I think it goes without saying that there are some changes taking place in our nation currently. And many of them are not looked upon with favor by many. Sky rocketing unemployment rates/job loss; a government that has largely lost the trust of the people they're there to serve; children having to deal with things that they shouldn't have to deal with; the family unit being torn apart... etc. You get the point.
I grew up in the public school system. In the public schools, they have a certain curriculum that isn't favorable to the gospel. Now granted, I may have grown up in a highly conservative around. I just picked up a book the other day in the store called "Brave New Schools" by Berit Kjos. I just started it, but it addresses soo many vital ideas that are being presented in school and even in society.
I graduated 3 years ago from FIRE School Of Ministry. They're mandate that they feel the Lord has put on their hearts is to be a training center for the Jesus Revolution. Check them out at www.fire-school.org. I also still attend the church there and service in various outlets. The president of the school, Dr. Brown, has authored several books, two of which I want to mention here because they made a profound effect on me and I want to present them to you, the reader. One is called "Revolution: The Call to Holy War" and the other one is called "Revolution In The Church." Now, I want to mention right away then when we say 'revolution', we are NOT talking about a violent over throw of anything. But we are talking about doing what we can do to make a change in society. Through evangelism, discipleship, prayer, bible study and other things of the like.
One of the biggest things that I personally see that needs to change is the hearts and minds of the believers and disciples of Jesus. I've grown up all my life in the church. Mainly, the non-denominational denomination/charismatic. I've seen the good, the bad and the ugly. One of the biggest things that I have seen is the fact that we need to get our acts together. So often, it seems like church is treated more like a gigantic social club. Now, i'm NOT against fellowshiping with other believers and encouraging one another. But what kind of impact are we having on society? Are we known in heaven and feared in hell? (These are questions I often ask myself). Now, if you've been a friend of mine of Facebook here for any amount of time, you know that I put up all sorts of political stories. It's one thing to sit around and post things about how bad things are, but we have to take it one step further and provide viable solutions to the problems.
Now obviously, our first and most powerful solution is the Good News of Jesus Christ. It's one thing to preach it, it's another thing to live it and walk it out. Let us show the world that we mean business and show them the Love and Truth of Jesus Christ, thus making a truly lasting impact on the lives around us.
Thursday, September 24, 2009
Friday, August 7, 2009
The American Teen
Lately, I've been watching a couple episodes of a tv show online. (If you'll notice, i'm not giving the name of the show because I don't want to come across like I'm endorsing it.) It feels like I'm watching a teen soap opera. There is tons of drama in this show and I'm just glad I didn't involved much with folks like this in school and at the same time, I kinda wish I would've had more friends like this to bring stability into situations. One of the main girls in the show is pregnant (i think she's about 15 or so) and they're all talking about sleeping around or at least making out and dating.... its a lot of drama for me. Sometimes, my heart is just totally broken for this kind of stuff. Another one of the main characters is supposedly the 'good little Christian girl', but its a bad portrayal of one. Granted, that's what the world sees and perceives of it. But when I found out that the 'christian' girl was who the character was to portray, I was just like "oh dear God, here we go..." (but that's what happens when the church isn't being the church and not being an example of living a standard according to the Bible... I'm preaching to myself on that one).
I find it hard to grasp of my identity being in anything but Jesus, but that's just how I grew up. I mean, obviously in this show most of the characters aren't Christians. In any case, I look at society around me and ask for God's heart for the folks around me. Because from myself, I just have no patience. But what about God's heart for these folks? Do we just abandon them or do we befriend them and show them the love of Jesus? Those who have been forgiven much know how to forgive. To those who have been given grace, they give grace a whole lot.
Normally, I wouldn't want to sink a whole lot of time into a show like this. But in a strange way, I feel the grace for it... meaning that I almost feel like the Lord wants me to get something out of it and show me something through it.
But over the past few years, I've been examining my evangelism methods. I used to be one to just boldly say stuff, regardless of many of the repercussions. And there is time and place for that still. I used to love to open air preach, and perhaps I'll be doing more of that someday. But I've come to realize that often times, folks don't feel loved. (I am in no way endorsing a total seeker sensitive thinking here and never addressing issues and never speaking truth, because there is a definite need for it.) But in every situation, grace and wisdom needs to be used. Jesus told the woman at the well to "Go and sin no more." He didn't say "oh, its ok, keep messing around with all these guys and i'll still love you..." He didn't exploit her either. He calmly and gently laid down the law and pointed her to truth.
