Common Prayer & Scripture

Bible Study at the Community House

Scripture and Prayer are key foundations to our Christian Faith, but if you see the reality of how we do church and fellowship, often prayer is the thing that is the first to go or we don't do enough of it.  

This semester, we did something quite different and risky.  Instead of having the traditional bible studies that are only full of Christians, we decided to let prayer shape our community.  

After days at a prayer retreat, we all felt that we needed to pray more.  So we decided to not formally offer bible studies at the beginning and lead multiple prayer meetings instead.  The result was that our students are spending more time in their classmates and friends lives.  It's bringing up more questions about faith and Jesus while creating a deeper longing and desire to be changed and transformed by Jesus for themselves.  It is from this that 2 investigatory bible studies have been started with students.  One is from a Muslim background and another who is Agnostic.  With the potential of a 3rd one for a PhD Engineering student.

Please continue to join us and pray that we as IVCF SFU will have all things in common.  Pray the common prayer meetings and pray for the common scripture that we would all be able to have "things in common" to be a witness to the SFU Campus.  

Upcoming Events and Prayer Requests

Upcoming Events

• Vacation in Toronto - July 17 - August 4
• Preaching at Father's House - August 14
• Staff & Student Prayer Retreat - August 24 - 26
• Student Leadership Camp - August 26 - 31

Students & Campus

• Pray for all the SFU students post VUP as they discern how to integrate their experiences back into campus and life.
• Pray for our graduating students:  Anika, Andy, Abraham, Christina as they are launched into the world
• Pray for Julianna as she is going to be in Montreal for the IVCF Internship.
• Pray for Alan Thorimbert with his transition to SFU and his fundraising.
• Pray for the Community House that they will be able to secure a place.
• Pray that God would give the student leaders and staff a vision for this upcoming year at SFU.
• Pray for my fundraising as I am about $1000/month short this year.

Personal

• Pray for my continued growth as a leader.
• Pray that April would be able to secure more full-time work in counselling.
• Pray for both April and I as we continue to journey together in marriage.
• Pray that I would be motivated to exercise more.
• Pray for the right timing in which God chooses to bless us with a family.
• Pray for continued support and discernment around our own respective ministries with the church.

Praise Item

• Praise the Lord that April and I are receiving new life and understanding of each other.
• Praise the Lord for the desire of the community house to come up.
• Praise the Lord for providing a new staff partner Alan Thorimbert

You Learned to Do "Nothing"?

Local's playing Chess and Chinese Chess at Carnegie Hall

Some of you don't know this about me, but I love playing chess.  My dad taught me when I was younger and I fell in love with it.  I was even a part of the chess team for 4 years during high school.

Chess has been a bit of a lost hobby of mine.  I miss it, but as I have done VUP, this passion for chess started to come out again.  I remember going to Carnegie Hall, getting a $1 membership and borrowing a chess board.  I would set up the chess board and sit an wait at one of these tables for a challenger.  After about 5 minutes, someone came and started playing.  After we play a game (which I often lost at), we set up again and play another round.  Before we knew it, 2 hours have passed by.  I don't necessarily know this person's name, but what I do know is that we shared a bond and connection over a common interest.  I created space out of my "busy" schedule to simply be available to play a game of chess with someone.  Did it lead anywhere?  Maybe not, but in a world where we are forced to be "productive" with every part of our time, it's times like these that are often missed and are often needed the most.

This idea of doing "nothing" in the DTES is known as Stooping.  Stooping is more from the word stoop which could either mean bow down (stoop to someone else's level) or the front porch of a house.  We are using it for the later.  The stoop is where people hang out to just be available to meet and talk with people who come by.  So basically, it's less to do with doing "nothing" and more to do with being present in the places where you are.  This is something that we did in excess during VUP this year.

My Stooping ground was at Carnegie Hall with all the chess guys.  I would walk in at around 12:00 and there I would see about 4 of the same guys playing chess together each day.  What I did was grab an open seat and simply just watch multiple games of chess (which some of these guys were incredible at), make the occasional comment, and laugh at the banter that was going on back and fourth.  After a week, I became a familiar face and they started asking me questions and having some interesting conversations from those questions.

