Saturday, October 20, 2012

A Weekend in Warsaw [First College-Age Conference in Poland]

Last weekend, I had the privilege to attend the first ever College-Age Conference in Warsaw, Poland, with 5 other dear university students from the UK. It was an awesome time of enjoying the Lord, being blended, and being built!

We began our trip Friday morning by gathering together at Stratford station in London. Our Ryanair flight was a brisk 2-hour flight that was followed by another 4-hour trek along the streets of Poland. We were squeezed unto a shuttle, got a rucksack (the British term for "backpack") strap stuck in the train, exited through emergency exits on the underground, and given a massage in the bus. Then, we got greeted by two Polish university students, Mira and Michael, who came out to meet us at the bus stop. Praise the Lord! One thing I've realized through this adventurous journey through Poland is that whatever the situation and the environment, it's so good to be able to spend it with saints and to see the saints!

The conference began that same night we arrived in Poland. The messages, of course, were given in Polish. I was impressed that the ones who were doing the translations were university students (Bartek and Lukas) who were close to our age. They did an excellent job as we felt that we weren't left out of the burden that was being shared throughout the conference. By the way, the subject of the conference was "Being a University Student in Truth, Life, Church and Gospel."

Along with attending the conference, we were allotted one hour to share concerning the campus work in London this past semester. It was so good to be able to overflow from our experiences of the Lord blessing us this past week and pass on the burden to the Polish students. Here's a highlight of some of our sharing: (1) A history of the student work in London (students rising up to take care of the campus work), (2) relying on the members of the Body in the matter of our burdens, (3) a personal experience of picking up a burden for contacts, (4) praying before every event, activity, or work, (5) coming together to pray and coordinate with one another to receive the Lord's blessing and (6) realizing that we are not merely tools, but vessels in God's economy and that our primary function is to be filled with Christ as life and that all our work is simply an overflow of this life.

So, there were 24 total student attendees this weekend (18 Polish and 6 UK). What I was most impressed was that these students were ready to pick up the burden right away. All they really needed was a gentle nudge that, yes, they can pick up the burden for their own campuses. Many of them were church kids who have been stored up with a rich deposit of truth and life. The few that were recently saved are burning for the Lord and have already had some experiences of bringing others to Christ. I was also impressed how eager the serving ones were longing to pass the driver's seat to the students in the matters of the campus work. We are witnessing a strong beginning amongst the university students in Poland!

Okay, so that was a brief recap of the trip, and for the other parts of the trip, I'll let the pictures tell the story. Enjoy:

Part of our 4-hour trek through Poland. Underground station.

Priceless.

The following day, we took a beautiful hike through the woods in Warsaw.

Hard to find such beauty in the busy streets of London.

Polish students coordinating our post-conference Warsaw tour. How cherishing!

The UK 6. Left to right: Raymond, myself, Tim, Aurora, Ela, Kennedy.

Old Town, Warsaw trip. Walking along the wall.

There's no such thing as a tour without a group picture! Blocking half of the archway so that we can preserve the sweet memories with the Polish students!

Another picture along the wall.

The cherry on top of the conference. Stopped at a chocolate shop in Old Town, Warsaw.
See more pictures on facebook!

Year 7-13 Conference Recap

Hello y'all, you are lucky today -- you will be getting a double-header. Two weeks ago there was a conference for the young people around the UK at Bower House. I'll just give a brief recap of the burden that was shared that weekend. Next post (which will also come out) is about the first College-Age Conference held in Warsaw, Poland. Stay tuned.

The subject of this last Year 7-13 Conference was on a Normal Fruit-Bearing Life. The main line of burden was that we, as young people in this age, would realize who we are. To begin with, we are man created in God's image for the purpose of containing Him. But we are more than just man. We are also believers, and when we believed, we received God's life into us. As believers we are three things -- salt, light, and branches.