Also in watching this show, I often times as myself how I would handle this if I were in this situation? I mean, obviously most if not all of these issues would be handled if the folks had any real idea of who Jesus was and all that wonderful stuff. But then they wouldn't have a show. And it makes me very grateful that I know Jesus and gives me a greater burden to make Him known.
The United States is probably one of the greatest nations on this Earth as far as I'm concerned. We have our problems, no doubt. But the Lord has been able to use us in countless occasions in the past to help our nations out. Now, with that comes a great responsibility. It's the responsibility to use what we have properly. Same thing goes for the church: we have to steward God's presence properly... thoughts anyone?
I find it hard to grasp of my identity being in anything but Jesus, but that's just how I grew up. I mean, obviously in this show most of the characters aren't Christians. In any case, I look at society around me and ask for God's heart for the folks around me. Because from myself, I just have no patience. But what about God's heart for these folks? Do we just abandon them or do we befriend them and show them the love of Jesus? Those who have been forgiven much know how to forgive. To those who have been given grace, they give grace a whole lot.
Normally, I wouldn't want to sink a whole lot of time into a show like this. But in a strange way, I feel the grace for it... meaning that I almost feel like the Lord wants me to get something out of it and show me something through it.
But over the past few years, I've been examining my evangelism methods. I used to be one to just boldly say stuff, regardless of many of the repercussions. And there is time and place for that still. I used to love to open air preach, and perhaps I'll be doing more of that someday. But I've come to realize that often times, folks don't feel loved. (I am in no way endorsing a total seeker sensitive thinking here and never addressing issues and never speaking truth, because there is a definite need for it.) But in every situation, grace and wisdom needs to be used. Jesus told the woman at the well to "Go and sin no more." He didn't say "oh, its ok, keep messing around with all these guys and i'll still love you..." He didn't exploit her either. He calmly and gently laid down the law and pointed her to truth.
Also in watching this show, I often times as myself how I would handle this if I were in this situation? I mean, obviously most if not all of these issues would be handled if the folks had any real idea of who Jesus was and all that wonderful stuff. But then they wouldn't have a show. And it makes me very grateful that I know Jesus and gives me a greater burden to make Him known.
The United States is probably one of the greatest nations on this Earth as far as I'm concerned. We have our problems, no doubt. But the Lord has been able to use us in countless occasions in the past to help our nations out. Now, with that comes a great responsibility. It's the responsibility to use what we have properly. Same thing goes for the church: we have to steward God's presence properly... thoughts anyone?
Truth Is Truth
Sometimes there is no way around it... sometimes, the law just has to be laid down. Sometimes, no matter how nicely I try and tell people something, there is a chance of a bad perception. Sometimes it’s my fault for the delivery, and sometimes the it was just received wrong, by that I mean the person receiving it didn’t get it right. I once heard the line that its better to be understanding than understood. And I try and live by that. But sometimes, no matter how it’s brought up, there is an offense brought up.
My pastoral side sometimes just wants to throw my arm around folks and encourage. And then at times the prophetic side rises up in me and then I know I have to be careful with what I say. I will say this: we as Christians are to be physicians more than cooks. With that said, its also important to say things in the right spirit/attitude and correct manner. You want to deal with each situation as you feel the Holy Spirit directs you.
I have come across a few arguments, they’re called ‘self-defeating’ arguments because followed out logically, the cancel themselves out. One’s like:
1. There are no absolute truths. Response: You sure about that?
2. Well, that’s right for you but not for me. Response: You try telling that to the cop when they pull you over for speeding, doing a 70 in a 55 (a hypothetical situation). When the officer comes up and says “I caught you doing 70 in a 55. And you say “Well, that may be true for you but not for me.” And you speed off… that just won’t work.
3. Well, I grew up in church and I’m a good person… Response: This one is my favorite one. Because it’s probably the most destructive one. In Revelation, the Laodicean church got all out rebuked for having this type of mentality. They thought they had it going for them, but they were spiritually bankrupt. Leonard Ravenhill said once “How is it that the world couldn’t get on with Jesus who was the holiest man ever to live and yet they can get on with you?”
