Extremely thought-provoking Bible Study (part of the Scriptural Roots of Commerce Series) regarding the meaning of work to help users understand and discover God-created purpose of work.  The meaning of work is a critical foundation for any missional enterprise.    

"We spend most of our lives working.  Do our jobs mean anything to God?  The Meaning of Work offers a hopeful answer to that question.  Early in the story, we discover a God who works with passion and love, and who has designed us to work.  We explore the truth that all work done in faith is sacred and purposeful.  The study then helps us discover how our professional lives can be integrated with God’s work to restore a broken world.  It closes with an investigation of physical and spiritual rest in the context of our stressful times."

– Global Commerce Network

​What are you dreaming about these days?  Does it seem like an impossible task?  Is it a big dream that you could give your life to?  Then maybe that dream is from God!  Two years ago, Navigator Ralph Gatti began to dream about having a L´Abri type of center in Central Europe that could be a think-tank for the Global Enterprise Network (GEN), the Navigators expression of business as mission, where interested entrepreneurs from around the world could come and dream about how to carry out the great commission in the marketplace where they live.  It seemed an impossible dream.  It would require all the Navigators in a city coming together to support such a center, hosting visitors from around the world. It would mean putting together a robust curriculum of the current thought in the business as mission movement while still holding true to the Navigators vision, mission and core.  And of course, it would take financial support to get the center up and running. Could such a dream become a reality?
 
Thankfully, God is into the impossible. The Agathe Center for Entrepreneurship, just an idea in the hearts of our Navigator family in Central and Eastern Europe over the last eighteen months, is now “open for business” in Bratislava, Slovakia.  The Agathe Center is a ministry of the Navigators dedicated to serving committed laborers from around the world who want to advance the kingdom of God through missional enterprise.  The founders of the Agathe Center believe that businesses should not only make a profit, but also change society for good. That is why it is called the Agathe Center for Entrepreneurship - in Greek, "Agathe" means "Good".   The mission is to provide holistic support to existing and aspiring entrepreneurs as they know Christ and make Him known.

​Bratislava, Slovakia was chosen as it has been a focal point for missional enterprise over the past twenty-five years.  There are experienced practitioners to draw upon, as well as good business examples in the city to study in order to understand what a missional enterprise should look like.  God, in His goodness, has also brought together a great international team and provided a space well-equipped to meet the needs of the center.  Those who serve at the Agathe Center are convinced that an enterprise should hold in creative tension the priorities of a triple bottom line: financial sustainability, social impact, and spiritual transformation.  The center services include mentoring and coaching, trainings and seminars, as well as intensive immersion experiences that involve spending extended time with the Agathe team.  You can read more about each of these services at the Agathe Center website.  The goal is to make personalized, individualized training and consulting available at no charge to entrepreneurs intent on advancing the Kingdom of God through business and social enterprise platforms. 
 
If you or someone you know would like to know more about utilizing the Agathe Center’s services, you can engage with Agathe through the website to start the process. The Agathe Center is now ready to receive “clients” and begin the in-depth work of helping young and aspiring missional entrepreneurs build businesses that advance the Kingdom.  Whether the enterprise has already been launched, or is still just a dream, the Agathe Center can help move it forward to the next level.  “Come and See” what God has done and how He will use the Agathe Center to advance His Kingdom around the world.  God has accomplished what Ralph dared to ask or even dream of, and He has done the work infinitely far beyond Ralph´s highest prayers, desires, thoughts or hopes.

What dream is God laying on your heart today?

Back in the 1980´s, the Navigators in Africa began making small loans to help African disciples launch businesses that would provide much needed income for their families.  Today, there are hundreds of enterprises across the African continent run by business men and women who have been trained by the Navigators in evangelism and discipleship.  With more and more “missional enterprises” springing up, Navigator representative Wanjau Nduba (who resources this network), saw an urgent need to have many more trained mentors and coaches who could help these business practitioners stay focused on a triple bottom line of financial sustainability, spiritual transformation, and social impact. This need led to the birth of an initiative called “Venture Villages”.

