“Don’t fool yourself,” warned Alan Klapmeier, co-founder of Cirrus Aircraft. “The industry hoped 100LL would survive, but it is going away.”

What does that mean for you?

That’s what the industry and federal agencies are trying to figure out now.

The demise of 100LL was a hot topic at this year’s AOPA Aviation Summit. It was discussed during the opening general session, as well as in several forums throughout the show. While a lot of uncertainty exists about the future of aviation fuel, one thing is certain: A change is coming.

“And we will be ready for it,” said Rhett Ross, president of Teledyne Continental Motors, who noted the company has tested “all different types of fuels.”

It’s also a top priority at Lycoming Engines, where officials warn that this is one of the most complicated issues facing GA today.

“Be wary of the five-minute sound bite,” said Michael Kraft, senior vice president. “We have just one shot at this, so we need to make the right decision.”

“Certification costs in time and money are such that the industry can only afford to make this change once,” added Earl Lawrence, vice president of industry and regulatory affairs for the Experimental Aircraft Association. “Whatever change we make, it better be right. We need to move deliberately.”

But why do we need to change?

A LITTLE HISTORY

Tetra-ethyl lead (TEL) had been added to fuel since the 1920s. After it was identified as a neurotoxin, it began to be phased out in the 1970s. In 1990, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) mandated that it be gone by 1995. “It is considered one of the EPA’s biggest successes,” said Glenn Passavant, director of the EPA Nonroad Center.

Through lobbying, avgas was exempt from that mandatory phase out because the aviation industry said it just wasn’t ready.

“Avgas isn’t mogas — it’s anything but that. It is made in specialty batches and transported separately. It’s the only fuel with TEL added at the terminal,” he added, noting that it’s an important ingredient to increase octane, which prevents knocking. “It’s especially important to higher compression engines. When you need that octane, you need that octane.

That said, “20 years is a long time to not have a solution,” Passavant noted.

Time is officially running out. New national air quality standards are set to take effect soon, while the EPA is expected to make a finding on a three-year-old petition from the Friends of the Earth that claims avgas endangers the public health and welfare. “The petition requires the EPA to take action,” he said.

He estimates findings from the EPA’s investigation will result in rulemaking in the next 12 to 18 months, while the agency is looking at the “2016-2017 time frame” for a final solution. “There’s still a lot of work to be done,” he said.

MOVING ON

That’s an understatement. As the EPA investigation continues, the aviation industry is searching for an alternative fuel, as well as developing engines that will fly safely on that fuel, whatever it is.

The big concern for the engine manufacturers are not the new engines — they know they can develop those. It’s the existing fleet that cause for worry, according to TCM’s Ross.

Making sure the existing fleet isn’t grounded by the demise of 100LL is the focus of the Future Avgas Strategy & Transition Plan — known as FAST — which is being developed to determine how the industry will get from “where we are today to the new fuel,” Passavant said.

The plan, expected to be complete this year, studied the viability of potential fuels, including low-octane 87-89 mogas — which was determined to be unacceptable — mid-octane UL94, which would require a lot of engine modifications and result in a loss of performance, and high octane synthetic or biofuels, such as the one being developed by Swift Fuels.

“That is very promising,” he said. “It is the equivalent — or better — than 100LL, but it is still in development, so it’s not available. Also, there’s no infrastructure, so it’s a complete uncertainty.”

That’s why the industry keeps coming back to UL94, which would require “some minor changes” to how aircraft owners operate, as well as some modifications. Those modifications could range from something simple, like a belt-on ignition, with a price tag of $5,000 to $10,000, to a requirement for electronic controls, which come with price tags up to $30,000, according to Passavant. “There also may be a portion of the fleet that can’t be modified,” he warned.

UL94 would be the easiest replacement for 100LL as the distribution structure is in place and it can be “more easily certified, which is an important point,” TCM’s Ross said.

But will it be compatible with your engine?

