The past few weeks have been pretty challenging: a relentless barrage of physical ailments, waves of discouragement, and tension caused by miscommunication with others.

Looking back, I’m pretty sure that it was a spiritual attack.

The timing of it all is suspect– as I endured these challenges, there were some pretty significant developments in ministry happening at the same time; developments that might not have occurred had I succumbed to the attacks. Satan is the tempter (Matt. 4:3) and the accuser (Rev. 12:10) who often tries to interfere with the advance of The Kingdom by encouraging God’s people to stumble; he is the thief who comes to steal, kill, and destroy (John 10:10).

However, before we start blaming all of our perceived misfortunes on the devil, we should remember that God sets limits on what the enemy can do (Job 1:12).  This means that even when we do get spiritual attacks, it’s because God has allowed them to happen.

The question then becomes, “Why?”

One of my mentors taught me that when we face opposition, we should find out what God is trying to show us through it.  Our true character can often be exposed in the midst of our difficulties, just as impurities rise to the surface of molten metal when you place a crucible into the fire.  Sometimes, spiritual attacks help show us areas of our own lives that need some work; other times, attacks reveal old wounds that continue to fester, even though we might not be aware of them.

The key, I believe, is to not accept a spiritual attack as being merely an enemy assignment against us– why give Satan the satisfaction?  Rather, we could view trials and temptations as opportunities from God for us to grow.

Consider it pure joy, my brothers, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith develops perseverance. Perseverance must finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything. -James 1:2-4

Some of my fondest memories was collecting ‘cap guns’. I was very proud of the arms I had stock-piled in my youth. When I was a kid, there was an entire aisle at Toys R Us dedicated to realistic toy guns. These guns were complete with gun caps sound, sparks, and smoke. Some of the ones I had even had real moving chamber action and actually loaded with a magazine clip. There was no sissy neon orange tip and the only thing that separated them from the real thing was that it didn’t fire a real bullet. I actually still have this collection since they are now an endangered species. In fact, they are so realistic that eBay doesn’t even allow to sell them!

Even though this commercial is ancient, I was collecting these guns till the mid 80′s! As a kid, these were a brilliant idea. It was brilliant till a kid got shot by accident by the police because it appeared he was carrying lethal weapon. It’s amazing how almost over night, a great idea could literally lead to death.

This is a good reminder not to be married to your ideas. Be prepared to be mocked and ridiculed (and take the blame) for an idea that seemed so great yesterday but is totally stupid today. Remember, guns don’t kill people, ideas do- uh, actually they both do but you get my point.

Thanks Scott for sending me this video!

“How do you love a child molester?”

That’s the question my wife asked last week after we watched this movie called Furious Love here in Mexico.

It’s a question that I have never bothered to ask, EVER, and I’m guessing that many of you out there hardly ever put such a sequence of words together.  LOVE!  CHILD MOLESTER?  Never.

The truth is, we know we’re supposed to love the homeless, the widows, the orphans, the druggies, the gangsters (or gangSTAs), the disabled, and the difficult.  We eventually come around to forgive the adulterer, the cheater, the liar, the thief and the occasional murderer (as long as it was an accident)… But a child molester?  Pedophile?  Rapist?  Trafficker?  Disgusting, unforgivable, unlovable.  These are the people who belong in Satan’s armpit.

When my wife asked this honest question, the people at the table were baffled, troubled, and unable to come up with a good, “loving” answer. 

I had no trouble answering at all.

I told my wife that I would beat the crap out of these kinds of people . . . and then I would consider loving them.

And then I was baffled just like everyone else.  After these people pay their dues, whether it be jail time or my fist, how in the world are we supposed to love them?

I am troubled because I know real love is not selective and it is unconditional. Real love reaches into the darkest depths, picks the very nose of Satan, dusts off the unholy boogers and clothes the sucker in a shiny robe.  But it’s never that easy, is it?

So what does this love look like?  (Especially when you or those closest to you are affected?)

How do you love the “unlovable”?

a common theme has peaked my senses these past few days and i felt like i needed to get this out there in case it means something to somebody.

something is happening to me in a weird but hopefully good way. i’ve secretly cried over conversations or written reflections regarding fathers and father figures and  i can’t explain why i’ve suddenly become so vulnerable to emotion.

