This bridge actually exists in Honduras: it was built in the 1930s by the Army Corps of Engineers as part of the Pan-American Highway, but was abandoned in 1998 when the river changed its course after a hurricane.

“It is still beautiful and it still stands,” said Okanya, during a lecture at ��ݮ����, “but the river is not there. The river has moved.”

Similarly, Okanya said, the historical, traditional model of mission engagement – with churches of the global north “sending” missionaries into the “receiving” global south – must be restructured to accommodate changing flows of worldwide Anabaptist faith.

Okanya’s visit to campus, in which he also spoke at two worship services, is part of the annual , originally funded by Myron S. and Esther Augsburger to address “topics in the area of Christian evangelism and mission for the stimulation and development of a vision for evangelism and missions for the EMU community.”

The first mission took place in the 1930s, Okanya reminded the audience during his chapel sermon, and those who were called, and those who sent them, were compelled by the powerful story of Jesus Christ. Like the early martyrs of the Anabaptist faith, they suffered for their faith. “You can see their graves,” Okanya said, recalling Elam Stauffer ’64, one of the first missionaries to be sent by EMM. Stauffer suffered for his convictions, losing an infant and then his wife, Elizabeth, after arriving in Tanzania.

Young people seeking purpose are often confronted with the popular narrative of “moving towards something we will get for doing things right,” Okanya said, adding that he too went to college for this reason. Yet there is an alternative narrative: the one followed by missionaries.

Think about “the difference that you can make in life because you are completed not by what you can get but in response to the One who loves you and gave you life,” he urged.

Okanya, who was born and raised in Kenya, pointed as evidence of this compelling narrative and the power of missions to the rapidly growing numbers of Mennonites in Africa. The Democratic Republic of the Congo and Ethiopia have the, behind the United States.

In his youth, Okanya interacted with the Kenya Mennonite Church and the EMM mission community in Nairobi. (When he preaches, he wanders away from the microphone, Okanya joked, because he is still a “Kenyan shepherd boy” at heart.) After graduating from university in Nairobi, Okanya came to the Baltimore area with the YES (Youth Evangelism Service) program and eventually attended seminary at EMU, where he met his wife Jessica Lawrence Okanya ’01.

Okanya has served as president of EMM since 2011, following years of mission work and also six years as lead pastor of Capital Christian Fellowship in Lanham, Maryland.

In his lecture titled “What Needs to Change? A Paradigm Shift in Missions Engagement and Implications for Western Mission Agencies,” Okanya shared some of the challenges affecting mission work today. He and his staff continue to grapple with the question of “what it means to be missional in today’s environment,” considering the issues of sustainable funding mechanisms, human resources, increasing hostility toward Westerners, changing stakeholders and globalization.

“There is a lot the church in North America can offer the world,” he said, “but there is much that the churches in the global South can offer us here. I’ve met with Lancaster Conference bishops asking about receiving missionaries here. What does that mean? What are the benefits? They want to know this and we want to help them.”

The way to engage youth in missions, and in church itself, is sharing and teaching with authenticity, Okanya said, just as the prophets, disciples and Jesus himself did.

“Are we ‘almost Christian’?” he asked, using a term coined by author Kendra Dean Creasy. “Are we not serious enough about our faith and not taking seriously what He said and what He meant? We lack the strength to tell the story, and if we do not have it, then we cannot pass it on. We must be passionate.”

Bertha Beachy, a long-time worker in Africa and the Middle East with and , will speak at an Abraham’s Tent forum 4 p.m. Tuesday, October 12 on “Why and How We Should Carry on Dialogue With Muslims.”

Her presentation will be held in Martin Chapel of the seminary building at EMU (see campus map). Light refreshments will be served starting at 3:30 p.m.

Beachy’s passion for relating to Muslims, promoting women’s issues and working for peace and justice have taken her to many different places and assignments throughout her years of service to the church.

After earning a degree in elementary education and English from EMC (now EMU), she moved to Somalia in 1958 to teach English and learn the ways and language of the Somali people.

She interspersed her service with educational opportunities in literacy, linguistics, Islamic studies and the Arabic language.