“There’s been substantial testing in low-compression engines,” Ross said. “Some will need just minor modifications — some changes could be just a change to the POH. For most normally aspirated engines, if 100LL went away today, they could be converted.”

There are some engines, however, that will require substantial — read expensive — modifications.

The assessment of UL94 continues, especially in the areas of performance and certification. “It will affect operating cost and range,” Passavant said.

So what’s next? A lot of work for everyone involved.

A fleet impact assessment is needed, as well as a transition plan. Then the modifications will have to be developed and certified — and installed and paid for.

Meanwhile, the industry also has to continue developing new engines and new fuels.

All this so we can “keep ‘em flying,” said the EAA’s Lawrence.

“This is really, truly here,” he said. “I feel like the boy who cries wolf, because I’ve been saying this is coming for 20 years now. What’s different now is that the EPA and FAA say it is going away.”

What’s taken so long, he said, is that when one problem is solved — a fuel is identified that will get an engine to run safely — another pops up — like “how are we going to make it work in the distribution system?” he said. “There’s a lot bigger picture here. That’s what we’re struggling with.”

EAA’s position is that it will support as many alternative fuels as possible, to ensure that a safe fuel is available — and perhaps more important — affordable.

Another important point: “No one says we must go to a zero lead fuel,” said the EPA’s Passavant. “If there are going to be multi-billion dollar effects, there must be another way to do it. Let’s come up with a creative solution.”

Thinking about fuel is a whole new ball game for the FAA, added Mark Rumizen, a reciprocating engines/fuels specialist with the agency. “We had one fuel, historically, and airplanes and engines were designed and optimized to operate on 100LL. We didn’t have to think about fuel certification.”

When the EAA and others started developing autogas STCs, the emphasis was still on making the fuel fit the engines, he noted.

“But with the unleaded fuels and Swift Fuel, we’re working backwards,” he said. “It creates a challenge. We have to think differently.”

The FAA is depending on ASTM to develop fuel specifications, he said, adding the industry should look for a notice of proposed rulemaking (NPRM) in 2010.

Meanwhile, the FAA’s 2011 budget includes funding for research on alternative fuels for GA. The agency also is working with the X-Prize Foundation to develop a contest for alternative fuels. “That should help spur development in this area,” he said.

WHAT IS SWIFT FUEL?

Swift Enterprises, Ltd. is developing an unleaded 100LL replacement fuel, called 100SF, that exceeds the energy content and octane number of 100LL, according to company officials. The new fuel contains two chemical components that, when mixed together, meet or exceed most performance parameters of 100LL. Because of this, 100SF requires minimal engine modification to run in the current GA fleet.

100SF can be produced from any organic matter that contains sugar of cellulose, company officials add.

For more information: SwiftEnterprises.net.

________________________

This article originally appeared in GA News

Janice Wood · November 29, 2009

From our hometown newspaper after being accepted with MAF (click to enlarge)

I was involved in this area of aviation basically for 17 years.  Three in training at Moody Aviation (at that time in Elizabethton, TN, now in Spokane, WA), and 14 with Mission Aviation Fellowship (8 as pilot/mechanic and 6 as a stateside recruiter).  All that to say, this is based on my own experiences as well having talked with hundreds, I don’t know…maybe thousands of people over the years.

This posts title is one question that I heard a lot, maybe not always vocalized quite that literally, but you could hear it in the tone of other questions or statements like:

“How much do they pay you to do this?”
“Must be exciting, but isn’t your wife scared you’ll get killed?”
“What do your kids do for school?”
“Don’t your kids miss their friends here?”
“Aren’t there a lot of snakes?  I hate snakes.”
“Must be hard on your parents, you being so far away and all, them not being able to see their grandkids.”
“Aren’t you afraid you’ll crash in the jungle?”
“How do you communicate with those people down there?”
“Well you can always come back home and fly for the airlines couldn’t you?”
“How long do you think you do this before coming home?”

