The Walk

Prayer Letter 12! - THE LAST ONE!

2008-05-30T18:20:00.004-05:00

Yes, this July I'm finally leaving InterVarsity to explore music ministry elsewhere. Please read my prayer letter for more details!

Here are more pictures from CATALYST 2008!

Early Year Updates!

2008-02-26T11:27:00.002-06:00

So much has happened since the first of the year I haven't yet had a chance to update my blog and for that I apologize! Let me bring everyone up to speed fairly quickly:

MIZZOU
-we are stopping the AABS (Asian American Bible Study) as interest seems to have shifted and it seems more important to do one-on-one discipleship-style meetings with the students we are reaching out to vs. the large groups we had before
-WE HAD OUR FIRST NON-BELIEVER BECOME A CHRISTIAN!!! Please pray for Jay as he continues to grow closer to God and to learn more about what it means to be a believer and a follower of Christ.
-Asian Christian Fellowship is planning their first big outreach event geared for April 19th and we will be partnering with a local church on campus
-ACF Small Group has grown to 15 from it's small beginnings last year

CATALYST (leadership conference)
-much to do as we prepare and develop materials for the big seminars this May. Please pray for me as I have to put together a worship team for this event as well.
-website and invites launch and go out respectively soon -- please pray for me as I'm responsible for these and other design/art-based activities
-final review meetings are most of next week, please pray for those traveling from IA to MO with all the weird weather we've been having!

UNITED
-continuing to disciple Lloyd in Columbia who is growing quickly in his development as a worship leader
-pray for Leah as she had to step down from her mentee position in United due to a busy school-life and family stress
-please pray for the worship team at William Penn as I had a great meeting with their leaders and they begin trying out some new leadership techniques and direction
-pray also for MBC church in CA that is currently considering hiring UNITED to consult with for their worship ministry

Thank you all and please keep praying for me!

Merry Christmas & Happy New Year!

2007-12-31T08:03:00.000-06:00

New Girlfriend Liz and her xmas-holiday-sock-cookie

A picture from inside Daryl's studio where members of UNITED are rehearsing for the National Staff Conference in January

Happy holidays everyone! I hope that the end of the year is treating you well. If you haven't already please download and read my newest prayer letter for the most recent updates about my life and my ministry! Thank you for all your prayers! Ministry at MU has been growing in some unexpected ways and UNITED has been hired to do worship for the National Staff Conference in January! Thank you, thank you and thank you again for making this possible!

SLU Worship Team Explores Authenticity

2007-10-24T20:05:00.000-05:00

Today we just had our second meeting in a series of songwriting workshops that I hope will help the students discover how they engage with music/art so that they can:

1. develop a more mature personal understanding of how God can minister to them through their gifts
2. help them lead people into worship through knowing how to communicate better

The meeting went exceptionally well (I like that word) and I was super excited to see them having a lot of fun doing the different creative writing exercises we did. Please continue to pray that things will go well as we continue to keep our little creative journals together.

What's been going on lately?

2007-10-24T13:25:00.001-05:00

It's been a while since my last post so I wanted to just quickly share with you some things about the last couple weeks.

CATALYST - ACCELERATING LEADERSHIP DEVELOPMENT!
I was asked to be on the planning committee for our leader development seminar that we put our leadership teams through. Last year over 100 students from Missouri, Iowa, Nebraska and Kansas learned about Discipleship, Authority & Self-Management; this year we're focusing on Witness & Vision.
After our first planning meeting last week I'm genuinely excited about the potential of Catalyst this year. A lot of leaders, both young and old, struggle with the use of vision and knowing how to translate that practically into our daily lives. I'm confident that the new structure of our seminar heavily focuses on helping us to really understand and gain experience in practically being a witness and working towards vision! And it sounds a little nerdy but I'm excited about that =).

NEW STAFF TRAINING: GOOD TO GREAT
Those of you MBAs may recognize the name "Jim Collins", the author of the book "Good to Great". We spent a week breaking down our paradigms of what ministry should look like and developing a healthy concept of what it would look like to have the "things we do" connect more to "who we are" in a way that is life-giving to the people involved. We also discussed how to apply some of Collin's learnings about operations and people in business to the ministry world.
What this means for Mizzou is for us to be creating a community of believers that aren't just there to be in Christian community but are together to learn what it is like to grow through being a witness for God to the people around them. Whatever we do, even at cost of size and growth, we are going to try and focus our efforts to both modeling and challenging Christians to be relevant witnesses in the community.

UNITED SEEKING MORE FOCUS
Please pray for an upcoming meeting between some of us in UNITED that are trying to establish a new focused direction for the new organization. We've had some loose dreams for the first half of this year but now it's time to crack down and gain a little more clarity on our mission as a worship leader development organization so we can more effectively work toward that goal.

CHURCH DEVELOPMENT OPPORTUNITIES
At InterVarsity we believe that by creating great leaders for our chapters today we fuel excellent leadership in the churches our students end up joining. Sometimes though we get the opportunity to partner in more direct ways. A couple worship leaders & directors have approached me for help concerning worship in their church - specifically working with their worship teams / leaders. Please pray that God guides me well as I start to talk to them about specifics.

UNITED WEBSITE LAUNCH

2007-10-01T14:42:00.001-05:00

After much work, re-work and a lot of "learning the hard way" the website for UNITED is finally up and running at www.untiedworship.com !

I'm hoping that the website will become sort of a connection hub for worship leaders to help each other, mentoring, encouraging, collaborating and otherwise just being in community with each other. Much of UNITED is geared around worship leaders helping worship leaders and building a growing knowledge of the art from there.

Most recently we are starting a discussion that came out of an experience at Fall Conference.

Click here to download the article.

Some prayer requests

2007-09-18T10:30:00.001-05:00

During your personal times with God this week if you think of me please be praying for a couple of things:

1) This is a busy week with Fall Conference at the end and I'm already very tired. We are taking 240 students to Kansas City and among those are also a number of "curious seekers" as one described herself that are interested in exploring Christianity.

2) I signed up to be a community group (small group) leader with my church to get to know more people there and to serve in a small way. However they wanted us to sign a paper saying we agree with a number of various issues that I could not sign primarily because of the inclusion of a statement about "Male Headship". Please be praying for me as I am in process with them about it.

3) Ray Deng, one of the worship leaders I disciple, is going through a rough patch in his faith and has been having a very pessimistic attitude for a while. Please pray that he will see God at work in his life and especially that his interactions with God continue to grow beyond the bounds of simple legal/systematic obedience. It is a good place of growth he is in but also pray that people around him would receive it well as it disturbs some of the younger people to see one of the senior leaders apparently shaken in his faith.

Worship in STL

2007-09-04T19:59:00.000-05:00

Phew, what a crazy Labor Day weekend! I was telling Daryl earlier today I wish that churches & religious organizations weren't so obligated to do so many things on the holiday so we could rest too. Well, I guess it is a great opportunity to reach out to new people. Anyway, Wash U had a praise night Saturday where one of the worship leaders I disciple was leading. It went really well even though they had a couple of technical problems, the place was packed and stayed packed (ie. no one left midway through haha). We ran out of chairs as over 100 people flooded the event. The praise night also served as a 'get to know more' about ACF, Harambee and One Voice - the three undergraduate ministries at Wash U here in STL. I came to Christ through One Voice so I'm a little bias but it was great to see so many people in fellowship and having a great time that night.

SLU also had a BBQ and praise night that I led worship for yesterday (Labor Day). Things went really well in the end even if it was a little awkward being outside and worshiping in the middle of a bunch of Sorority house meetings (it must have been the perfect location to get together with people). But overall, I think it was great and there were quite a few new faces who all hung around afterwards to get to know each other.

Thanks for all your prayers! I go down to Mizzou on Thursday but will be trying to take it easy Tomorrow after the crazy weekend.

First days @ Mizzou

2007-08-27T16:12:00.000-05:00

I'm currently sitting in a little coffee shop in downtown Columbia, MO right next to Mizzou, the campus where we are planting a new chapter. There are over 25k students at Mizzou and not many of them know Christ. This past weekend I spent two whole days hanging out with students in AAA (MU's Asian American Association) and volunteering with their Unificasian (Unification & Asian -- clever huh?) event that helps to connect Asian minorities to each other in the huge rush of incoming freshmen the school sees every year.
I met a bunch of great people and we had many sign up to come to our Bible Study that InterVarsity recently started here with the help of IV volunteer Andrew Moon (a philosophy grad student). Many who signed up aren't Christian but ARE very much interested in learning about Jesus and what the Bible / Christianity is really all about. It's amazing to see such openness in them, especially considering that not far from this coffee shop today an old school 'evangelist' named Brother Jed is bringing the 'fire and brimstone' message. I am blown away that despite that the Holy Spirit is moving in people around the campus that I have met who honestly want to know Jesus. One guy named Wataro the other day who opened up to me about his spiritual journey and how he almost became a Christian before learning that I worked with InterVarsity- then he said "wow, it must have been fate that I ran into you because I don't normally talk about faith and spirituality".
Please continue to pray as we have our first GiG tonight of the semester (GiG = Group investigating God -- a Bible Study for non-believers). Thanks!

~31 new followers of Christ @ SD Conference

2007-08-17T16:11:00.000-05:00

~31 people either made first time decisions or re-commitments to follow Christ during "Pursuit" in South Dakota. Daryl and I are at the airport waiting to catch our flight back from leading worship there this week. It was a great time of not only praising God but getting to know a lot of great students with a passion for sharing Christ with others. We met a lot of new friends but also met a lot of people who are interested in being mentored through UNTIED - the worship ministry Daryl and I are founding. Thank you all for your prayers and God bless!

Michael - Moving from Worship Leader to Team Leader

2007-08-09T10:28:00.000-05:00

Michael is a more experienced and skilled worship leader than the others I am working with in Iowa. I enjoy working with him as it is a great place to push the envelope but also readjust the focus of growth to developing the worship team around him. Michael is approaching the point where in order to maximize his own development he needs to start thinking about raising up those around him. I also think this will also help him to grow as a worship leader who's influence goes beyond the short time he spends in the spotlight on stage. Please pray for Michael as he has a lot to think about in terms of time managment and beginning to draw his team together as a real team and not just a group of people serving together.

Leah - William Penn Worship Leader

2007-08-08T14:15:00.000-05:00

Just met with Leah this morning here in Pella, IA. Leah is currently a Junior at William Penn University and passionate about worship. Specifically, Leah was telling me this morning how she God has changed her through her time at college to be less focused on herself and to see her ministry as caring for others. He has also given her a heart for justice & restoring joy and purpose in our times of worship. Please pray for Leah, that God will give her strength as one of the few Christians in her school and that He will continue to reveal to her His plans for how He will use her at William Penn.

As a side note - William Penn has recently placed some very difficult requirements on campus ministries mandating that they collectively only have one time of ministry during specific time that is overseen by the campus ministry department. Please be praying for that also.

Leading Worship @ IV Conference in SD

2007-08-06T21:42:00.000-05:00

This is a sneak peek at the conference Daryl and I will be leading worship @ next week. Currently, I'm still in Iowa but will be leaving Thursday back to STL after meeting with Leah and Michael on Wed. Tomorrow I'm going to be doing some reflecting on today's meeting with Morgan and preparing for Wednesday. Please continue to pray for these busy next two weeks.

Meeting with Morgan goes extremely well

2007-08-06T13:52:00.000-05:00

Thank you all for your prayers! I just wanted to post a quick update to say that I finished my first meeting here in Pella with Morgan and was blessed by her desire to develop her team and her openness in talking about things in general. We did a lot of work this morning and met for about 2.5 hrs and I feel like she no longer feels like she is in over her head which but instead is excited about trying out some of the things we talked about which is great. Please continue to pray for her as she is actually moving to Cedar Rapids later this week to start her internship at Coe College where she will be leading worship and developing the worship leaders there.

Meeting with students & staff in Iowa

2007-08-03T13:10:00.000-05:00

Next week I'll be leaving for a few days to different parts of IA to continue to grow United's ministry. I'll be meeting with a few student leaders who do worship at William Penn University & Drake University as well as a staff who will be in charge of a worship team at Coe-College for the first time. I plan to meet with them all individually to oversee both their individual development as worship leaders & their development of their respective worship teams.