Matt 5:13-14 says that "You are the salt of the earth..." and that "You are the light of the world..." What does it mean to be salt and light? Salt has two unique functions: (1) it kills germs, and (2) it preserves. A good picture of this is fish. Once you kill a fish, it automatically begins to stink due to the decaying germs. Thus, many fishermen put salt with fish. This kills all the germs on the fish and preserves the fish so that it can later be fresh for food. This decaying fish is like the world around us -- stinking and decaying. We as believers in the world serve this kind of function as salt, of killing and of preserving. However, there is a danger. The danger of salt is that it can lose its salting function. As salt, we have to be careful not to lose our saltiness. How can we preserve our salting function? Lot's wife became a pillar of salt (and lost its salting function) because she looked back. Lot and his wife were probably somewhere in between Sodom and safety (maybe halfway?), but happened to turn around. The reason why she looked back was because her heart was still towards Sodom. She was not a 100%, absolute Christian but a halfway Christian. We must make sure that if we want to fulfill God's purpose we have to be absolute Christians, a full one-hundred percent. For this, we need to have a fresh love towards the Lord.

As light of the world, our function is to bring light to this darkened world. This world is full of darkness and chaos -- no one is clear of his direction. However, as light of the world, there is a danger as well. The danger is not that we lose our light. As believers our salting and shining function is not anything of our own. It is a natural capacity that issues from the divine life that we have received from God. However, there is a danger that we can cover this light, and hide it under a bushel. A bushel is a unit of measurement and it typifies the worries and anxieties of our life. When we are bound by the same worries that unbelievers faced, we can cover our light. As young people in this world, we are faced with many anxieties in life. Following the latest fashion. Getting the newest shoes. Etc... All these anxieties and worries in life make us no different from the unbelievers and covers our light under a bushel. For this, we need to talk to the Lord. We need to let the Lord know all our thoughts. Phil. 4:6 says "In nothing be anxious, but in everything, by prayer and petition with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known to God." We should let the Lord know everything, even of our worldly woes.

I'm realizing that this post is getting longer than I thought it'll be, so I'll save the branches for a later time. The conference was an exhausting but exhilarating time nonetheless. I thoroughly enjoyed enjoying the Lord with my dear young people, and hope that these ones will be the ones to join our generation in bringing the Lord back. Amen, Lord, come quickly!


Four dear Year 7 brothers who were baptized at the conference. From left to right: Jordan, Ryan, Daniel, and Joseph.

Wednesday, September 26, 2012

Commanding the Lord's Blessing by Taking the Blended Way

I cannot describe with adequate feeling what the past two weeks have been like. Wednesdays (today) are all-London coordination meeting at Bower House. And having finished coordination at its regular time, we ended up coming back around 4 PM. That's when it hit. I have not been back home this early, ever, for the last two weeks or so. It's been a crazy, yet, such a rewarding time. There's no room for tiredness. There's no time for yourself. The Lord is moving, and if we are not following Him, we may miss our opportunity to participate in such a privileged time!

We are so blessed to be in the Lord's recovery, and to be in His recovery today. I have to admit, a few weeks ago, I was blind in how much the Lord is moving, especially here in Europe. The Lord truly desires to expedite His coming, and for that, He needs to gain this land as a testimony against the age.

Enough of my excited rambling. Let me give you a few reports. Over a thousand bibles, one-thousand one-hundred thirty-six to be exact, have been given out this past week to university students here in the London area. This is something beyond what every one of us have been expecting. We are not doing anything particularly special -- no drama, no rock band, no nothing. Just lovers of Christ, passing out the Word of God.

So, to be honest, I don't know why so many university students have been coming to our teeny table standing in the end of the sidewalk, asking for Bibles. Actually, scratch that, I think I may know of a crucial element that played a key role in creating such a hunger for the Word:

The Lord blesses the oneness, which is brought in by taking the blended way. We are not here just to carry out a successful campus work with structured organizations. We are here to build up the Body of Christ.

Prayer and fellowship time at the bookshop.
It all started out when a few dozen saints - students, full-time serving ones, and community - came to a small bookshop on Pentonville Road to enjoy the Lord together and pray for His move amongst the universities in London. Many paid not-a-small price in coming, time-wise and money-wise. 

So, I can try to analyze every single element in our Fresher's distributions, but I think just showing some pictures would be most entertaining.