….they go on and on.  You get the idea.

First, my story.  How I got into this.

People are surprised to learn I was not in the military or an ex-airline pilot first of all.  That’s a popular misconception a lot of people have about this type flying.

I was actually a businessman in Atlanta, Georgia, doing fairly well. We lived in a nice swim& tennis subdivision in suburban Atlanta.

I was in my early thirties and had come to know Jesus Christ as Savior in my late twenties (aka “became a Christian”).  Then for the next several years I began to study what the Bible actually had to say about life and how to live it versus what I thought I knew. Simply put, I began to realize that we are not put here for our own pleasures.

We are put here for many reasons, and while self fulfillment of your God given abilities is not wrong, it’s at best only one of a myriad of reasons.  Others are: help people, learn to love the unlovely, go out of your way for others as a way of life and not for a pat on the back, and so on.  What I discovered that my specific area of abilities were more in the area of service to others.  Some are better at teaching, others and giving of their resources, others are very insightful, others encouragers.  But my gifts fell into the area of serving mainly.

So at the age of 32 or so I began searching for ways to serve people possibly as a way of life.  But let me be clear, it wasn’t a call to be in ministry or let alone be a missionary.  No I was just looking to get involved with a company, or organization where I could put my serving skills to work  as a layman or maybe even full-time in Atlanta.

“What about talents?” you may ask.  That’s different.  Talents (artist, speaker, mechanic, athlete, etc.) are useful in the area you are gifted in (serving, teaching, giving, etc).  Don’t confuse the two.

My talents were in the creative and speaking realm.  My college degree was in Communications with a minor in graphic arts.  That about says it all.

So I began looking into a lot of exciting opportunities.  One was with a Christian film maker in Atlanta, another with the Walk Through the Bible folks, another was just working with a successful Christian owned business. But they and many others all fell through over a period of two years.

Having actually given up on that concept I decided to just be a witness where I worked and that’s be that.

Then one day I was making marketing calls to potential clients and called Moody Bible Institute in Chicago.  You see at the time I worked for a company that brokered jet fuel and avgas (and I wasn’t even a pilot then).  I had seen their flight school (Moody Aviation) listed, that they had a number of aircraft  and wanted to sell them fuel for their fleet.  Logical thought.

One thing led to another. That was in 1989.  In 1990 our family found ourselves in Elizabethton, TN enrolled at Moody Aviation. I was there for the next three years (1990-93) getting my commercial pilots license, instrument rating and the airframe & powerplant mechanics license.  I graduated in 1993 and joined Mission Aviation Fellowship (aka MAF) that same year. One year after that (1994) we were in San Jose, Costa Rica studying Spanish for one year before eventually arriving to our base of operations, Shell, Ecuador in 1995.  I was forty.

I hope I captured the speed at which this all happened.  It was a whirlwind indeed.

Training to be a missionary pilot is more than stick & rudder

Doors opened to Moody Aviation almost effortlessly it appears to many.  However the training was hard and we had our days there when we asked ourselves “What have we gotten ourselves into?” .  God knew we needed training in more ways than one: Learning that God is faithful and to trust Him completely even when it hurts a little, maybe even a lot.  Examples?  My mother died while at Moody after a month in ICU.  My sister became terminally ill during that time. My wife had a miscarriage.

But while these situations were heart wrenching, we also saw God work so many incredible miracles.  Let me give one example.

The first winter there was brutal to a southern boy like me.  We were cold most of the time it seemed with only a small wooden stove for heat.

I had decided we would use a credit card and buy a nicer, bigger wood stove.  They ran about $500.

Then one day a I got a call from a recent Moody Aviation grad who said someone had told him I was looking for a bigger wood stove and that he had an older one that just needed a little work.  So I went to look at it and was surprised at what good shape it was in.  The guy just gave it to me saying someone had given it to him (Paying it forward before paying it forward was cool).  But here’s the really cool part.  Read on…

So I bring the stove home after making a few repairs in the shop at Moody, set it up, and realize, now I need a lot of wood.