4. You’re being judgmental! Response: thanks for judging me and thus cancelling yourself out. This is an argument that’s seemingly based out of Matt. 7. What that chapter ISN’T saying is that we’re not to use common sense and wisdom from God and make a judgment call when someone does something stupid… like stealing (just an example). What this chapter is meaning is that we’re not to judge the motives of someone’s heart. Check out this article about it http://www.facebook.com/ext/share.php?sid=119940306848&h=rf8ZX&u=IP-HP&ref=mf.
Here’s the deal: Jesus had more grace and compassion on the sinners of the day than the religious folks. The woman caught in adultery, go and sin no more. He didn’t excuse or condone her sin. He judged her with love and compassion.
We also need to get a concept of what love REALLY means. True love is rough at times when it’s needed. Sometimes, loving parents have to kick their kids out of the house for being stupid. And honestly, I have more patience with a outright pagan than I do with someone who CLAIMS to be a Christian, but produces no fruit for it. They don’t know the Bible at all, there is no prayer life… stuff like that.
Sometimes, love means discipline… and yes, I believe in spanking. Spanking done in the right spirit produces fruit. I know, I was spanked as a child (and I continually thank my parents for it to this day.)
Lately, its seems like the church (talking about the body as a whole) is in this huge identity crisis. It seems more like a big social club gathering, and instead of actually addressing issues, we’ve turned a blind eye to it.
A solution to all of this: For one thing, quit giving the Lord lip service. In Jeremiah it says that we honor the Lord with our lips but our hearts are far from Him. We put on a mask and sadly, we can fool a good number of folks. Two: be honest with the Lord and with yourself. Three: it’s time to get the presence of God back into the body. We’ve traded the presence of God for our churchy programs. I’m not against programs necessarily. I teach at our Royal Rangers program once a week at my church. But more than anything, my desire is for the body of Christ to experience the manifest presence of God. Trust me when I say that 30 seconds in the presence of God can and will do the work of hours and hours of sermons/messages. And those messages aren’t a bad thing necessarily. We need good solid Biblical teaching. But just seconds in Daddy’s presence will do the work of tons of sermons.
All of this isn’t really anything new. Most of it was due to recent conversations I’ve had with folks who were very well meaning, and I just wanted to set the record straight on a couple things.
I’m not afraid to necessarily pull ideas from various sources, but just to let everyone know in reading this that the Bible is my foremost authority. I get a lot of concepts and ideas from various sources and everything is taken by to scripture and scrutinized according to Biblical principles. So I welcome your comments but be mindful that I do use discretion and if I feel the comment needs to be pulled, this is my site and I hold that right. But everything will be done in a Biblical order.
I forgot to mention some websites to check out:
www.fire-school.org
www.fire-church.org
http://www.fireonyourhead.org
http://www.fireonyourhead.com/
My pastoral side sometimes just wants to throw my arm around folks and encourage. And then at times the prophetic side rises up in me and then I know I have to be careful with what I say. I will say this: we as Christians are to be physicians more than cooks. With that said, its also important to say things in the right spirit/attitude and correct manner. You want to deal with each situation as you feel the Holy Spirit directs you.
I have come across a few arguments, they’re called ‘self-defeating’ arguments because followed out logically, the cancel themselves out. One’s like:
1. There are no absolute truths. Response: You sure about that?
2. Well, that’s right for you but not for me. Response: You try telling that to the cop when they pull you over for speeding, doing a 70 in a 55 (a hypothetical situation). When the officer comes up and says “I caught you doing 70 in a 55. And you say “Well, that may be true for you but not for me.” And you speed off… that just won’t work.
3. Well, I grew up in church and I’m a good person… Response: This one is my favorite one. Because it’s probably the most destructive one. In Revelation, the Laodicean church got all out rebuked for having this type of mentality. They thought they had it going for them, but they were spiritually bankrupt. Leonard Ravenhill said once “How is it that the world couldn’t get on with Jesus who was the holiest man ever to live and yet they can get on with you?”
4. You’re being judgmental! Response: thanks for judging me and thus cancelling yourself out. This is an argument that’s seemingly based out of Matt. 7. What that chapter ISN’T saying is that we’re not to use common sense and wisdom from God and make a judgment call when someone does something stupid… like stealing (just an example). What this chapter is meaning is that we’re not to judge the motives of someone’s heart. Check out this article about it http://www.facebook.com/ext/share.php?sid=119940306848&h=rf8ZX&u=IP-HP&ref=mf.