Now a resident of Greencroft Retirement Community in Goshen, Ind., Beachy continues to embrace opportunities to learn and serve, including a stint with a to Iraq and a peace and learning tour to Iran with MCC.

She continues to relate to many Muslim friends and is a strong proponent of interfaith dialogue.

Abraham’s Tent at EMU is a center that plans and sponsors a variety of opportunities and programs for interfaith engagement.

Admission to the program is free.

About 150 friends and family members turned out Saturday night, Aug. 14, to honor the memory of Glen Lapp, the aid worker from Lancaster who was killed Aug. 5 in Afghanistan.

Community Mennonite Church of Lancaster held a visitation for Lapp, who was killed along with nine other workers while returning from a trip to provide eye care to villagers in northern Afghanistan.

The Taliban has claimed responsibility for the killings.

Read more on .

When Lisa Schirch was in Afghanistan a few weeks ago, she turned to a friend and fellow Mennonite to show her around the war-torn capital, Kabul.

Glen Lapp in Afghanistan (photo courtesy of Lisa Schirch)

Glen Lapp, a nurse, was the only other Mennonite she knew in Kabul, but they had more in common than a faith. They both shared a desire to help Afghans make their country a better, more peaceful place.

What Schirch could not have known at the time was that it would be the last time she would see her friend, a 1991 ��ݮ���� graduate.

Lapp’s life was cut short on Friday, when he and nine other aid workers with a Christian charity were gunned down in northern Afghanistan, according to published reports and the Mennonite Central Committee, one of the nonprofit organizations for which Lapp worked.

“It’s devastating,” said Schirch, an EMU professor who teaches peacebuilding in the Valley and in Afghanistan. “He knew he was taking a risk and he was very willing to do that. I think he died doing what he believed in and he was willing to take that risk. He was helping a lot of people.”

Attack from Taliban?

Lapp, 40, of Lancaster, Penn., along with five other Americans, a German, a Briton and four Afghans, were found shot in Badakhshan province, known as a relatively peaceful area of Afghanistan.

Although the Taliban claimed responsibility, police say they are also looking into robbery as a possible motive. Schirch and others with MCC cast doubt as to whether the Taliban actually carried out the attack, one of the deadliest on civilian aid workers since the war began in 2001.

Lapp and his team were returning to Kabul from a trip to northern Afghanistan with International Assistance Mission, an MCC partner agency that provides eye care and other medical assistance. Lapp was an executive assistant with IAM and manager of its provincial ophthalmic program, according to a statement from MCC.

Luke Schrock-Hurst, a staff member at the committee’s Harrisonburg office, said Lapp had been in Afghanistan for nearly two years and was set to return to the U.S. in October. Lapp, whose family is from Lancaster, Penn., was not married and had no children, Schrock-Hurst said.

Attacks on aid workers in Afghanistan and other war zones are relatively rare. Lapp is just the third MCC worker to die due to hostile action in the organization’s 90-year history.

“There’s been thousands of us in war zones,” Schrock-Hurst said. “I’ve been [in such zones] myself.”

Being ‘A Presence’

Loren Swartzendruber, EMU president, said the university is grieving over Lapp’s death, along with his family and MCC.

Watch video:

“As with many of our alumni around the world, Glen was fulfilling EMU’s mission of serving and leading in a global context, which often involves great personal sacrifice,” Swartzendruber said in a statement.

Schirch, who plans to return to Afghanistan in October, described her friend as compassionate, humble and “devoted to using his life to serve others.”

Lapp’s perspective on his work was recorded in a report he recently filed.

“Where I was [Afghanistan], the main thing that expats can do is to be a presence in the country,” he wrote. “Treating people with respect and with love and trying to be a little bit of Christ in this part of the world.”

As of Sunday evening, information about funeral arrangements or local memorials was not available.

Updated August 12, 2010

Jump to memorial service information

An EMU graduate working for Mennonite Central Committee (MCC) in Afghanistan, Glen D. Lapp of Lancaster, Pa., was murdered during a shooting incident in Afghanistan’s northeastern Badakhshan province.

According to an , Lapp, 40, was traveling with a medical team of four Afghans, six Americans, one Briton and one German. All, including Lapp, worked with MCC partner organization , a charity providing eye care and medical help in Afghanistan.