The next day while I am at Moody Aviation, my wife gets a knock on the door.  It was a tree trimming foreman working with a crew on our street.  The city was cutting down all of the old Maples and Oaks on our street.  He asked if he could use our phone.

Noticing the stove he asked, “You all need wood for that stove?”

“Yes!” Trish said.

The next thing she knew he had measured the firebox and said, “I’ll have my crew cut all these trees on your street up the right size for your stove”.

That was eight cords of wood neatly stacked in front of my house and that supply lasted us nearly the next two years.

Total cost for the new wood stove and two years of wood: ZERO!

That’s how I’ve seen God work in the lives of others as well.

But when you experience this first hand, it should cause a chill to run down your back on the one hand and smile come on your face on the other.

God is perfect.  His plans are perfect.  Sometimes we just tend to want to do it our own way and frankly…. we just slow things down.

Training to be a missionary pilot is more than stick & rudder.  It is a family affair and everyone has to be on board and God will use the flight and maintenance curriculum yes to prepare you technically, but as importantly, as a backdrop for His greater training in faithfulness and for His greater purpose.

_________________________________

In Part 2: Discussing the role of the missionary pilot.  If you want to be a missionary pilot just because you like to fly and want to use your skills for God, please think again.

This article is taken from Christianity Today and is based on a recent study by Dr. Kurt Ver Beek of Calvin College.  His findings are surprising I’m sure to most rank and file Christians.  However I’m not so sure those of us who spent years on mission assignments are shocked.

Each year in Shell, Ecuador, we as mission community (4-5 mission agencies) hosted hundreds of people who came with genuine, good, heart-felt reasons no doubt.  However in the end you have to ask: What was the actual financial cost and would it be better stewardship of time (of both missionaries and the work teams) and of those resources to have just supported the work of the mssionaries directly and more substantially with those finances?

Read on…

_________________________________

Missionaries don’t keep giving after they return; hosts prefer money to guests, Calvin sociologist finds.

Short-term mission trips to foreign countries are the biggest trend to hit the evangelical Christian outreach scene since vacation Bible school. Between 1 million and 4 million North American Christians reportedly participated in STMs in 2003, and the number keeps rising.

Praises and critiques of the trend tend to be proportionately extreme, touting STMs either as miraculous recruiters of long-term missionaries or insidious sowers of third-world dependency.

But a new study, to which I contributed the literature review, suggests both sides are off the mark.

According to Kurt Ver Beek, professor of sociology and third-world development at Calvin College in Grand Rapids, Michigan, traditional STMs don’t do much at all.

That conclusion might sound odd to those familiar with any of the with the 50-odd dissertations written on the subject in the last 15 years, or with Roger Peterson’s well-known studies in the subject. Most of these papers conclude that STMs significantly increase participants’ spirituality, financial giving to missions, prayer for missions, likelihood to become career missionaries, and so on.

But in his survey of 127 North American short-termers and 78 Hondurans for whom they built new homes after 1998’s devastating Hurricane Mitch, Ver Beek found that neither group had experienced notable life changes.

Why such different conclusions? Ver Beek ascribes the difference, in part, to methodology. Many previous studies involved small sample sizes, interviewed short-termers soon after their trips—while they were still on a missions “high”—or failed to take into account social desirability bias, the human tendency to exaggerate one’s goodness in surveys and interviews, he writes.

Few checked reports of increased giving against other sources, such as church giving records, and almost none solicited opinions from people in the third world who received STM groups, he says.

Ver Beek’s study is unusual in that it does both. The results, therefore, are also unusual.

While 52 percent of respondents claimed to have increased their giving to the sending organization after the trip, according to the organization’s records 70 percent of the participants in their STM trips to Honduras didn’t send in a single direct donation in the three years after the trip.