While I'm in Pella, IA I'll also be helping Central College to redesign their sound equipment setup for their large group which has over 200 students attending weekly! Please keep us all in your prayers next week.

Here's a little about each of the leaders I will be meeting with:

Leah is trying to start a worship team at William Penn. She has a heart for diversity and reaching those different from her (around 1/2 of the chapter at WP is made up of ethnic minorities). Leah is also concerned about leading worship for the first time in college and getting others to help her at WP.

Michael is an experienced worship leader at Drake University. He is also extremely passionate about worship and reaching others through his music. He is currently undergoing difficulty with getting the rest of the team as on board with a holistic approach to music and not just being a member of the band / playing out of a service aspect.

Morgan is coming on staff this next year at Coe College and was asked to lead the worship team there since she plays guitar. She is a little anxious about leading worship as well as developing her team but is excited for the school year to start.

Please keep all of them in your prayers as well. Thanks again!

First Visit to Mizzou!

2007-08-02T14:49:00.000-05:00

This past Tuesday was my first trip out to Mizzou to meet Andrew Moon, our IV volunteer out there, for the first time. Jean and I got there around 3pm and hung out with Andrew all afternoon, just the three of us. He was extremely excited to see us and really needed another mature believer to talk to about a lot of challenges he was facing in leading his GiG (Group investigating God).

Some of the students from Mizzou came over around 5pm to go swimming & dinner and then we had a Bible Study with them from 8-9:30pm. There were seven non-believers that showed up that night and they all stayed from 5- 11 (we played some games afterwards). A couple of them even came to AABS for the first time and really enjoyed it.

Personally, Jean and I were both very impressed with the kind of non-believers that Andrew had coming to AABS. They had already made the mental switch from Cynics to Seekers* and were some of the most open minded non-believers we'd ever met before! What's more is that quite a few of them aren't in the original study which means that the group is continuing to grow in the summer.

The best part is that I met a couple of non-believers there that I hope to meet up with continually over the year to help them get more time to dig into specific questions & issues they have about Christianity and God. Please pray especially for Vince and Will, two of the people I hope to start meeting with regularly.

*Cynics to Seekers is one of the "conversion points" that we think of in InterVaristy. The complete picture is:
Cynic → Seeker → Follower → Minister → Leader → World Changer

Student Testimony - UNITED Worship Ministries

2007-07-25T15:11:00.000-05:00

One of the students I mentored last semester wrote this and I wanted to share it with you all. Thanks again for your prayers & support, without you none of the work I do would be possible.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

My worship training experience with Jon really developed how I look at musical worship from a leader's standpoint. I have always felt a strong connection to God through musical worship, and because of that and my musical ability, leading worship is something I have been involved in for several years, including three and a half years with IV. For the first half of my senior year I thought our worship 'team' was pretty good, but I knew we needed something to take it to the next level, so to speak. Then I went to Urbana and realized what true worship could really be like. It was amazing to be there with so many people and still experience God in a very personal way through the musical worship.

The spring semester after Urbana, Jon came on as a staff member at SLU IV with the main purpose of really developing our bunch of musicians and vocalists into a true worship team that leads the chapter into deeper relationship with God through music on a regular basis. While on the surface the means by which our team was developed may seem sterile and clinical, the result was a real evaluation of how musical worship must be done in order for it to truly minister to people where they are and bring them into a place where they experience God. The semester of training with Jon really took our group to the level where it could be effective as a ministry.

-Nathan Clark, SLU Alumni

UNITED continues to grow

2007-07-18T14:39:00.000-05:00

Just got back in town last week from almost a month of slightly hectic travel and it's good to be back home. I wanted to update you all on some of the recent developments with UNITED, the worship ministry within InterVarsity that I am working on. The college branch (that I am in charge of) is growing rapidly, expanding to 6 campus ministries at five different college campuses: Washington University, MO; Drake, IA; William Penn, IA; Coe College, IA; St. Louis University, MO. The most recent project is planning a worship workshop for ACF - please keep it in your prayers as I work with their worship leader to put this out.

We're also working on a FAQ publication that allows younger leaders to seek help from more experienced worship leaders. I thought I'd share one of the questions with you:

How do I learn new songs that are multicultural / multiethnic?

We have a lot of diversity at my college, and I want to be able to do new stuff, but not just the stuff I know. I want our worship to be very diverse…but I don’t know how to learn new songs and be effective at leading them.

(Leah Doolan - William Penn University, IA)

SOLUTION
The challenge with multiethnic worship is that it often comes across as inauthentic and poor-quality which, especially if you are trying to bridge racial & ethnic gaps in worship, is often received poorly and results in insulting or distancing yourself from the very people group you are trying to reach out to. This is because that multiethnic worship is not just about learning new music and songs, but learning how to minister to people of a different cultural background than your self.
To do this you should focus on the following:

1. GET TO KNOW THE PEOPLE YOU ARE TRYING TO REACH – spend time with them, go to church with them, seek to learn what worship looks like in their cultural context by immersing yourself in it.
2. SEEK OUT A MUSICAL ADVISER – especially if you are not proficient at your instrument or a certain singing style, look for someone who leads worship in the culture you are trying to reach and learn from them (church is a great place to find these people).
3. TAKE THE TIME TO PRACTICE – create a practice schedule for your self and spend at least 30 min a day going over one or two songs that you are trying to adapt for your worship community. Only after you have mastered these songs and have a basic fundamental understanding of what makes worship work for the culture you are trying to reach should you try to teach it to your team. The only exception is if you have someone from that culture in your team, then you should have them help you learn and teach the song to the rest of your team.

Teens @ Chinese Gospel Church

2007-07-09T14:48:00.000-05:00

Thank you for your prayers! The talk @ CGC's Teens went very well. I ended up talking about the relationship between 'Apologetics' and 'Evangelism' and how they share the commonality of being about serving others vs. adhering to a sense of duty. So we talked about getting a heart for the lost and spent some time doing an exercise examining stories we had experienced where God transformed us along our own continual journey to know Him more. I also used a couple of videos from InterVarsity's new evangelism training to help relay some of the more abstract concepts I was trying to explain to them.

I'll be going back there this Friday to lead worship while my boss is speaking; please continue praying for us.

ONS Snapshot #5

2007-06-25T10:54:00.000-05:00

Thank you for your prayers. The extended worship session last night was a very powerful experience for many here at ONS. One staff was even delivered from some very painful experiences in his past that had begun to take control of his spirit and weigh him down daily in his walk.

Also yesterday was the evangelism experience that all 127 new staff here at ONS participated in. As a group saw three people make decisions for Christ and had hundreds of great conversations with people though most importantly many of the staff gained a value for evangelism and good spiritual conversations in general.

Today is the last full day of ONS and we have it rather light in terms of worship. Tomorrow we'll be playing one final set in the morning and then we will all be traveling home. Please continue to pray for our safety on the road back!

ONS Snapshot #4

2007-06-25T10:43:00.001-05:00

Today is the start of a new week and is going to be a very challenging day for many of the staff here at ONS. York Moore will be leading the staff in learning about "conversational evangelism" which although very different than "contact evangelism" has some negative connotations to a lot of people. "Conversational Evangelism" is much more engaging, conversational and pastoral than "Contact Evangelism" which is more one-on-one preaching. This afternoon many of the staff will be going out on U. Washington's Madison campus to do some conversational evangelism in pairs. Please be praying for them as although this is often a great experience for all and changes the hearts of many involved - it is often a difficult journey for many.

For a non-believer's perspective on Conversational Evangelism check out this blog entry I wrote last year when I took one of my non-believer friends along with me

Please also be praying for extended worship this evening and that myself and the worship team can discern what the Holy Spirit wants us to do.

ONS Snapshot #3

2007-06-23T08:08:00.001-05:00

It's finally the Sabbath period for ONS which means we get a bit of a break from the intense program. However, break in the program means more work for the worship leader as I try to continually improve the team's ability to minister to the diverse crowd that is InterVarsity. This coming Monday we are going to be inviting some of the people in ONS who are music ministers onto the worship team as guests to better connect with some of the different worship cultures that exist here. I normally never do something like this because I believe in trying to minimize the craziness that can be a 'worship team' by having people who are on a worship team with me be involved for longer terms than one day. This time I made an exception because we are working with mostly staff who tend to be fairly mature. Please pray for me as I try to get a lot done with a lot of people in just a little bit of time. Thanks again for all your prayers and support!

On a side note, there has been a lot of interested in the United College ministry here at ONS and I've also received numerous emails from those worship leaders I am coaching asking various questions about worship and their teams while I'm away. I've a meeting today with another staff in the East Coast area that was wanting to do something just like United - hopefully I can feed him some ideas or help him out in some way; please pray for this meeting also.

ONS Snapshot #2

2007-06-19T19:09:00.000-05:00

Today, we had a lot more time to practice and work ahead as this first week is a little light on worship once we're past the first day. God has shed a little light on my strengths and weaknesses as a leader in the challenging task to teach my team a number of different worship and musical styles that are outside the box of what they normally do. I seem to excel at earning trust and setting up a good team environment but sometimes I struggle to find words / ways to explain some of the things I want to communicate when it comes to specifics.

We had some very rough spots in our practice today which I am uncertain of rather to push for excellence or just settle for where we are at. Please continue to pray for me as God continues to refine me in my ministry.

Students Feedback From Catalyst

2007-06-19T17:41:00.001-05:00

Since Catalyst (our regional leadership conference) staff have been reading written feedback from students that attended and God met them in some amazing ways. Here are a few of the things they wrote:

"[God] took away my doubts about being a leader"

"[God] Delivered me from lies I had been believing about myself."

"Jesus gave me peace with the changes on the leadership team and gave me a vision of huge growth for next year and after I leave."

"HE reassured me that he can use me despite my weaknesses and reminded me that he rejoices over me."

"[God]Showed me my strengths in leadership and also my weaknesses in my relationship with Him and in my responsibilities as a Christian (such as evangelism)"

"Being affirmed that it is normal to feel inadequate and have doubts. This was my first time being in a place where so many people were on fire for God. Usually I feel alone."

"He reopened my heart. He showed me how apathetic I was being and I’m excited to see the changes He’s going to make in me over the next year."

"He showed me the image of resting with Him instead of being a busybody."

"He made me realize I don’t need to be shy or afraid."

"I learned so much about myself and my perception of God and how that perception was hindering me that now I’m experiencing a renewed sense of freedom and peace that is immeasurable."

"I was initially hesitant about taking up this position of leadership that I’ve been put in. However, Catalyst helped me realize that although I’m weak in my own strength, I am strong because God is with me."

Snapshot of ONS

2007-06-18T23:58:00.000-05:00

DAY I
It's been one exhausting day. The morning was busy with meetings, setup and getting oriented and the afternoon was non-stop practice and sound checks. Today I spent a lot of time with the worship team - teaching people new styles of music & new ways of leading worship as many on the team are feeling stretched. It's a tough job trying to connect with such a diverse group of leaders that are in InterVarsity. I was telling Daryl the other day that I hadn't noticed how much I learned from our experience at Urbana until now when I'm trying to teach it.

I'm beat - just got out of 4 meetings since we finished and am ready for bed. Thanks for your prayers despite all the things that went wrong tonight God still came through and I believe it is because of prayers. Here are some ways God answered prayer today: i. even though the ppt wasn't working people were still worshiping as evident by their postures and general response; ii. the worship team itself is quickly bonding into a fun little community.

Please keep praying for us! Goodnight everybody!

New Staff Orientation in Madison

2007-06-18T08:17:00.000-05:00

Thanks for your prayers for us at the Byron Cage concert. It went very well even though we didn't get a sound check (the entire sound system was different) and had a few technical issues, people still responded fairly well. Currently, I'm in Madison, WI, getting ready to lead a worship team for InterVarsity's national new staff orientation over the next 10 days. Tonight is the first evening and I am a little nervous as the stage isn't even put together yet so we haven't had a chance to practice anything together. We will probably not have much time today and one of our team mates doesn't arrive till 5:30. Please keep us in your prayers.

Last night I took the team out for dinner and to walk around the city. We all come from very diverse backgrounds: non-denominational churches, a Lutheran seminary, a young woman who desires to be a nun, to name a few. Hopefully, as we learn to work and worship together we'll be a great team to reach the diverse community that is InterVarsity staff. I'll keep you updated over the course of the next couple weeks.

