Hong Kong is high-altitude, so as we look out of our hotel windows on Kowloon Park, we're treated to mountainous skyscrapers, but also to stunningly beautiful mountains and, literally, eye-level clouds wrapped around both.  Then when the sun or moon peeks out between these manmade and God-made mountains, I'm reminded of the partnership with God which is our privilege as His children-the partnership of tending His Creation.  Finding ways to do that as God wants demands we know what God says in His word about how He wants it done.  That's our mission here this week for TOW. 

     Thanks for your emails and comments.  As I get time, I'll try to answer questions going forward.  Marcus asks: "Why Hong Kong?" (paraphrased).   Great question. 

     In the 1890's, missions and missionary organizations faced many of the problems we face in the work/faith field.  The Lausanne Covenant and it's network turned those problems around, and formed the basis for much of the structure we used to get our TOW Project operational.  It was natural, then, that we would include representatives from Lausanne's own work/faith teams on our Steering Committee (two were appointed).  With Lausanne's next Congress convening this year in Capetown, South Africa, the Lausanne Marketplace Ministry team invited TOW to join them in Capetown, and even invited us to recommend TOW Steering Committee members as delegates to Lausanne itself.  TOW accepted the invitation, not only because LMM was a predecessor to our efforts, but because we want to mirror collaboration both nationally and internationally.

    Meanwhile, Lausanne was re-evaluating its' own operation, and sometime last year determined to abandon the "track program" structure of the past.  This meant the Lausanne Marketplace Ministry group no longer had a reason to convene in Capetown, but they still wanted to forge ahead with the collaboration.  They shifted their invitation to Hong Kong, and again TOW accepted.  Now, not only do TOW members have the opportunity to do their regular business (article review and approval), we're doing it with an advance party from LMM participating, and then inviting the larger group to meet in two days of joint sessions.  After those sessions, representatives from TOW and LMM will then join the East Asian Graduate Fellowship organization for a third work/faith conference, this involving hundreds of Christian professionals and workers from Asia and other Eastern and African nations!  So, for many of our team, this is not only one conference, but three! 

     Today, TOW met separately to approve more articles for public release.  The discussions were extremely fruitful and productive, and led to the final approval of research on I & II Thessalonians as well as a Key Topic article on Ethics, brilliantly and creatively written in a dual-path format by Alistair Mackenzie and Wayne Kirkland from New Zealand. 

     We're joined tomorrow by the LMM Advance Team for intense article review and discussion.  It's fair to say dozens of nations are represented in these three gatherings, and they're all impressed by TOW's commitment to make its research universally available to any Christian and Christian organization wishing to minister in and to the workplaces of the world.   I'll be sending along photos of Hong Kong and the meetings later in the week, and more anecdotes on the sessions and results.  In the meantime, please keep us in your prayers, and also send along your encouraging emails, comments and questions.