Collection-plate giving from the congregations involved did go up by an average of $2,600 a year, but Ver Beek says that’s nothing worth shouting about.

And when he interviewed the Hondurans whose homes the missionaries rebuilt, he found that if given the choice, they’d prefer short-termers stayed home and just sent down money, “thereby using less resources on their own travel expenses and more on the people they intend to help.”

“The truth is that they don’t have to come here to build homes. … If they come, they should come for the friendships, for the cultural exchange,” says one Honduran NGO worker quoted in the study.

Unfortunately, Ver Beek found that few lasting friendships were built. While 92 percent of the North Americans said they had meaningful contact with Hondurans for at least part of every day of their trip, less than a quarter stayed in touch with their Honduran friends after they returned home.

“While we were there, you know, you have notions of maintaining contact with them, but we never have,” says one short-termer quoted in the study.

“This study shows that short-term missions as done now are not having the impact that people think or want, even if done to levels of excellence,” says Ver Beek. “If that’s true, it requires a whole rethinking of whether or not we’re going to do this, and if so, how.”

His proposal: It’s not enough to stress the importance of orientation and debriefing as ways of augmenting the short-term mission experience—something you’ll hear from any STM expert worth her salt. Instead, the STM needs to be treated as one small module that augments a much longer and more intense course of learning.

Peterson, for his part, applauds Ver Beek’s attempts to verify giving reports and fill in the third-world side of the equation, but questions some of his calculations. “The data appears to be manipulated with a strong bias,” he says.

Ver Beek freely admits that others could interpret his data differently. “It’s true, there was a small increase in giving. But after all the time and effort and money spent on these trips, is an increase of a few dollars success?”

For Ver Beek, who has lived in Honduras for most of the last 20 years and worked closely with community development organizations, the answer is no.

Peterson, president of STM sending agency STEM Ministries, also questions the assumption that the money raised for STMs would be available for direct donation to third world organizations. Most people are simply less willing to aid a distant cause than to help a friend or coworker go on a trip, he says.

“What I would do would be to increase fees to hire Honduran workers to work side by side with the volunteers,” says Peterson. That way, the money would be sure to be raised, third world workers would be given work, and North Americans could still participate in valuable cultural and spiritual sharing.”

Ver Beek is directing a follow-up study involving more than 1,000 STM participants and third world beneficiaries in Honduras, Haiti, Kenya, and Thailand.

He plans develop orientation curriculums for both North American STM groups and for the third world communities they visit. Until now, orientation for third-world beneficiaries has usually amounted to, “They’re showing up next week! Clear out the church, and here’s the mattresses!” says Ver Beek.

Abram Huyser Honig is a freelance writer and photographer living in Tegucigalpa, Honduras.

But today as I read through Deuteronomy 8, God showed me that no, what He means by discipline has more to do with training than punishing. True, (and I believe where my concept came from) punishment can be a component in the discipline process, but not always.

Listen to what God said:

“All the commandments that I am commanding you today you shall be careful to do, that you may live and multiply, and go in and possess the land which the LORD swore to give to your forefathers.

2“You shall remember all the way which the LORD your God has led you in the wilderness these forty years, that He might humble you, testing you, to know what was in your heart, whether you would keep His commandments or not.

3“He humbled you and let you be hungry, and fed you with manna which you did not know, nor did your fathers know, that He might make you understand that man does not live by bread alone, but man lives by everything that proceeds out of the mouth of the LORD.

4“Your clothing did not wear out on you, nor did your foot swell these forty years.

5“Thus you are to know in your heart that the LORD your God was disciplining you just as a man disciplines his son.”

However we are told in verses 11 thru 20, that when we finally see God’s blessing in our lives, to remember where it came from and not become proud. That’s where the punishment comes in:

18 “But you shall remember the LORD your God, for it is He who is giving you power to make wealth, that He may confirm His covenant which He swore to your fathers, as it is this day.

19“It shall come about if you ever forget the LORD your God and go after other gods and serve them and worship them, I testify against you today that you will surely perish.