I think it is mainly because I have become a father myself as of November ’08 and I can’t bear the thought of my son growing up without me. I love my little boy so much that to even hypothesize over a day when there’s distance between us is enough to ruin me.

It is not a far-fetched assumption to say that many of our societal ills can be traced back to longstanding “daddy wounds”– the number one unofficial cause of emotional death in human beings–and it just breaks my heart.

most of us men have or will have the privilege of being a father one day and i hope that if and when we have kids, we will do all that we can to let our kids know and believe that they are loved, beautiful, and capable of anything, because this is true.

there are many things that i will fail at and be ok with (eventually) but i will never tolerate within myself a failure at being a father to my children.  i’m not declaring that I’ll be perfect and without blemish but I am saying that I won’t and can’t give up being the best possible father i can be.  it is the one thing I want to do right.

men, let’s raise up a generation of up-and-coming fathers who will then respond to the same call and raise up the next generation of fathers.  the cycle of “daddy wounds” can end today.

(note: too young to be a dad?  various circumstances prohibiting fatherhood?  we can all be a father figure to someone when we choose to impart, empower, and invest.)

i leave you with one of my favorite pictures of me and my boy.  i’d say it’s symbolism.



Hi guys!! I just got my first chance to get on the internet. we have been busy!

travelling was great other than getting stopped in customs in south africa for too much yarn. luckily, a rep from monte christo was there to come explain. they finally got tired of us and sent us on our way. we were welcomed to south africa by rain on and off until monday evening.

our guesthouse that we are staying in is so nice and cozy. we are the only ones there and the family who owns it lives upstairs. they are a lovely family and make us feel welcome and like we have been transported to some amazing world with their hospitality and cooking!

so far, we taught–well let me rephrase, tried to control chaos in the schools. the teachers were on strike so the school was in chaos. my team went to orleansvale, a school i’ve worked in before. i walked into the room and was delighted to see former students from 2 years ago! the sad part…those sweet little boys are now the menaces of the class. to say the kids were wild and crazy is an understatement!!!! i had no control and leave defeated. our school is in the roughest part of that community. the team that hit the other school had a better experience. we were supposed to go back wed but were reassigned. instead, we swept the streets of paarl with the homeless ministry. and no….they don’t have street sweepers like the states. i literally swept the streets with a broom and homemade dustpan. i was tired and sore all over by the end.

this afternoon i’m meeting the teacher and headmaster of the autism school here and picking out paint to paint their classrooms. we’ll be doing that tomorrow as well as doing a craft with them.

it was nice to see everyone again — especially the kids that i still have permanently etched in my mind!! SA 2008 team, i saw our 2nd graders–dulan the one who sang like an angel and a few others. no worries..he is still sweet. =) he is now in 6th grade. he found me on the playground.

the team is doing well. we have all been exhausted in the evenings and have gone to bed at 9:00! we’ll update the team blog as we can and i’ll email as often as i can.

35Jesus was going through all the cities and villages, teaching in their synagogues and proclaiming the gospel of the kingdom, and healing every kind of disease and every kind of sickness. 36Seeing the people, He felt compassion for them, because they were distressed and dispirited like sheep without a shepherd. 37Then He said to His disciples, “The harvest is plentiful, but the workers are few. 38″Therefore beseech the Lord of the harvest to send out workers into His harvest.”

Charles Lee from New Hope South Bay challenged NOC to embrace humanity in four ways. First, in an embrace of presence that involves really “being there.” Secondly, in an embrace of sight where we see the story that GOD is telling in every person’s life. Thirdly, in an embrace of compassion that contains real action versus superficial concern. And lastly, in an embrace of work that ultimately requires sacrifice. By embracing the individuals that GOD places in front of us in Fullerton, we can represent Him as The God of This City.

Newsong NOC Sermon Archive

***This post is from Mission: Loving Mexico Out Loud blog.

We’re a part of NewSong LA’s third culture community traveling down to Mexico City in an effort to fight against Human Trafficking. Mexico City is one of the largest transit  and destination countries for persons trafficked for commercial sexual exploitation and forced labor.  We want to help fight this injustice and help those who are already doing so. ***

Ever since I started this 365 Days of Love project “to do one act of love each day for 365 days” it has really centered me. What I mean by centered is that each day I come back to appreciate what I have been given. It’s crazy, but each day I somehow manage to find some way to serve another human being. By doing this each day I am able to take the focus off of myself and on to another. Whereas before, much of my day was focused on what I needed to do, what I needed to get done, what did I need to accomplish to meet the goals I had set for myself. As you can see, there was a lot of “me” in my days before.