Here’s the deal: Jesus had more grace and compassion on the sinners of the day than the religious folks. The woman caught in adultery, go and sin no more. He didn’t excuse or condone her sin. He judged her with love and compassion.
We also need to get a concept of what love REALLY means. True love is rough at times when it’s needed. Sometimes, loving parents have to kick their kids out of the house for being stupid. And honestly, I have more patience with a outright pagan than I do with someone who CLAIMS to be a Christian, but produces no fruit for it. They don’t know the Bible at all, there is no prayer life… stuff like that.
Sometimes, love means discipline… and yes, I believe in spanking. Spanking done in the right spirit produces fruit. I know, I was spanked as a child (and I continually thank my parents for it to this day.)
Lately, its seems like the church (talking about the body as a whole) is in this huge identity crisis. It seems more like a big social club gathering, and instead of actually addressing issues, we’ve turned a blind eye to it.
A solution to all of this: For one thing, quit giving the Lord lip service. In Jeremiah it says that we honor the Lord with our lips but our hearts are far from Him. We put on a mask and sadly, we can fool a good number of folks. Two: be honest with the Lord and with yourself. Three: it’s time to get the presence of God back into the body. We’ve traded the presence of God for our churchy programs. I’m not against programs necessarily. I teach at our Royal Rangers program once a week at my church. But more than anything, my desire is for the body of Christ to experience the manifest presence of God. Trust me when I say that 30 seconds in the presence of God can and will do the work of hours and hours of sermons/messages. And those messages aren’t a bad thing necessarily. We need good solid Biblical teaching. But just seconds in Daddy’s presence will do the work of tons of sermons.
All of this isn’t really anything new. Most of it was due to recent conversations I’ve had with folks who were very well meaning, and I just wanted to set the record straight on a couple things.
I’m not afraid to necessarily pull ideas from various sources, but just to let everyone know in reading this that the Bible is my foremost authority. I get a lot of concepts and ideas from various sources and everything is taken by to scripture and scrutinized according to Biblical principles. So I welcome your comments but be mindful that I do use discretion and if I feel the comment needs to be pulled, this is my site and I hold that right. But everything will be done in a Biblical order.
I forgot to mention some websites to check out:
www.fire-school.org
www.fire-church.org
http://www.fireonyourhead.org
http://www.fireonyourhead.com/
Thursday, July 30, 2009
It's Been Awhile...
I know, it's been a long time since I've posted anything here. I just haven't been in the mood I guess to post... to take the time and do it just doesn't always happen. And it's not like I don't have anything to say. I have tons to say, but just sometimes putting it into words and then you get to deal w/ the fact that it's sometimes just too painful to think about the stuff... I mean, I could just always post just nice stuff... tickle peoples ears and do all that... but that just wouldn't be me.
Lately, a friend of mine and I have been discussing the possibility of starting up a Bible study w/ a few folks. There is a desperate need for it and people have questions. Primarily, I see a lot of youth that need to be challenged and trained up... I'm not sure what's going on w/ local ministries, but it just doesn't seem to be happening (I told you, its not always the pleasant stuff that I get to write about. If your looking for that, you picked the wrong blog to read...) So, as we continue to pray about it and see if its the timing to do something. My heart soo yearns to see people equipped. I get asked questions a lot and I seem to have fairly decent answers, I guess. Hey, i'm just reading the Bible and seeking God's heart. And He just keeps using me... its not that hard.
Just this past Saturday, our church and other local churches came together to do an outreach to the homosexual community down in Charlotte. We called it God Has A Better Way. Our goal was to reach out and resist. To show the homosexual community that we love them as God does, but we don't love the sin that they're living in (the lifestyle). But we understand that they're struggling and we want to be able to help.
One of my big interests is politics. I realized that my life is involved with probably two of the most controversial topics: religion and politics. Not religion OR politics, but religion AND politics. The last couple weeks at church we were having night classes. We called it the School of Cultural Engagement. We had speakers like Dr. John Rankin, Joe Dallas, Dr. Brown, Frank Turek, Joseph Infranco and Pat Mahoney. Each speaker took a different week and spoke on the topics that they were best at. I plan on buying all six weeks because they were just soo meaty and power-packed, so life enriching. I tried to get notes with each week, but I'm not soo good at taking notes. It's not my strong point.