20“Like the nations that the LORD makes to perish before you, so you shall perish; because you would not listen to the voice of the LORD your God.”

So what’s the take-away from this for me?

I think back to my high school days and our football coaches and how they worked us and pushed us. The purpose wasn’t that they hated us (though that concept came to mind once in a while) but rather was to make us stronger physically and mentally so we could do our best in the battle of Friday night competition.

Friday nights for me as a adult Christian are my life, each day. Jesus’ discipline is his way of coaching me daily to do my best for Him.

First it isn’t something that I ask God for. He gave it when I came to Christ. Christ did everything already. As Tony Evens said during one of our Chapels when I was at Moody, “You don’t need to do anything because it’s already been did”.

Sanctification is giving my life over to Jesus and allowing the holiness that is His (that is now mine as a believer) to pour out and through me.

My wife once read a book about the rooms in her life. The premise was that we all have rooms that we are more than willing to share with God; our works, our church attendance, our sacrificial giving of our selves to ministries within our church, so on and so forth…the pretty stuff. But there are always rooms we keep locked and say, “No Jesus, you don’t want to go in there. I haven’t made the beds and well, frankly (in a whispered tone we say)…it’s a mess.” What am I talking about? A short list might be; anger, jealousy, addictive behaviors, laziness, gluttony…you get the idea.

Jesus knows that already, before you told Him.

And that’s what sanctification is all about. You and I unlocking those doors [of our own free will] and saying, “It’s a mess, I want to clean it up…will you help?” [because we still believe it's us doing it].

When we get to that point, and come to Him, He will. But when we open that door we find the room in already in order. He was already there, working, we just had to acknowledge His sovereignty in our life completely and not just in the chosen, best-of-show areas.

When I left Ecuador I had flown nearly 3,000 hours without one accident or even and incident. Not a scratch on any plane I flew.

And it wasn’t because I only flew on pretty days. In fact, the last two and a half years there I flew 20% more than any of the other pilots. I took extra flights when the weather was crummy, or the legs were long over the Andes in IFR conditions, or just exhausting days on the weekends with 20 or so take-offs and landings.

How did I do it?

Of course God’s protection first and foremost. But one of the moving parts in God’s protection mechanism for me was in how He wired me. You see, my nature is always to say, “What if?” Some people say I’m a little paranoid when it comes to safety issues. That was a trait that was developed while a flight student at Moody Aviation [where it was inrgained in the training]. Then after joining MAF it was one of our mantras; “What if?”. It’s a key link in breaking the accident chain.

What if:

• A child is hiding in the grass by the strip”?
• What if their’s a mountain inside that cloud on that ridge?
• What if the wind direction changes on this one-way strip on final approach?
• What if the surface of that dirt strip has more water standing on that I can see?
• What if the turbo fails on take-off?

The answers to all of these had answers and I practiced thinking through my responses through out the day as I made decisions that ultimately affected the lives of hundreds of people I carried on-board my MAF aircraft the 7 years I flew in Ecuador.

But this natural safety device is a two edged sword I have found, something I have to turn off in my walk with God somedays. Sometimes, I have to admit, that I don’t have the answer to some of the what-ifs in life. I have to recognize that only He does and I have to trust Him. (Proverbs 3: 5,6)

Some days, many days actually, I am like Peter getting out of that boat and walking on top of the waves in that tumultuous Sea of Galilee. Once I take my eyes off Jesus, though, and realize I am in deep water, I begin to sink.

So what’s the point?

Sanctification then is taking my eyes off of myself and putting my gaze back on Him. I have to open that door to that messy room in my soul and let His holiness manifest itself.