Yet now, even for just 5 minutes or 1 hour each day I can take time out to help somebody else in need. To do an act of kindness or a simple gesture of love and it has made all the difference in my life. I’m starting to recognize more and more that the world does not revolve around me, but the world is full of life, opportunities, and people to be loved and acknowledged! In fact, the more you give of yourself the happier you become.

As they say, “joy is not in the getting but in the giving.” I find so much more fulfillment now that I am less focused on myself and more focused on others. I think about how in one moment I can be sitting in a high rise, in my own office/desk, with a heater and a personal lap top computer… and the next moment I could be on the street corner meeting a homeless man who has no food, no shelter and no place to lay his head. Or how simply walking up to someone and smiling invokes a smile from them. Or how just taking a moment out of my day to listen to someone else share about their struggles and problems instead of thinking about my own. This way of living changes you. It is changing me.

So many times we are so stuck in our own little worlds. We are stuck in our own pity parties. We are trapped in our minds and we are prone to think about me, me, me…. We can become so unappreciative, so ungrateful and so pessimistic. But when we got our eyes off of our problems and onto others we realize many times that are problems aren’t so bad. When we take the little love that we have and we take a risk to give it to someone else… that action will spread love, spread freedom and spread goodness that will ultimately affect not only the one receiving it but the one who gave it.

I heard it once said, “A man kept complaining about having no shoes until one day he saw a man with no feet!” … Let’s not complain about what we don’t have, let’s not feel pity if we don’t get our way, lets not be ungrateful for anything in life, but rather lets us be thankful for what we do have and give what we have to others each day and by doing so find ourselves.

For the Chinese version of the article please click here.

Thank you for your prayers!  Laura and Khai are feeling much better today!  We started our first work day at El Pozo(The Well), which is the house for the human trafficking victims here in Mexico City.

There has been a lot of work done on the house so far by NEO and other mission teams, but there is still a lot to do.  We helped out today with assessing the inventory of the house and reorganizing and purchasing some of the necessary items to get the rooms ready.

Working together with members from YWAM and NEO we cleaned out a laundry room full of debris and moved shelving in order to organize the rooms to accommodate for 3 girls per room.  We also fulfilled some of the current needs for the house.

It was a great day working alongside fellow brothers and sisters and we are looking forward to seeing what God has in store for us!  More to come.

Original Posts – Click Here

Dave Gibbons is the senior pastor of Newsong Church, an international multi-site church with 8 campuses located in California, Texas, Mexico, United Kingdom, India, and Thailand. He is an entrepreneur and owns YangDang and Xealot. And he is the author of The Monkey and the Fish.

ABOUT NEWSONG CHURCH

Year Began: 1994
Locations: 8 Campuses – Irvine, CA / Culver, CA / Fullerton, CA / Dallas, TX / Mexico / London / India / Bangkok

10Q WITH DAVE GIBBONS

1Q = What is Newsong Church’s chain of command from the senior pastor to the church volunteers?

The Leadership Team comprised of both volunteer leaders who represent the congregation and support staff guide the church but all under the submission to the Holy Spirit. The congregation affirms major decisions.

2Q = For big decisions, what is Newsong Church’s decision making process?

Depends. The big decisions can originate from our members or from the leaders of the church. But eventually, there is affirmation with Leadership teams, Management teams and the congregation.

Hi. I’m Hannah, organizer of Cupcake Camp OC.

So here’s how it really happened…

I had never fasted for lent before, but I decided to try it this year. For 40 days I decided to give up SWEETS! If you know me, you know how much I LOVE sweets. So this was no easy task. And to be quite honest I failed a few times during the 40 days and cheated here and there. But even with sneaking in a bite here and there, I was almost to the point of depression because I craved sweets so much; I swore I would never fast desserts again. You don’t understand..eating is a huge part of my life and I especially LOVE desserts.

I decided I wanted to celebrate lent being over by breaking fast with a couple of my friends who were also fasting sweets and a handful of other friends. I decided to throw a Desserts Galore Party where everyone had to bring a different type of dessert. My plan was to gorge on all types of sweets possible in order to make up for the 40 days. It was to be a sugar feast.