After 16 months of development, the first Venture Village was launched in Nairobi, Kenya in November of 2016 as a joint initiative with Naventure (the Navigator African business network led by Wanjau), Agora Enterprises (a US based ministry that promotes international entrepreneurial accelerators), and the Global Enterprise Network (the resource team that serves Navigator missional enterprises around the world). The goal is to launch dozens of successful startup missional entrepreneurs around Africa in the next few years.

One essential ingredient in this Venture Village process is to recruit and train successful Christ-centered entrepreneurs as business coaches and mentors who can walk alongside new and existing Navigator business practitioners.  These mentors and coaches will empower Navigator entrepreneurs to stay focused on pursuing the triple bottom line that is being used in the Global Enterprise Network (GEN). 
 
In this first Venture Village nine mentors, who were trained in the techniques of Lean Startup and coaching skills, met bi-weekly with nine aspiring entrepreneurs.  Prize money was awarded at the end of the three-month course to the three entrepreneurs with the best business ideas. Investors will be reviewing all nine business plans for potential capital investments. The next Venture Village, which will begin at the end of September 2017, will train a new cohort of mentors to work with more new entrepreneurs so over time there will be a growing number of mentors/coaches to serve the ever-increasing number of missional entrepreneurs in Africa.

The operative principle behind training new business mentors/coaches is Ecclesiastes 4:9 - “Two are better than one because they have a good return for their labor.”  By having trained business mentors/coaches working with new Christ-centered entrepreneurs to pursue a triple bottom line, God will ensure there will be a good return for their labor.  This will enable the gospel to flow out of these businesses into communities around the world as business men and women live out their faith daily in the marketplace.
 
Says Matt, who trained the coaches, “Our passion is developing missional entrepreneurs to become lifetime laborers who can be fruitful in the marketplace where they will spend most their time.”  Feel free to contact us  if you would like to learn more about how to become an entrepreneurial mentor/coach.

After a particularly crazy December, I finally carved out an hour to hole up in the local Starbucks and compose my introductory blog for the GEN Desk explaining Second Story Coffee Roasters, our missional enterprise in Japan. My coffee had arrived, my computer was open, my earbuds were in -- and just a literal moment later, my phone buzzed. A text message, written in Japanese: "Are you at Starbucks?" I looked up, puzzled, mainly because I didn't recognize the Chinese characters of the author's name. How do you read that kanji again? "Yes, I'm in Starbucks. Where are you?" I glanced around for a familiar face as I typed, hoping I might remember the name that went with it.

I didn't need to wait long, because she showed up at my table: a woman I'm slightly acquainted with through my volleyball league. She asked if she could join me, though I was clearly there to work and even said so. Nonetheless, she grabbed her bag and sat down, which is unusually forward for a Japanese person, so I took the hint and closed my computer. This was outlined long ago in our cultural training, right? To let go of expectations and go with what comes? I took the opportunity to practice, and found myself excited to have coffee with a new friend.

She and I talked about the normal things of life: work and children, medical appointments and shopping, daycare, school life, and trips we'd taken. It was essentially an hour of chitchat. The time I had set aside to work had been totally enveloped into conversation with this woman, whose name I would later look up and make a note of so I could actually use it the next time we met. I mentioned the time and we parted ways, she to get groceries and I to pick up kids. I was musing over our meeting in the car, when realized that God had given me my blog post, though I hadn't written a word. That simple conversation about day-to-day life in Japan? That was at the heart of our desire to start a missionally-minded business.

When we worked in traditional ministry with college students, though we had good relationship with the young adults that came to our home, we felt out-of-sync with the culture at large. While everyone else's husbands were at work, mine was available to help. Whenever anyone asked what our job was, they quickly became lost after we tried to explain. We were living our lives in a way that was very different from the people around us. Though we had moved to their country, studied their language, and sent our children to their schools, there was a part of the nominal, everyday chitchat that we just didn't get. We keenly felt the ways in which we could not relate to our Japanese friends and neighbors, from childhood memories to language, skin color, family culture, and even worldview. But we felt that if there was anything we could do to bridge the gap, enabling us to understand the hearts and minds of our friends just a little bit more, we wanted to do it.

This is one of the reasons we have started Second Story Coffee Roasters.