Local police found 10 bodies on Friday next to abandoned vehicles and said robbery might have been the motive. The Taliban has said it is behind the attack, according to the MCC release.

Lapp a 1991 EMU graduate

IAM, which has worked in the country since 1966, regularly dispatched “eye camp” medical teams in Afghanistan. Lapp, a 1991 mathematics graduate from EMU who went on to study nursing at Johns Hopkins, had been working as executive assistant at IAM and manager of IAM’s provincial ophthalmic care program.

Watch video:

“The EMU community joins the Lapp family and Mennonite Central Committee in grieving the deaths of Glen Lapp and his colleagues while serving the people of Afghanistan,” said Loren Swartzendruber, EMU president. “As with many of our alumni around the world, Glen was fulfilling EMU’s mission of serving and leading in a global context, which often involves great personal sacrifice.”

‘A little bit of Christ in this part of the world’

According to MCC, Lapp was to complete his term in October, and recently wrote about it in a report, “Where I was [Afghanistan], the main thing that expats can do is to be a presence in the country. Treating people with respect and with love and trying to be a little bit of Christ in this part of the world.”

Professor Lisa Schirch traveled with Lapp

Dr. Lisa Schirch, professor of peacebuilding at EMU’s graduate Center for Justice and Peacebuilding, worked and traveled with Lapp in Kabul. In an interview August 8, Schirch told that she and Lapp had many conversations about the risks involved with humanitarian work in Afghanistan, but he believed the needs of the people there outweighed personal risks. “There’s not a lot of medical assistance available to people in those remote areas [where Lapp was killed].”

Schirch said the killing of IAM workers in Afghanistan is not common.

“The Taliban is a very diverse group,” Schirch said Sunday. “[These killings] are not necessarily the official Taliban line. Normally they leave medical missions alone . . . IAM operated under Taliban rule in the 1990s. It’s unusual that he died in this way,” she said, suggesting that the killings may have been motivated by robbery, as opposed to strategic insurgent military operations.

Schirch hopes that Americans realize the scope of humanitarian efforts in Afghanistan, and the ongoing needs of the Afghan people, many of whom put themselves at risk alongside Americans like Lapp.

“Glen found the work that he did to be very meaningful. I hope that his life is an inspiration to people to continue the work that he was doing there.”

Lapp was the son of Marvin and Mary Lapp, and a member of Community Mennonite Church of Lancaster, Pa., a Mennonite Church USA congregation.

Memorial service

The memorial service for Glen will be held at 2:30 p.m. on Sunday, Aug. 15 at Bright Side Baptist Church (515 Hershey Avenue, Lancaster).

A visitation time with the Lapp family will be held from 6-9 p.m. on Saturday, Aug. 14 at Community Mennonite Church of Lancaster (328 W. Orange St, Lancaster). People are encouraged to ride bikes to any of these services, and wear shorts in honor of Glen.

In the Sunday service where members became aware of Glen’s death, the hymn O Healing River was sung in his memory.

Read more of the to Glen’s death.

More info

• Watch video:

• Daily News-Record coverage: In Face Of Violence, Aid Workers Find ‘Something More Important’

• Daily News-Record coverage: EMU Grad Glen Lapp Murdered In Afghanistan: Among 10 Humanitarians Killed Friday

By Tom Mitchell, Daily News-Record

One of the earliest uses of Tom Sine’s creativity turned heads – and cars.

Sine spoke Wednesday at ��ݮ����’s Lehman Auditorium (listen to the podcast). He recalled for his audience how, as a college student in Portland, Ore., he and some friends piled into the back of an old hearse that a member of the group had just bought, and rattled the nerves of fellow motorists.

Tom and Christine Sine

“We stopped really fast at an intersection, and every one of us in the back tumbled out of that hearse,” Sine said. “One driver ran off the road and I think another swallowed his cigarette.”

Sine and his wife, Christine, spoke for 45 minutes at Lehman about how today’s college students can use that kind of imagination for good in a troubled world. The couple’s joint talk was part of fall Spiritual Life Week, which began Monday and runs through Friday at EMU.

The Sines are also founders of Mustard Seed Associates, a nonprofit multidenominational alliance headquartered in Seattle that consists of Christians from throughout the U.S., Canada, United Kingdom, Australia and New Zealand.

