Ideation Conference

Last week I had the privilege of attending the Ideation Conference in Long Beach, about 30 miles from Pasadena.  It was a gathering of about 200 non-profit leaders, many (maybe even the majority) of whom led faith-based organizations.  The focus was on justice.

I loved it.  For one thing, I can’t remember the last conference I attended as a participant, not a speaker.

Second, when I say participant, I mean participant.  The goal of the conference was to help each leader connect with other leaders and the causes represented by the speakers (who were given a refreshing 15 minutes in a general session, not the normal 45 minutes).  Even the layout of the general sessions was like “theatre in the round,” thereby encouraging a spirit of dialogue.

Eugene Cho from One Day’s Wages was one of those speakers.  He and his family decided to give up their $68,000/year annual salary to empower the poor.   Now he’s inviting folks to give “One Day’s Wages” of their own, which represents 0.4%  of their income.

Eugene mentioned www.globalrichlist.com, a site that allows you to figure out how wealthy you are compared to the rest of the world.  Here’s a great exercise for you to do with your youth ministry kids:  figure out how much a teenager working 10 hours/week at minimum wage would make, and then see how that teenager compares with the rest of the world.

If you’d like, you could also plug in salaries of adults – like maybe $37,000 for a teacher or $120,000 for a business executive.

What would it look like for you and your kids to give One Day’s Wages?

©2010 Fuller Youth Institute