The Evite was sent out and I was starting to get really excited…

During that time, also, one of my good friends Stephen was in the process of raising funds to go down to Mexico City for a year to assist El Pozo (a sex trafficking rehabilitation home). I really wanted to support him, but I’ve been unemployed for quite some time.  I decided to get creative. I started brainstorming of ways to double this dessert party as a fundraiser. The obvious one was a bake sale, but that wasn’t quite it.

That’s when I serendipitously (love that word) stumbled across the Cupcake Camp Seattle page while browsing through a cupcake wrapper website my sister Michelle sent me (since I enjoy baking). I read about the ad-hoc gatherings of cupcake camps all over the world and I immediately thought ‘Oh my gosh.. this is it! I wanna do this!’

To read more, Click Here.

A friend shared this quote from Mother Teresa and mentioned it reminded her of Laundry Love Santa Ana.  What an honor…

“Many people are hungry not for bread only, but they are hungry for … love. Many people are not only naked for want of a piece of cloth, but they are naked for human dignity … Homelessness is not only not having a home made of bricks, but homelessness is being rejected, unwanted, unloved, uncared for. People have forgotten what the human touch is, what it is to smile, for somebody to smile at them, somebody to recognize them, somebody to wish them well.”

**This post courtesy of www.laundrylovesantaana.com**

Musicians In Black Coffee & Jazz Night! from Lenz Kap on Vimeo.

Thank you to everyone who came out to our fundraiser! We are so blessed to have a community who supports us! Thank you to Dave Martyn and Andy Campbell for holding it down and rocking us with awesome tunes! It was a really good time and hopefully when we are back we will do it again except share all about the trip! We need your prayers still so please continue to pray for us. We thank everyone for your continued partnership and friendships! 5 Days left!

Thanks to God for bringing back the CHINA team safely, and for giving them amazing experiences.
Pray for the Nepal team that just left for 10 days. Pray that they are safe, but also experience God’s view of the people there!

HELLO FRIENDS!

Hope this update finds you well.  Just thought we’d catch you up on the last month or so.  Things are very exciting right now as it seems like a momentum-shifting period in the life of the community here in Mexico City.  The rehab house for trafficked victims (The Well) is continuing to be renovated through the help of various teams that are passing through for short periods of time.  We are adding a Sunday morning community gathering in addition to our Saturday nights in order to help more people join in on the movement.  We also just held an amazing “Iluminarte” event — a quarterly arts showcase to reach out to the community and share about our vision for ending Human Trafficking in Mexico and the world…

We also spent 2 weeks back in California to take part in the inaugural Origins event in Los Angeles as well as the annual Newsong Alliance staff retreat.  It was a beautiful time spent with family from all around the world– people from Thailand, Beijing, Australia, Mexico, India, Brazil, Dallas, New Jersey, Toronto, and more joined the team in California for a time of rest and recalibration.

During our visit back to California, we were able to spend lots of quality time with friends and also witnessed an amazing consciousness and fund-raising event called the Cupcake Camp held in Irvine/Santa Ana at the Atrium Hotel.  Nearly 1000 people showed up to eat, submit, purchase and/or judge cupcakes for the cause of anti-Human Trafficking.  It was extremely inspiring (and delicious!).

Hope these pictures inspire you (brought to you by the iPhone which I am currently using as a glorified iPod touch and camera)

Brent and Celia from Australia joined our staff festivities. What an amazing couple. Brent is a gourmet chef and Celia is a former journalist.

This is a snapshot of the turnout at the first Cup Cake Camp OC held at the Atrium Hotel. Nearly 1,000 people showed up to this fund-raiser for The Well rehabilitation house for trafficked women.

OH MY GOSH. Micah’s first kiss… held at the Cupcake Camp. How appropriate– sweets, battle trafficking, and more sweets.

It was great to be reunited with friends in California. Sadie taught Annette how to do the scariest face in the world.

Back in Mexico City as of August 3. A busy month of hosting teams from Vancouver, Irvine, and L.A. The renovation of The Well continues. A picture of the Vancouver team putting up the fencing on the roof.

Another shot of the fencing on the roof.

we took part in our first Iluminarte event. It’s an arts showcase to reach out to the community. This is moments before kickoff as people are hanging out and enjoying food.

a shot of a b-boy doing his thang at Iluminarte

this is a shot of the “Chilaquiles,” a reggae-style Mexican band. Such great people that we’re becoming friends with.

