It is so exciting to me to be able to report to you all on what God has been doing over the last three months. I have to admit that the time that we have all been dispersed since our last gathering seems longer than that, and thankfully, God has been busy at work. Instead of loading you all down with a really long email, I'll send a few shorter ones throughout this week on what God has been doing. This one will focus on the small group that I feel the Lord told me to start.
When I was sitting with you all at Andrew's church in Denver listening to Matt Hulst share about his experiences at Bethel, my heart was stirred with passion. Not only were things happening up in Minnesota where Matt had made himself available to the Lord, but I was in the same stage of life as he was, going to a University. God challenged me to start a small group when I got back on my campus at Biola University, focused specifically on outreach, while also having times of prayer and accountability. Going into it I was completely at a loss as to how to go about leading it, so I told God that He would have to direct it completely. We started at an average of about 7 guys for the first few weeks, each week differing in our conversation and fellowship. Over the next few weeks we kept growing and saw a couple people even from other dorms joining. By the last meeting of the semester we had 12 people at the small group, and the small group will continue into next semester as well.
So far in outreach we have prayed over our campus, had times of listening to and obeying the Lord (in a very YWAM fashion), and visited a local Community College where we did survey evangelism. It has been a struggle to find a lot of ministry, but the Lord has brought people into divine appointment with us and moved strongly when we have stepped out. I have also talked to two or three other people from other parts of the campus who are interested in what we do in our small group, and they want to start parallel small groups in their own dorms. I am calling them..."Awaken Groups!" I believe its a pretty fitting title and people want to hear about them and get involved once they know what we are about. I am just seeing how many people on my campus want to be involved, but just need a spark to set off their readily kindled hearts. It just takes testimony!
This is just one area where God has shown his faithfulness, but I don't want to wear everybody out with one email. I will write one or two more later this week, but as for this area of God's move, pray for:
1. God's continued stirring on my heart and the hearts of those around me to pursue awakening in prayer and action
2. More opportunities for ministry and outreach to open up
3. A spirit of boldness on our group
4. Wisdom for me in how to lead the group
Thank you all for your partnership with and inspiration to me.
Its time for my second update. I hope this encourages you all where you are at right now.
In this time of revival, prayer is the vehicle that will drive the move of God. When I was at Biola last semester, I couldn't help but miss the prayer room that was so available in Kona. At Biola they have a prayer chapel, but it is always silent and not conducive to times of group intercessory prayer. I started trying to find a place where I could really just cry out to God, and the only place that I had was my own room when both of my roommates were gone, but even then it was only at times that my room was available and it would never be the most private of places. So I talked to my dorm senator about getting a prayer room started on campus. She told me to email a specific senator who was already vying for a prayer room to be started. Once I got into contact with him he sent me an email of a very specific and bold proposal that someone had already drawn up to build a prayer room on campus just for that purpose. It is so encouraging to see that God is already working in and through many other people, knowing that I can just partner with them many times.
God has also been speaking the importance of prayer in my family. My father and I went to breakfast once over my Christmas break in Colorado Springs, and the end result of our talk was that we were going to start praying with my other two brothers for an hour every morning. This was also in part because of the challenging messages we heard from Lou Engel and others at the One Thing Conference. These times of prayer have been great for our bonding as a family, but have also been trying. We have to be aware of the devil's attacks and vigilant against apathy and complacency in our prayers. We also are doing it at six every morning so it gets very tiring, but I believe that God is going to break through and speak and act in great ways. My brother Drew and I have also decided to continue this at Biola once we head back. We are hoping (or praying) for great revival on that campus, and God is already doing it!
So what you all can pray for with me is:
1. That God would speak and reveal His heart in what we should pray
2. For the Holy Spirit to stir many others to prayer on our campus
3. That God's glory would be revealed on our campus
4. For endurance in prayer and intercession
Thank you all again for your support.
This is the last of my three updates. I hope these have been encouraging and challenging to you. Let's remember who is in charge and what He is capable of. This update is focused on real stories of awakening.
Ever since my DTS I have questioned how I can bring passion back with me and truly affect the people closest to me. It is easier, I believe to start a new friendship, laying out what you care about and the passions that God has placed on your heart than to change old ones. Old friends many times just want things to be the way that they were before. They want what is comfortable. But change is possible for them through us, those who know them best. I thank God that my family already cares about the things that I care about, but now I have really seen the Lord moving among my close friends as well.
The first friend that I have seen this with is Jesse. Jesse has never been a bad kid, and in fact he has been strong in his convictions. But with that comes a bit of a hotheaded and prideful demeanor at times. When he has gotten a certain thing in his head, specifically about someone or something, he speaks it out and allows it to affect him. I was able to sit down with him one night and address this head on, seeing as how this attitude had just manifested that night. Jesse isn't irrational, and really he loves justice, but there was a lack of unconditional love for his enemies. I was able to just lay out the plain truth of Jesus' teaching to him in a way that directly challenged certain attitudes and actions that he so readily expressed. Jesse is a strong Christian man, and I in no way want to portray him as a bad person. He has so many qualities that I admire and respect, and he has made wise choices in his life. The point of this story is seeing a strong Christian move from focusing on his relationship with Christ alone, to now starting to look at how he can love and forgive others when it doesn't even make sense to do so. This is the step that we all must take to truly start to affect the world for the Lord Jesus--moving from an inwardly focused Christian life, to an outwardly focused one. Not focusing on injustices as they negatively affect us, but willingly suffering injustices so that we may advance the Kingdom. By the end of our conversation he said, "I don't know about you but I'm excited! This isn't the normal conversation that I have with people." The Holy Spirit is truly stirring on his heart in an awesome way.
The other person that I have seen awakening in is my friend Alyssa. This is quite a different story than the first. I met Alyssa two summers ago in between my DTS and SBS. We had connected pretty well, but I didn't know where her standards were at other than the fact that she was a Christian by name. I picked up on a couple things just by the way our conversations would go and concluded that her standards didn't match those of the Bible. We hung out a couple more times before I went to SBS, but I decided that it wasn't an uplifting friendship for the time. Over my SBS she was still on my mind as someone to keep in prayer and a couple times I texted to see how she was doing. I never got a reply, but over this break she approached me at the college group at our church thinking that I didn't even remember her, but she wanted to say hi anyway. Evidently she had gotten a new phone number and didn't get anything that I was sending her. This time however, I could sense a difference in her, ever so slightly. I ended up having a long conversation with her, having found out that she had a past that she was ashamed of. I was able to just speak truth to her, whether it be that she was forgiven and justified completely, or that I would be her friend and love her even if she messed up again, or even that weakness, when submitted to God, is where God's power is made perfect. She said, "I know it was God that you came back when you did." She had just broken up with a boyfriend of nearly a year and a half who she was almost engaged to. Since I have been in contact with her again, her heart has been tender toward the Lord, and she has expressed a deep desire to break away from the things of the past. I will be encouraging her to take steps to break from the past, whatever that looks like (if its DTS then so be it). God's timing is truly perfect.
In these situations, please pray for:
1. A deeper knowledge of the Lord's love and desires to these two people
2. A willingness to surrender everything to the Lord (specifically for Alyssa)
3. Strengthening in the inner being of each person
4. A deepening of intimacy with Christ
I love you all and pray that God will show himself mighty to save in your lives and the lives of those under your influence.
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