Meet the Team -- Part V

Our 2013 Costa Rica mission team includes a variety of ready and willing, enthusiastic and able high school students. We want you to meet them, and just as we—the leaders—are getting to understand their hearts and abilities, we wish to have you see, too, those same loving souls and what brought them to our team.  (A complete list of team member testimonies can be found at 2013 Team Members.) 

Nathan Tighe

A senior at Dayton Christian, Nathan Tighe, plans to attend Wright State University after graduating. He will study in the pre-physical therapy program and later enter a physical therapy program at a different university.

This trip to Costa Rica will be Nathan’s first mission trip.  Nathan shares, “My older brother and older sister have both done missions trips and said that they were amazing, life-changing trips. I have also heard that from several other people who have gone on missions trips.” Not playing basketball this year, Nathan decided to take advantage of the time and opportunity to serve.  

Nathan looks forward to the trip, particularly to experiencing another culture and learning how to share his faith with others. He expresses the importance of working as a team and working together to make life easier for each individual: “I'm hoping to be able to contribute a lot to the physical work that our team will need to do.”

Nathan says that he is a very competitive person, so his other interests usually include “well, competitions with people!” Basketball, dodge ball, or whatever the game may be. Even if he may not be particularly skilled at some activities, Nathan still loves the competition and athleticism involved.” Besides sports, Nathan also plays the guitar. Having played for four years, he enjoys both acoustic and electric.

“All people need encouragement in different ways,” Nathan shares, “because we are all in different situations and have different life stories...but we all do need encouragement.” For all team members, this trip will produce many opportunities to encourage.

Chris Harr

Christopher Harr, aka Coach Harr, is another of our fearless leaders (in fact, perhaps he is our most fearless leader). Coach Harr has taught math at XCHS for six years; he is married to his lovely wife Jamie, and he would someday like to be a cowboy.

Also a veteran leader of the Costa Rica mission trip, Coach Harr’s reason for joining the team is because he remembers the impact that short term mission trips had on his own growing faith experience. The chance to be a part of that in someone else’s life is a great opportunity. “Costa Rica kind of chose me,” he shares. “There was a need for a male leader, and after I prayed about it, I was in.”

These trips to Costa Rica have certainly not been his first opportunities to work in short-term ministry. Other trips include ministries in Quebec, Canada; Trinidad; four times in Malawi, Africa; and in India. This will be his ninth trip as such. He is looking forward to seeing what the Lord does through these students and in these students’ hearts.

Other interests of Coach Harr’s include strength and conditioning, which he also uses as a ministry outreach to young people at XCHS. He is either training others or working out himself seven days a week. Most any outdoor activities interest Coach – particularly hiking, camping, and white water rafting.

Coach Harr encourages young people to “stop comparing yourself to others. Just worry about how you are using the gifts and abilities God has given you to glorify Him.”

Tia Reilly

The last of our four teacher-leaders in the group, Tia Reilly, is a third-year teacher at Xenia Christian High School. Three-and-a-half years ago, Tia moved back to Ohio with her family after serving overseas with the mission agency ABWE.  They first worked in Paraguay, South America, and then most recently, in Costa Rica for four years.  The opportunity to return to the ministry, culture, and language of “home” is also an opportunity to encourage young people in their current spiritual walk as well as a chance to share with them what life and ministry looks like outside of the United States.

Having lived there, Costa Rica was an obvious choice for Tia last year when asked to go along as a teacher-leader. Being a part of the team enables her to get to know better the young people of the school where she teaches and encourage them in current and future ministries.

Tia has also participated in missions trips to Chile, South America.  Retired Cedarville University professor Dr. Bev Monroe leads trips to English-speaking seminaries and Christian schools around the world in order to organize and digitally catalog their institute libraries.  Tia has worked on four such projects with Dr. Monroe’s team, and may travel with them to Croatia this coming summer.

Married to Kevin Reilly, who teaches history in the middle school, the couple has four children and one grandchild. (The youngest two—Cole and Tara—are also XCHS graduates.) Tia’s other interests include reading and writing, piano and choir ministries, photography, and mindfulness.