God is doing something in this 'hour' that is just awesome. He is turning the hearts of His children to Him. There is a holy roar that is breaking out and people are getting hungry for the things of the Lord. They realize that government isn't going to solve the problems and that even the church isn't really providing many answers. But God is and Jesus loves them. So luckily, they're turning to Him.
Lately, a friend of mine and I have been discussing the possibility of starting up a Bible study w/ a few folks. There is a desperate need for it and people have questions. Primarily, I see a lot of youth that need to be challenged and trained up... I'm not sure what's going on w/ local ministries, but it just doesn't seem to be happening (I told you, its not always the pleasant stuff that I get to write about. If your looking for that, you picked the wrong blog to read...) So, as we continue to pray about it and see if its the timing to do something. My heart soo yearns to see people equipped. I get asked questions a lot and I seem to have fairly decent answers, I guess. Hey, i'm just reading the Bible and seeking God's heart. And He just keeps using me... its not that hard.
Just this past Saturday, our church and other local churches came together to do an outreach to the homosexual community down in Charlotte. We called it God Has A Better Way. Our goal was to reach out and resist. To show the homosexual community that we love them as God does, but we don't love the sin that they're living in (the lifestyle). But we understand that they're struggling and we want to be able to help.
One of my big interests is politics. I realized that my life is involved with probably two of the most controversial topics: religion and politics. Not religion OR politics, but religion AND politics. The last couple weeks at church we were having night classes. We called it the School of Cultural Engagement. We had speakers like Dr. John Rankin, Joe Dallas, Dr. Brown, Frank Turek, Joseph Infranco and Pat Mahoney. Each speaker took a different week and spoke on the topics that they were best at. I plan on buying all six weeks because they were just soo meaty and power-packed, so life enriching. I tried to get notes with each week, but I'm not soo good at taking notes. It's not my strong point.
God is doing something in this 'hour' that is just awesome. He is turning the hearts of His children to Him. There is a holy roar that is breaking out and people are getting hungry for the things of the Lord. They realize that government isn't going to solve the problems and that even the church isn't really providing many answers. But God is and Jesus loves them. So luckily, they're turning to Him.
Story Time!
Well, since everyone loves a good story, I wanted to share with all of you the time my roommates (Joshua and Jordan Pearson) bungee corded my door shut. I have to tell you that my initial reaction was frustration at first, but after about 5 seconds, I laughed really hard.
The layout of the how my bedroom door is helps out. If you walk direction forward after walking out of my door, you walk directly into the bathroom. And on the right side is the door to the other bedroom here. So all three doors are right close by, giving perfect opportunity for any good jokes. And I gotta hand it to the guys for coming up w/ the idea. They were thinking about seran wrapping my car, which i'm really glad they didn't because that would take a lot of seran wrap and it would take a while to clean up.
So anyways, they normally were getting up like stupid early. I mean, they were getting up before the sun gets up. And more of a night owl... relatively speaking. But the one morning, as they were getting up, i guess they were bored. So Jordan took some bungee cords and connected one to my door with the doorknob and one to the bathroom doorknob. And then he also connected one to the then spare bedroom doorknob. (I'll look into taking a picture of how its set up.) But anyways, so the boys go off to school and i'm yet to get up. At one point in time during the set up, one of the bungee cords had slipped off and made a loud snapping noise. I heard it but thought Jordan was doing something out in the garage, so i just rolled over and fell back to sleep. So I get up (and running slightly late) but I go to open my bedroom door. I open the door and let go of the door knob and the door slams shut. I was like "what the..?" Mind you, I'm still just waking up, so i'm not completely with it yet. But I open the door again and look out and see the bungee cords and I just start laughing. I really wish we could've recorded my reaction, because I would've loved for the guys to see it. I gotta hand it to them.... they did a good job
The layout of the how my bedroom door is helps out. If you walk direction forward after walking out of my door, you walk directly into the bathroom. And on the right side is the door to the other bedroom here. So all three doors are right close by, giving perfect opportunity for any good jokes. And I gotta hand it to the guys for coming up w/ the idea. They were thinking about seran wrapping my car, which i'm really glad they didn't because that would take a lot of seran wrap and it would take a while to clean up.