Our first distribution. At the Westminster campus - 52 Bibles.
Queen Mary! This is the university where I'll be studying for the semester - 60 Bibles (ran out of Bibles). No picture, but South Bank distributed 80 Bibles before running out as well.
Sorry for the blurry picture -- after our double-hitter Wednesday (day we distributed at two campuses at the same time), we had a welcome dinner for the new ones. Food and fellowship was great! - Approx. 10 new ones or so.
Thursday @ University of Greenwich - 127 Bibles. We didn't run out of Bibles this time...because we got a second load! More Bibles were distributed on Friday as well.
Welcome Dinner @ University of Greenwich - 5 new ones or so. Another time of much enjoyment and really, really good food. There was also a second welcome dinner on Friday with more new ones!
Kingston on Friday. Kingston distributed 700 Bibles in total for the entire week! Amazing!!
Saturday Picnic @ Greenwich Park
Tuesday @ Brunel. 144 Bibles (ran out again) given out in 4 hours or so.
Brunel Welcome Dinner with 7 (or 8?) new ones. Again, really great food. We forgot songbooks so we just decided to sing verses from the Bible. Awesome time of fellowship.

Not to say that the Lord will not bear fruit this year, but even if we bore no fruit, I feel that there has been such a strong building up amongst the students here in London. And not just amongst the students, but with the full-time serving ones as well as the community saints. I truly believe that the Lord will grant us some remaining fruit this year. It's been an awesome opportunity to be part of such a laboring, paying a price for one another - praying for one another's campuses, going to each other's campuses, etc.. Blending really takes place when we are enjoying the Lord together, and there is no better way to enjoy the Lord together than singing with one another in the middle of the street!

And the things is, we are not finished yet! We are tackling one more campus twice this week, granting us two more days of blending with one another. The Lord is itching to gain more ground!

Monday, September 17, 2012

Greetings from London!

Hello there! It's been a while, a very looong while. I apologize. I have to admit that this last spring, I got a little burnt out and lost my motivation to blog, so I took a small hiatus. But I'm back now...on the other side of the pond! That's right, I'm currently on the other side of the Atlantic Ocean in the other "United" country (the UK). I'll be taking this next semester off to study at Queen Mary University. I actually have been in Europe since the end of August, but have been very occupied with other sorts of things. Like what? You may ask. Well, mainly traveling to many different cities around Europe to visit the saints.

I would really love to talk about every single event and city, but if I did, I would bore you to death. So, I'll let some pictures do the talking. They say that a picture is a thousand words right? So, I'm still writing a lot, just in different media. Enjoy:

Bower House. Our family took hospitality close to the Bower House. This is the training center where the Lord has been actively moving the last few months through the Bible distributions.

Buckingham Palace. Of course, our family had to do the touristy stuff around London. I'll post more pictures in a future blog, maybe. But for now, this will suffice.

Amanatrust bookshop and cafe.

The Kang's. Our families have known each other for a while. Brother Newman used to serve at San Diego before migrating here to London. This is right in front of Bower House.

Our journeys then led us north to the land of the Scots! This is up a hill in Edinburgh with our dear brother Haggai Kim.

With the Kim's family at their restaurant - Kim's Korean Mini Meals. If there was a chart that accounted best tasting Korean food vs. Distance from Korea, this place would be an outlier. Beats Chicagoan Korean food for sure.

London Bible Distributions. What a blessed time! I cannot describe that one Wednesday with words. People are hungry for God's word. The Lord blesses when the entire Body acts and moves in one accord. In this picture alone, three continents are represented.

Colosseum, Rome. My dad and I took a little tour to Rome, Italy. This little detour may deserve a blog post of its own. Let's see if it surfaces. More pictures to follow.

The church in Madrid. Our family reunited again in Madrid, Spain, where we were able to join the table meeting there.

Segovilla, Spain.

Segovilla, Spain. Touristy stuff. They say that castle in the background is what inspired the castle in Disneyland. It was a really cool castle.

Madrid, Spain. I have to say that Madrid is one of the cleanest cities in Europe.

Cordoba, Spain. This is the beginning of our long trek south to visit the churches in southern Spain! On the left is brother Jameson Chen who migrated to Spain a few years ago and was our indispensable guide for the trip. He speaks perfect Spanish.

