Click here to read the article about Floresta in the San Diego Union Tribune!

How Great Thou Art

Working at Floresta has been, and continues to be, intensely rewarding on a number of levels. Seeing lives change and being a part of a growing international team that is working together to serve the poor and serve God is fantastic. However, one of the most unexpected personal blessings has been reawakening to the wonder of Gods Creation.

When I first got involved with Floresta as a volunteer, way back in 1992, the humanitarian and spiritual aspects of the work attracted me. Environmental restoration was less interesting. I saw it from a purely pragmatic point of view: “We plant trees because people need the trees.”

However, because we were in a strange niche, planting trees and restoring watersheds, I had the opportunity to be around some of the people who were at the forefront of what has come to be known as creation care. From them, I learned that the Creation has intrinsic value in God’s eyes. Scripture frequently talks of His love for His Creation.

At the same time, I learned to walk in the woods with Christian biologists and naturalists, essentially rediscovering the outdoors. I had been an avid backpacker in college, and had somehow gotten out of the habit of being outside during seven years in the Navy. Now people who both knew the Creator and understood something of the complexity and wonder of what He had called good reintroduced me to God’s handiwork. Creation has historically been understood to be a part of God’s general revelation, and as I began to understand and spend time in it, the more I got a sense for who and how big God is.

I have, as a result become an avid – if inexpert – birder and gardener, and spend my free time hiking in the local mountains. There, it is easy to connect with the words of the great hymn:

When through the woods, and forest glades I wander,
And hear the birds sing sweetly in the trees.
When I look down, from lofty mountain grandeur
And see the brook, and feel the gentle breeze.

Then sings my soul, My Savior God, to Thee,
How great Thou art, How great Thou art.

Whatever your reason for supporting our work, I pray that you will be blessed by the gift God has given all of us in His Creation.

AP Article on Haiti

The Associated Press recently ran an article on reforestation in Haiti that highlighted our work and included a quote from me.

Haiti's Efforts to Save Trees Falters

Since it was wire article it appeared in sources as diverse as the International Herald Tribune, San Francisco Chronicle and a Sudanese newspaper.

Floresta in Oaxaca - Part 3

Floresta in Oaxaca - Part 2

I know that many of you have been waiting anxiously for the second installment of our Oaxaca documentary. Well here it is:

Floresta in Oaxaca - Part 1

This video documents our work in Oaxaca. Because of space limitations on YouTube it is divided into three parts. Here, for your enjoyment, is Part 1.

Scott Sabin a "Metro Mover to Watch"

San Diego Metropolitan named Scott Sabin one of its "Metro Movers to Watch in 08." Check out the full article here: http://www.sandiegometro.com/2007/dec/movers2.php

Congratulations, Scott!

Floresta in the News

Floresta was recently featured in an article in San Diego Magazine regarding alternative gift markets.

As an fun side note, the author of the article will be joining our staff next month as a grant writer. Welcome Aly!

It isn't as easy as it looks

Inc. Magazine has an interesting article this month about the hazards of starting your own international nonprofit organization. There is a trick to doing business in the poor, underdeveloped and neglected corners of the world.

I wish more people would read this. Whether you are a church or a retired businessman, working through established organizations like Floresta may not be as exciting as doing it yourself. However, we have learned from our mistakes, and we have something to offer.

I thought his comments about the cost of due diligence were especially telling.

Everybody Wants to Save the World.

What's the Big Idea?!

The other day somebody asked me about Floresta. “What is the big idea?” was the way they put it. It is an excellent question. I think there is one big idea and three very important secondary ideas.

I think the big idea is that we can make environmental restoration profitable for the rural poor at the same time we are making poverty reduction beneficial for the environment. That is the Floresta idea. In other words, we are creating virtuous cycles or spirals in places where vicious cycles existed before. In so doing we are solving two enormous problems that taken by themselves seem intractable. The big idea is that it is actually easier to address both problems together than it is to take them on one at a time. This is unique, and I think it is what sets Floresta apart from most other organizations and solutions.

Almost as important is the idea that the poor are the most important allies in solving these problems and are probably the greatest untapped resource on earth. They have the skills, insight and vested interest in solving their problems. They have far more intelligence and initiative than people give them credit for. Often they only lack tools or opportunities. Perhaps all they lack is self-confidence. Yet far too often those who want to help see the poor as an obstacle. The temptation is to try to solve their problems for them without involving them. One of the most important things we can do is empower the poor to realize and use their God-given talents to change their communities and restore their land.

Another idea - one that almost seems self-evident - is that any long-term solution to the problems of environmental degradation and rural poverty must be holistic and must focus on root causes. Distributing food and medicine may solve immediate problems but they won’t change the world. Giving away a shoebox with Christmas presents or a disaster kit may be a nice gesture, but probably won’t change someone’s life. Building a low cost home may be a tremendous blessing to a family. However, the family is probably not poor because they don’t have a home; they don’t have a home because they are poor. This is not to disparage any of the ministries who build homes or distribute food. God calls each of us to different tasks, and each of those has its place. However, at Floresta we feel called to changing peoples lives through long-term holistic solutions that get at root causes of poverty and environmental degradation and leave the people transformed forever.