Byron Cage Concert

2007-06-06T21:36:00.001-05:00

Daryl Black, myself and others will be opening for Byron Cage's concert this coming Thursday, June 14 @ Abudant Life Church. You are welcome to join us there for an evening of worship and praise!

Purchase tickets through MetroTix

New Website - New Mission

2007-06-06T21:27:00.000-05:00

Hope you are enjoying the new website! My ministry with InterVarsity has changed since last year. I will be assisting with a new chapter plant @ Mizzou and mentoring a number of worship leaders at various colleges around the region in partnership with UNITED WORSHIP MINISTRIES. I hope to tap the resources of UNITED to better disciple and train worship leaders in InterVarsity who often feel isolated and under great pressure in their respective chapters. Feel free to download my most recent prayer letter or read my new case for more information about these new ventures.

Global Day of Prayer
The global day of prayer was excellent! Over 2000 people showed up in St. Louis to join the millions around the globe in prayer this past Sunday, May 27. Daryl, myself and a few friends were honored to be able to lead them in worship and were blessed later that day as God healed 4 people in the crowd of everything from paralysis to chronic hearing loss! Praise God!

New Leaders Step up @ CATALYST '07

2007-05-22T09:58:00.000-05:00

Last week (May 13-18) was "Catalyst", Central Region's leadership development training for our student leaders from MO,IA and KS. About half of the students attending were new leaders and God used the weeks activities to encourage them to step up and not feel overwhelmed by the responsibility of being an IV student leader.

This year we focused our training on the topics of:
*Authority - redeeming authority and our fears about being under authority or a person of authority / influence in someone's life
*Discipleship - knowing how to choose someone to disciple and how to help them grow into the person God wants them to be
*Self-Management - passionately following God's call without burning out or becoming a work-a-holic

I led worship at Catalyst as well as helped develop part of the curriculum for the Authority section of the week. Please pray for this coming weekend when I will be helping to lead worship at the Global Day of Prayer in STL at Bush Stadium (www.praystl.org).

InterVarsity CityLights in the news

2007-04-27T10:23:00.000-05:00

Local TV station KPLR 11 did a news spot on CityLights, a program our students participated in this spring, where they served in the inner city to help those often ignored by members of "productive society". Not only did God use many of them in their service but God grew many of their hearts for the people they met. Click here to read the article.

SLU InterVarsity 2007 Slide-Show!

2007-04-26T13:53:00.000-05:00

We're having a little end of the year party on Monday. This is a little slide show that will be shown there. I think the greatest accomplishment this year at SLU was to really see the students start to enjoy each other as a community. That alone has been a great witness to non-believers on a campus that has a culture of independence and individuality. Thanks again for your support!

Urbana 2006 Live Worship CD Released!

2007-04-19T12:06:00.000-05:00

The CD is out finally! Click here to listen to some samples or to buy it online! Thanks again for all your support & prayers for Urbana!

FYI the group of people formerly known as the "Urbana 2006 Worship Team" are forming a ministry called "UNITED". UNITED is NOT a band but rather a ministry that seeks to empower other worship leaders around the country. It is mostly an idea right now but I will keep everyone posted about what evolves.

The Ministry in Iowa

2007-04-19T11:44:00.000-05:00

Back from the trip! I left last Monday and returned last Thursday in the afternoon. Thank you all for your prayers - I definitely felt them. Here are some of the ways that God showed up during my trip:

Protection on my travels
A deer ran in front of my car on a dark Iowa highway and caused me to swerve and skid all over the 2 lane highway. Thankfully no cars were near me and the car stayed on the road and didn't hit any of the obstacles that could have been laying off the highway. No damage was done to me, the car or the deer but I did leave some awesome skid marks in a snake like pattern in the middle of I-63 =).

Two student leaders @ William Penn University
Please continue to pray for Leah and Jenerro who will be trying to start a music ministry at their local InterVarsity chapter @ William Penn. Our first couple meetings went extremely well and I was blessed to see God already at work in growing their hearts for helping others to worship God at the University. Their goal is to do their first worship set together at the end of the semester at the last large group. I will be following up with them and their campus staff, Sherami, and will keep you posted. Here is an excerpt from a letter Sherami sent to me:

I'm so grateful for your passion & initiative in helping the students start worship at Penn. It's so nice having someone who understands empowering students & is willing to continue working w/them. ... I can already see the potential leadership growth as I've spoken with Leah and Jenero! You blessed us tremendously - thank you! - Sherami, IV Staff @ William Penn

One Student Worship Leader @ Drake
Drake University already has a worship team but had just gotten a new worship leader who is extremely gifted as a worship leader but is facing some challenges and frustrations in sharing his passion with those on his team and in the chapter itself. We had a great conversation and I look forward to continuing to mentor him and be a resource to empower him to improve the quality of music ministry leadership at Drake. He recently wrote me a short email:

Hey Jon, I want to thank you for coming and talking with me last week. It was really a blessing to be able to speak with you about things others wouldn't understand. I feel like I was able to learn from what you shared with me as well. I'm exited about practicing your thoughts about how people interpret worship through the worship leader. ... I'm looking forward to hearing back from you. - Michael, Worship Leader @ Drake

Thanks again to everyone for your prayers. Please continue to pray as I follow up with these students and work to help them lead others in worship.

Worship & Music Ministry

2007-04-09T16:00:00.001-05:00

Just a quick update / prayer request. I am going to Iowa today to help staff start a worship team @ William Penn University & to assist in the growth of a worship team at Drake University. Please keep me in your prayers. It seems that God has a lot on my plate in the realm of worship lately:

Urbana '06 Worship Team - December '06
Start Worship Team @ SLU - January '07
Daryl Black Worship Concert / CD Release - February '07
Asian American Staff Conference Worship Team - March '07
CityLights Spring Break Worship Directory - March '07
Start Worship Team @ WP - April '07
Coach Worship Team @ Drake - April '07

and coming up...

Urbana '06 CD Release - April/May '07
Catalyst (140 student leadership camp) Worship Director - May '07
National Orientation for New Staff Worship Director - June '07

Please do keep me in your prayers this week. I hope this goes well, it is really a first for our region to have staff help others in the area of worship & music ministry.

Happy Easter everyone!

SLU Goes Bowling to Build Community

2007-03-24T17:14:00.000-05:00

Sometimes the best things to do to meet new people are to enjoy the simple things in life. Like hurling a 10lbs ball down a wooden alley to smash into things. A couple of the SLU students put together a bowling night to build community between some InterVarsity regulars and others on the fringe of our community. We had quite a few fringe people show up and had a great time bowling together.

We decided to quit after one game and run out and get some ice cream and just hang out and talk afterwards (no pics of that - sorry!). One non-believer commented how she loved hanging out with this group of people that could just have fun wherever we went and without anyone in the group feeling left out or like an extra. The two students that put the bowling night together are hosting a movie night next week - please pray that it goes just as well!

City Lights 2007!

2007-03-22T17:20:00.000-05:00

CityLights is always an excellent experience for students that changes the way they see God at work in the world. Too often we see Christians who aren't willing to step outside their own comfort zones or beyond their dreams of a comfortable life to help those less fortunate than them. CityLights takes students from around the country and transplants them into the heart of the inner city in St. Louis where New City Fellowship (a local church that partners with us) places them in workgroups where they will not only get a chance to serve those around them but also be challenged in their ideas of justice, diversity and faith.
Since we started CityLights nearly 40 students have relocated to St. Louis to continue working / living amongst those in the inner city who they developed relationships with during their Spring Break. For SLU, many students felt challenged to reach out to people that SLU generally tries to keep away from their campus: the poor, the widowed, the abused, the addicts etc... Students at SLU are continuing to think about how to spread their new found heart for the city & for those less fortunate than themselves to others around campus who generally think of projects like CityLights as a gold star on their resume.

On a more personal note, at CityLights, I had the opportunity to lead worship with over 20 students from different cultural, ethnic and musical backgrounds. On a more personal note it became more clear to me how God has grown me in the past couple years as it was much easier to coordinate this large group of students and keep a fun, energetic atmosphere than it had been for me before. Many people at CityLights were blessed by the worship team I directed - staff commented that most of the transformational work they saw being done in their students was done during the times of worship we led. One student even commented that "this was the best worship I'd ever experienced, thank you!".

Asian American Staff Conference

2007-03-19T01:03:00.000-05:00

So every 3 years all the Asian American staff get together, network and address certain ethnic specific issues as well as common issues that it is helpful to go through with other people of the same cultural upbringing. This year it was held in San Francisco so we had some beautiful weather during the conference.
Personally, I had a great time there for three reasons:
1) I got to work with a great team of people doing worship and gained yet more insight into how different people lead. Erna, the worship director for the conference, was on the Urbana 2003 worship team and is a great worship leader. I enjoyed her sense of where the spirit was going and assertiveness to change the schedule in order to do God's will. I also met another young staff named Audrey who has a heart for worship and is working on developing her own worship curriculum to better the training teams receive. I hope we can compare what we both have in the future.
2) The focus group I attended was incredibly helpful and insightful in shedding light onto how one might transform their job on staff to something that is a more custom fit to their specific gifts / call by God. I hope that I, like a few others in InterVarsity, can eventually create a custom position on staff where I can work on the issues that concern me most as opposed to being called to do everything under the sun.
3) I networked and met a number of interesting people - a few of which have a similar desire to work in a more specialized capacity within InterVarsity. I was also invited to put together and team and lead worship at ONS (orientation for new staff) this coming June - of which I'm very excited.

Overall the experience was great if not very tiring as I spent a couple nights up very late trying to get our sound equipment setup and working properly (seems to happen at many conferences I'm at). Please be praying that I get an opportunity to run in a more specialized field in InterVaristy because I feel very strongly that it would benefit both me and the people around me.

1st Talk

2007-03-01T11:32:00.000-06:00

Hello again supporters! I gave my first talk @ SLU this past Monday. I exposited on Ephesians 2:11-22 where Paul is addressing the church there about how they are trying to define themselves as Christian believers. The people there at the time believed that God did save people through grace based upon His original covenant with Abraham. However, they believed that because the promise was made to Abraham and his offspring, the Israelites, it didn't apply to those who weren't directly related to Abraham --- unless, they were marked through circumcision, therefore identifying them as 'children of God'.
There is of course something wrong with that picture. Paul corrects their thinking in Ephesians 2:11-22 by redefining the power of Christ as the force that identifies and unites us as a body of believers -- not circumcision. Today this means that Christianity is NOT about quiet times, devotionals, Bible Studies, Laws, church attendance etc... which is revolutionary for many students at SLU.
To help the students process through this rather abstract concept - we spent 30 min at the end of the evening in reflective worship where students were also offered the opportunity to write on a piece of parchment paper something they wanted to offer to Christ that was a pattern of this world they felt trapped in. We then tied these pieces of paper to a tower of incense (in the OT incense represented both God's presence and purity) to help us better picture our prayer being offered to God as symbolized by the smoke and the Holy Spirit poured out among the people as symbolized by the scent diffusing in the room.
Please continue to pray that the students will continue to strive to define themselves as believers by the transformation Christ does in them - by the breaking of the usual patterns that exist in today's society.

What? Evangelism?

2007-02-17T08:59:00.000-06:00

Friday, Lee (a Sophomore on the Worship Team) and I went out to see if we could have spiritual conversations* with random people in the food court at SLU. First we met Daniel who was raised Catholic and goes to mass weekly but believes that "you can't really know God". We talked for a while and Daniel explained a little more about what his faith meant to him and about a necklace he wore of two saints: St. Andrew and St. Jude to remind him about his family.

Then he suddenly became interested in knowing more about me and what I do and I was able to share with him the story of how God has pursued and continually pursues me to do the things that I do. I shared about how no matter how hard I tried, I couldn't escape the things that God was calling me to do in life - though I may not have recognized it at the time. Right before we left, we learned that Daniel is on track studying 4 different majors from Psyche to Spanish to International Affairs.

Next we had a very interesting conversation with a table of people including Mike, a self proclaimed atheist; Kimmy, who believes in a god or some higher power of some kind but can't describe what that god would be like; and Mark, a non-practicing Catholic. For around thirty minutes we swapped stories and learned about each other's spiritual journeys from when Mike decided god is a myth to when Kimmy had a deep spiritual experience at a Catholic retreat.

