Here We Go!

Today we head back home to Belo Horizonte, Brazil. Thanks to all the family, friends and supporters who made these 4 months fun and productive. Thank you for your love and partnership.

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Kelley, Tathiana, Rachel and Becca

Support Update: April 2015

Understandably, some of you might expect this update to be about how we arrived back in Brazil. However, we are still Stateside (no April Fools Day hijinks here!). We decided to extend our trip for 3 weeks to invest as much quality time as possible in this current season of support raising.

I talked in a BLOG post in December 2014 about being Prepared, Assessed and Positioned for the next season of life and ministry in Brazil. By “positioned” we mean being financially ready for the next 5-10 years on the field; hence the past 4 months in the US. We have been wonderfully received by my family, current supporters and several churches in the Chattanooga area. We have not been so well received by snowstorms and cold viruses.

Thus far we have raised $1000 in new support. A-M-A-Z-I-N-G. This is a combination of new supporters AND increases from current supporters. Glory to God. Really. A huge shout-out to all the new supporters, welcome! To our current supporters, we LOVE this partnership. Should anyone like to consider an increase in their support level, let’s talk :) !

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This puts us to about 55% of our $1800/month goal for new support. The need is based on recovering $500 in lost support over the past 2 years, $800 in new support for increasing expenses over the next years with more kids, schools and raising cost of living, plus the final $500 to save toward a down-payment for housing in Brazil. We are still $800/month away from that goal.

I have tried to connect with may of our supporters, and to those far away from Chattanooga or Birmingham, I’m still going to try to connect in other ways before we head back to Brazil.

Please pray as we continue to work toward our goal the next weeks and fly back to Brazil at the end of April.

Alumnus Opportunity

Last week, I was very pleased to have been included in the Samford University Journalism & Mass Communication departmental E-newsletter, Monday Morning Memo. Often the MMM includes a short testimonial from alumni as a means to encourage current students and to allow for networking among its graduates. I was happy to write about how I benefited from this quirky department and how my time spent there aids my current role as Resource Director with Campus Outreach.

http://howard.samford.edu/jmc/

Alumnus Spotlight: Jon Elam (2001)
Global Horizons

Hello, my name is Jon and I'm a production junkie.

Before arriving at Samford, I knew I liked to design and enjoyed writing, but I thought myself too mainstream to be an art major and yet too unique to be a mere business major. Advertising seemed enough of a mix of capitalism and creativity to be enjoyable and also to provide a job upon graduation after dropping a pretty penny on a private-school higher education.

I believe God sometimes enjoys irony as much as we lowly men do.

Now, almost 15 years after graduation, I still do not have that coveted job that makes my higher education cost worth it...or maybe I do? Divine irony has ordained my vocation as a support-funded missionary ever since 10 months after graduation. I work with Campus Outreach in Belo Horizonte, Brazil, and I love it.

The JMC department at Samford truly was a great fit for me. The academic rhetoric of a liberal arts university was inspiring. However, I had a craving to do something. I love to do, complete, make, refine and produce. Yes, I am a self-diagnosed production junkie. So I loved the hands-on, project-heavy JMC advertising track. I freely admit that I did not have a traditional exam the last two semesters of my college career. Those countless hours spent in computer labs and group meetings to get projects done... that was the life!

It was the mentoring of JMC professors Dr. Melissa Tate, Dr. Jon Clemmensen, Dr. Dennis Jones, Dr. David Shipley, Dr. Julie Williams, other adjunct faculty and loving JMC department regulars that made my impulse to produce into a skilled capability to produce something that actually had content and quality for the audience it was directly toward.

I really enjoyed advertising, my internships and the Advertising Federation competitions. It all seemed like the type of job I wanted and the type of atmosphere that a guy who loved Christ could go into and have relationships that extended beyond the normal surface-level, business culture. That would be my future: a creative/production career in this non-status-quo field. So, since that would be my long-term future, it made total sense (to me) to go overseas to serve God and experience non-American life for a few years before my professional reality began.

A two-year term in Brazil turned into five years, then longer, and before I realized it, ministry became my calling and Brazil became my home. I spent several years as a campus staff member, but most recently I have been serving as Resource Director, taking charge of the administrative and operations side of our field team for both our American and Brazilian staff.

However, my time spent preparing for advertising was not wasted. I really do believe that the well-rounded education and preparation I had as an effective communicator has served me so well as a missionary. From coordinating external and internal communications, to financial reports, and all the way to editing resources in Portuguese, I thank Samford JMC's courses and staff for helping me produce quality material communicated in an effective manner. I use my training as a communicator so that Brazilian college students can investigate the person of Jesus Christ in their own language and context.

Obrigado e abraços a todos!

Jon Elam is from Chattanooga, TN., and lives in Belo Horizonte, Brazil with his Brazilian bride Tathiana and their 2-year-old son Isaac. He serves as Resource Director for the Belo Horizonte region of Campus Outreach where he coordinates the U.S. and Brazilian administration and operations for his staff team. You can find more information about his ministry at www.jonelam.net.