Thank you for your support, positive thoughts and prayers.  We need them in a bad way over here.  If you can, please pray that human trafficking would end here in Mexico City and that one day, the world would be free of slavery.  Easier prayed than done… but one day, it will happen.  We believe it and that’s why we’re here.

love,

DK and Sadie of City Release…

**This is a post from Newsong Trex South Africa Team blog. **

Hi supporter family! I wanted to tell you about a recent “adventure” embarked upon by the South Africa team.

On July 11, the team went on a surprise “adventure.” Because we will not know what we will be doing in South Africa until we arrive (and even then plans change often) the social planner and I wanted to plan an event that would best simulate this experience locally.

Come on the adventure with us through this recap!

Most of us attended the 9am service at NewSong together and carpooled to our “initial destination.” The team, most of which had no idea what was planned, was instructed to meet at the following address at 10:45 sharp: 15215 Barranca Parkway, Irvine. Upon arrival, the Amtrak station was revealed.

Roundtrip Amtrak tickets were purchased to Union Station, LA. The Amtrak was 30 minutes late leaving so we sat around and chatted to pass the time. Once we were en route to LA, the ride was really comfortable and fun!

At Union Station, we bought day passes for the metro so we could ride the train or bus.

After we ate, we headed back to Orange County via the reversed route. When we got to Union Station, it took us a while to figure out where our Amtrak rail was supposed to be. We then found out that it was delayed with no known departure time. We would up waiting about 2 hours at a very busy Union Station. This is the time when the novelty of the adventure could wear off. We were tired and had spent the day out of our normal Sunday routines and for some, out of our comfort zones altogether. However, this is when the true simulation begins. I wondered:

Knowing that a few team members had places they needed to be when we got back home, how would the team react when at the mercy of public transportation with no control over our schedules?

How we would we respond to each other when we were tired and uncomfortable after spending the entire day together?

I’m proud to say that while we were all disappointed with the delays, no one complained. The team really took this part in stride and found ways to pass the time—celebrity magazine shopping and swapping, playing games, reading, chatting, and walking around. No one was visibly irritated. It was the best experience we could have hoped for!

This is only a small scenario of what life is like on missions. Most of us like to plan and be somewhat in control of our schedule (especially me) in our daily lives including what time we do things, what we eat, etc.

On a larger scale while in Africa:

• We will have no idea what our schedules will be until we arrive; hence, no planning and mentally preparing for what we may say or do and no practicing
• Many of us will be placed in activities in which we feel we are not using our “skill set” and face immediate feelings of inadequacy as we struggle to use our perceived “weaknesses”
• Even if we plan the best activities and show up at a destination, that doesn’t mean that the Africans will be there on time or at all. As Francisco, one of the South African Monte Christo staff members, once said to us: “A schedule is not worth the paper its printed on.”
• Being affected by fatigue, emotions, and hunger is easy which further diminishes any patience we may have been trying to reserve!
• We will not always be able to choose what we eat or when we eat it. When we do eat, certain communities may have different customs like the Ethiopians who eat with their hands. Some find it more difficult to try new foods or handle certain textures.

I can’t wait to introduce the team to my 3^rd home (My 1st is Mississippi and my 2^nd is California) in less than 2 weeks! I know that through the previously mentioned points, I have learned so much over the past 3 years from travelling there including being less structured and more “go with the flow” (if you think I haven’t improved, you should have seen me 3 years ago), being more open minded with customs and foods, and spending more time with and focused on people in lieu of the schedule at hand.

We can’t wait to share with you our experiences—the good, the bad, and the trying, all of which we know will help us grow into the people we are intended to be.

Until next time….Much love, blessings, and appreciation to you & yours,

Danielle

Reminder:

Departure: August 6 arriving in South Africa August 8

Arrival in LA (team): departing South Africa August 21 arriving in LA August 22

Arrival in LA (Danielle): departing South Africa August 28 arriving in LA August 29

As he neared Damascus on his journey, suddenly a light from heaven flashed around him. He fell to the ground and heard a voice say to him, “Saul, Saul, why do you persecute me?”
“Who are you, Lord?” Saul asked.

“I am Jesus, whom you are persecuting,” he replied.
-Acts 9:3-5

At a recent staff retreat, we were asked to get into small groups and share stories of how we came to Christ. Several people were almost apologetic that they didn’t have “dramatic” conversions– they had learned about Jesus from an early age and later made the decision to accept His gift of salvation.