Long story short, we had a number of great spiritual discussions and met four great people. The best part? Lee asked if we can do this every Friday for the rest of the year! Please pray for us all that God would continue growing our hearts for the lost!

*Spiritual Conversations: evangelism done on the belief that the Holy Spirit is at work pursuing all people and that evangelism has twin goals of spreading the message of the gospel and changing the heart of the messenger. This is an essential discipline to practice with non-believers that you know and have only just met in order to develop compassionate hearts for the lost.

Urbana 06 - Video made by a group of students

2007-01-07T20:49:00.001-06:00

This video was made by a group of students sent to Urbana by Midway Church Vietnamese Alliance - It gives a great little picture of some of the things at Urbana.

Urbana 2006 LORD YOUR ARE GOOD

2007-01-07T20:39:00.001-06:00

Video of "You are good" shot at urbana by some attendee

Urbana 06 - Personal Reflections

2007-01-06T15:49:00.000-06:00

Everyone asks me how it was and there is so much to say... Here are a few short stories that I think were really meaningful to me while at Urbana:

It's opening day and we're doing our first onstage rehearsal which is being coordinated with the dance teams for the opening ceremony. Things are going horribly - we are all making lots of simple mistakes and I am stressing majorly over a couple of new parts I'm supposed to play that I just learned hours before hand. Afterwards, I'm talking to our drummer, Bill, and basically feeling like things are falling apart and we're going to blow it. He reminds me that God has the power to cover our mistakes but honestly -- it just seemed too simple. The reality was that I didn't have time to practice that part and I just couldn't focus on the huge stage.

Then right before we went to opening night we were praying and I remember Betsy specifically praying that God would enable us to be free to worship Him despite the many distractions with the pressure and the huge arena etc... I suddenly felt at peace. Then the strangest thing happened....

Later that night when we were playing the opening song I totally blanked when we got to the new part. As I started going into a panic I looked down and saw my hands playing the right notes in perfect timing ... it was like I was watching myself from a distance. Then I felt God saying to just trust Him and everything will be fine. It still sounded too simple but it was backed up by the reality that God was there on stage with me and that in an unexplainable way He was playing through me. Thanks be to God for such a blessing.

---------

The other story is much shorter... The whole conference I was disappointed that my parents couldn't be there to attend. I felt like they were missing out on an important milestone in my life / a glimpse into what I do and where my heart is. One of my good friends on the worship team, Melissa, her parents decided almost last minute to come to Urbana. I met them and they were so encouraging to all of us - then on the last day after we had finished I went to wish them a happy new year and her mom gave me a big hug and kiss and said "this is from me" then she gave me another hug and kiss and said "this is from your mom who couldn't be here". I nearly fell over.

So Melissa's parents, if you're reading this then thank you so much for your love and care for all of us on the worship team. It was a blessing having you there with us all.

Picures from Urbana 2006!!!

2007-01-03T10:32:00.000-06:00

Thanks for all your prayers! Here are some things I've heard from attendees:

"You guys [the worship team] are challenging me to rethink what God's church should look like in the world"

"I feel like my eyes have been opened to how selfishly I've been living my life for me and nobody else"

More stories to follow - enjoy the pictures, thanks again and HAPPY NEW YEAR!

More pictures
Watch the webcast

Happy Holidays!

2006-12-22T02:07:00.000-06:00

Happy Holidays everyone!!! Nothing says "fun family moment" like walking into the mac store with your mom and wasting some time with the cameras in their computers haha. Hope you're all having a merry Christmas!

It's like some master artist sketch!

Awww...

Help! We're stuck in a comic book!!!

Attend Urbana Session on Dec 30 for free!

2006-12-19T00:02:00.000-06:00

You're all invited to attend an evening session of Urbana for free!

December 30th
Edward Jones Dome (Rams' stadium)
Doors open at 6:30p
Event starts at 7:30p

Featured speakers:
Rick Warren - author of "Purpose Driven Life"
Lisa Chen - IVCF Director of International Student Ministry

NEW Bible Study

2006-12-15T09:23:00.000-06:00

Started a new Bible Study with a couple of students last night who wanted to pursue a deeper understanding of scripture beyond what they felt our current Bible Studies do. Personally, I love the desire they have to dig deep in the scripture and hope to show them that it's not as hard as one might think to do. Maybe one day they will be leading a similar type of study on campus, for their local church or in their families down the line.

The Last Rehersal

2006-12-15T09:18:00.000-06:00

Thank you all for your prayers! The last rehersal for Urbana went extremely well if not extremely busy. We were finally able to practice in a place (thanks to Grace church in STL) where we could hear each other through a sound system. There are 11 people on the team so if we are all just crammed in a room with no equipment to balance vocals against say drums and bass then it is impossible to tell who is doing what at times.

Personally while I don't feel ready for Urbana just yet - I don't think it's impossible for me to feel ready by the time we get there. What also helped to prepare me this past weekend was playing for Grace church (around 6000 attenders). Here are some audio samples of what we did from my friend's MD Recorder. You might need to turn the Bass down on your stereos (the EQ on the recording is funny).

Blessings!

"Holy Hour"

2006-11-28T10:00:00.000-06:00

(picture curtosy of "Lost" on ABC)

I was on campus yesterday evening attending a prayer session led by one of our student leaders and afterwards many of us went to attend "Holy Hour" the Catholic Student's worship service. "Holy Hour" consisted of about 50 min of psuedo-contemporary praise songs sang by a small choir and backed by 2 guitars and a djimbae and has been a fairly good way to start building bridges between the two religious communities - however I am grateful for the discussion it opened up with one of our student leaders.

What is the role of music in ministry? What is the impact of the attitude / heart of a worsihp leader on the people? What is the connection between communal worship & our beliefs / lives? How can 'joyful praise' be a mandate in the scripture? These and more great questions are hovering in students' minds and I can't wait to explore them more.

Please pray for me tomorrow (11/29) as I will be meeting with Kale Uzzle, one of our student leaders who is also a song writter and musician and has a lot of these questions on the mind. Blessings!

And now I'm back... from outer space

2006-11-16T14:53:00.000-06:00

Hello again! If you don't get the song reference in the title than just ignore my sillyness BUT there is reason for my happyness brothers & sisters!

It may have taken a while but I'm finally getting on campus part-time 16 hrs/week starting immediately!!! What an answer to prayers especially as last week I was about to loose it. Funding is at 54% - however, the year is 1/2 as long so the budget for the remainder of the year is lower. Hopefully, I can stay on campus by next fall if fundraising continues at the rate it has been. (Don't you love these financial projections?)

Anyway - I have taken this opportunity to distill my thoughts a bit more. Now that I can spend time on campus -- how should I spend it? Over the past couple days I have been thinking / praying about how to do this and where / what God is specifically wanting from me @ SLU. I've put it all into this neat little 1 page mission outline to keep me focused =).

In other news, I recently led a team @ Covenant Seminary to develop & deploy a Worship Service that stretches the Reformed PCA traditional practices toward a more post-modern / contemporary context. I was actually quite worried about it but things went very well in the end. Here are some comments from a few emails I recieved:

Thanks for the encouragement. I really benefited from the song selection and the way that you led--your introduction was so beneficial. It was a joy to work on this project with you.
-P, Seminary Student

Thanks. I thought the worship time was well done in all its aspects. I appreciate your work and leadership for chapel today.
-Prof. Z, Seminary Professor

You wouldn't be a good steward if your current and future ministry didn't allow you to exercise your gift of leading others in worship. I would like to hear your thoughts expressed in our class on Tuesday nights more often – I feel like you have much experience and would bring a lot to our discussions. Speak up and speak out brother!
-T, Seminary Student

Drum Jam

2006-10-22T01:12:00.000-05:00

Video of our drummer 4 Urbana: Mr. Bill Henderson

Yes, Urbana is going to rock!

Fall Conference Story - Harambee

2006-10-19T13:53:00.000-05:00

This year Harambee (InterVarsity's Black Campus Chapter @ WashU), brought over 30 students to Fall Conference. It has grown so much from 3 years ago when less than 10 students were together for Fall Conference in that chapter. One of the Seniors reminisced on how much they have seen the chapter grow since their first year at school. Many of the underclassmen shared stories of thanks about how grateful they are to the upperclassmen for caring and shepharding all of them throughout their first years away from home.
It was encouraging to listen as similar to ACF, the younger students in Harambee began to cast a vision of faith in God's continued work through them to reach non-believers around the campus, including many of their close friends at school. In many ways this FC marked the passing of the leadership baton in Harambee and was very much an encouraging time for all. Please pray that God will give these new leaders opportunity and insight to be uniquely used for the kingdom in their lives.

Fall Conference Story - ACF

2006-10-18T14:03:00.000-05:00

The keynote speaker for this year was Lisa Chin, a Filipino woman of great wisdom and eloquence. ACF felt very served by her use of stories in her teaching and were often quoting her during the retreat in reference to their own lives. It was also helpful for them to see an Asian keynote speaker as they felt empowered in an environment where it sometimes easy(as an ethnicity with a lot of cultural norms that make us sometimes seem shy or quiet) to feel overpowered by other cultures in America.
The most encouraging thing that happened at ACF during FC however was with the freshmen. Jean Kung, ACF Staff, told me about a young freshman who was sharing with the group how she realized that "ACF's purpose is the mission [not just a social place], and I need to start thinking about what that means for me personally as a missionary on campus." Many ACFers began to brainstorm together what they should be doing on campus to reach people who don't know Jesus as Lord and Savior.
I am excited to think about what might happen in the future of this chapter as people begin to grasp a missional attitude earlier in their college career. Please keep the class of '10 in your prayers that they would remember and act upon the insight that the Holy Spirit gave them this past Fall Conference.

Fall Conference Story - SLU

2006-10-17T16:38:00.000-05:00

[Because the work I do now is mostly conferences & such until I raise enough funds to start work officially at SLU I'm going to post some stories from the last conference I worked at for you to read and enjoy! -- Once I get funded, hopefully I can share more updates with you all from SLU specifically]

SLU @ Fall Conference 2006

SLU students were greatly impacted by seeing the students in Harambee (IVCF's Black-Ethnic-Specific chapter @ Wash U) engage in worship @ FC. Many students in the SLU chapter come from mostly white Protestant or Roman Catholic backgrounds and commented that they were amazed at the joy they saw in their Black Brothers & Sisters during worship. FC was for many of them one of the first cross-culturally focused programs they had been at.
Naturally, many questions were brought up and many felt uncomfortable during times of worship because of the diversity and liveliness of it. During a hike around the campsite Tammy Chi (current staff @ SLU) was able to talk through their questions and help them process what was going on in their heads. "I was amazed at the honesty and earnestness in their questions" Tammy shared with me later while we were catching up.
I'm excited to think about how God is stretching the students there to see Him in new ways - even through the eyes of other cultures. Out of the 13 students that went to FC from SLU, every single one of them was personally met by God and challenged to go a step deeper in their faith. Hallelujah!

Students Engaged at Fall Conference

2006-10-12T00:01:00.000-05:00

Get Your Own! | View Slideshow

This past weekend, I led worship with other members of the Urbana Team for over 100 students from seven InterVarsity Chapters around the area. Included in those students were around 10 International Students whose homes are outside the United States. It was a blessing to have them there adding to the already diverse culture found in integrating so many chapters (some of them ethnic-specific).
I was encouraged as I saw barriers for race, culture and ethnicity melt away through the power of the Holy Spirit - especially in our time of extended worship Saturday evening. Students felt free to respond genuinely to God's spirit through dance, lifted hands, slient prayer & meditation, and deep discussion all at once. It is not often that people feel comfortable enough to genuinely respond with whatever is in their hearts as these students were doing.
Tomorrow we are debriefing as an area team and I will have more details then. Thank you all for your support! Please continue praying for many of the students who are processing things that came up during the conference. Blessings!

A focus in my work

2006-10-02T21:14:00.000-05:00

Through a class at Covenant Seminary, I have developed a rough draft of a personal mission statement & strategy that I hope to refine as time goes on. The purpose of doing so is to help discover and focus on my own calling that God has placed on my life.

