room:
Room 3024/3025, 3rd Floor

Description:
This session will discuss the global landscape of food securities and the importance of meeting nutritional needs around the world. Why, in the midst of great global need, is help least likely to be found? How can we as Christians help turn the tide and reshape the global landscape through community and influence?

---

 

Rural Missionary Nursing Then and Now

Speaker(s):
Mary Hermiz, RN, MSN, EdD

Room:
Room 2028/2029/2030, 2nd Floor

Description:
Nursing in the 1970s in rural Papua New Guinea (PNG) was very primitive; And being the highest trained health care worker for 10,000 people with limited resources was a challenge. After 10 years in PNG, it was a dramatic change to work in Kenya (Tenwek Hospital) and start their school of nursing. From living on a small medical compound in PNG, to living on a large medical station with a 300-bed hospital came with an awareness of the many differences. Nursing was vastly different. However, equipping the nationals for hospital nursing, midwifery and community health along with giving spiritual care was very rewarding. Stories, along with the struggles and blessings of those times will be shared.

---

 

Surgical Safari: Low Resources, High Complexity

Speaker(s):
Kristin Long, MD

Room:
Mission Control, 3rd Floor

Description:
What do you do when the nearest surgeon is HOURS away?  In this breakout session, we will discuss the disparities in surgical availability in Sub-Saharan Africa, including an assessment of the feasibility and effectiveness of KenyaRelief.org’s ambulatory surgery center as a model for building capacity.  Additionally, we will examine some of the clinical and ethical challenges of providing highly complex surgical interventions in this setting and discuss how forming sustainable community partnerships are essential to long-term success in the mission field.  Finally, we will review the unexpected, never-boring challenges that come with venturing out on a “surgical safari” as KenyaRelief.org helps you “Take the First Step” towards a surgical mission trip!

---

 

10 Years of Clinic Growth, Village Health Teams and Sustainability

Speaker(s):
Martin Nkundeki, MBChB, MBA

Room:
The Chapel, 3rd Floor

Description:
Dr Martin Nkundeki from Wentz Medical Center in Gaba, Kampala, Uganda, shares lessons learned about missions, the local church, the community and hospital sustainability. This one medical center raises up to 90% of its funds from local services. Additionally, the medical center has supported the establishment of 4 other rural health units using medical camps, church engagement, village health teams and measured levels of care to keep healthcare as a sustainable instrument of Christian medical witness.

---

 

Infected in Rural Africa

Speaker(s):
Todd Price, MD and Sue Price, RN

Room:
Room 3022/3023, 3rd Floor

Description:
Many in the rural areas of the developing world are forgotten, and the diseases with which they struggle are neglected. But we have a great opportunity to effect a change in these rural communities by pursuing healthy behavior and addressing their neglected diseases.

---

 

Through the Eye of the Needle: Preparing for Medical Missions Now; Things I Wish I Knew

Speaker(s):
Keir Thelander, MD, FACS, FWACS, FCS (ECSA)

Room:
Trailblazers, 2nd Floor

Description:
Dr. Keir Thelander will be speaking about living a missional life now in preparing for service. You will hear about Keir’s preparations for the mission field, his 10 years of experience, as well as reflection and insight as to what he wish he had known and done. He will be presenting his “hindsight” view of preparing for life as a missionary.

---

 

Best Practices in Short-Term Medical Missions

Speaker(s):
Mark Topazian, MD

Room:
Room 4023/4024/4025, 4th Floor

Description:
Short-term medical trips can be transformational for both short-termers and their local hosts. In this session we’ll consider factors that maximize the positive impact of short-term trips, including aligning expectations, appreciating cross-cultural values, flexibility, a relational approach, assessing local assets, and the value of returning.

---

 

Are Short Term Medical Mission Trips of Any Value Whatsoever?

Speaker(s):
Russ E. White, MD, MPH, FACS, FCS (ECSA)

Room:
The Warehouse, 4th Floor

Description:
There are many arguments both for and against the value of short term medical mission trips.  Dr. White has served continuously for 20 years at Tenwek Hospital, which literally hosts hundreds of short term medical visitors every year.  In this session, Dr. White will review the good, the bad, and the ugly of short term medical mission trips and review the reasons to “Take the First Step”, and perhaps the reasons not to initiate this ambulation.

 

Privileged to Serve

Speaker(s):
Yancy Stermer

Room:
Main Sanctuary

Description:
The battle to re-take the city of Mosul from ISIS control was expected to be protracted and grueling with enormous consequences for the surrounding population. In response to the growing humanitarian crisis, Samaritan’s Purse deployed its Emergency Field Hospital (EFH) to provide emergency trauma care for all in need.  In stark contrast to the surroundings, the EFH was filled with peace, love, compassion and hope.  We’ll take a glimpse inside the protective blast walls at the mission and the people who made it happen.

---

 

Calling to the Greatest Need: Medical Missions Past, Present and Future

Speaker(s):
Perry A. Jansen, MD, DTMH

Room:
Main Sanctuary

Description:
Medical missions has historically been critical to early Christian missionary efforts, meeting the “felt needs” of communities in Christ’s name. Mission hospitals have been used to advance the gospel, plant churches and improve health outcomes in some of the world’s most needy and hard to reach places. But the work is far from done. There are still millions of people with poor access to essential health services. There are also millions in hard to reach areas who have never heard the good news of Jesus Christ. Many are in “closed access” countries that do not allow “missionaries” but welcome well-trained health providers. We will explore these opportunities and how the Lord is using this generation of health care providers to advance His kingdom. How will He use you?

---

 

Living Matthew 25: A Mandate for a Blessed People

Speaker(s):
Douglas Jackson, PhD, JD

Room:
Main Sanctuary

Description:
The parables in the 25th Chapter of Matthew establish a clear roadmap for our culture and community in using our resources to care for the people closest to God’s heart. Central to the founding of Project C.U.R.E., these directives are applicable to anyone serious about using what we have been given to impact the world.

 

Defend the Orphan

Speaker(s):
Mike Reiszner

Room:
Main Sanctuary

Description:
Coreluv believes that James 1:17, “Learn to do good. Seek Justice. Help the oppressed, Defend the Orphan. Fight for the rights of widows.” is not merely a suggestion but a commandment. Unless someone defends the orphan, they are defenseless. Unless someone speaks for them, they will not be heard.

---

 

Smile on Purpose

Speaker(s):
Phillip Kemp, DDS, AAACD

Room:
Main Sanctuary

Description:
With dentistry being the #2 most unmet healthcare need in the world, it’s easy to fall into the trap of serving over impact. Dr. Phillip Kemp will present how Hope Smiles is seeking sustainable impact over running on the treadmill of can we do enough. It is our hearts that will make the difference in people’s lives, not our hands!

---

 

Mission Impossible, Made Possible

Speaker(s):
Issam I. Raad, MD, FACP, FIDSA, FSHEA

Room:
Main Sanctuary

Description:
Describing how the impossible mission of reaching the suffering people of the Middle East caught in the cross fire became possible through faith in Him who eternally loved people unto death of the cross. Specific examples will be given on the power of firefighting faith in action in making the impossible made possible.

---

 

Charge the Darkness

Speaker(s):
Gary Haugen, JD

Room:
Main Sanctuary

Description:
How the followers of Jesus can switch from playing defense to playing offense in a hurting world. Let’s explore Jesus’ invitation to throw off the bondage of fear and despair to be authentic light in the darkest corners of the world.