Prayer meeting at the church in Cordoba. Here is where I was forced to speak Spanish.

Sevilla, Spain. Second from the left is sister Cynthia. She is a very young sister who is an indispensable pillar for the church in Sevilla. Due to some circumstances, the church in Sevilla was left to be a few families in number. Still, she has been a steady rock, still standing for the Lord's testimony in Sevilla. We have no excuse, and I mean it. If you think the church life is hard, you need to hear this sister's testimony.

The church in Malaga. The biggest locality in Spain, full of authentic Spaniards. Wish I could have spent more time here blending with the saints.

The Martinez family. Dear couple where we stayed for hospitality. These saints have been in the church life for so long!  Pillars who love the Lord and follow the ministry in an absolute way.

Wednesday, January 25, 2012

Midwest College Conference 2012

Last weekend, there was 3-day long Christian conference down in Camp Tecumseh, Indiana. And I had the time of my life.

It didn't started out with much of a bang. I was pretty down from all the pressures of being back in school, and there was a huge snowstorm coming our way. Our original time of departure was 2 PM, but we ended up leaving around 3 PM due to the terrible weather. It took us another two-and-a-half hours to get out of Downtown Chicago, so we knew we weren't going anywhere. To be down right honest, I was not in my spirit for the first 10 minutes of the car ride. But there is something special about being with brothers in a confined space. Liiiiiiiife just starts seeping in here and there, and soon enough, I was warmed up to utter prayers desperate for recovery. It was kind of like a Romans-8:26-groaning. Probably by the eleventh of twelve minute, we were well-burned by our prayers. I felt so revived, that all the thoughts about missing the first night were drowned. We prayed to gain our enjoyment of the now-Christ - the Christ that was allotted as our portion that afternoon in our car ride. We prayed for the atmosphere of the conference. We prayed for the safety of all the saints. And we realized that all Satan could do was release more of the flow.

Eventually, we found out that the speaking brothers were also stuck because of the weather, so there wasn't going to be anything missed on Friday night. With that in thought, we decided that it was probably better to leave Saturday morning when the snow should have stopped and the roads cleared.

The Lord truly knows how to cherish us, as He led us to a home gathering in downtown to blend with some of the families that live close to UIC. This was a sweet time. Besides eating a LOT of great food, we got to spend some quality-human times with the saints, hearing about each others' day, telling testimonies, and sharing laughs.

Shabu-Shabu at Downtown Home Gathering


Saturday morning started out very early for us. Cold pizza, cookies, coffee, and icy roads. We left downtown around 6:30 AM and headed south to Camp Tecumseh. Again, I just have to say that all Satan can do is hold the flow, but what he doesn't realize is that when you hold a flow, it just want to burst out even more! So this 6:30 AM car-ride was not like any other 6:30 AM car-ride. It was a time filled with the exercise of the spirit. Singing. Reading the word in prayer. More singing. Pizza stuffing. Coffee sipping. Singing. Fellowship. More pray-reading. Our car spent some quality time in Colossians chapter 1, taking the Word in slow nibble-bites, squeezing as much as juice as possible.

Cold Pizza + Icy Road on the way to Tecumseh

Anyhow, we arrived at Camp Tecumseh around 9:30-ish? And the rest is history. I'll share a bit regarding the topic of the conference, which was Christ our portion. We see that the portion Paul speaks of in Colossians is our all-inclusive Christ portrayed as all the riches of the good land in Deuteronomy 8. He is the waters, He is the plants, He is the minerals, He is everything! And our share of the portion is that we get to explore this land! All these items are a picture, or you can say a shadow, of the real thing, Christ. If you can see someone's shadow, you can eventually follow that shadow to reach the real person. Well, all these marvelous pictures that we see around us, is to remind us that we should enjoy Christ! That's awesome that Christ is all these things, but practically, how do we receive, or where can we go to receive Him as all these items? The practical way to apply Christ as the reality of all positive things is in the Word. The Word is where we find Christ. Actually, we should never separate "searching the Scriptures" with "coming to Him", for the Scriptures speak concerning Him. We come to the Word to meet with a Person and converse with this Person. He has spoken to us through the Word, and we should respond to Him by our prayer. Well, what is all this receiving for? It's not for us to hoard all these resources for ourselves, but to minister it to others. Did you discover those streams in the valleys? You need to minister that to those who may find themselves in a low situation. Did you find barley in the land? You need to minister that to those who may be in a dead condition. Minister, but be wary to not minister letters, but the Spirit. Practically and humanly speaking, this requires us to have a genuine heart of care for the ones to whom we want to minister to.

