week six

So we are at week six for norte church. Things are starting to come together. We had our biggest sunday so far;10. It is cool to start to see some of the people that will be making up this church body. Four couples are bi-racial. By that i mean a hispanic and another race. I believe a big portion of our church will be composed of people that fit that description.

Worship was cool this week. It is soooo different when there are more than three people in the seats. I felt like i didn't have to try to encourage people to participate. That is good.

So the next few months we will be focusing on promoting two services that are coming up one in jan. and one in feb. and our new launch date; Easter sunday!

As far as preaching goes i am getting a little more comfortable every sunday preaching and praying in spanish. Because we are a bilingual church i try to do a lot of stuff in both languages. It is pretty interesting how that is working out. People are responding positively so i guess i am doing that well. As i get better at speaking off the page i feel like i get a better responce from people.

I started off my service this week with a disclaimer where i basically said please forgive me for my spanish which stinks. Isn't that a line from a movie? Anyway they just laughed with me... not at me, of course.

Well today it reached into the seventies so i won't be needing to shovel the driveway. Sorry i know back east you guys just had a terrible storm. Thanks for the pics.

Peace

getting in a groove

Well we are into week four of norte church. We are having a fun time doing ministry together Nicole and I. I do the worship leading and preaching and she takes care of the rest. She plays percussion, works on the program, Slide show presenaitions. If she spoke spanish i would have her preach too.

We are seeing a few people start to show up and few excited to be a part of it. At times i feel very inadequate as a preacher, but as one lady put it " your preaching...it's a good ice breaker". I think that she is giving me a compliment...i think.

So we are getting into a groove and i feel pretty good about what we are doing so far. I am pleased to be able to make changes and tweaks to what we are doing as we do it. By january we shold havea good idea of what the service will usually look like.

Well in a few weeks we will have our "big launch" I am hopng to have a cool singer, band or something for that sunday. I know this is crazy, but i am half thinking of having george lopez there. No way he would come.

Since he is my inspiration. Well not really my inspiration, but God spoke through him. You know the story ....don't you?

Los

Ramona park study

I started an informal BibLe study at a park in a rough part of Long beach. I am tagging along with a guy, Calvin , as he runs a weekly program for young kids at this and several other locations. While the kids go to Calvin i have an informal study with the parents, mostly moms. The community around the park is Hispanic and poor. This park is in a rough area as i said and a you will read about now.
The other day as we were getting ready to start the program four teens were walking directly in front of the stage when a cop car came out of nowhere. They were quickly pinned against the car with their hands on the hood. The teens were obviously being questioned for something that they were suspected of doing.
Calvin who was running his program along with music was asked to turn it down. Calvin kept running the game with this going on ten feet from the little kids. I tried to keep doing my study, but it was kind of pointless with the distraction that was going on...kind of distracting. I was saddened and commented to the parents how hard it must be to live there. They agreed. It was for me a reminder of why i am here.
I once read a book by a pastor who wrote that he was saddened when he met a young couple who were pastors who had decided to move out of the city because "God would never want us to have our kids grow up in that kind of environment."
That is one of the reasons that i am here. I heard God saying to me right then just as clear as the day i read it..."Who will go to the city for me?" Who will go to the hurting places for me?" While i was sitting there, while all this was going on, i was reminded of that story.

Soft launch

This is a term used in church planting circles for starting your church without a big splash. The idea here is to just start and eventually have a big promotional launch at a future date. Our official launch date is October 21st. We will do one service at 9:00am. As for the big launch date. It looks like december 24th will be our "Big Splash". I am working on a sweet promo to get into people's hands to let them know about the service.

and the winner is....plan B

Well it has been a few months since the cueva's have been in long beach and I am sure you were beginning to wonder what has been going on the church side of things. Because of some city red tape (you know how that goes) we can't use the building that we thought we would use. So...plan b. What is plan b?

Plan b is way different than i had imagined. We are going to do the whole thing in spanish. And i am going to preach. Ya that's right. i am preaching. I didn't plan on it, but that is what is unfolding for us. I have a lot of organizing and praying to do to do this right. Please keep us in your prayers as we begin this service. It looks like we are starting sometime in october.

please pray for us!