The goal of Mustard Seed Associates is to spur people to help others at home and abroad and, like the biblical mustard seed, bear the fruit of change in the world.

Less Means More

The Sines urged students to turn the world’s financially fragile times into a chance to help others through service that meets the needs of the less fortunate.

Tom and Christine Sine gather with students in the campus center after chapel to discuss their ideas. (listen to the podcast of their chapel talk on “Life after EMU.”)

Due largely to a poor economy, today’s young adults may have less materially than their parents, Tom Sine said. Such monetary limits, he added, may enable young adults to find joy in other ways.

“We’re trying to help college people consider using their lives more to make a difference than a living,” he said.

Such prompting competes with what Christine Sine calls a “consumer culture” that promotes self-indulgence. But a surprising portion of young adults aren’t so materialistic, she said.

“We are finding a number of young people in their 20s and 30s who really question the values of the consumer culture,” Sine said.

Tom Sine, 73, teaches at a Seattle seminary and Australian-born Christine, 59, works as an international health-care consultant. Both have authored numerous books on purposeful living.

Students at EMU applauded the Sines’ address.

“I like their idea about new churches getting people involved with God,” said Alejandra Gutierrez, 18, an EMU freshman who lives in Bridgewater and is a native of Colombia.

Aaron Yutzy, 21, an EMU senior from Timberville, said a cross-cultural trip he took to Central America last year taught him compassion for those outside the U.S., but added he is still assessing life after college.

“I’m not yet sure how I’m going to fit [service to others] into my life,” Yutzy said.

A Popular Choice

EMU campus pastors Brian Martin Burkholder and Julie Haushalter said EMU invited the Sines to speak after a survey showed students wanted a Spiritual Life Week conducted on the theme, Following Jesus With Our Lives.

“The students wanted [to hear] a significant voice that integrated faith with life,” Burkholder said.

For all its attention on EMU’s students, Spiritual Life Week retains a community focus, say organizers, who add that EMU reaches out to the Harrisonburg community with such service projects as home repairs and visits to the elderly.

“Almost all of our Spiritual Life Week events are open to the public,” Haushalter said.

This semester, EMU is holding activities on one day – Wednesday, Feb. 11 – and moving from the Campus Center to the spacious hallway on second floor of the University Commons.

EMU freshman Jihoon Park (left), 19, of South Korea, talks to Mennonite Central Committee’s Sonya Charles in October 2008 during the fall semester Mission and Service Days. Photo by Nikki Fox, Daily News-Record

“We’re trying a few different things this time around – everything happening on one day, in a different setting, inviting local community ‘learning agencies’ and serving refreshments,” said Jennifer Litwiller, director of career services at EMU. “We hope the end result is more students and others checking out the many service opportunities,” she added.

Representatives from at least 11 church-related agencies will have displays set up and will be available all day to talk with students and area residents about possible service openings with their organizations.

Participating agencies will include: Eastern Mennonite Missions, Salunga, Pa.; Mennonite Mission Network, Elkhart, Ind.; Mennonite Central Committee, Akron, Pa.; Virginia Mennonite Missions, Harrisonburg; Paxton Ministries, Harrisburg, Pa.; PULSE (Pittsburgh Urban Leadership Service Experience, Pittsburgh, Pa.; and Wycliffe Bible Translators, Willow Street, Pa.

Community Learning agencies will include: Big Brothers/Big Sisters, Boys & Girls Clubs of Harrisonburg & Rockingham County, Community Mediation Center, Harrisonburg Gift & Thrift, Habitat for Humanity, Mercy House, NewBridges Immigrant Resource Center, Our Community Place and Virginia Mennonite Retirement Community.

An extended university chapel service 9:55-10:40 a.m. Wednesday in Lehman Auditorium will complement the mission-service theme. Steven Mosley, a writer, filmmaker and biblical storyteller from Orange County, Calif.,will give a 42-minute performance, “The Chosen Garment: the Whole Bible in One Act.”

For more information or to schedule an appointment with a service representative, call Jennifer Litwiller in the career services office at 540-432-4131. More information is also available online.