When it was my turn to share, I jokingly apologized to the others because I did have a dramatic conversion, which came about after a supernatural encounter with Jesus. As I processed this, I realized that this was not because I am any more “spiritual” or “anointed” than anyone else; it’s more likely that God needed to do something outrageous that would get my attention because I had doubt and lacked faith.

While reflecting on my conversion, I thought about the Apostle Paul– how did one of the most hostile Pharisees of his day, “thoroughly trained in the law of our fathers” (Acts 22:3), undergo a radical transformation and become one of the greatest evangelists of all time?

It started with a supernatural encounter with Jesus while on the road to Damascus.

There are plenty of people all around us who have rationalized their way into not believing in God. Many of them are intelligent, educated folks who support their arguments with knowledge, science, and reason. They’re not easily convinced, and handing them a tract or a book might not be the most effective way to lead them to Christ.

Maybe what they need is a supernatural encounter with Jesus, one that leaves no room for doubt.

Is the Holy Spirit nudging you to reach out to someone who doesn’t know the LORD yet? Is He giving you a word of knowledge for this person, or the bold faith to pray for him/her to be healed of an affliction? Perhaps the LORD wants to use you to facilitate a divine encounter and lead a skeptic straight to Christ.

My message and my preaching were not with wise and persuasive words, but with a demonstration of the Spirit’s power, so that your faith might not rest on men’s wisdom, but on God’s power. - 1 Cor. 2:4-5

Pray on,

Stephen Bay
Prayer Ministry Pastor
stephen.bay

Here is video made by the South Africa 2008 TreX team. Enjoy!

The speakers and panelists came from a wide array of different professional fields that all spoke of tangible ways they are helping and caring for others. Many of the panelists saw a certain need in their community or somewhere across the world and were moved to do something about it. I was inspired by these panelists like Blake Mycoskie the maker of Toms Shoes, and Scott Harrison the creator of Charity: Water and how they had both wanted to meet some basic needs of people in different countries. Blake wanted orphans to have shoes, and Scott wanted people in developing countries to have clean water (check out their websites: http://www.toms.com/ and http://www.charitywater.org/). After listening to both men’s stories on how they started with a small idea that turned into something bigger than they expected, I was reminded that it’s not about what we can do, but what God can do.

To Read More Click Here.

We’ve probably all have heard the story before, but not sure if this angle has been taken yet. Who ever thinks that they’re building their house on the sand? We like to always think we’re the ones building on the rock. Can we really build on the rock? This was one of the points that stood out. Without Jesus in our lives we cannot. Therefore, we can look at the passage as that we are the house, but Jesus is the builder if we let Him. Another take home message that stood out to me was that we don’t actually know what our house is built on until the rain comes aka trials in our lives. The passage talks about the rain coming (and it will eventually!) and washing one away. We’ll be able to tell how we’re built through our seasons of rain.

To read full article, click here.

Video showing a glimpse of what makes Newsong Irvines Student Ministries great!

By Sara
Hola!

Today was our 2nd day at Excelensia Familiar and I already feel like I’m home. The tias that we have been so blessed to spend our days with are some of the most selfless people I have ever met. The Lord has truly blessed these women with hearts of gold and the gift of service.

During the day we continued to paint the interior of the house. My continued prayer is that the Lord will bless the work of our hands so that it is pleasing not only for the inhabitants of the house but for our Father in heaven.

Despite having some challenges with the language, I feel like God is allowing us to speak to each others’ hearts, so that the “barrier” is nonexistant. One of my teammates shared last night, about the difficulty in the transmission of language; to her, it is an outpouring of vulnerability and humility between two people. After contemplating her statement, I couldn’t agree more. Taking a chance and risking humiliation looks very differently for everyone. I just pray that the Lord would totally reveal and diminish any bit of pride that is in me and any of my teammates.

Something I immediately realized upon arriving at the orphanage is the joyous simplicity that the children seem to posses. Growing up in the U.S., a sense of materialism and egotism, is apparent everywhere, especially inside me. It may be premature to make the following statement, however, I feel like that same sense of materialism and consumerism is not present in this place. I can’t help but feel God’s protection and guidance upon my teammates and myself.