So anyways, they normally were getting up like stupid early. I mean, they were getting up before the sun gets up. And more of a night owl... relatively speaking. But the one morning, as they were getting up, i guess they were bored. So Jordan took some bungee cords and connected one to my door with the doorknob and one to the bathroom doorknob. And then he also connected one to the then spare bedroom doorknob. (I'll look into taking a picture of how its set up.) But anyways, so the boys go off to school and i'm yet to get up. At one point in time during the set up, one of the bungee cords had slipped off and made a loud snapping noise. I heard it but thought Jordan was doing something out in the garage, so i just rolled over and fell back to sleep. So I get up (and running slightly late) but I go to open my bedroom door. I open the door and let go of the door knob and the door slams shut. I was like "what the..?" Mind you, I'm still just waking up, so i'm not completely with it yet. But I open the door again and look out and see the bungee cords and I just start laughing. I really wish we could've recorded my reaction, because I would've loved for the guys to see it. I gotta hand it to them.... they did a good job
Friday, June 19, 2009
Guatemala, 2009
In all my excitement of writing the last note, I forgot to say what we actually did. Our actual idea for the trip was to do a "Champions for Christ" sports camp for the kids. I got to teach a bunch of 6-9 year old kids how to play baseball and soccer.
They weren't too thrilled with baseball, but they loved soccer. I'm not sure if we actually taught them anything in that arena actually. Most of these kids grow up with a soccer ball (or futbol) around. So Monday thru Thursday we did the sports camp. We started off around 9am and went until about 1pm. It may not sound like much, but remember, this is under the Guatemalan sun. But the temperatures were about like Charlotte actually. I was just amazed at my energy levels. I was only getting about 5-6 hrs asleep a night for some reason. Usually, after 2 nights of that, I would've been really tired and cranky and no fun to be around. But there was a real grace for it. And thankfully, all the fields were provided due to an anonymous donor. One of our translators and friends, Rolando, had the hook up for that. So, whomever it was, thanks a ton. Through sports, we were able to teach the kids some valuable lessons in life.
I had to keep reminding myself that they children I was dealing with were 6-9 and not youth. So I had to be really careful when addressing wrong attitudes. I didn't want to just snap at them, but I wanted to find out what was going on with them and give them something to look forward towards. All in all, i think the camp went off pretty well.
After the camp ended on Thursday, we headed up the coast to a coffee plantation somewhere in the Guatemalan hills. The place was phenomenal! It had a great view of a nearby river and cities. We ended up taking a small bus load up. Now mind you, the road to get up to this plantation was not flat by any stretch of the imagination. The bus driver literally had to get a running start up the hill or the bus may not have made it. It wasn't nicely paved roads the whole way up. This is Guatemala after all. No, the incline up the hill was pretty steep. It was probably at least a 45% incline. So we went up to the plantation and spent the night there. We also had a small worship time and water baptismals. A number of folks on our team got baptized in water and then a number of the children did as well.
After leaving the plantation, we went back to the children's home, changed clothes and repacked for a quick overnight trip to Antiqua. That was our sightseeing time. What's a missions trip without a sightseeing time? We hit various markets there and toured the Casa de Santo Domingo.
This is a brief synopsis of my trip to Guatemala. Further details available upon request.
They weren't too thrilled with baseball, but they loved soccer. I'm not sure if we actually taught them anything in that arena actually. Most of these kids grow up with a soccer ball (or futbol) around. So Monday thru Thursday we did the sports camp. We started off around 9am and went until about 1pm. It may not sound like much, but remember, this is under the Guatemalan sun. But the temperatures were about like Charlotte actually. I was just amazed at my energy levels. I was only getting about 5-6 hrs asleep a night for some reason. Usually, after 2 nights of that, I would've been really tired and cranky and no fun to be around. But there was a real grace for it. And thankfully, all the fields were provided due to an anonymous donor. One of our translators and friends, Rolando, had the hook up for that. So, whomever it was, thanks a ton. Through sports, we were able to teach the kids some valuable lessons in life.
I had to keep reminding myself that they children I was dealing with were 6-9 and not youth. So I had to be really careful when addressing wrong attitudes. I didn't want to just snap at them, but I wanted to find out what was going on with them and give them something to look forward towards. All in all, i think the camp went off pretty well.