“Perhaps you have heard on the news that the political party of Southern Sudan (called the SPLM—Sudan People’s Liberation Movement), has decided to withdraw from participation in the national government. They’re saying that the national leaders, based in Khartoum in the North, have failed to carry out the requirements of the North-South peace agreement signed in 2005. What this means for Sudan, I don’t think anyone knows. The government in Khartoum is now facing enormous pressure from all sides, within and without—there is the Darfur conflict raging in the west, there is political dissatisfaction brewing among the tribes of the far north and east, the Southerners are protesting after less than two years under a peace deal, and international attention is focused on this nation like it probably never has been before. I get the feeling that Sudan is on the brink of something major. All-out war could be imminent, and underneath it all is where the real battle is being fought—the spiritual one. This is a crucial moment.”

“Pray specifically for:

• The believers in Sudan, who are scattered throughout the country:

• that they will be united in a spirit of repentance and humility;

• that they will lead the way in putting aside all pointing fingers and malicious talk, all corruption and exploitation (Isaiah 58);

• that they will cry out to God for the sake of their nation, with a 2 Chronicles 7:14 spirit. It seems to me that no amount of prayers from the outside could have the same effect as prayers coming from within Sudan, from the Sudanese themselves.

• Pray that they seek God’s face, in this moment.

• Also pray for the leaders of the government, that they will act humbly, in full recognition that their decisions affect the 37 million people of Sudan. Ask God for this to be a turning point for good in this nation.”

We were asked to fast and pray for this country and this missionary this week. Will you join us?

However I find my self at loggerheads, for example, with how most people [who ask for my help] view their web development projects.

What I am saying is that more often than not, I find that clients tend to be heavily oriented toward either the content or visual side of their website. For example some churches only want boring lists of members, lists of events, a notice that heart healthy chicken will be served on Wednesday night, lists of service times, on and on. However another wants Flash animation and lots of multi-media/video and audio to, as they perceive it, draw a younger audience. But good web design today dictates that each form of digital communication have their part. It’s really not an either/or situation. Read on.

For example I am wired to look at most business/organizational web development projects simultaneously from BOTH a creative AND content angle. It needs to look good but it must have substance at the same time. They call it balance.

In other words, it does no good to have a visual/sensory Flash-feast if it takes forever to load (even with a broadband connection). However, on the other hand, you can have the most pertinent, focused, well written, thought provoking content, but if it isn’t presented in a visually provacotive manner people will click out. This has been proven .

The Stanford University Captology Lab has performed extensive analysis of what draws people to one website over another: Why some work and others don’t.

The highly esteemed Consumer’s Report (see the article) highlighted Stanford’s research in this article. But more importantly here is a quote from the Stanford research as quoted in the Consumers Report article regarding visual importance and web design:

“The data showed that the average consumer paid far more attention to the superficial aspects of a site, such as visual cues, than to its content. For example, nearly half of all consumers (or 46.1%) in the study assessed the credibility of sites based in part on the appeal of the overall visual design of a site, including layout, typography, font size and color schemes.”

So what’s the point? That old adage I heard in my first college economics classes [on the topic of business models], “To thine own self be true”, is good advice for the bi-brained like me.

In the end, I will do what is best for the client, church, organization. That’s a worthy goal I think.

Here is a short video clip from Daniel Pink (the screenshot image of his book links to Dan’s website) that makes good points on how creative people should approach their projects:

Click here to view the embedded video.

He said there is an unofficial space race going on now between the US and China and we need to wake up to the ramifications if they succeed.

China’s goal is to put a person on moon by 2017. Say what you wanna, but this is significant. Think about it. What has the space race done for you and me?