Who: The spanish service
what: A service to reach spanish speakers
where: the church ministry center (youth worship there)
when: october!

Los Angeles... A.K.A...

El Pueblo de Nuestra Señora la Reina de los Ángeles del Río de Porciúncula," ("The Town of Our Lady the Queen of the Angels on the River Porciúncula").

Yes this is our home now. We live in Los Angeles county. On the south end of it actually, in a town called Long Beach.
Yes! Thats snow in them hills!

Home again

Living in California again is wierd. I am kinda remembering things that i had forgotten. Smells, sights its all coming back to me. A lot is the same. It really hasn't changed a lot in the past 12 or so years since i have been gone.
One of the things that has changed so much is the amount of hispanics around. Now don't get me wrong there have always been hispanics in claifornia, but not like this. Now i have been to a bunch of the local stores and malls and it is so strange.

At the local mall the other day. I could have sworn i was in mexico. I'm serious. I'm not complaining, just observing. The bigger stores have signs in english and spanish. Cashiers speak both lanuages and you can hear spanish being spoken all over the place.

Yes i know there are sections of cities that are like this. Cultural groups that live predomonatly in a city block and have opened stores in that area. Imgine that x 10.

I know the percenage of hispanics is suppossed to be 40 percentor so, but i feel like its a lot more like 60 percent. Really.
I see how very quickly (and studies show this) hispanics are going to outnumber the non hispanic in the cities of Los Angeles County. Not to mention the other cities in California.

Now here is the problem. Who is reaching these people? Are ministries really making an effort to reach out to these people? I do see some efforts, but not nearly enough. I see alot of little storefront churches and churches that are reaching churched hispanics. What i have not seen are churches that are reaching unchurched hispanics.

For a pastor trying to reach these people this is all good news. I will always have work. But for the non hispanic minded church, the numbers are shrinking not growing.


Pray that God would begin to put a burden on the hearts of pastors to reach the hispanic population around them.
Pray that God would bring spanish speaking pastors and lay people to this area to help with this effort.
Pray that God would speak into the lives of these people and they would repond to the message of hope that Jesus has to offer.

Paz
Los

one month to go

In another month i will be knee deep into the next phase of my life. I have somehow convinced my trusting wife to move three thousand or so miles away from her hometown to my hometown. My hometown is sooo much different than hers. This move will be not only to a different state, but to a different country. Yes, i mean it. My children are convinced that everyone in California speaks spanish. I agree it seems that way.
I am really starting to get excited about what it will be like to live in sunny california again. Not just because of the great weather, but for the reason why we are moving in the first place. I want spanish speakng people to know that God loves them. I want to be a part of that. God has called me to be a missionary to these people. People like me. Too many people think that you have to leave the country to be a missionary, but I think that wherever you are, that is your mission field. Do you know someone who doesn't know that God loves them? What are you waiting for, tell them. Better yet; show them. And If they don't speak english send them to me!

embracing uncertainty

This past sunday I preached a sermon by that title (embracing uncertainty). I thought that it went well. I basically was speaking out of the experience of the past years of ministry. I have in a few places in ministry been moved by God to do something that required a lot of boldness and this move to Long beach is pretty bold.
I said in my sermon that I should be at least a little concerned that my house hasn't sold yet (2 months on the market) and i don't know where we will live or where the kids will go to school. But strangely enough I ain't. I guess i either have a lot of confidence in myself or in God. I hope it is the latter. Today was a great day here is Syracuse mid.60's. Great running weather. I just ran 5 miles. Peace.

What have i gotten myself into?

I guess I want to have a place to share my thoughts as i attempt to start a spanish venue. I have a lot of work ahead of me since I have no clue what i am doing. Well that never stopped me before. Anyway I am two or three months away from starting this venue so i have some time to start getting ready. What does that entail: getting used to speaking and thinking in spanish again. Spanish is my first language, but like anything if you stop doing it you get rusty. Call me rusty. So i am doing a lot of reading and watching anything in spanish on t.v. Tha's tough in Liverpool New york though. I also need to start thinking about what this venue will look like and feel like. I really have no clue what lies before me, but i know the one that does so i am not worried, just anxious. Not bad anxious, like the bible says not to be, just a little bit. So many questions? Who? What? where? When? That type of thing.