Summer 2004

Dear Friend of Troubled Youth,

The first half of this year is over and I have just come up for breath. Year-end accounting, receiving wonderfully intensive fund development coaching, writing a chapter for a book on therapy with troubled youth, conducting a workshop in New York to train therapists on the use of action methods with incarcerated youth, conducting two workshops in Southern California to train urban youth workers, and completing an enjoyable, but lengthy seminary project paper on "The Theology of Mission with the Incarcerated"; all this and the continuing privilege of serving incarcerated youth in the Orange County Juvenile Justice Complex and my corporate Pacific Youth staff worldwide has made quick work of the last 180 days. This has been my biggest push in ten years. I have looked in the mirror many times this semester and reminded myself that, "You're not 25 anymore!" Needless to say, I am glad it's summer! I think I hear my boogie board and Harley Davidson motorcycle (a Father's Day gift from son Jeff several years ago) calling my name.

However, that being said, I've been thoroughly enjoying the convergence of experience, education, age, and opportunities of this season of life. When I was a boy I feared the "older" years. Growing up in a depressed and lower class neighborhood, my childhood witnessed a number of middle aged and aging folks ending life in failure. This deeply bothered me and etched a vague anxiety into my heart. I had no way of knowing then that God's plans for me included a significant final third of life filled with productivity and fulfillment. This season of life is so rich I stand in amazement, but maybe I should have paid closer attention to my dad and my older brother. My dad mechanized all his life and was able to spend his sunset years in business doing very well for himself as a small engine mechanist. My older brother ran heavy equipment in Alaska for forty years and retired with a reputation that has construction companies statewide continuing to call him to build runways and other projects: For Dad and Don, experience, age, and opportunity converged as they should. It was modeled for me by those closest to me, two examples to whom I should have paid closer attention as an adult.

Today Pacific Youth and I stand at the intersection of experience and opportunity. With horrendous state budget cuts and local county governments drastically reducing services, we continue to provide uninterrupted chaplaincy services. While institutions scramble to determine how to provide for the religious needs of their population and fulfill legal mandates while limiting potential liability, we continue to provide a model ministry design and needed tech support. As clinical services are reduced that aid the incarcerated in a critical season of their lives, we continue to provide pastoral counseling, discipleship, and mentoring that facilitates maturation out of delinquency. With the correctional environment despairing over increasing crime rates, we continue to provide hope to the hopeless because we know God and the grace He brings into every situation. Being needed more than ever I can say, "It's good to be alive, especially now."
Let me encourage you with a current and an exciting international ministry opportunity. Apo Rageci is our PYCM regional director in the Islands of Fiji. Apo is an ex-offender who came to Christ decades ago and serves God faithfully. Because he is a man of God and unwavering, God has positioned Apo to provide leadership at the highest levels of government. He is consulted when government meetings are held on prison reform. He is consulted when churches, denominations, and missionary associations enter prison ministry. He is consulted when the youth and family department of the Fijian government explores improving children's services. Apo is included and valued because he, too, is living at the intersection of experience and opportunity. At this season of Apo's life he is now focusing on twenty-two South Pacific island countries that desperately need quality correctional ministry. Twenty-two small nations are destined to be impacted by Apo's life because he is able to meet opportunity at full speed. Apo is but one PYCM staff member impacting an entire region of the world and he would agree that it's good to be alive, especially now.

I continue remaining at my intersection of experience and opportunity because you have joined me in this work. With Jan by my side and you on my team, I run toward the future God has promised me. Local ministry will remain an important focus because I am the supervising protestant chaplain for 6 Orange County juvenile facilities. National and global ministry will necessarily increase as a focus because PYCM is now properly positioned to offer experience and expertise as the Lord's opportunities for ministry come to us. PYCM has made education and training our strategic initiative and we are soliciting corporate funding to achieve this goal. As executive chaplain I am committed to a larger corporate vision of impact, and as well, all that God has for each member of my PYCM team and for Jan and me personally.

I need your prayer covering that constantly bathes my life in God's favor, blessing, and provision. Our youth need your prayer covering that bathes their lives in God's grace and mercy. Your prayers have sustained me personally for 28 years and I welcome and praise God for them. God is indeed seated on the throne, and your prayers are constantly changing things for the better. Be encouraged, your prayers matter!

With your welcomed prayers, I also need your financial caregiving. I am dependent upon your sacrificial giving to my personal support, as it literally funds my every day. This season the financial need has increased. Summer months are usually a struggle for homeland missionaries with donor bases that enjoy summer and vacations, and sometimes forget to pray and give. I understand. However, as a PYCM partner you also stand at the intersection of experience and opportunity. You have experienced the goodness of God in your life, and welcome with us the significant opportunity God is poised to provide through PYCM. Please come and join Apo and me in saying it's good to be alive, especially now.

Thanks for your generosity and your patience between so lengthy an interval of communication. You will hear more from me as 2004 unfolds.

Your chaplain in His service,
R. Steve Lowe