After the camp ended on Thursday, we headed up the coast to a coffee plantation somewhere in the Guatemalan hills. The place was phenomenal! It had a great view of a nearby river and cities. We ended up taking a small bus load up. Now mind you, the road to get up to this plantation was not flat by any stretch of the imagination. The bus driver literally had to get a running start up the hill or the bus may not have made it. It wasn't nicely paved roads the whole way up. This is Guatemala after all. No, the incline up the hill was pretty steep. It was probably at least a 45% incline. So we went up to the plantation and spent the night there. We also had a small worship time and water baptismals. A number of folks on our team got baptized in water and then a number of the children did as well.
After leaving the plantation, we went back to the children's home, changed clothes and repacked for a quick overnight trip to Antiqua. That was our sightseeing time. What's a missions trip without a sightseeing time? We hit various markets there and toured the Casa de Santo Domingo.
This is a brief synopsis of my trip to Guatemala. Further details available upon request.
Guatemala 2009, Pt. 1
I want to start this note off by thanking everyone for their support for me on this missions trip. There was a lot of planning and running around that I did for this trip. It's amazing how much type of administration/ behind the scenes type of stuff goes into planning a trip. Luckily, I'm largely wired for that so to have George, who was the leader of the trip, ask me to do a lot of that was fun for me.
We started getting together and uniting as a team the end of March of this year. We started with Friday nights and then did Friday nights and Saturday afternoon. We would have a Friday night meeting for prayer/worship and take care of admin stuff w/ the group and then do sports training Saturday afternoon. we had to go over the guidelines for baseball and soccer. My family did a lot of baseball/softball and I played soccer. I knew the rules for baseball but not much practical application of it myself. I was afraid to play catch b/c i couldn't catch a baseball very easily. But soccer was always my thing.
So in any case, we would be getting together as a team and start from square one. We even did a Biblical Foundations series which was really fun. Going over just the basics and then building on that. Starting off w/ salvation and then getting into healing and baptism of the Spirit.
It's amazing how unified the team still is! Despite the fact that half of us are from different churches in the area here, the common factor is Jesus! (What a great foundation to build on!) I would often tell the team that even after the trip, I won't be able to forget about them. Which is true to date because thanks to modern technology, we still keep in contact!
So after all the training (sports, Biblical), we set off. We flew out Sat. June 6, '09 @ 6:30 am from Charlotte. All the while, i was even getting to meet the folks who lived down in Guatemala via none other than Facebook. So when I got there, I felt like i knew a lot about them already!
I knew going into this trip that I wasn't going to be doing much preaching at all, but more of just letting Father God love on me and giving me His heart for the children I would be ministering to and just loving on them as Jesus would. I did get to give a brief message the one night to a small village, but it was a quick 10 minutes. And most of them were there to receive food that we were giving out. None the less, myself and George preached for a bit and the team did some hands on ministry. Including praying for an elderly woman and seeing her getting up and walking w/o a walker! Jesus is sooo awesome! (Take that satan... in ur eye!)
I can remember the very first night of arriving at the childrens home where we were staying, we get out of the van and in under 5 seconds, we were surrounded by little kids! I loved it! Hugs all around. These kids didn't care how much we knew, they were just there to receive love from Jesus who loved them! And I was there to freely give it away! The uncle/big brother/future father in me came out! I once heard it said that people don't care how much you know until the know how much you care! I can't tell you how refreshing it was to just hold the kids and just love on them! While we were traveling around w/ the kids, they would just come and sit on your lap and sometimes just fall asleep. It totally broke my heart to think of all the broken homes and lives that these children come from. Some of them were orphans and some of them were probably more like foster kids that had to be taken from their homes b/c of bad child hoods. Just simply saying hello to them really ministered to them. My hat goes off to the volunteers who are there much more full time than we were. I was blessed to be able to help a few of them out w/ some technical difficulties they were having w/ their computers. I figured I have the skill, use it. After all they do, its the least I could do.