By Tom Mitchell, Daily News-Record

EMU freshman Jihoon Park (left), 19, of South Korea, talks to Mennonite Central Committee’s Sonya Charles Wednesday at EMU’s Mission and Service Days. The two-day event, held in the spring and fall at EMU’s Campus Greeting Center, brings representatives from various mission agencies to talk with students. Photo by Nikki Fox

Karmen Eby came to EMU with more than a casual interest in mission work.

"I enjoy traveling – that’s part of it," said Eby, who served three missions before coming to EMU. "But a mission is also about where God is pulling your heart."

Eby, 25, an EMU senior social work and business major from Harrisonburg, was among a stream of students who took time Wednesday to explore the notion of doing mission work while in school or after their university days are over.

The occasion that drew them to the university’s Campus Greeting Center was EMU’s Mission and Service Days, an event that acquaints students with mission opportunities in the U.S. and abroad. The university holds Mission and Service Days in the fall and spring.

The program concluded Thursday at 5 p.m.

On Wednesday, more than a dozen agencies set up displays and had representatives on hand to talk with students about mission work. Each booth promoted a group that does missions locally, nationally or overseas.

Jennifer Litwiller, director of career services at EMU

Mission and Service Days serves as a visible part of EMU’s broader goal "to educate students to lead and serve in a global context," said Jennifer L. Litwiller, director of career services at EMU.

"We want to provide instruction for [students at EMU] to explore opportunities during their college years and after graduation," said Litwiller, 36, a 1995 EMU grad.

Students considering missions may choose from programs that vary in location of assignment and level of commitment. The latter option is particularly important to candidates who may still be unsure if a mission is right for them, Litwiller said.

"Some missions are for several years, some for the summer, and some even shorter," she said. "Some students choose to do a mission on their spring break."

Phillip A. Rhodes, administrator for Virginia Mennonite Ministries’ Partners in Mission program, says that his association offers prospects a choice of limited missions, usually for a year or less. Those options are often alluring enough to draw an applicant’s interest, said Rhodes, 25, of Dayton.

Virginia Mennonite Ministries is based at 901 Parkwood Drive in Harrisonburg.

"We try to find what a student is interested in, but it’s fun to hear the questions they bring to us, like how they can use their major on the mission, or if we’re involved in any kind of business," Rhodes said.

Uncertainty can deter some students from doing a mission.

One obstacle is money, though officials at EMU say that needn’t be a barrier. Students who’ve taken out college loans can often get those loans deferred, if they make arrangements ahead of time, says Michele Hensley, director of EMU’s financial assistance office.

"A lot of times, it depends on the mission board they’re going to for their mission," Hensley said. "Many can get loans deferred, and there are a lot of churches out there that can help.

"But the best thing is for a student to remove as much debt as possible beforehand."

Loan obligations have stalled more than one applicant.

"Loans are a major issue, a big concern," Eby said. "They’re what holds a lot of people back. I’ve heard people say that they want to do a mission, but they feel like they’ve got to get a job and pay off their college loans first."

Organizations that recruit students for missions find EMU’s campus to be fertile ground: the school’s focus on cross-cultural experiences grooms grads for missions.

Eojin Lee, a senior church-music major at EMU from Daejeon, South Korea, was more than a visitor to Mission and Service Day. Lee attends Stephens City Korean Community Church, which partners with Bell International School to recruit people from the U.S. to teach English in South Korea.

Lee, 22, thinks that Mission and Service Days "represents something about how EMU celebrates diversity, and how it emphasizes serving God’s people."

When he chose Cambodia for a mission, Doug Neufeld wanted to help clean up the Asian country.

“Cambodia has lots of environmental issues,” said Neufeld.

Neufeld, his wife, Cristina, and their sons, Alex, 5, and Evan, 3, spent the past two years in the Cambodian capital of Phnom Penh, returning to the U.S. in July. What Neufeld and his spouse saw during their stay in Southeast Asia was a nation nursing old wounds while harboring new hope.

Neufeld, an associate professor of biology at EMU and chairman of EMU’s biology and chemistry departments, used a long-awaited sabbatical and a leave of absence to serve overseas with his wife.