Some of the spin-off benefits we have all enjoyed due to the United States’ lead involvement in the space race, to name a few are:

• Scratch Resistant lenses
  • Scratch-resistant lenses were developed by NASA by applying a diamond-like lubricating coat over plastic lenses. This application was originally used in the space program in a “dual ion-beam bonding process. Today, the coating is still used on hard resin plastic used in most eye glasses that people wear everyday.
• Cordless Power Tools
  • While on the moon and working in deep space, the astronauts would need to perform many tasks to gather scientific data concerning the surface of the moon. Often in these tasks, they needed mechanical help. Neither traditional tools nor power tools of that era would work. Traditional tools would not provide enough assistance, and power tools could not be used due to their cord restrictions. Thus, NASA developed a way for power tools to be used without cords. Today, cordless power tools are everywhere. Uses for these tools have proved extremely versatile and beneficial to society. People use them to construct homes and conduct other projects, such as making repairs.
• Freeze Dried Food
  • Humans need food, and astronauts in space are no exception. To keep food fresh that would feed the astronauts, NASA adopted the practice of freeze-drying food. Previously, the technology had been “developed originally for preserving plasma during World War II.” This process proved effective on food and allowed for extended manned space flights such as the Apollo flights. In the process, the food is frozen and then most of the moisture is removed from the frozen object. The moisture is removed by sublimation; it turns into a vapor before a liquid. The process works best on liquids, thin slices of meat, and small objects like peas.
• Sports Shoes
  • Technology originally developed for the boots worn on the moon, has now been applied to athletic shoes in the mid-sole section. The technology improves shock absorption, stability, and motion control.
• Computer Readers for the Blind
• Laser Angioplasty
• Ocular Screening
• Programmable Pacemakers

If we do not step up to to the plate, it seems to me, China will most likely develop their own spin-off industries whose products we’ll pay dearly to purchase. In short the US runs the risk of losing it’s place in the world economy if we don’t support continued space exploration.

Here is a link to a NASA site that details more spin offs.

Frankly, you’re right. My only qualification I guess in all of this that I have a 14 year collection of 1040 forms from MAF. But that is precisely what I want to talk about in this installment.

The second thing you have to do is come to the realization that missionary work is not something you “go and do”. It should be your spiritual personality, your life by example, albeit imperfect. It is a logical and ongoing next step if you’re living the illogical life of a saint; putting one foot in front of another in the valley that is day to day. Occasionally you are on the mountaintop with God, sure, but that isn’t often. Mountaintops are, after all, small pieces of spiritual real estate.

James 2 talks about it this way. The believer [as seen by an unbeliever] says : “So sorry to hear about your problem, I’ll pray for you that you will be warmed and fed”. The unbeliever then says: “You talk about ministry; I do good works but all you do is pray“.

Faith and works in a believer should go together like peanut butter and jelly. Talk is cheap. Faith is made complete by what we do (James 2:22)

One of the things we look for in new people applying to MAF is their level of involvement in the local church and outside activity. Not a perfect indicator but does provide some sort of initial barometer.

My wife and I also own a coffee shop in Auburn. From the ranks of our employees we have already had two go out as missionaries, one with Pioneers the other with African Inland Missions. A third student took 6 months off and went to Thailand to teach. Currently we have another young lady who believes God has called her into full time ministry. Of all of our employees, most have been on short term missions trips. What can I say though. We’ve been incredibly blessed with Godly examples of what I am talking about. It’s just the way they are wired, not some someday ideal.

So you need to do some self examination. Does going to the mission field sound exciting? Adventurous? Something “I’ll do for a few years till something else comes along”? Or is it a logical next step in your step of faith? It should be.

• First put Jesus in the driver’s seat (Prov. 3: 5-6) After 14 years of listening to a lot of people (1000’s) who contemplate a “call” into ministry, experience has shown me that most have more faith in faith than faith in Jesus. That’s one of the best ways of putting it I’ve read recently. (Borrowed from Oswald Chambers BTW).
• 98 out of 100 “would-be missionary pilots”, at the first glimpse of difficulty or uncertainty [that circumstances will turn out as they had prayed for them to be], skedaddle back to their evening small groups declaring, “Musn’t ‘ve been God’s will or everything would have worked out as I prayed for” (aka “easily”). I guess that just validates that old saying, “If it WAS that easy everybody’d be doin’ it.”

Second…well that’ll have to wait for tomorrow.