I'll say now, even if they didn't ask me a question, I would still do it.  The reason being is because I just enjoy playing/watching chess and I also believe Jesus calls us to simply be present in people's lives.  Being present doesn't mean you need to have everything planned or organised, sometimes being present just means that you need to be around for a longer period of time.

As we think about what we are doing on campus with regards to stooping.  I feel that the community house has now been confirmed in our students hearts.  This idea of stooping on campus not only means to be "like furniture" up there but some are responding to a deeper call to live up on SFU campus.  This very act and decision flies in the face of the commuter mentality and I can only imagine what this faithfulness is going to translate to be this upcoming year.

Wait... Where are you taking me?

Jesus, full of the Holy Spirit, returned from the Jordan and was led by the Spirit in the wilderness

Luke 4:1

With the theme's of lament being very clear during VUP, I asked my friend Steve Schalm to see if he could come and share on being led by the Spirit and lead our prayer meeting.  After much conversation and convincing, he agreed, but when the day came for him to come and speak, he came down with a mysterious sickness that took him right out for the whole day.  I found myself in an awkward situation where I had little planned and organised and I needed to lead my VUP students on this prayer time.

This was a situation where I needed to be "led by the Holy Spirit."  With the original plan not working, I needed to come to Jesus myself and ask "Where do you want to take these students?"  I soon received from the Spirit that I needed to send the students out on a prayer walk to be aware and sensitive to where the Spirit is also taking them.  After sharing stories and experiences of some crazy encounters of being led by the Holy Spirit, I gave them these instructions:

1.  Break off into groups of 2

2.  Go out together into the neighbourhood.

3.  Pray as you walk and be open to where the Spirit is leading you.

4.  This is most likely going to be weird.

After an hour, we came back and debriefed about the experience.  To our surprise, we heard of stories on how the Spirit was leading students to walk in certain directions, go to locations, talk with women who are wearing green dresses, pray for specific people.  These are all strange, I know, but they all had a reason.  The group that followed the spirit in this way was led down an alleyway and found a couple of books that reminded them of their childhood.  They were then led to the Sunday street market where they talked to two women.  One of them they felt the Spirit compelling them to say she was beautiful.  She responded by saying that she really needed to hear that.  Another women they felt compelled to say that Jesus is with her and that she'll never be alone.  They found out from her that she was going to be bedridden for the next month with no one around.  From there, they offered one of the books that they found for her to read.

Can I logically explain how the Holy Spirit works?  No, definitely not.  What I do know is that we fill our lives so much with asking Jesus for things that we rarely take the time to listen to what He might be actually trying to say to us.  

Campus Gathering 2016

This theme of being led by the Spirit kept coming up at Campus Gathering 2016.  I had the privilege of hearing the origin story of the Korean Christian Fellowship (KCF) ministry.  It started with a few faithful students who had a desire to see the lost found.  These few students came together to pray... No intention, no plans, no agenda.  Just to pray and be led by the Spirit.  After a year, the few students grew to about 250.  It's not about the numbers, but about the faithful following of where the Spirit is leading them.  

My hope and prayer for the SFU campus is that our students would faithfully follow the Spirit's leading for them to be fully committed followers of Jesus Christ.

The Art of Lament

Reconciliation without lament cheapens hope. 

To be deeply bothered about the way things are is itself a sign of hope. 

It is crucial to remember that lament is not despair or a cry into a void.  Lament is a cry directed to God.  Lament is prayer. 

Through lament we come to that hard place of knowing that we cannot "achieve" reconciliation.  It is always a gift from God.

Reconciling All Things.  Emmanuel Katongole & Chris Rice.  Pg. 88, 89

During VUP, we started off the first week with the prophets.  In general, the prophets talk a great deal about lament.  Specifically around injustice that God's people are doing to each other.  I remember as we were talking about being prophetic, students would be showing and displaying their dissatisfaction.  Canadian things like:

"I don't want to disappoint people."
"I don't want to make people feel uncomfortable."
"That's not a nice thing to say."