Talks with officials from , the relief and development arm of Mennonite Church-USA, alerted the Neufelds to the need in Cambodia for addressing problems with pollution, poisons and peace.

Neufeld’s wife, Cristina, and their sons, Alex, 5, and Evan, 3, spent the past two years in the Cambodian capital of Phnom Penh, returning to the U.S. in July.

Wastewater levels in Cambodia loom dangerously high, said Neufeld, and the use of loosely regulated pesticides from neighboring Thailand and Vietnam increases contamination. The latter impurities thrive on impoverished Cambodia’s dependence on foreign trade, particularly in its export of rice, the country’s key crop.

Moreover, the tapping of newly unearthed oil reserves, Neufeld said, has caused deforestation.

“There is a lot of economic pressure on Cambodia to use its natural resources,” said Neufeld, who worked with staff from two universities in Phnom Penh to gauge toxin levels in sprayed fruits and vegetables. “How to use its oil reserves will be the next big issue there.”

Old Demons

Cambodia, said Neufeld, grapples with an even more venomous past.

Suffering inflicted on civilians by the sadistic Khmer Rouge regime of the 1970s left deep scars. That horrific era’s physical legacy shows in today’s maimed survivors missing arms or legs, victims of Cambodia’s civil war, or its post-war traps that include forgotten yet functional land mines.

More subtle signs of the nation’s horrors remain in its people’s reserved manner, said Neufeld, especially in their trained aversion to cooperation. Such reluctance, he said, is indicative of Cambodians weaned on fear during the Khmer Rouge era.

This lack of cooperation can be seen in the two academies that use Neufeld’s scientific skill. The Royal University of Phnom Penh and nearby Royal University of Agriculture may both use his expertise but share little else.

“There’s a lack of trust between individuals from the Pol Pot days, which means there’s less cooperation than there should be between the two universities,” said Neufeld. “Khmer Rouge destroyed all of society. They killed intellectuals and took children from their parents.”

The constitutional monarchy that has ruled Cambodia since the mid-1990s, says Neufeld, amounts to barely more than a “nominal democracy,” and little of the state’s income from trade aids the poor.

“Cambodia’s government is not communist,” said Neufeld, “but it’s not fully functional.”

Cristina Neufeld, a part-time accountant in Harrisonburg who worked with pro-peace youth groups while in Cambodia, concedes that today’s Cambodians “still have a lot of difficulties dealing with their sad history,” but adds that she feels hopeful for their future. “They have a lot of energy to move forward.”

Cristina Neufeld, who spent most of her youth in Bolivia as a daughter of missionaries, thinks that taking her children to the Far East also enriched both boys’ lives.

“Our kids were able to learn a lot and experience a lot of things they wouldn’t have been able to experience if we had stayed here,” she said. “I think being over there gave us a better sense of just how connected the world is, how we can all affect each other all over the world.”

Teaching Tools

Marie S. Morris, vice president and undergraduate dean at EMU, feels that Neufeld’s ministry will help his teaching.

“Doug not only sets the mission and goal of our school, but the real-world experience he can bring into a classroom will only enhance his teaching,” Morris said.

Neufeld plans to return to Cambodia for a pair of three-week trips within a year with students from EMU and Buffalo State, which will partner on the project.

Morris adds that Neufeld’s work in Asia “brings theory and practice into service. I think Doug is a good role model of how that happens.”

Neufeld’s mission left him upbeat enough to want to go back.

Neufeld plans to return to Cambodia for a pair of three-week trips within a year with students from EMU and Buffalo State, which will partner on the project.

Despite the barriers built by Cambodia’s past, Neufeld feels that the country’s best days lie ahead.

“Cambodians are survivors,” he said.

Contact Tom Mitchell at 540-574-6275 or mitchell@dnronline.com.

Representatives of church-related organizations will have displays in the Campus Center Greeting Hall and will be available to talk with students and area residents about possible service openings with their organizations.

Participating agencies will include:

• Virginia Mennonite Board of Missions
• Mennonite Missions Network, Elkhart, Ind.
• Eastern Mennonite Missions, Salunga, Pa.
• Mennonite Central Committee, Akron, Pa.

For more information or to schedule an appointment with a service representative, call Helen Nafziger in the Career Services office at 540-432-4131.