Personal Mission Statement

Jon Wang is a musical-administrative-shepherd seeking to assist others in discovering opportunities to work together as a diverse body toward strategic objectives and goals specializing in areas that require a balance of creative expression and orderly execution.

Implementation Strategy

Focus work at InterVarsity in promoting a collaborative environment while specializing in the area of worship (which is weak in the central region). Take advantage of the gift of music ministry to establish credibility to leverage further partnership between chapters. Additionally, leverage the natural necessity of teamwork & strategic action involved in music ministry to create cross-pollination in student leadership and development strategies. Openly partner with staff as well as students in creating momentum in the areas of student leader development (of which worship can serve as the experimental venue). While working for InterVarsity continue to be on the lookout for opportunities to effectively partner not only internally but also externally and to promote a culture-of-execution & excellence into the already passion-filled ministry of InterVarsity. External partnerships are especially valuable to push the mentality of equip-and-send from IV-Staff hearts into the students.

Do be cautious about how hard you work your team members and student leaders while pushing them into areas matching their gifting. Allow for flexibility in your expectations to avoid placing square pegs into round holes. Always put God’s will over your own.

===================

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Fall Conference 2006 - Pray!

2006-10-02T21:05:00.000-05:00

Hello again brothers & sisters. Fall Conference 2006 is upon us this weekend. Please be praying that the students will not only have a good time but will experience a growth spurt in their spiritual maturity during this conference. The main topic will be an introduction to discovering their unique calling in Christ as we study the book of Esther together. Hopefully this will get them thinking about calling and they will be better prepared for Urbana 2006 this winter!

Specifically please be praying for:
-safe travels (the camp is a 3 hour drive SW of STL)
-students will venture out beyond their comfort zones (this will be a multi-cultural experience with students from 6 chapters and many countries)
-spiritual healing (every year a number of students end up facing difficult and personal struggles at Fall Conference)

Thanks for your prayers!

Non-Christians Show an Interest in God @ SLU

2006-09-18T08:24:00.000-05:00

the above movie may take a minute to load

More and more non-believers are showing an interest in spirituality. A recent survey by the marketing people at MTV concluded that the current generation is more spiritual than any previous generation, they just don't know what they are spiritual about.

At SLU, a number of non-believers come to our chapter meetings to learn more about Christianity / Jesus and are often fascinated that the people they meet there are a lot like them. Allison (featured in this video) is one of many in the chapter who are curious about God. Please keep her in your prayers this year.

download a higher quality version of the movie here

*The "John" mentioned in the video is not me but in fact one of our Student Leaders who is reaching out to her!

Orlando - Missions Conference

2006-09-17T23:57:00.000-05:00

Just got back today from a trip to Orlando to lead worship for a Missions Conference @ a local Latino church. Myself and a few other members of the Urbana Worship Team went along with some friends who filled in for a couple team-mates who weren't able to make it. Overall, it was an excellent experience to be able to share our gifts with the people of that church. The missions conference was very professionally done (with a CD & DVD being recorded that evening) and while the focus was on God's work & the need in China, the guest speakers also challenged people to be living their lives in light of God's will, not their own. The same message that we are excited to bring to Urbana this winter!

Here are some samples of the praise that evening:
Praise the Lord With Me
My Heart Belongs To You
No Hay Nadia

ISM Furniture Giveaway

2006-09-17T17:28:00.000-05:00

One of the best ways to reach out to students from another country is to show them God's love through our care. Many of these students come to the United States with nothing more than a couple of suitcases - never any furniture. Through an area-team outreach led by Janet Atkins (IV Staff who is called to work with Internationals) and partnering with many local Christian communities, we worked with student leaders to collect and give away a large amount of much needed furniture. Here are a few pictures of the outreach event.

International Student Ministry (ISM) is a part of InterVarsity.

Recent Happenings

2006-09-12T14:19:00.000-05:00

It's been a busy last few weeks that's to be sure. Here are some highlights:

- 6 new believers through InterVarsity ministries in STL over the past couple weeks!!!
- at least 4 people have contacted us about learning more about Jesus
- fundraising up to 40%
- exploring a potential partnership with KLife, a HS ministry (see picture), that will:
*give SLU Worship Team another venue to grow their gifts without the restriction they feel from leading their peers
*develop our leadership pipeline (many students from KLife will go to college, many from the STL KLife historically have gone to SLU)

Please continue to pray about the following challenges:
- need to get to 95% of my budget to be full-time
- need to connect with more people who are able to give financially to support the cause
- pray for my staff-partner, Tammy Chi, as SLU grows rapidly that she will not be overwhelmed

Thanks again for all you guys do! Prayer Letter 3 will be coming out in a couple weeks!

A great start to a new year!

2006-09-01T23:52:00.000-05:00

Some highlights from the 1st week of InterVarsity's work this semester:

-2 students came to Christ!
-SLU large group has 25 new-visitors (almost 200% growth!)
-Nearly 400 Fall Conference flyers distributed
-Hundreds of new students visited & talked to
-A moving truck worth of furniture donations from the Christian community was collected for care for new International students

Additionally:

-started classes @ Covenant Seminary (to better equip me for work in the mission field)
-found another mentor to assist in the development of music ministry in InterVarsity St. Louis
-new contact with a church mission board (pray for more funding support!)

Covenant Seminary - New Student Orientation

2006-08-27T00:06:00.000-05:00

In an effort to do my best at my job I enrolled in some classes at Covenant Seminary. I hope to become better equipped to work with the sharpest minds in the university world. Today was new student orientation. I met a lot of interesting people, from those who came to seminary straight out of undergrad to those who are starting seminary after leaving an executive position in a billion-dollar industry.
I am highly encouraged by the caliber of student at Covenant and their desire to follow God even into a seemingly fuzzy calling (not everyone is exactly sure what they are there for but they are certain that God wants them there now). I am especially impressed with the opening talks that emphasized 'community' as one of the major essentials in growing as a Christian. It is primarily through community that the depth of our relationship with God can really be challenged, stretched and developed even more. Through community we see our weaknesses as well as strengths and giftings; community also demonstrates and challenges us to love one another - despite our sinful natures.
Classes start this coming Thursday and with my funding at a point that puts me off campus and not working with the students - I am thinking of taking a few more classes than I had planned to get a step up in preparation for next year. I also plan to begin work on the worship leader curriculum I want to put the SLU worship team through. As always, I will keep you all posted!

---- Planned Classes ----
-Praise & Worship in the Church
-Bible Overview & Background
-Spiritual & Ministry Development
-Preparation and delivery of Sermons (? maybe - depends on course load)

Prayer Request - Fall Conference & NSO

2006-08-23T13:57:00.000-05:00

Please be praying for the upcoming:

Fall Conference : 10/6-10/8 Lisa Espineli Chinn who spoke at Urbana '03 & the Urbana '06 worship team will be ministering to students @ Camp Windermere from SLU, Wash U and International Ministry areas.

NSO @ SLU & WashU : The next couple of weeks will be New Student Outreach at SLU & Wash U. At WashU on Sept 1 parts of the Urbana Worship Team in STL will be helping to give a picture of diversity in worship. Please be praying that the right message gets communicated and that students take interest in both NSO opportunities.

God's Grace

2006-08-18T02:51:00.000-05:00

So I've caught a very annoying cold here in MN. It is making me dizzy and a little off during the worship sets. Beyond the cold however, I honestly made quite a few major mistakes tonight that were blatently obvious. We had some reflection time arranged for the students and I was playing an instrumental with some of the other members and man... totally started out in the wrong key and had numerous technical difficulties dealing with the sustain and shape of my guitar's tone (which in hindsight I really should have worked on earlier more).
At the end of the set I felt like I had let the team down. I am however, very grateful for our worship director Daryl Black. He encouraged me to get past the mistakes I made and even said it was a good thing and all part of the learning curve. As someone who pours all they have into their work and craft, I greatly appreciated his encouraging words.
We will be returning home tomorrow after playing one more set in the morning. Please pray that it goes well and that I recover from this sickness (especially as I have a donor meeting on Saturday).

A Relaxing Work Environment

2006-08-16T16:35:00.000-05:00

One of the things many people dream about is a great work environment. One that is relaxing but allows you to focus without too many distractions. The camp we're at in MN is exactly that. It's a great place to be where you can easily find places to enjoy the beauty of the world God created.
The retreat so far is going very well. We got a lot of work done the past couple days and we're enjoying a short little break now before dinner. Leading worship as a team has never been more fun. I think we're the most together we've been so far and we're still getting better. It has also been great leading the students, who are enjoying their chapter camp, in encountering God through music. It's a much more diverse crowd than I thought it would be initially. They even have some international students that are joining us from as far away as China! One, from Japan, just because a Christian through InterVarsity less than a year ago. There are over a hundred students from over 15 different schools around the MN area. It reminds me a lot of Catalyst but a little different in terms of how they do things here.
Please pray for me as I've caught a nasty cold!
Gotta run but I'll keep you all posted!

Praise & Worship in MN

2006-08-13T15:17:00.000-05:00

Today at 6pm I'm leaving for MN with the rest of the Urbana Worship team. We'll be leading praise at a worship conference there for a number of students from the MN regional area. We're also planning to use the time as a team retreat to both spend some time in prayer together as well as have a long focused time to practice & get ready for this December. Please keep us in your prayers!

Impacting the Youth

2006-08-10T22:46:00.000-05:00

Here are some excerpts from a student's testimony @ the youth retreat run by some of our college-aged InterVarsity members:

"Before I came to ETR my relationship with God was in one of those spiritual pits. I based our relationship off of rules and laws. I followed all those rules without really loving God and understanding what those rules were for. I was basically raised up as a christian so i felt like there was nothing else to learn. Therefore i was in one of those pits again and just ignored God completely. I know some ppl might think im kinda young for this experince, but i say God is mysterious and his plans are unpredictable...

Jean and Jon came to share to us about relationships and how we can use that to help built up our relationship with God. Jon was talking about how rules dont even matter with God. I was confused because i always based my relationship with God off of rules...

I walked around outside, kinda questioning God. Then all of a sudden i screamed, "WHERE ARE YOU LORD!" "WHATS NEW!!!!!!!" "WHY ARE YOU LEAVING ME IN THIS PIT!" "I THOUGHT YOU LOVED ME!" I wept outloud, as tears poured onto my hands, i felt as if God commanded me to whipe my tears off and go back to the worship room. So i slowly troutted to the worship room. They just finished singing hymns when Jon said "if anybody wants to talk to us 1-1 then do so" I got the courage to ask him if i could talk to him. We waited until everybody left and we walked up the trail. Once we were out of site i just started weeping, trying to explain what i am feeling. I told him how i feel like theres nothing new. Jon prayed with me and we talked about how right now i dont need to have knowledge...but a strong open relationship with God.

The following days i was starting to fall back into routine. I started to notice and felt bad. I asked stacey and she said that u need to be doing ur quiet times. I praise God for doing wonders in my sister. So just last night I had the longest quiet time i think im my life. I just prayed to God, sang worship songs, and just really had a spiritual time with God."

--- A Seventh Grade Student

Again, none of this work would be possible without your support. Thank you!

Thank You!

2006-08-09T14:11:00.000-05:00

Here is a letter from the organizer of the retreat Jean and I ran workshops at. None of this would be possible without your support as donors so thanks!

======= Asian American Youth Conference =======
Jean and Jon,

I cannot even being to express how thankful I am that you came to help out with the camp. I know entering in, there wasn't much of an expectation, but God used your words, even if it was a small group. I know the workshops really challenged a lot of the youth's hearts and they now learn its more about God wanting their hearts than just obeying law after law and you showed them how great it was to worship God in many ways other than the standard. I know you guys sacrificed a lot of time, energy to help prepare, and for that Im so grateful. You did work in furthering God's kingdom and putting a seed of growth in each person that went's hearts. Thank you for your passion in speaking, and I know God will do great things in the future.

Prayer updates!

2006-08-09T10:07:00.000-05:00

Thanks for your prayers! Here are some updates:

Urbana - the team has been growing together very well even as spiritual attacks continue from paralyzing attacks that sent a member to the ER to more subtle attacks on security / identity. It is amazing to see God at work in all of us despite the spiritual warfare that we see going on in each other's lives.