Tomorrow, we’ll probably get to share some lessons with the children so please pray that we can say exactly what the Spirit leads us to, nothing more and nothing less. Thank you for your continued support and prayers. It really means so much! We love you all!

-Sara

And pray in the Spirit on all occasions with all kinds of prayers and requests. With this in mind, be alert and always keep on praying for all the saints. -Ephesians 6:18

There was a time when I’d pray anywhere and everywhere, even while driving. Some of my more “mature” brothers and sisters in Christ told me that, in their opinion, it wasn’t appropriate to pray while doing something else because it was disrespectful towards our King and Father, but I figured that I’d rather spend my driving time in prayer than listening to the radio. I’ve had many intimate conversations with the LORD while behind the wheel, stuck in traffic.

About a year ago, another one of my well-meaning brothers chided me when I offered to pray for him while driving down the freeway. He told me to at least pull over before praying. Ever since this incident, I started to question myself: had I been disrespectful towards God by praying while driving? Had I failed to show Him due reverence?

Cut to last May: one of my neighbors, an alcoholic by his own admission, had been on my heart for many months, and I came home from Sola Dei one night to find him trying to climb up to his third-story bedroom window. He had been arrested for DUI and had his car impounded that morning; his house keys were still attached to his car keys, and he had walked 10 miles to get home. I offered to drive him to the police station the following morning to pick up his car.

During our drive to the station, he was the most vulnerable he had ever been in my presence. He was broken, sober to the realities of the life he was living, and open to talking about faith issues. While I didn’t want to be an evangelist with an agenda– and a captive audience– I found myself with the perfect opportunity to share my faith with him. I did, and I asked if I could pray with him.

He smiled. “Yes. I’d like that.”

We were driving down the freeway.

In my mind, I heard the words of my friends, telling me that it wasn’t appropriate to pray while driving.

I thought it’d be inappropriate to pull over, as we had to get him to an appointment at the police station.

So I didn’t pray.

Instead, I said, “Let’s pray when we get back home.”

To make a long story shorter: we would keep missing one another over the next several weeks. I’d be home and he’d be out, or vice versa. I kept thinking about him and praying for a chance to meet him face to face and make good on my offer to pray with him in person.

I finally caught up with him the other day. He had gotten his driver’s license back, was busy with work, and his life was returning to normal. When I offered to pray with him, he declined.

He wasn’t as open to it anymore.

I feel like I missed my window and it bugs me, because I’ve felt the LORD impress upon me for months to reach out to him, even before the DUI, and when I had an opportunity to pray with him, I let it slip out of my hands. I had fallen to legalism.

I’m not saying that showing reverence to God is a bad thing– it’d be ideal if I could dress up and go to a special place every time I wanted to pray– but does the LORD require this?

Another friend reminded me that pagans worship angry deities who must be appeased and approached only through intermediaries, but is God a pagan deity? As believers, we have been reconciled to Him through Christ and are now His children. My son knows that I won’t get upset if he jumps in my lap and starts wrestling with me, but he also knows that I’m his father and will assert my authority when he gets out of line. His respect for me as his parent doesn’t require him to be on pins and needles around me all the time.

Thanks to Jesus, we don’t need rituals or ceremonies when we pray; we can simply have a conversation with our Father, anytime, anywhere.

And because we are his children, God has sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, prompting us to call out, “Abba, Father.” Now you are no longer a slave but God’s own child. And since you are his child, God has made you his heir.- Galatians 4:6-7

Pastor Dave Gibbons founded Newsong Church in 1994 with a mostly Korean American congregation. Since then, it has grown into a thriving multi-ethnic church with 8 campuses all over the world. He is also a successful entrepreneur, father, husband, and author. But before finding his purpose and calling, Pastor Gibbons says his life was marked by pain. In this “Faith, Power & Influence” interview, Pastor Gibbons frankly shares his life testimony and how it all shaped him to be the man of influence today.

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How is it that I find comfort in volunteering with cleaning other person’s rooms but I can’t find time to clean my own?? Today our team went to Mercy House which provides housing and comprehensive support services to homeless men, women, and families. For two hours we cleaned 3 rooms by vacuuming, dusting, scrubbing toilets and bathroom floors. Again we had the opportunity to spend time with each other outside of our comfort zones. It was interesting to see Janet and Jen clean a room the quickest without breaking a sweat, our 2 men Tyler and Peter cleaning the bathrooms, while Susan and I tried our best to not ruin the blinds.

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