February 2008

Signs of hope among Taiwanese youth

Dear Friends,

Because of the academic pressure during the school year on Taiwanese students, Christian students especially look forward to camps and conferences during the winter break. These past few weeks I have been traveling around the island by the new bullet train, by plane, and by bus to speak at conferences on the coast and in the high central mountains.

A university student conference on the Bible, which focuses on a different biblical book each year, has a rich history. This year they divided it into two conferences, with the first week focusing on the Book of Acts and the second week focusing on the Book of Genesis. In total, over 300 college students attended these conferences.

University students place a candle on a map of Taiwan and pray that God will use them in mission.

I spoke the last night of the first week. They asked me to share about my call to mission and to challenge the students to ponder to what kind of mission God may be calling them. Each day the students would divide into small groups and study the Bible and then share what they had discovered. Before I spoke, I asked some of the university chaplains to prepare two huge maps of Taiwan to place on the floor in the front of the chapel. They also placed four arrows pointing away from Taiwan to the world. I then asked the students to light a candle and bring the candle forward and place it on the map in a place which represents where God is calling them to be in mission. The students streamed forward reverently, kneeling to place their candles, and then pausing to pray that God would use them as God’s servants. As I took the four-hour bus ride back to Taipei the next day, I gave thanks for these college students who use their vacations to learn more about God’s Word and God’s call.

The second conference was held on the east coast for aboriginal junior high and high school students. Two-hundred-and-twenty students attended the conference in a setting which could hold 150 comfortably. They were packed into the chapel where I spoke twice a day. Eight young people were crammed into dorm rooms that ordinarily hold only two. The dining hall could not hold all the youth, so they overflowed into stairwells and hallways to eat.

But they didn’t seem to mind. Keeping the attention of 220 youth isn’t easy, especially speaking five times for an hour each time. But they did pay attention, and they responded enthusiastically in song and in small group discussions.

John McCall and aboriginal seminary students wash the feet of the youth at the conference.

The last day I asked the 18 small group leaders, who are also aboriginal seminary students, to wash the feet of the youth in their small group. The youth lined up on the basketball court and, one by one, took off their shoes to have their feet washed. I told the leaders to wash and massage the feet slowly, as a humble act of service. 

Again, I was encouraged by the response of the youth. They didn’t focus on the inadequacies of the conference site, but instead loved being with other Christian young people of different tribes. I told them that the success of the conference would not be measured by the three days that we were together, but instead by the way they lived out their faith in their homes, in their schools and churches, and in their villages and cities.

Many of these youth come from families with great challenges. Others find little support at school. But Christ offers them a welcome which they experienced in our time together.

Thank you for your prayers and support, which allow me to accompany these young people as they seek to live a Christian life in a non-Christian land.

Gratefully,

John McCall

The 2008 Mission Yearbook for Prayer & Study, p. 108