We’ve been busy. I think that is an understatement, but it’s the truth. We had 3 short term teams all together along with the visit of my oldest brother Mike.
I’ll start with the Business as Mission (BAM) team. It was very different than any other team we’ve had in Bolivia, a lot of work, and a lot of fun.

(Don, Quinn, Dana, Jay, Mike, Peggy, Justin, Bill, Michelle, Rob, Doug)
Here’s our team with 2 fiscal analysts, 2 entrepreneurs, an insurance expert, a Senior pastor, a kids-at-risk chaplain, 3 WorldVenture staff, and a carpenter with 40 years experience. And working with our team here in Bolivia they visited our small business projects, asked a lot of questions, studied bolivian tax laws, brainstormed, built financial models, did market analyses, rebuilt their models, asked more questions, rebuilt their models, and left us with detailed business plans for a BLESS Kids’ sports league and a for-profit Carpentry model to go alongside the non-profit Master Carpentry shop.



And here’s the best part, our mission to Be, Make, Mobilize Disciples for Jesus was built right into the DNA of each plan. We now have solid business plans with kingdom impact and a positive bottom lines!

I like the way my brother (tall handsome guy in blue) described the whole process. He said, “Dan, all my life I’ve been told that my role as a businessman in missions is to pray and pay, so I’ve prayed my heart out and given all I can. But this is the first time I’ve been able to use what I do Monday through Friday (financial planner and entrepreneur) in a mission kingdom impact project. I’ve got 12 business friends back home that can’t believe what I’m doing and they’re already interested in the next trip!”
Only about a third of what we do in Bolivia is a business as mission (BAM) model. The other parts are community development and local church missions work. But for our BAM projects we just received 400 hours of free professional business consulting. What an incredible gift. And since it’s been much harder the last 2 years to fundraise for community development and local church missions, we’re having to get creative for the funding streams for Project BLESS and the Master Carpenter Shop.

(Rob the carpenter with Alex our carpenter, all smiles with some new tools!)

Along with all the planning, we also got our hands dirty, explored a bit of Bolivia and had some fun.

…eating Tucumanis at Jhonny’s house. You gotta visit to try them!

…visiting Compassion International, one of my favorite Christian non-profits tackling poverty issues in Bolivia. What they do in the name of Jesus with limited resources has my attention.

…watched some BLESS volleyball

…ate more food

…visited the Cristo statue

..took pictures of Dan in his office, don’t know why, maybe they just wanted to show the golf clubs in the corner or the candy dish on the corner?

…and even finished the week with a round of golf
Thanks to all who came on this team, supported and prayed for them while here. Now comes the hard part, implementing the business plans and dealing with each challenge as it arises.