MTI

We just spent three weeks at Mission Training International (MTI) in Colorado Springs, Colorado. Our program there was called SPLICE, and we learned about various Spiritual, Personal, Lifestyle, Interpersonal, Cultural and Endurance/Enjoyment challenges we will face while integrating into a new culture. The goal during this was to teach us about “splicing” ourselves into our new culture effectively. It was a fun break from being in The DR but each day left us mentally, emotionally and spiritually drained.

The MTI building, located in Palmer Lake, Colorado (just outside of Colorado Springs), is like a small conference center, with hotel like rooms, a large meeting room, some smaller rooms, a kitchen and dining room and a game room downstairs. There were 23 adults in our group, who are serving the Lord in countries such as Kenya, Spain, Germany, Paraguay, Nigeria, Ecuador, China and South Africa. We really enjoyed getting to know everyone and living in community with them (and the 15 kids under the age of 8 years were fun to be around as well.)

Each weekday we were treated to a hot breakfast at 7:45 and then our morning session started at 8:45 and went until noon with a break or two thrown in to help keep our minds fresh. Lunch was then served for us. The afternoon session lasted from 1:30 until 4:00. We were then free for the rest of the evening with dinner being served at 5:30. We were also free on the weekends to relax our brains from the onslaught of emotions from the week.

Our class leaders were Robin Allen and Tim Wilson. Robin is from South Africa and lived with his family in various places, including Sierra Leone and Nigeria, for many years, living and breathing Christ to those cultures. He had multitudes of stories which greatly added to illustrate much of what we were learning. Tim was a Christian camp director for over 20 years, and lived in France for 9 of those. Both of these men were amazing as they led us through various issues which would impact the life of anyone moving to a new country, such as cultural differences, managing stress, crossing cultures, and values awareness.

For one of our crossing cultures class, we role played various different societies, from a strong military regime to a subservient society. We weren’t allowed to use words, and so Andy’s group (the loud, friendly, excited, welcoming society) jumped up and down, made excited noises and was very touchy feely when welcoming others into their group. Lauren’s group was a slow, lackadaisical society that gets things done on their own time (just like the DR!), but which really frustrated the strictly regimented society. Overall, we just had to learn how to drop our preconceived notions of others. We found ourselves consistently looking at the other groups in a negative light, considering how they were different. Yet, we all had a purpose, a reason for acting like we did. Just a lesson learned, that most people do behave rationally, and that we should really try to look for the positive in other cultures.

Another thing we talked about was conflict resolution, which is very important when living in a community and trying to merge with another culture. I am a “Teddy bear”, meaning I will let go of my side of the conflict for the sake of the relationship with the person. As long as they are not my family, where I will be “sharkish” and stick to what I believe Andy is an “owl masquerading as a shark.” Owl’s want to talk everything out, make sure they have all sides of the story, and try to get to a resolution that is amenable to everyone. However, this takes too much time, so the shark in him comes out to sacrifice relationships to make decisions. There is a time and a place for various types of conflict resolution, and it is important to learn how to relate with other types.

One of our sessions, entitled “Who we are under pressure” was very enlightening. If you have not yet been to MTI, but plan to go SKIP THIS PARAGRAPH!!!! I don’t want to give anything away.
I mean it….
We were introduced to “the box,” a simulation where we were split into two groups and put into 6 foot high, 6×10 boxes in a simulated hostile takeover of the building. Andy’s group stayed calm and prayed, and most of the men in my group ended up dead. I’ll leave it at that, but it was a very enlightening/ exciting/ frustrating few hours of our life.

Other issues we talked about revolved around living in a Christian community, such as moral purity, spiritual vitality, keeping the Sabbath and building community. Much of what we talked about could be construed as “well, yeah, that makes sense,” yet if I were just to think about it on my own, I might come up with a different conclusion. We were challenged to know scripture solidly for every aspect of our lives. An example of this is taking/making bribes. What does the Bible say about that? We know the Roman Road, we know what Jesus says about salvation, yet do we know what the Bible says about everyday life? This really challenged me to work on my knowledge of scripture in everything.

On a lighter note, we were spoiled rotten during our time there with tons of food and comfy rooms. It truly was a blessing to have three hot meals served to us each day and then have someone else clean all the dishes. The kitchen crew was awesome. I, Andy, think I put on a couple of pounds. We also enjoyed our free time in the evenings and weekends. We got lots of shopping done for things we can’t buy in the DR. We came back with over 150 pounds of stuff we bought to furnish our apartment, including dishes, toiletries, pots and pans, a toaster, a coffee maker, etc. We also were able to attend church at the Air Force Academy Chapel on two Sundays, which was beautiful. One day was spent hiking at the Garden of the Gods and marveling at God’s creation.

I could go on and on about the things we learned in our three weeks there, but I’ll refrain at the moment. To all of our supporters, thank you for giving so that we could go learn about the how to deal with the difficulties we will be facing over the next year. We learned a lot about ourselves and God, and it is all great knowledge to have for the future.

Lauren (and a bit from Andy as well)