As I listened to this along with about 10 other reasons, I realised that our millennial generation does not know how to be prophetic because there is an avoidance of lamenting, grieving, and truth telling.
The week progressed and we heard from numerous speakers and studied various passages.  One passage that stuck out was from Jeremiah 29.  I was shocked to hear that as we studied this, we landed on the reality that us as Canadians are more aligned with the Babylonians and in some ways, we are worse than the Babylonians.  As we landed, I could see some of the distress and confusion in my students faces.  Some of them started accepting this reality while others tried to talk about something completely different.

The following week, we focused on the life of Jesus.  We wanted to go out of lament and into hope, but it seemed like the Holy Spirit had other plans for us.  Crisis' came throughout the week that forced us to see and acknowledge the brokenness and privilege around us.  Talks around sexuality and pornography were particularly striking.  Instead of focusing on the life of Jesus, we had to come face to face with our privilege and lament over the brokenness that our Canadian and societal culture has caused to women and our indigenous brothers and sisters.  Following these conversations and realisations, came tears, anger, frustration, personal repentance, corporate repentance, etc.  Students and staff were in tears almost daily.  They were calling each other to pray for them as they lamented over these tough realities.

The final week we focused on the movement of the Holy Spirit in the church.  What we found interesting in this is that more crisis came up.  Yet, this time it felt different.  The students and staff chose to accept that things were broken.  They embraced the sadness and felt the pain.  Then, as they felt the pain, they turned to Jesus as the one that has authority over all of this brokenness.  It was beautiful!  A community of believers lamenting over injustice together and coming to Jesus together.  This came out through prayer walks of being led by the Holy Spirit; The Beauty and the Brokenness Project in inviting our friends and families to experience the journey from lament to joy.

Even though the situations around us didn't change all that much.  We came to a deeper sense of joy and hope in Christ's Gospel of Reconciliation for this world.  The fact that we continue to lament and lament well has enabled us to receive true hope in Christ and what he died for.

I came out of VUP with a greater hope that as we (the millennial generation) learn how to lament well with our other brothers and sisters, it will enable us to be seeking a much deeper level of what this Kingdom of God is supposed to look like here on this earth.

From Loneliness to Solitude

I would have to say that these past 6 months, I have not been doing well.  I was experiencing a great deal of tiredness and sadness.  Feeling extremely burnt out and in a place where I just couldn't experience joy anymore.  I know this was also tough for April too as she was wrestling with work and feeling quite helpless to help me but also frustrated that I am not well.

Thank goodness for this past week where we were able find space, away from each other, and come to Jesus personally.  For me it was at Emerging Leaders where I remembered who Jesus was and the reason why I keep denying myself for His sake.  I had to move from Loneliness to Solitude which physically, looks identical but are very different.  Loneliness, Jesus is no where to be seen, felt, or heard.  Jesus is absent.  Solitude on the other hand is the constant presence of Jesus.

I also came to a place where there was a great deal of unforgiveness in my heart towards April.  I didn't realize how much it was affecting me until I was practicing the discipline of Sabbath and attempting to rest.  I realized at that moment that this unforgiveness was one of the major barriers that was preventing me from loving my wife and also from resting.  I repented right there and then.

During all of this, April was also going through a bit of a realization.  She had multiple conversations with friends in which she shared her frustrations.  It was then her friends were able to reflect back to her around some of her "unreasonable" expectations.  She in expected me to be an intellectual (I'm not really one).  She expected me to be a respectable leader and to be always well (which I am but I'm not always well).  Over this week, these realizations she had, she was realizing how tough it was on me and she also had to come to a place of forgiving me and repentance of these places.

In short, we both had to repent of our unforgiveness of each other.  This has been an answer to prayers of all our friends, family, and supporters, as well as our very one ones.  It has only been a couple of days, but we've been experiencing a deeper sense of joy and peace for each other and we give Praise to Jesus for this experience.

We continue to welcome and covet your prayers and support.  If you would like to hear more specific details on my Emerging Leaders and April's week, we would love to share it with you more.

Shattering Old Traditions and Rules.