This is my third college conference in the Midwest, and even in my short stay, I can see the progress and growth of life in the Midwest. Statistically speaking, attendance numbers have been increasing from around 150 to 200 to 260 this year. Of course, numbers don't speak everything. The exercise of the spirit has also been increasing more and more. Praise the Lord for the coordination of all the serving ones who are taking care of the college students. It's their coordination that brings in the blessing, and their faithfulness to sow and water that brings God to cause the growth.

Brothers - Midwest College Conference 2012

Sisters - Midwest College Conference 2012

Wednesday, January 11, 2012

Winter Break Recap (2) - Winter Training One-Sentence Recaps!

So, to update you what had happened last week at the terminal... My flight was supposed to leave at midnight and arrive at Chicago the following morning at 6 AM. Due to some airplane problems, we ended up leaving around 4 AM and arriving close to 10 AM? I had a class at noon, which I was supposed to have caught, but I missed it. Funny thing is, this happened last year too.. and you know what else happened last year? The Wisconsin Badgers played at the Rose Bowl. And they lost. Hmm.. I wonder if there is a direct correlation here...

Anyhow,  I wanted to give a brief recap of the winter training in this post, and then hope to get back on to something old or new. I don't know what to say about the messages, except that the speaking brothers were filled with nothing less than the burden of the Lord Himself. There is no possible way I can recap all 12 messages, but I like to give one sentence that sums up or encapsulates the message. (Disclaimer: by doing this, I am doing no justice to these rich and overflowing messages. Please get into them!)

Message 1:
Christ needs to be properly appreciated by giving Him the preeminence, of which one way to do is to love Him with the first love and forsake all idols.

Message 2:
The Triune God became flesh to tabernacle among us (Jn. 1:14) not only so that He can dwell among us but so that He can become enterable!

Message 3:
God's heart's desire is for Zion - the overcomers - because Christ is in Zion!

Message 4:
To experience God in the highest and fullest way is to take Him as our habitation, which means to take Him as everything, and enjoy Him in all aspects of our living.

Message 5:
May the Lord Spirit operate in us and apply resurrection life to know Christ, build the church, experience the cross, deal with our natural self, comfort the saints in affliction, be a living testimony, produce a ministry in resurrection, and live in the realm of the Body of Christ.

Message 6:
The highest revelation of Christ is in Psalm 110 as the King, High Priest, Warrior, Victor, and Drinker.

Message 7:
Christ as the cornerstone is the consummate revelation in the Psalms and everything He has done and accomplished is found in this cornerstone for His consummate goal, the building up of the Body of Christ.

Message 8:
Christ is the reality of the law as God's living word, to infuse His living substance into His loving seekers.

Message 9:
May Zion and Jerusalem remain deeply in our consideration and concern.

Message 10:
Behold how good and how pleasant it is, for brothers to dwell in unity!

Message 11:
Christ is recovering the earth!

Message 12:
What left is there to say buy, Praise the Lord!

Wednesday, January 4, 2012

Winter Break Recap (1)

I'm sitting at an empty Home Turf Sports Bar as I'm writing this entry. It's January 3rd of 2012 - the second day of a brand new year. It's 42 minutes past midnight, and I'm waiting to catch a flight that was supposed to have departed about an hour ago. I'm in Terminal 6 of LAX - the terminal with all the below average airlines. My mistake in scheduling to fly in one of these.. I should have known! Last year, approximately around the same time, I got stuck overnight trying to fly one of these airlines as well.  Hopefully I will not be missing class as I did last year.

