January 2019 – Janelle Look

Hi Family and Friends,

I hope you’re doing well! We’re entering an exciting time of the year where we meet and interview internship applicants. We have the privilege of helping young people discern their calling and have the opportunity to pastor them through the big decisions they are making. This year, we are accepting applications for our San Jose internship and various international internships. The interviews will be held February 22-24 in San Jose. I welcome your prayers for this process. Ask the Lord to send out more workers into his harvest field! Pray that God brings us mature applicants who feel called to serve in under-resourced and marginalized communities.

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Speaking of interns, our team had the opportunity to take a day trip to Tijuana to serve with Al Otro Lado, a nonprofit that provides legal clinics and legal consultations for asylum seekers (click here to learn more about the migrant caravan). They estimate that there are approximately 10,000 refugees in Mexico. Our time there was eye-opening and led us to lament the many injustices in the immigration system.

Did you know that asylum-seekers have the right to directly approach the border to request asylum? Once an asylum-seeker arrives at the border, they put their name on a list and wait for months to be called for their initial asylum claim interview. Did you know that this list of asylum-seekers (“la lista”) is literally a list of names handwritten in a notebook? That blew my mind. It shows how little our government cares about this issue, not to mention that this whole process of restricting asylum seekers is illegal. Our time at Al Otro Lado was an invaluable experience for me and the interns.

(Above: Our intern team at Al Otro Lado)

In December, I had the opportunity to preach at my church on Matthew 1:18-25, Jesus’ birth from Joseph’s perspective. Click here to listen!

I also had the opportunity to attend Urbana, a student missions conference in St. Louis. I was there to recruit for Servant Partners. To my surprise, there was a LOT of interest in our internships! Praise God. I had the opportunity to chat and pray with many students. Urbana was also fun because I met staff from our sister organizations (Word Made Flesh, InnerCHANGE, Servants). Lastly, it was sweet to spend time with other SP staff from around the world who I don’t see very often.

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