A Modern Day Fable

A group of scientists placed five monkeys in a cage, and in the middle, a ladder with bananas on top. Every time a monkey went up the ladder, the scientists soaked the rest of the monkeys with cold water.  After a while, every time a monkey would start up the ladder, the others would pull it down and beat it up. After a time, no monkey would dare try climbing the ladder, no matter how great the temptation. The scientists then decided to replace one of the monkeys. The first thing this new monkey did was start to climb the ladder. Immediately, the others pulled him down and beat him up. After several beatings, the new monkey learned never to go up the ladder, even though there was no evident reason not to, aside from the beatings. The second monkey was substituted and the same occurred. The first monkey participated in the beating of the second monkey. A third monkey was changed and the same was repeated. The fourth monkey was changed, resulting in the same, before the fifth was finally replaced as well. What was left was a group of five monkeys that – without ever having received a cold shower – continued to beat up any monkey who attempted to climb the ladder. If it was possible to ask the monkeys why they beat up on all those who attempted to climb the ladder, their most likely answer would be “I don’t know. It’s just how things are done around here.”

Every culture, church, fellowship, workplace, household, family, friends group, etc has its unspoken traditions and rules that they follow almost like the monkeys.  Even we have unspoken traditions that we follow also.  These rules and traditions are set in place for most likely good purposes.  But when do these rules and traditions become hindrances for us as we try to follow Jesus and bring the Kingdom of God to this earth?

When I came to SFU 5 years ago, I would hear stories of SFU being the campus of death or it's really hard to do ministry up there.  In the IVCF realm, I would hear from staff not so good things about the SFU campus.  Things like:

• No one from SFU would go to MARKwest 
• No one is interested in GUPs or the Internship
• No one will go to Urbana
• It is impossible to do community there because it's a commuter campus.  

As I heard these reasons from both my friends and peers, I kept wondering, "Why?"  Why is it so difficult? So I went in with the mindset of, "I'm going to prove you ALL wrong!"  I'll be honest, I thought I was going to be doing great things, and God did some incredible things in and through me.  But, I don't attribute these following growth and numbers to what I have done.  Fortunately for me, God seemed to have the same mindset in proving everyone wrong.  All the glory to God.

In response to the tradition of not attending MARKwest:

2011 - 7 SFU students went to MARKwest

2012 - 12 SFU students went to MARKwest
2013 - 20 SFU students went to MARKwest
2014 - 21 SFU students went to MARKwest
2015 - 30 SFU students went to MARKwest
2016 - 45 SFU students hoping to go to MARKwest

In response to the tradition of not going to Urbana:

Urbana 2012 - 7 SFU students went to Urbana
Urbana 2015 - 20 SFU students went to Urbana

In response to GUPs

• 2011 - 1 SFU student went to China
• 2012 - 2 SFU students went to VUP
• 2013 - 1 SFU student went to VUP
• 2014 - 2015 - 0 SFU students went on GUPs
• 2016 - 6 students are applying to go on VUP & 1 student is doing a DTS with YWAM.

In response to the IVCF Internship

1 student (Julianna Lei) from SFU is applying to the IVCF internship

In response to the commuter campus and the lack of community

• We are going to be doing everything on campus now.
• Fall 2016 - The first IVCF SFU Community house is hoping to be on campus.

Looking at these numbers and the quality of students that I have the privilege of being with.  I think God is trying to say something here to me and also everyone who is reading this.  I think God is saying that whatever rules, traditions, mindsets, expectations, systems, etc, God is not bound to these things.  God is above and beyond these things that we tell ourselves to believe and I believe, he LOVES proving us wrong and showing how narrow-minded we really are.  Even when I look at these numbers, I realize, God is going to prove me and everyone wrong again.

I believe that this is ONLY the beginning.  I look forward to sharing with you stories of people students coming to faith monthly, weekly, even on a daily basis!  I look forward to sharing with you how the SFU campus culture is being shaped by God's work through the IVCF Community.  God is not done yet.  He is only beginning!

This old mindset of SFU is dead now and has no right to be here anymore.  God is choosing to use faithful students, staff, and donors (you), and he wants to show each of us and the world what He is capable of doing and that He is worth following.  

My dear friends and family, I am happy and honoured to be a part of God's mission and I hope that you feel the same way knowing that you are sowing into building the Kingdom of God at SFU through your prayers and financial support.  Keep praying, keep supporting, and pray some more, because God is not done with this.  He is only beginning.