Funding - after the first month of focused fundraising work I am at 15%! Thank you for your prayers! Do to a miscommunication - I need to be at 90% funding to be on campus full time, 80% is part time. Please pray that funds continue to go up.

Recoveries - two friends are out of the hospital from both cancer & labor complications. Thank you for praying!!

Planning for '06-'07 - first exec meeting with student leaders went extremely well and we established the small group structures. Tonight and tomorrow we will work on digging a little more into the details of our campus strategy. Also praise God for blessing us with what has been called 'the most thought through' campus strategy our supervisor has seen in a while.

Students Learn 3 Ways to Live

2006-08-09T09:49:00.000-05:00

Too often as Christians we fall into the trap of thinking that the ultimate objective is to become a better person. Church becomes a self-help group to 'get my life back on track' or 'get my God time for the week'. Recently, I spoke at an Asian American Youth Conference with Jean Kung: IVCF staff @ Wash U. The conference was hosted by Chinese Christian Church in STL and organized by one of the IV SLU students. We challenged the students to have a relationship with God; the real God, not the system of laws or rules that they have to follow that we often percieve as God. Friday we used marriage and dating as an analogy to approach Tim Keller's "Three Ways to Live":

1) irreligious: life apart from God; 'I am the master of my own life'
2) religious: seeing God as law; 'I obey so I am accepted'
3) gospel: worshiping the true God; 'I am accepted so I obey'

Over 30 people attended the conference including counselors / small group leaders. Jean and I returned the next day to lead them in a workshop; there had been a lot of teaching the other days in the retreat so we decided to give them a little practical workshop time to learn how to connect with God in ways that perhaps they hadn't. We led them in a time of seeking God from where they are including listening to Him, looking at how he's working in your life now, and just spending time with Him in general.

After the workshops many students had some great questions and struggles that I believe are excellent signs that they are well on their way to owning their faith. Thank you for your prayers!

Coversational Evangelism :: A Non-believers Perspective

2006-07-27T16:44:00.000-05:00

Recently, a good friend of mine who's not a believer accompanied me for an afternoon of conversational evangelism. He wrote a little essay on his experience, here's an excerpt:

As we walked down the park path, I recalled that we were reminded at the start of our journey not to force anything and let God do all the work. We are there to listen as well as to speak. Knowing that, it took a lot of pressure off of us. We walked for another five minutes and encountered a couple sitting on a bench. We politely approached them and asked if they would share their opinions on religion with us. Surprisingly, we got a very warm sounding "Yes!" I didn't actually expect anyone to talk to us that day. The next thing you know, we had been talking for an hour.

InterVarsity @ Harvard

2006-07-22T11:38:00.000-05:00

I was working on a presentation on my ministry to give at churches / large groups of people & started investigating some of the evidences of InterVarsity's ministry in recent years. I came across this article on Intervarsity's work @ Harvard - here is an excerpt:

Harvard United Ministry chaplain Jeffrey K. Barneson says Harvard has a reputation for being irreligious. “I get these calls from people saying, ‘Oh I’ve heard that Harvard is a godless place,’” he says.

This reputation may soon be no more. According to University President Lawrence H. Summers, the evangelical Christian community here at Harvard has grown significantly.

Speaking to prospective freshmen during prefrosh weekend, Summers said that the number of students at Harvard who identify themselves as evangelical Christians has doubled in the last decade.

Link to HRAACF - A chapter of InterVarsity @ Harvard

St. Louis - National Disaster Area

2006-07-20T22:20:00.000-05:00

Wednesday night, St. Louis experienced a freak storm with winds up to 90mph in some areas of the city. Power is out in so many areas around the city it is estimated to take up to 4-5 days to get most of the city back up and running. Today, the national guard was called in to evacuate residents without air conditioning due to a heat wave that has swept over the entire region.
This evening some friends and I canceled a BBQ we were planning and instead drove around the Tower Grove area of the city cleaning up fallen trees from the streets and people's property. The damage is pretty intense all over the city - even a 60 sq. ft. section of the airport roof got whipped up in the air and taken all the way to the highway. Please keep all of us St. Louis people in your prayers as we work to clean up and rebuild from the storm.

Prayer in St. Louis

2006-07-19T16:36:00.000-05:00

Today at 1:30p pastors, professors and other Christian leaders met at the America's Center - the future location of Urbana 2006. This winter over 25k college students and young professionals will come together right here in St. Louis to learn about God's heart for the world and to begin to learn how God has called each and every one of us to play a unique role in his kingdom. Before that happens, Intervarsity is partnering and praying with many different Christian communities here in area to prepare for the work God will do this winter. It was exciting to be immersed in this communiity of leaders, some old faces, some new, some from as far away as Kenya and Malaysia and many from right here in the city.

Please be praying for the Urbana Program Team & Operations Team that are meeting here this week flushing out the details of how everything will work and asking God what his will is for the content of the plenaries.
Meet the Urbana 2006 speakers

In other news today - I learned that Intervarsity & affiliated campus ministries are now in over 130 countries! Praise God!

Coversational Evangelism :: Who is Jesus?

2006-07-17T10:22:00.000-05:00

My church, The Journey, recently started a new ministry called "The Seventy-Two" which is a ministry focused on evangelism. I had made a commitment at ONS to take my student leaders out to experience conversational evangelsim; to go out and see the evidence of God working in other people's lives (believers or not), pursuing them as he pursues us. However, I knew that God needed to continue to grow my heart for this discipline as it really is something that's very difficult for me to get out there and do. It's amazing to me that on my first Sunday back in STL I hear about this new evangelism ministry and how they will be doing it every week. So in the nature of 'practice makes perfect' and that the best way to overcome your fear is to face it head on (with God right there with you I might add), I decided to start going on these weekly ventures to better my understanding of evangelism so God might use me to teach my students about it in the future.
During my first experience with "The Seventy-Two", I went and followed one of the two guys who had been doing this for the past couple months. It was an interesting experience as it was very different than the approach that I leared from York Moore a month ago. I left thinking I wanted to try York's meathod again - so the second time we met up (this past Saturday), I decided to go off by myself and have my friend Jason who come with me. The interesting thing is that Jason isn't a Christian but we are good friends and often talk about spiritual issues together. Jason gave me some great non-biased perspectives on how each conversation went and I was extremely greatful for his encouragement after each encounter.
We we ended up talking to a couple we met in Tower Grove Park and talked to them for about an hour. I learned all sorts of fascinating things about their background, beliefs etc... When Bill and Sandra hear the word 'religion' they think of things like: constriction, something that divides, man-made, and oppressive. They have similar thoughts about Christ and suggest that Jesus is just another myth in a history of myths, one of the oldest being Isis and Osiris. I was able to share the gospel with them and got their immediate impressions of it which was similar to their response to "religion". Most interesting to me was how different their view of Christ is to mine (if you read the tale of Isis & Osiris and the story of Jesus in the New Testiment you'll see what I mean). Also interesting was their desire to "find the truth - because somebody's got to be right and somebody's got to be wrong".
At the end of the conversation I felt like I had just made a couple friends and we exchanged contact information and look forward to getting some bubble tea together (Sandra really likes the tapioca candies in bubble tea =) and they've never been to STL Bubble Tea before!). Please continue to hold them in your prayers.

Interesting Conversations
-- snippet of a conversation between me and Jason earlier that day --
"... and it really struck me just how amazing it is that God connects with so many different peoples and cultures through the same gospel. At this black church I was at, the service was steeped in celebration for the freedom that Christ provides us from songs like "breakthrough, free for all, etc.." to dances that had repeated themes of throwing off chains and tearing through invisible walls. At the journey we focus more on the radical-ness of the gospel, how different Christ was and how we should be constantly approaching God so that we might be transformed into radical believers who God uses to change the world around them. At ACF (Asian Christian Fellowship) they love how the body of Christ is a tight community, intimately involved in each other's lives just as God Himself is a community: Father, Son and Holy Spirit (Elohim -- 'im' being the plural construct in Hebrew and name for God). "

-- snippet of a conversation with Bill and Sandra --
"... religion is oppressive and used to control people. Spirituallity on the other hand is something totally different. It is universal, inclusive vs. exclusive, truth, honest, pure and you're free to find your own path to God. There's no one to go through to get to God, you just go straight to God yourself. ... Who is God? Well he created us and everything here but then he gave us free will. He also controls everything to a certain extent - we don't know how but he somehow has his hand in what goes on. Who is he though? I guess I don't really know who he is."

Church & Para-Church

2006-07-05T09:56:00.000-05:00

Today I had a great meeting with Mike Duncan who will be running the Journey's college ministry next year. Intervarsity is a "para-church" organization. According to the wikipedia, a parachurch is "a vehicle by which evangelical Christians work collaboratively both outside and across their denominations to engage with the world in mission, social welfare and evangelism." which is more or less true. I think of my role with Intervarsity as a missionary sent to a college campus. There's often a lot of confusion that goes on between Church and Parachurch boundries in that the Church doesn't like the "fact" that parachurches are "stealing their college students" and the parachurch doesn't like the "fact" that Churches "aren't reaching the college campus / raising up real followers of Christ vs. 'sunday believers' ".
Truth be told we're both working toward the same mission and in service of the same God. The end goal of Intervarsity's work IS NOT to be a safe-haven / hang-out for Christian students BUT it's to see students learning how to witness to their friends while discovering & embracing the calling that God places upon their lives. This is, I believe, the same mission the Journey works toward if in a restricted context (college campus vs. everywhere). I look forward to partnering with the Journey in the future to ensure that students are getting the message that we need to be living our lives for God as a witnessing community vs. a personal sanctuary. Mike and I have committed to meeting at least monthly to look for opportunities to partner together in our work. Please keep us in your prayers.

Intervarsity's Church Partnership Website - about

Intervarsity's Community Impact:
-Jimmy Lee: Intervarsity alumni @ U of I is now serving on the president's council on Asian & Pacific Island initiatives
-Stuart Holt, IV alumni, started his own marketing company and serves now as director of The Evangelism Institute; training people to share their faith with others.
-Mark Charles, IV alumni, now serves as a missionary reaching the Navajo people

Intervarsity Church Relations:
-Vintage21: a new Church planted by some ex-Intervarsity staff
-City Lights: a missions project partnership between Intervarsity & New City Fellowship
-Memorial Presb. Church in STL: pastored by intervarsity almuni
-The Pink House: a center for urban ministry training

*picture from "The Journey - How to Respond to the World: sermon"

The Journey - New Building

2006-07-04T02:00:00.000-05:00

God has been at work @ my Church. Since I became a member 3 years ago, we've grown from ~100 to ~900 attenders; many of whom are non-believers who need to hear the Gospel. The Journey just got a new buildling - actually, our first (we didn't own the previous one) and it is quite a match with who we are.

A Church, as you may have heard, is the people & not the building... but... if our Church were to somehow magically transform into a building - this would be it. It's amazing to me how God has gifted us with a place that reflects in everyway who we are as a body of believers. True to the word / identity of God yet working to demonstrate how Jesus is not a God of the past but lives on even in today's culture.

I'm grateful for Jonathan's message this past Sunday on being a Church for the city; that we should be cautious to avoid being 'the new cool Christian group' but be committed to God's work in reaching those not like us. I'm reminded of how I heard small groups described at Intervarsity's New Staff Orientation: "[community] IS NOT a safe house for our well-being; rather, IT IS a residential home, a gathering place for the neighborhood where all are welcome to be part of the family".

Sadly, our culture has grown accustomed to churches saying, "You must look like we look and think what we think, not do what we don't do, and come to our building. Only then will we welcome you in to our community." The Journey is proud to stand against this attitude and engage people wherever they are with whatever they think. And since pubs and coffee shops are where people meet and hang out, it is the natural place for Midrash conversations.

Worship & Music

2006-07-04T01:18:00.000-05:00

Spent part of the weekend talking to Ray (student @ Washington University in STL) about worship & my hopes for working with the students @ St. Louis University. Worship is often one of the most misunderstood words in the Christian world (another highly misunderstood word is 'church' but that's another topic). Worship is often spoken of as 'more than just music' and 'a lifestyle'. Many say 'we [people] are created to worship'. What does it all mean?
Ha - like I can answer that question in a single blog entry! I will say that the Bible does give examples of worship as singing , dancing, and even a spiritual transformation... One thing is clear - worship is much more than we make it to be.