Globalization + Missions

This pic is Instagram post of Wandson (from fellow staff Lee Cunningham), a friend and graduate of CO from our church in Belo Horizonte, Comunidade Horizonte. 

Wandson left Brazil in February to serve in Papua New Guinea with Mission Aviation Fellowship's radio broadcast ministry using his degree and experience as an electrical engineer. Thank God for sending out His people from BH!

Also, I, an American, just bought a book for Wandson, a Brazilian, from an online bookstore in Australia for delivery in Papua New Guinea. Pretty neat - and also a good possibility for processing errors - and all so that Christ is known all over the world.

Year-End Giving 2014

Many pledged supporters use year-end as a time to make sure their yearly pledge amount has been met, and sometimes give some extra 1-time gifts, or even for some unexpected 1-time gifts from other friends who do not give through a pledged amount.

This year-end, due to the fact that we are beginning a support-raising season and our account balance needs some help, we make a special request to everyone to complete your pledge for 2014. Also, should anyone wish to make any other gifts other than regularly pledged amounts, these options are available:

1. Via donate.campusoutreach.org: if you are a pledged supporter you may have an online account already or need to signup for one. Gifts for up to $100 can be given through credit card or debit draft, however anything over $100 must be processed through draft of a bank account.
2. Via check: make to "Campus Outreach", with "Jon Elam 2180" on the memo line and sent to: Campus Outreach Int'l Network / PO BOX 43737 / Birmingham, AL 35243

Remember, all gifts to Campus Outreach are tax-deductible. Any and all donations need to be made online, delivered or post-marked by Dec 31st, 2014 to be considered for the 2014 calendar year.

Thank you for your partnership and commitment to us and the work of Jesus's gospel in Belo Horizonte, Brazil.

Prepared, Assessed and Positioned

2014 was an atypical year in many ways for the Elam fam. We met some new challenges, downshifted a bit to regain some perspective and energy, and now are headed your way for a support-raising season to get positioned for the next season of life and ministry in Brazil.

PREPARED: We called it a "semi-sabbatical". A kind of part-time rhythm for Jon and Tathiana in terms of our ministry responsibilities in order to focus on health: physical, emotional, marital, spiritual and with our growing family. It lasted from January to August of 2014. In a much-to-oversimplfied summary, it was REALLY GOOD FOR US. 

ASSESSED: Then came a sort of evaluation of our job and how we fit into what we are doing. Recently these types of Assessments within Campus Outreach have been more proactive, wanting to evaluate before any burnout comes sneaking in. Three Assessors from CO came to visit us, and also a Brazilian psychologist who has worked with several members of out team recently filled up about 4 days of meetings and read a gazillion pages of diagnostics and reports that we had previously filled out. Tathiana and I were excited about really thinking through our role, our calling and our future. Admittedly anxious to receive feedback indicating something we weren't expecting. 

What a joy it was to hear from my director and the other assessors words like "right-fit", "influential couple", "a lot of personal growth", and "leaders." 

POSITIONED: With this, we made a decision spend a few months in the US to get positioned financially for the next season. We have lost some support over the past years, and have some specific goals we would like to reach for our family. We will spend the end of December with family for Christmas in Chattanooga, then spend January through March raising new long-term support for an extended investment in what God is doing in and through the CO ministry in Belo Horizonte and possibly new cities in the near future! More info coming in 2015.

See you soon!

Conference & Contributions

October 2014 is going to meet me with some drastic climate changes. I will bid a brief farewell to Brazil's dry season finale and its 95º dry-heat and brushfire-smokey air. Then, I will say hello to a brisk Fall in the Southern US. Then, I will close out October with a return to Southeastern Brazil's arrival of its monsoon-like rainy season. These rushed travels do have TWO good reasons; not one of them having anything to do with the weather.

I'll start with the second, but most pressing, reason. During my time in the US I will be meeting with some support contacts and churches in Chattanooga and Nashville to try and raise $6500 in one-time donations. Over the past 2 years, Tathiana and I have had an above-average loss of support for various reasons, and we now need to raise a lump-sum in order to finish the year in the black. If any of my monthly and annual supporters desire to give beyond their pledge, it would be graciously appreciated.

Now, continuing the reverse order, the first reason is that I will participate for the first time in an annual conference of all the Campus Outreach administrative directors in Atlanta, GA. We call ourselves Resource Directors because we want to be administrative teams that are a resource to the front-line work of evangelism and discipleship on the college campus. These meetings bring together conversations and meetings about best practices, networking, vision for the future as a ministry and fellowship between us Resource Directors. In my almost 4 years as Resource Director in Belo Horizonte, I have not been able to participate in person because, well… I live on another continent.

I will be leaving Brazil on October 4th, spending some days with my extended family in Tennessee, then a trip to Nashville sometime in the middle, and finishing up with the conference in Atlanta, where I fly out of on Oct 30th.

Hope to see as many people as I can, and raise as much support as God allows me to.