Sorry I have not been updating for a while, but in reality, it's only been around 2 weeks since my last post, meaning I've only missed a week. I don't know where to begin writing, because either (1) I have too many options to choose from, or (2) it is really late at night and my brain is not functioning at tolerable capacities.

I do want to hopefully finish the Isaac series rather quickly up till the present moment. Then, I feel like I can share more ministry materials and conferences + trainings or special events. But I do think I will have to recap this past winter break because it was just AWESOME.

Winter break in itself started out really nicely because I got to go home a few days early. My winter break was super busy - I might have assigned myself too much work to begin with. I really wanted to get into some truth materials, so i spent some quality times on the ITERO messages from this last year (2011). Those messages were truly diamonds. I guess since I said that, I'm going to have to share a little bit, right?

The Lord's recovery stands on four pillars - truth, life, the church and the gospel. Many groups stand for just one of these, and a handful stand for two, but I really do appreciate that in His recovery, our focus is on these four pillars. By definition, pillars denote something steadfast, something unshakeable, something people can rely that structure will hold. This shows the qualifying importance of these 4 items. Just by missing one of these items, a huge loss can be afflicted to the building happening in His recovery. On one hand, these 4 pillars may be objective realities as seen in the Word, but take a look at Rev. 3:12: "He who overcomes, him I will make a pillar in the temple of My God..." On one hand, truth, life, the church and the gospel may be objective items found in the bible, but on other hand, these items are people. They are people whose fabric, essence, and constitution, is truth, life, the church, and the gospel.

It all begins with truth. Truth is the container of life, and brings life to others. And life issues in building, the church. The gospel cannot run without truth, because the word of the truth is the gospel of your salvation (Eph. 1:13). So, we see, truth is very crucial. And it is very crucial that truth must always come first.

For this, I really enjoyed something Brother Ron shared regarding truth. In order for truth to become a part of our being, fabric, and constitution, to the point that we ourselves become pillars of truth, there needs to be the shining of light. The apostle John, whose writings are in the nature of recovery, writes in the second chapter (vv. 7-8) of His first epistle - "Beloved, I am not writing a new commandment to you..." This is in the sense of innovation. In the Lord's recovery, we are recovering all the truths of the past. There is no such thing an a brand new invention to God. It may be a new discovery to us, but God has already given us all His truths. It continues "...but an old commandment, which you have had from the beginning; the old commandment is the word which you heard." Here we see that the words given to us by John are old commandments. These are the Old and New Testaments, the words which we have had since the beginning. But in the next verse, John mentions something contradictory: "Yet again a new commandment I am writing to you," I thought he just said that he is giving us an old commandment, what does he mean? This second new commandment is new, not in the sense of innovation, but in the sense of recovery. It is new, because, listen to this commentary by brother Witness Lee: "new, because in their Christian walk it dawns with new light and shines with new enlightenment and fresh power again and again." WOW. Isn't this really our experience? We may have known a verse for all of our Christian walk, but there is always that point in time, when it is struck with fresh light and the verse becomes something new to us. The verse continues: "...and the true light is already shining." The shining is the reaching out of the light, which is God Himself, meaning that shining, God reaching out to us, is the Spirit. The Spirit shines over our being and His word, then this old commandment suddenly becomes something new and it is constituted within our being.

This is why it is truly important that when we come to the Word, we also come with the following prayer the apostle Paul prayed in Ephesians 1: "Lord Jesus, grant us a spirit of wisdom and revelation, and shine on the eyes of our heart!"

Anyhow, yep. Sorry, that went rather longer than I thought.. because, that's what usually happens when I overflow. Here are some other things I did other than being a Bible nerd, which I'm not ashamed of being, over the break:

My sister visited from Spain! It's been a year and half since our family got together. It has been an overdue visit from her, and I'm really glad the four of us got to spend quality time together. We went to Avila Beach, which is about a 3-4 hour drive from Downtown, Los Angeles. Enjoy some pictures and I will continue to post regarding the Winter Training -

 Monarch Butterfly Grove - Pismo Beach, CA


Pier @ Avila Beach, CA

 Cal State San Luis Obispo (that's my true height)