Finally, we believe that for lasting change to take place, Jesus must be involved. There is a spiritual dimension to all of the problems we deal with. In order to succeed in our task, Jesus must empower us and walk with us. In order for lives to be transformed, Christ must be working in those lives. That is not to say that we force our faith, or even our “witness” on anyone. We serve the poor out of our love for Jesus, and it is our desire that people would come to know Jesus, but we absolutely do not want to manipulate people in any way. To even imply that one would have to “convert” to receive help from Floresta would be manipulative, so we go out of our way to make it clear that the spiritual activities of Floresta are optional. However, it is only Jesus who can take a virtuous cycle of economic opportunity and environmental restoration and turn it into something that resembles the Kingdom of God.

All of these ideas are important; it is the first idea that makes Floresta unique. We share the other three with many fine ministries.

I was recently at the Global Leaders Forum of the National Association of Evangelicals, in Washington DC, and was participating in a workshop on “Creation Care.”

The facilitator went around the room and asked each of to tell why we were there. Most people gave the kids of reasons that you might expect: to learn more, or because the environment had been a long-time interest, or because of something they had recently learned. However, one participant, an older gentleman with a long background in religious broadcasting, nearly brought tears to my eyes when he simply quoted:

This is my Father’s world, and to my listening ears
All nature sings, and round me rings the music of the spheres.
This is my Father’s world: I rest me in the thought
Of rocks and trees, of skies and seas;
His hand the wonders wrought.

This is my Father’s world, the birds their carols raise,
The morning light, the lily white, declare their Maker’s praise.
This is my Father’s world: He shines in all that’s fair;
In the rustling grass I hear Him pass;
He speaks to me everywhere.

This is my Father’s world. O let me ne’er forget
That though the wrong seems oft so strong, God is the ruler yet.
This is my Father’s world: the battle is not done:
Jesus Who died shall be satisfied,
And earth and Heav’n be one.

What a powerful reminder!

All of creation exists to praise its Creator. And as we have dealt with the fires in San Diego, the flooding from Tropical Storm Noel in the Dominican Republic and Haiti and all the personal tragedy wrapped up in these events, it is a powerful reminder that though the wrong seems oft so strong, God is the ruler yet!

Images of Noel

Most of these photos were taken in the last couple of days around the town of Piedra Blanca, in the central Dominican Republic, near Floresta's field office.

Tropical Storm Noel: Fernando's Story

Testimony of Fernando De la Cruz Díaz
Discipleship Promoter for Floresta RD

At 2:45 in the morning on Monday, October 29, the electricity in Piedra Blanca was interrupted by the intense rains. Cries and voices of neighbors could be heard everywhere as the Maimon river was coming into their homes. The neighbors were knocking on each other’s homes but the voices were not distinguishable because of the loud noise of the rain and the rising of the river. I got up and looked out the window of the room where I sleep and saw dead horses floating and dragged by the river. I could sense that the water was coming into my house and I exclaimed “Oh Lord! Everything is coming to an end!” The first thing I did was go to my daughters’ room: Fernanda and Esmirna. I woke them up and got them out of bed, we ran to leave the house, but the door wouldn’t open because the currents were so strong, they held it shut. I decided to break through the roof of the house to go out the top, but I couldn’t lift up the girls by myself. So I climbed through alone, then broke the door from the outside. The water rushed in and knocked down the girls, but somehow we all managed to leave the house. The water was up to my chest, because it had risen four feet. I carried the girls in my arms and all the neighbors left our houses for the highest part of the area where we live in Piedra Blanca.

The current pulled Fernanda, my oldest daughter (7 years old), towards me and I fell. I held on more tightly and lifted myself with my two daughters and continued forward, with difficulty, towards the Floresta warehouse. When I arrived, Beato, the caretaker of the warehouse didn’t know what was happening and I explained that at this moment the community had water up to 6 feet high in all of the houses, due to the overflowing of the river. He allowed us to stay, along with all of the people that fled to the highest part of the place. The hours passed. The 60 of us in the Floresta warehouse waited for the daylight to arrive to see what actually happened. When the day dawned, I went to see my house and it was full of mud. Even the fridge, beds, stove, dresser, clothes and plates were full of mud. The mud was at least a foot high throughout the house. The rain kept pouring and I went back up to where the girls and the rest of the people were, because they hadn’t been rescued yet due to the strong currents of water that knocked out the main bridge that connects the area to the rest of town.

In the midst of cries of desperation of many people, due to the loss of children, mothers, family members and friends, we encouraged one another. The rains died down a bit around 11am and we were finally able to cross back into town. Around 1pm in the afternoon, my sister in-law rescued my two daughters and me. We began to realize more clearly that we would no longer see some our neighbors and friends in this life, as the river had taken them away. [At least 15 people died in Piedra Blanca that night.]

I thank God that my daughter Fernanda, especially, was not carried away by the currents. She said to me “daddy, the water is going to take me, don’t let me die.”

And now the trauma continues, together with a great gratitude to God for giving us life anew.

A book for all parents

Highly reccomended for all of us but especially parents. Last Child in the Woods by Richard Louv.