And the friendships that I made while being there are priceless! All our translators and everyone who helped out... impossible to forget all of them! We started off w/ a core team and that team just kept growing! By the end of the week, our team doubled in size! Let's see, there was Quikay and Carol (the leaders of Fundaninos (sorry about the bad spelling here folks), Janet, Sonja, Sonia, Carla, Carolina, Sigrid, Ana, Diego, Marco, Rolando, Vivian and Holly. (If I forgot anyone, someone will correct me.) And those are just the folks who were there that were on the team. Some of our team weren't able to go due to financial reasons... Mallory and Michael.
We have just a few pictures of the trip. Only a little more than 3,000 I think. And check out Voyager Expeditions website @ www.voyagerexpeditions.org, we're working on getting things all together. We got a lot of video as well, which we'll be putting that on the website someday.
And thanks to all those who supported me financially and w/ prayer here in the States! As always, its my joy and privilege to represent you and Jesus out there. May you be blessed abundantly.
We started getting together and uniting as a team the end of March of this year. We started with Friday nights and then did Friday nights and Saturday afternoon. We would have a Friday night meeting for prayer/worship and take care of admin stuff w/ the group and then do sports training Saturday afternoon. we had to go over the guidelines for baseball and soccer. My family did a lot of baseball/softball and I played soccer. I knew the rules for baseball but not much practical application of it myself. I was afraid to play catch b/c i couldn't catch a baseball very easily. But soccer was always my thing.
So in any case, we would be getting together as a team and start from square one. We even did a Biblical Foundations series which was really fun. Going over just the basics and then building on that. Starting off w/ salvation and then getting into healing and baptism of the Spirit.
It's amazing how unified the team still is! Despite the fact that half of us are from different churches in the area here, the common factor is Jesus! (What a great foundation to build on!) I would often tell the team that even after the trip, I won't be able to forget about them. Which is true to date because thanks to modern technology, we still keep in contact!
So after all the training (sports, Biblical), we set off. We flew out Sat. June 6, '09 @ 6:30 am from Charlotte. All the while, i was even getting to meet the folks who lived down in Guatemala via none other than Facebook. So when I got there, I felt like i knew a lot about them already!
I knew going into this trip that I wasn't going to be doing much preaching at all, but more of just letting Father God love on me and giving me His heart for the children I would be ministering to and just loving on them as Jesus would. I did get to give a brief message the one night to a small village, but it was a quick 10 minutes. And most of them were there to receive food that we were giving out. None the less, myself and George preached for a bit and the team did some hands on ministry. Including praying for an elderly woman and seeing her getting up and walking w/o a walker! Jesus is sooo awesome! (Take that satan... in ur eye!)
I can remember the very first night of arriving at the childrens home where we were staying, we get out of the van and in under 5 seconds, we were surrounded by little kids! I loved it! Hugs all around. These kids didn't care how much we knew, they were just there to receive love from Jesus who loved them! And I was there to freely give it away! The uncle/big brother/future father in me came out! I once heard it said that people don't care how much you know until the know how much you care! I can't tell you how refreshing it was to just hold the kids and just love on them! While we were traveling around w/ the kids, they would just come and sit on your lap and sometimes just fall asleep. It totally broke my heart to think of all the broken homes and lives that these children come from. Some of them were orphans and some of them were probably more like foster kids that had to be taken from their homes b/c of bad child hoods. Just simply saying hello to them really ministered to them. My hat goes off to the volunteers who are there much more full time than we were. I was blessed to be able to help a few of them out w/ some technical difficulties they were having w/ their computers. I figured I have the skill, use it. After all they do, its the least I could do.
And the friendships that I made while being there are priceless! All our translators and everyone who helped out... impossible to forget all of them! We started off w/ a core team and that team just kept growing! By the end of the week, our team doubled in size! Let's see, there was Quikay and Carol (the leaders of Fundaninos (sorry about the bad spelling here folks), Janet, Sonja, Sonia, Carla, Carolina, Sigrid, Ana, Diego, Marco, Rolando, Vivian and Holly. (If I forgot anyone, someone will correct me.) And those are just the folks who were there that were on the team. Some of our team weren't able to go due to financial reasons... Mallory and Michael.
We have just a few pictures of the trip. Only a little more than 3,000 I think. And check out Voyager Expeditions website @ www.voyagerexpeditions.org, we're working on getting things all together. We got a lot of video as well, which we'll be putting that on the website someday.
And thanks to all those who supported me financially and w/ prayer here in the States! As always, its my joy and privilege to represent you and Jesus out there. May you be blessed abundantly.
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