Go, Live, Serve is hosting a BAM business consulting competition.  Your answers will go to help solve a business problem in an emerging market.  Today the founders are faced with the decision of how to grow the business while helping them stay true to their vision.  Teams will be asked to advise the client in this case competition.  Finalists will have the opportuntiy to present their solutions and win $20k.  

Register before January 1, 2017 and send in your solutions to qualify for the final round.  

For more information, visit: www.goliveserve.org/overview.

Second Story Coffee Roasters (SSCR) wants to take care of people. "We want to be a resource to our friends and neighbors, helping them to move closer to who they were made to be.  We believe we can do this through coffee, which is the second most traded commodity in the world.  Within this large market, we would like to create a business where taking care of people and their stories is as valuable as the quality of our product."
​

Bryan and Jamie launched SSCR to be a relationally-sourced, primarily single-origin coffee roaster located in Shizuoka, Japan.  Currently, they operate on a subscription basis, mailing and delivering coffee to our customers weekly, bi-weekly, or monthly, in addition to occasional pop-up coffee stands in the Shizuoka area. They also roast for wholesale and commercial accounts and hope to open a retail location.

Japan is one of the  leading consumers of specialty coffee in the world.  

​Bryan and Jamie have a passion for the art of the craft and take great care to bring precision to every part of the process.  But beyond the roast and the cup, they brilliantly illuminate the stories of life... from the plantations, consumers, and themselves.  They are also deeply interested in the "second story" that is being written every day.  

​"SSCR strives to buy direct and fairly traded high quality coffees roasted on location with full knowledge of the story behind each bean.  We strive to connect with your story, the 'second story,' as we introduce you to the countries and producers of your daily pleasure, even offering the opportunity to travel with us and experience the communities that produce your coffee."

Their own story to launch SSCR has been written over many years.  Read more about a first leg in their journey to launch, "Our Story to Become Missional Entrepreneurs."   

A second phase is currently taking place to raise capital needed to secure a new roaster and continue the story.  Follow SSCR on Facebook and Instagram, or contact us for more information about Navigator Missional Enterprises and Business as Missions (BAM).   

Our goal is to propel entrepreneurial teams as integrated and holistic lifelong laborers in business start-ups around the world.  The Entrepreneur Readiness Workshop (ERW) is the first step to prepare for ministry as a Navigator missional entrepreneur.  Missional enterprise is the Navigator’s Business as Mission (BAM) context to living out our calling.     
 
ERW Details:
September 30 – October 2, 2016
Navigator HQ in Colorado Springs, CO
More info and Registration at www.gendesk.org/erw
 
This workshop is for you if any of these apply to you...

• Seriously thinking about opening your own business either internationally or in a US cross-cultural context…  
• Desire to make holistic Kingdom and social impact where God is calling you...
• Passionate for the nations and realize that non-traditional missions is necessary for the future of global missions… 
• A college senior or 20s with an eye toward exploring missional enterprise in the next 5 or 10 years…

 
FAQ:

• Should I come if I don’t know how to start a business or have business experience?  Yes, this workshop is geared to helping both those with some business salve and others with little experience.  You will be teamed together to uniquely utilize your strengths just like on an entrepreneurial team.  Actually, some of the best entrepreneurs are those who currently don’t know anything about business.
• After the workshop, what’s next?  The ERW should give you a good sense of “missional enterprise is great, but I could never imagine myself doing this…” or “I could see myself as part of a team.”  In either case, you’ll have an opportunity to reflect on whether or not missional enterprise is for you.  If so, we have a team who can walk with you through next steps here in the US or somewhere internationally.      
• How certain do I need to be about serving internationally?  The ERW is meant to be a starting point.  You may still be 5-10 years out from moving around the world, possibly.  There is no need to commit to a timeline or location just yet.  Although we discuss international contexts, missional enterprises can even be started in the US.  The Navigator’s I-58, Nations Within and NavMissions already have missional enterprises.

 
Where are they now?
ERW Alumni are currently starting new ventures around the world in places like Latin America, the Middle East, South Asia, East Asia, and the US.   