Practicing the discipline of Worship
Once I get on campus (which depends on how quickly I can raise my support funds) - I plan to work with the SLU worship team to push them to not only lead people in worship as a community but to develop a deeper understanding of what worship is and how it extends and impacts every aspect of their spiritual growth. One thing we will be doing together in addition to music is to venture out and do conversational evangelism. We will also look into God's text to better understand the truth behind worship and how to express it.

Memory lane
The conversation this weekend made me think of a friend in LA who is one of the few worship leaders I have met with not only a heart condusive to worship but also a temperment sensitive to the spirit in leading people to worship. He's also one fantastic guitar player and becoming an excellent doctor =). I found some old pictures that we took too - God bless ya bro as you work with your friend to start your new Church out in CA!

ONS - Small Group Pictures!!!

2006-07-04T01:00:00.000-05:00

patrick is shocked at my comments!!!

me & my small group in beautiful madison!

beth - yet another great iv staff working in intervarsity urban missions!

-> Intervarsity also has an urban missions project in st louis. Many SLU students have already gotten involved. We hope to send yet another group to city lights next spring for a whole week to see how God is at work in the city.

Conversational Evangelism

2006-06-30T12:14:00.000-05:00

What is conversational evangelism? I asked myself this as I eyeballed the 2 hour block on our schedules marked "Conversational Evangelism Practicum". That Monday morning, I got a sneek peek into our afternoon as York Moore, Intervarsity's director of regional evangelism talked to us about sharing the gospel.
Basically, conversational evangelism is the post-modern version of the dreaded 'contact evangelism'. Unlike in contact evangelism where the focus is on your ability to clearly communicate the message to as many people as possible - conversational evangelism focuses on the fact that God is already at work in non-believers around the world and it is our privilidge to go and participate in the harvest. It's "like a treasure hunt" as you talk to people and discover where God is already at work in their lives and help them to see that they are on a spiritual journey.
Staff paired up and went out seeking conversations with people around the downtown area and in those 2 hours we saw 4 people come to know Christ (and yes, they were directed to Churches in the area who can continue to disciple and welcome them into the kingdom) as well as nearly 100 presentations of the complete gospel.
Please pray for me as next year I hope to include conversational evangelism as one part of stretching the worship team at st. louis university towards a more wholistic view of what worship is.

Orientation for New Staff - Day 3

2006-06-21T23:49:00.000-05:00

It's the third day of orientation and I'm finally getting a chance to sit down and do a little writing to catch ya'll up on what's been going on. Orientation for New Staff (or ONS) has been a great experience so far. From learning about the history of intervarsity to studying scripture to talking about fundraising (yike...) - I think what I have enjoyed the most is getting to know some of the other ~100 new staff coming on this year.
It is very exciting to hear everyone's stories of how they came to be on staff and what they believe their callings to be. Day 2 focused on hearing and confirming our calling to staff and specific ministries we are working in. God prepares us all for a calling, a single vocation via the specific gifts and passions he has built into us and that vocation may span a number of jobs / careers. It's very affirming to me that God is soverign and that he has a purpose for us. Sometimes it can be too easy to think that we go it alone and God doesn't care about the work we do. We studied a scripture in Genesis 12 about how God called Abram and undeservingly decided to turn this unlikely nomad into the father of God's chosen people. As is often the theme - God uses the weak to do wonderful things so that in the end, God might be glorified by their works on earth.
Day 3 has focused on fundraising and partnerships, both with individuals and with the church. I learned some neat things about intervarsity's partnership with churches though some discussions with people in my small group. For example - intervarsity helped establish Vineyard church's mission arm. Intervarsity staff from 2100 productions also planted the vintage 21 church in NC. The more I learn about intervarsity the more excited I am to be a part of this kingdom buildilng movement. Speaking of partnership - I want to thank all of you who are currently praying / supporting me - without you guys we wouldn't be able to be nearly as effective as we are. Thank you!!!!

--> vintage 21 videos: a satire about the perceived Jesus in today's culture

Spa 101

2006-06-05T16:00:00.000-05:00

When I was in Seattle, my mom took me to a spa for the 1st time. I'd never really had interest in going to a spa before and honestly... I was a little uncomfortable being there. Let's face it - when people ask how I spent my afternoon I'd rather say I played some football or went skydiving or went to a band rehersal - going to a spa scores a 0.2 out of 100 on the 'manly things to do' scale. Never-the-less, since my mom already booked me a time slot, I was in.
Massage Pride
The first thing she'd signed me up for was a full body massage. The lady giving me the massage was very nice at explaining that sometimes the pressure she applies is too much for her clients and that I should tell her if it starts to hurt and she'll back down. Inside I smiled, surely this little lady can't push that hard. It wasn't but 15 min into the massage that I became the victim of an acurately placed elbow dropped right onto a pressure point in my upper back. Yes it hurt, it hurt like mad crazy. Call me a sucker for punishment or just call me proud but after spending a couple of afternoons getting pummeled by Kurt (former US National Team w/ Martial Arts) during a grappling lesson I wasn't about to tap out for this gal. So I gritted my teeth and took the punishment for an entire hour finally thanking her through clenched jaw and pridefully limping out the room. God has been working on my pride since I've ever been involved with intervarsity and though I'm getting better - I still have a "I can do anything" kind of attitude toward work which isn't always realistic =).
Facial Evangelism
My final experience at the spa was getting a facial. Yea, that's right I said facial - what of it? =0 I ended up having a great conversation with Erika (the woman giving me the facial) about her wanting to know more of who God is and desiring 'a spiritual component to [her] life'. So in the end the facial was very refreshing - more so because I felt renewed as I listened to her explain her experience at the Church she's going to and what she's thinking about God right now. I couldn't help but think of a young lady named Allison at SLU who's thinking many of the same things as Erika at this point in time. Please keep both of them in your prayers as I feel they are both eagerly peeking over the fence at Christianity.

Stefan & Rachel tie the knot

2006-06-05T15:39:00.000-05:00

So after dating for what seems like forever ... 4 years, 5 years? Stefan and Rachel are now officially Mr. & Mrs. Atay! I served with Stefan and Rachel on worship team my Senior year of college and it's so great to see their relationship grow. Stefan & Rachel are both strong Christians who's lives are greatly affected by their faith. During Stefan's own bachelor party (we were in the loop at the time) he took time out to go get a sandwich for a homeless friend of his & even spend some time with the guy before we moved onward to our next destination that evening. The two of them together treat each other lovingly and respectfully and are, as a couple, submissive toward God and His plan for their lives. It's very exciting to me to see what might happen in their future. Good luck you two and God Bless ya!

More pictures of the wedding...

Top 5 Dust Mask Don'ts

2006-05-25T20:47:00.000-05:00

Sanding down the wall of the Seattle house today I learned that when wearing a dust mask, one should never...

1. Try to blow the sawdust off the wall
2. Cough
3. Sneeze
4. Try to drink a coke
5. Burp (it lingers there with you)

The DaVinci Code

2006-05-25T10:58:00.000-05:00

Yesterday evening I went to see 'The DaVinci Code' - the movie. Somebody's going to win an award for it-dang great movie. During the movie I was torn between enjoying it for what it is and reacting to the intricate web of false history and bad theology that forms the foundation for the plot. Overall though, the story is every bit as good as they say it is (having not read the book yet - the book might be even better).
The thing about the movie that bothered me the most is probably their portrayal of God. In the movie, God is portrayed as an aloof superbeing that either doesn't have any real power or depends on people for one thing or another. In fact- the biggest lie in the whole film is that Jesus came for the betterment of mankind. The idea that God exists primarily to make life on earth better, make people better people and bring order and "peace" to the world leads us to a consumer point of view on God. It both masks the truth of our existence and leads to an unhealthy relationship with God. It puts God as the servant of man.
The truth is of course that we are servants of God and to worship God means to choose his will for us over our own. It is by God's grace and because he is a good God that his will for us includes maturing us into better people, and bringing mercy & justice into the world.

“Evidently some people are throwing you into confusion and are trying to pervert the gospel of Christ. But even if we or an angel from heaven should preach a gospel other than the one we preached to you, let him be eternally condemned! . . . I want you to know . . . that the gospel I preached is not something that man made up. I did not receive it from any man, nor was I taught it; rather, I received it by revelation from Jesus Christ” (Galatians 1:7-8, 11-12 NIV).

Intervarsity has posted a number of good articles about the movie:
-Urbana-DaVinci Code Article
-Campus Impact of The DaVinci Code

I love pho

2006-05-23T14:02:00.000-05:00

There's nothing like a good bowl of Pho =). For those who don't know what I'm talking about.. Pho = hot bowl of herby light broth with rice noodles & beef - a vietnamese staple!

Being a pho lover, I couldn't not eat at this hilarious restaurant I saw in Bellview (hint: Pho is pronounced "F-uhh"):

Mom: is this place good? what's their specialties?
Me: i've no idea, i've never been here before.
Mom: did one of your friends tell you about this place?
Me: nope.
Mom: why are we eating here again?
Me: look at the name! how can we not eat here??!? it's flippin' hilarious!

The first talk

2006-05-23T13:44:00.000-05:00

About 1.5 weeks ago - I gave my first talk at ACF Mini-Camp on the topic of 'Communal Worship'. I'd given a lot of public talks before but mostly on engineering subjects and never before a 'sermon' sort of lecture. Was I nervous? Of course!
I also think I was the target of many a spiritual attack going into it. My talk was supposed to be given the first evening but the students were running late and didn't all arrive until around 10pm (originally the talk was supposed to start around 8pm). So we ended up pushing the evening program back one day. That night my heat wasn't working in my cabin and my blankets etc... got locked in the large meeting room (so I couldn't get to them). So I ended up grabbing a series of cat naps in the car between 12am and 5:30am - finally deciding that I should just give up on sleeping all together. So of course I started getting a cold at that point due to exhaustion (the prev. day was a long one), temperature changes, and all the whispers of doubt and inadaquacy that were looming in my mind.
Praise God though that the talk seemed to go fairly well, despite my loopy-headed-ness. I'd structured most of the talk around me telling stories to make points and I do love telling stories.
The best part of the talk was probably the baby demonstration (Thanks Justin & Hollie!). I borrowed a little baby doll from my buddies, Justin & Hollie Powell, to use as an illustration of our relationship with God. I had the students instruct me on holding the doll as if I was holding a real baby. As you cradle the head and make sure the baby is looking / thinking / focused on you - so does God cradle our lives and direct our attention towards him and it is in that moment (when our eyes are on him) that we are at peace in our lives, even if our lives are not at that moment peaceful. After done with the illustration I had to put the baby back in the shoebox I had kept it in because well... baby dolls freak me out man. I can't stand the beady little eyes and the life-like-ness of the whole thing *ick.... *shiver.
Anyway - it was a blessing to see the students actually trying to apply much of the practical part of my talk throughout the rest of the retreat & onward into Catalyst (they were back to back ---> exhausting for staff!). Praise God for communicating the message despite my tiredness & fear of baby dolls. =)

How do those old people do it?

2006-05-23T13:35:00.000-05:00

So this year I've been working ~4 jobs (Boeing, Journey-College Ministry, IVCF-ACF/SLU, Urbana WT) and haven't had much time to go to the gym. Now that I've dropped 2 of those jobs and am on a short vacation in SEA visiting my mom, I thought I'd take this chance to get back to the gym. Now it may have something to do with me eating camp food like a hungry teen over the past week and a half but my heart was pounding after I'd only done a short warmup! In fact, I had to take a little break there because I was feeling a little dizzy!
Meanwhile, there were these elderly retired folks zipping about the gym doing a little here and there and generally being quite energetic. What the heck? Have I become so lazy that I will soon be passed up by those 50 years my senior? It doesn't help that while I'm home my mom wants to feed me like every day is thanksgiving. To top it off - Tammy Chi (God bless her crazy heart) signed me up for a triathelon in September... or is it August? Whenever it is - it's going to kick my butt.