Behind every Primary Mobile Med International, PMMI, supporter there is a unique story that exemplifies dedication to global health.  In our last newsletter, we covered how two of our supporters, Drs. Edward Fynn and Lewis Roberts, helped Tom and Kevin present PMMI’s work at this year’s Safari Five Conference.  Because both Drs. Fynn and Roberts have firsthand experience providing health care to underprivileged populations and have been advising PMMI for the past few years, we are very thankful they helped us tell our story to conference attendants.  We are excited to present Dr. Fynn:

Dr. Edward Fynn, currently living in Namibia, is a radiologist and senior lecturer at the Namibia School of Medicine.  In addition to running a private radiology practice primarily dedicated to women's health, he also works with The Navigators to oversee humanitarian projects in Namibia and southern Angola.  Dr. Fynn studied at the Ghana Medical School and completed postgraduate radiology training in South Africa.  He has three children with his wife, Kate.

Dr. Fynn took part in the following Q&A with PMMI:
Q: Describe your reaction to seeing PMMI’s mobile medical clinic (MMC) in-person for the first time.
A: When the container idea was pitched to me, I was very excited. But I was extremely excited when I got to walk into the container.  I saw something that has been inspired and created by compassion, love, and need.  It is amazing that the container and its equipment can meet 80% of the primary health care needs of any third-world country.  The container is very relevant and will be very useful.

Q:  How can the container help you in your practice?
A: Even though, in my practice, a lot of the radiology I do is with bigger machines, there are still many people I could help by providing outreach treatment with equipment that could fit in a shipping container, such as ultrasound and x-ray equipment.  Providing access to an ultrasound would be especially helpful.  Ultrasound diagnostics are critical for infant and maternal health.

Q: Why are PMMI’s clinics an ideal solution for remote locations?
A: The clinics will especially help practitioners who are in remote locations.  The clinics help these practitioners get connected to central hubs and other medical professionals.  This helps provide a more extensive diagnostic service to remote areas.

Q: To what extent is Africa in need of primary health care?
A: It is difficult to even estimate a level of need. It is even beyond the [African] government's ability to estimate.  The government's lack the resources and funds needed to keep an accurate estimate.  People are in great need.  People have to walk miles to health care facilities.  And sometimes when they get there, they might find there are no doctors, nurses, or medical supplies.  Then they have to walk home untreated.

For details about clinic sponsorship and employment opportunities for medical professionals please contact Eva Bammes, Director of Media and Marketing at [email protected].

For more information about PMMI, visit: www.primarymobilemed.com or join the mailing list for monthly updates: www.primarymobilemed.com/newsletter.

On a busy corner in Guadalajara, Mexico, the scent of fresh bread beckons pedestrians into a rustic bakery.  Once inside, however, the pleasing aroma of Christ draws customers to the bakery's mother and daughter owner-operators, Myriam and Adriana Sanchez.

Rogenbrott was founded in 2014 as a missional enterprise to share Christ among the lost.  The Sanchez family had a dream of starting a business where they could use their God-given talents as bakers, provide for their economic needs, and share Christ with others.  That is what is happening as God is fulfilling their daily prayer of “Lord, let us be a fragrant scent here; may You be who attends to the true needs of our clients and providers.”

The bakery sells homemade artisan bread to the community, and its impact is felt daily.  Clients come in to purchase bread, and are charmed by the family who naturally shares Christ with them.  Clients have learned that they can find a listening ear and someone who will pray for them.  One client loves coming into the shop because she admires their peace and joy.  When asked how they could always be so joyous, mom and daughter responded that it is Christ in them. 

The bakery's providers are also being reached with the Gospel.  Over the past year, the Sanchez family has developed a relationship with one supplier.  Although he comes from a religious family, he didn´t understand the Gospel.  The Sanchez family believes in making Jesus known through their daily lives, so it wasn´t long before their provider asked them to pray for his sick relative.  They rejoiced together when the relative was restored to health.   After, their new friend began to come to them for counsel, and they began studying God´s Word with him.  The Sanchezes hope that this is just the first of many who will come to know Jesus as their Savior because of the bread store dedicated to the Lord.

The Gospel is being lived out in this bakery,  and the pleasing aroma of Christ is fragrant to all.  Will you take a moment and pray for this missional business, for the Sanchez family, and for other businesses serving to make Christ known around the world?  “For we are the aroma of Christ to God among those who are being saved and among those who are perishing.”  (2 Corinthians 2:15 ESV)

– GEN Desk Contributing Author