Catalyst

2006-05-22T12:05:00.000-05:00

Last Friday marked the end of a week long leadership retreat for the central region called "Catalyst". The retreat was by invite only for students in Iowa, Missouri and Kansas with leadership positions in their chapters. The idea being, to lead this group through an experiential 5 day course on practical leadership, chapter development, and teamwork. Instead of just one or two staff planning and running an entire retreat, Catalyst was planned and run by the entire central region staff, taking advantage of all the staff's independent giftings.

I, as a newcomer to IVCF Staff, was very impressed with not only the quality of the teaching and programs but the quality of the students that were at the retreat. These were definitely students who shared a passion to serve in God's kingdom and were readily engaging each other in idea-storming and troubleshooting as well as shaping each other into more mature believers. Together they spent the week learning things such as spiritual disciplines, vision development & goal setting, evangelism planning and more; yet they soaked up all that like a sponge and seem eager to get back to their campus to apply it.

In addition to all of that - one of the staff experienced God's healing hand via some prayer late in the week. God healed her of some chronic hearing problems as well as her asthma!

This was the first of hopefully many collaborative retreats run by the central region. I can't wait to see what God will use us for in the future!

Urbana 06 WT Pictures

2006-05-08T22:50:00.000-05:00

Here are some pictures of the Urbana Worship Team for you to check out!

(yes, it is really as much fun as it looks like in the pictures!)

-jon

An apple a day

2006-05-05T15:31:00.000-05:00

Just a quick link to the most hilarious ads that mac has put out! If you're a mac lover, or if you just like funny commercials, you have to check it out!

apple ad

Praise God a Donor!

2006-05-04T22:17:00.000-05:00

Good news people! I just got my 2nd Donor! God has truly been great to me as the first Donor approached me about giving and I didn't even ask them! I did have my first donor meeting tonight though and it went very well - now I have 2 =). It feels good to start on it and make some progress. I am so grateful to both my donors for their trust in me & Intervarsity with their funds. I pray that we will not disappoint their investment but give God a great return on his money!

Secondly, I had dinner with my Dad & the President of International Business @ A. Bush Brewery! Talk about a jam packed evening. The Pres. is a pretty nice guy (as most business execs I've met so far seem to be). I even told him about Intervarsity's Catalyst event going on this summer and he seemed very interested in the work we're doing for the future leaders of tomorrow's corporate world.

For those that haven't heard of it - "Catalyst" is a week long leadership retreat targeting only student leaders in each IV chapter in the Central Region (this year there are 200+ students attending). The retreat will help them to develop skills in terms of teamwork, visioning and goal setting, and practically working towards those goals in partnership with each other. And the funnest part for me is that I get to help Betsy E - Urbana Worship Team Assistant Director, with leading worship =). Fun times people, fun times!

Speaking of Urbana, tomorrow is the start of practice session #4 for us. (I think it's #4 anyway) - keep us in your prayers! Thanks to everyone for your support & prayers!

Battle of the 'Gospel' Bands

2006-05-03T09:27:00.000-05:00

The other day I went to play with a couple of friends at one of their cousin's churches. Nobody seems to know what exactly the purpose of the evening is but we're supposed to play 1 or 2 songs. I figured we were opening up an evening service with a short time of worship so I was happy to go along... surprise surprise.

Okay, so it wasn't really "Battle of the Gospel Bands" but it sure felt like it. The entire evening was performance after performance by artists that had introductions like "is reknown around the world..." or "... you may have seen in the recent movie..." or "... is one of the most talented in st louis... " etc... I kept waiting for the man with the sparkly sequence pattern on his suit (yes, you read it right) to say into the mic "let's get ready to rumbleeeeeee....".

Culturally, I already felt a little out of place (which is okay, I'm used to it by now after years of moving around) but spiritually, I was getting all shook up - and not in a good way. I felt like it was an evening where artists should bring their 'A' game and show what they've got. As band after band was introduced and had their say (or song rather), I began to wish I was anywhere but there and when we finally ended up playing - truth be told, I really did not want to play at all.

I am however very grateful for Daryl Black - Urbana Worship Team leader and the leader of our little shindig that day. I was glad that throughout the weirdness of the evening he was able to almost seemlessly transition from what I felt was superficial music to an invitation to let the holy spirit work in your heart. I felt very comforted that dispite all the distractions of the evening he was still able to lead people in worship.

In retrospect, I believe that the event was to show an appreciation for the different artists in the St. Louis community and to try and pull a crowd of people to the church we were at. There were a large number of talented people there - the far majority of which I believe love and serve God to the best of their abilities. It's just interesting though that you can have so many worshipful people there and still miss worship by a long shot.

Transition

2006-05-02T20:32:00.000-05:00

My last day at work was last Friday and since then things have been crazily busy with numerous transitional materials. Whoever invented paperwork should be dragged out into the street and... well... let's just say that filling out forms and reading purpose statements is not my favorite pastime. I understand their purpose but I think there is certainly a line somewhere between usefulness and absurdity. I would just like to say, enroll in an insurance plan and not get a 200 page manual explaining everything in mindnumbing detail. Instead maybe they could send a CD database, or better yet, a flipbook =).

Alas there are a lot of firsts this week. I have my first fundraising meeting, prepping my first talk, my first time without a steady income, getting ready to send my first prayer letters etc... Please keep me in your prayers as the next couple weeks will be very busy.

Renewing Affirmation!

2006-03-26T21:12:00.000-06:00

Good news -- I got accepted onto Intervarsity staff!!!

After much praying, thinking and working - I've finally made it onto staff (offically start at the end of June) and I'm very excited. God has even confirmed the direction I'm moving in by:

1 - told my boss who was very encouraging and supportive. He offered to write me a reccomendation if I ever needed one, said I was always welcome back and gave me his contact #. This helped me with an unspoken fear that once I start IVCF I may be stuck there forever.

2 - another co-worker who had one time thought about going into the ministry work (in the end he didn't) was also very encouraging and believed I was making a good choice. He hopes to remain in contact and find out what happens.

3 - I was told not to start fund-raising yet but have already received a $500 donation from a friend! So very grateful (you know who you are) thank you again!

I'm thrilled to be given the opportunity to serve among the many passionate staff out there and work for something I'm very excited about. I can only pray that the future continues to be as encouraging as I know there are many barriers I will have to work though and trust God on. I believe that it will all only strengthen my faith by learning more about who God is as I trust him more obviously in the day to day.

Worth It All

2006-03-13T23:15:00.000-06:00

So I didn't hear from IVCF yet. They are having a meeting this Tuesday (3/14) to discuss my future prospects with them ... or not with them - we'll see. Though I would love a chance to work with them, I ended up visiting City Lights tonight and having a couple of good conversations with some students who were either rejoicing in God or going through a challenging period in their lives -- but one thing they had in common. They had a great desire to know and be known by God, to pursue a deeper relationship with him. Makes me think of a song I heard recently from a very talented woman at the Multi-Ethnic conference "Worth It All"

Now around every corner
And up every mountain
I'm not looking for crowns
Or the water from fountains
I'm desperate in seeking, frantic believing
That the sight of Your face
Is all that I need
I will say to You

It's gonna be worth it
It's gonna be worth it
It's gonna be worth it all
I believe this

So true.

If I get the privilege of being on IVCF staff or not - it's definitely been worth it all!

Also - 2 songs we did at LeFe for you to check out:
Urbana 06 - Con Mis Manos (mp3)
Urbana 06 - No Ay Nadie (mp3)

Urbana Promo Video Out!!!

2006-03-09T13:33:00.000-06:00

They recently released some online promo videos for Urbana and they're quite exciting ... if I do say so myself ;). Really - it's great to think about how many students this will potentially impact and I have to add that I'm happy the topic is "You have a calling" for this year. I've seen so many students who greatly desire to find out just what their calling is.

Click here to go to the videos!

My personal favorite (there are a couple) is the "You have a calling" one!

Praises @ La Fe

2006-03-09T07:41:00.000-06:00

From the organizer of La Fe this year...

Thank you so much for your prayers for our recent Northern California La Fe Conference. Latino students were blessed! God moved in so many ways!!!

- Everyone traveling from LA and around the country arrived safely, Praise God!

- All 57 students arrived safely. Praise God!

- About 15 students (so many hands went up I could not count them all) made commitments or recommitments to Christ, Praise God!

- Worship had been a big need for this conference in the past. This year the Urbana worship team came and ministered to us in a culturally appropriate way. On Saturday night they invited the students to come to the altar and worship God in freedom. Everyone left the pews and at the altar jumped, danced, lifted their hands and their voices in worship of God. It was a wonderful picture. Praise God!

- Many miracles happened Friday before the conference even started. I know they were responses to your prayers. Praise God!

One Example:
Since our conference was at a church we needed to move Sunday because of the church services. I had put in a request for a room on the Berkeley campus a couple weeks prior. The Friday of the conference I found out that our request had been rejected. We were not informed prior. I started to think and to pray and subsequently use up all my day time cell phone minutes. I thought of the Westminster House, a place we had used before. However when one calls the Westminster house their phone directory is set up in such a way that you need to know the name or extension of he person you are call, or you just leave a general message. That would not help me. I thought of other options. My supervisor called again and hit a random number and it was the reservations desk! He came running handing the phone to me and I told the person what we needed and it was taken care of immediately. God opened the door for us. Praise God!

There is so much more I could say about the fellowship, the food and the fun. It was a ministry to our students, it was a ministry to my soul. I trust that the Lord will allow our paths to cross soon, there is so much more I could say.

----------
La Fe is a group of Chicano/Latino students exploring God, our Faith,
and the experiences of our People

"Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world, but be
transformed by the renewing of your mind." Romans 12:2

Back in the Lou

2006-03-04T17:17:00.000-06:00

What a trip! So glad to be back and yet so sad to leave. California is a rockin' place for anyone who's never been. Even though we didn't see much of it (we were pretty busy) the weather, scenery and people were all very very cool.

First stop... San Francisco & La Fe!
La Fe was an awesome experience and a joy to be a part of. We were there from Friday through Sunday at the 3rd Latino Ethnic-Specific Ministry conference. Latino students from around the country came to SF and were highly encouraged by not only getting to meet other Latino Christians of varying maturity but explored together what it meant to follow Christ. I personally was impressed by the genuine excitement that poured out of the students during praise and worship and also afterwards in their community. God took care of us as our team overcame many technical challenges of malfunctioning equipment, missing luggage, and lost equipment.

Second Stop... Los Angeles & Multi-Ethnic Conference!
The ME conference blew my mind away on so many levels. I had never before seen so many people of such diverse backgrounds who were all on fire for God and desiring to learn / care / work together! IVCF did a brilliant job at creating an environment that was a combination between a working group, racial reconciliation powerhouse, and seminary class! Members of the Urbana Team not only learned more about IVCF's history of working through tough experiences with racism, cultural clashes etc... but also were highly encouraged by the interactions of the people there. Seeing them work through tough situations on both the individual and community level.

God also provided much guidance in our ministry as the team saw the fulfillment of a vision God had given to one of our members and answered our prayers for the conference by bringing healing and empowering to a hurt population. God also walked our team through a lot of learning about each other musically and personally - allowing us to do our best in a high pressure situation [ only 1/2 the team could make this debut to staff from around the nation including the president of IV & many cabinet members ].

The Interview
While I was away in LA, I had an interview with Intervarsity for a Staff position in St. Louis. It was probably the best interview I've ever had. The two staff that interviewed me were very receptive and easy to talk and I was able to answer all their questions honestly and clearly. I even told them about what I dreamed to do if hired and what I really desired to see happen and they seemed interested by those ideas instead of turned off by something they didn't want to deal with. I'm highly encouraged and know that whatever they decide will be telling of God's will for me.

Stressed am I?

2006-02-22T22:11:00.000-06:00

So much has gone on this week. I feel like I should be stressing out - but I don't think I am. What with my Dad going to the hospital - multiple friends going through some rough patches in their lives, social justice issues stretching my discernment, discipleship stuff and on top of it all this Friday morning I'm off to CA to lead worship with the rest of the Urbana team @ LeFey and Multi-Ethnic Ministry conferences. Phew!

Community group tonight was such a blessing, to be a part of such a great group of people who are still getting to know each other. It's great to have a strong Christian Community you can count on for prayer and support. I'm very grateful for God connecting us together and bringing us all to the same Church and same group.

That's it for now - I'll try and keep things updated while on travel but I'm not sure of the internet access right now. Please be praying for us!