Risky Business

So this is where we're at. There is 1 week left until project ends and you know what we do? We revamp our whole schedule. Now, during the days we no longer have ministry teams so we no longer tell people where and what to do. Until night time on most days there is nothing planned but the time is open for whatever each person on the team wants to plan and do with their time. I mean we're still going to be evangelizing but there will just be less structure in the sense of telling people what to do. It's expected that people will continue to go and share and meet up with people.

The heart behind it was that we were feeling very drained, burnt out, and just doing things for the sake of doing things instead of pursuing and loving God. So, we took 2 days off for personal retreat. Then, thursday we started this new thing. We want people to work together, to work with people they haven't gotten a chance to work with yet, and to try new things out. People are excited and that's a good thing. To be honest, I am really scared about what will happen. This is a risk and we're excited to take it to see what God will do with it.

Pray that we would be strong as a team this last week. That we would want to see God glorified and to love God. Pray that we would continually trust in God.

Worship

On last Sunday night we were invited to a special service at the First Assembly of God church by some of the local friends that we'd made. Some people we'd met were leading worship that night and it was a joint youth and adults praise night. It was an awesome night of worship.

Just the chance to be there was great. I honestly didn't really want to go. I was tired of hanging out with people but I went in just wanting to worship God. That's exactly what I got to do and it was awesome. I was able to just be there, uninhibited and lift up praise to God.

That night was a commissioning night for the new leaders in the church and so as the pastor was praying over the new leaders, I was like God, this is the prayer for our team. Let us just be a team that will love you, a team that just wants to seek your face, and a team devoted to you. At the end of the service, the pastor called up all the young adults and youth in the congregation and prayed over us as well, empowering us the to be the generation that rises and leads. It was a special night to say the least.

I was so excited that night and so joyful. But so quickly after coming back to "project stuff", I was brought back to earth. And even though emotions come and go, I know God is faithful.

That was good different

I started to pick up guitar this past semester and mostly just messed around. I figured I would mostly just be playing the guitar for worship if ever because it's not like I would become an awesome guitarist and perform or anything.

So, last thursday one of the guys was like, hey Kevin can you lead worship for tomorrow's devotional time? And I was like uh... uh... uh.. okay. I had never led before but I knew this was something I wanted to try at least. So for the whole night I was pretty scared. I was trying to pick songs I felt comfortable playing and singing, and I ended staying up until like 2:30am doing a directors evaluation and some last minute practicing.

So it's the morning and I'm getting some more last minute practicing in. I felt the need to just come before God and lift it up in prayer, asking Him to make this not about my performance but about worship to God. To have these songs be full of worship. And so I just went to our devotional time and just worshipped.

Leading worship is a interesting thing. It's nothing like I've experienced during worship before. Even though their is the temptation to feel like you're performing for others or for God, the heart of it is all worship and when that comes out, it's an awesome feeling. It's great to just worship with others and even though you're "leading" it, it's great to just worship in that time.

Divine Appointment

When I felt like it was a dead end, God opened a path.
When I wasn't aware, God kept pursuing.
At the most random times, the Spirit moved powerfully.
And before I knew it, God had orchestrated something wonderful, a new brother in Christ!

(There's a story behind this but I don't feel like posting it. Ask me sometime and I'd love to share it.)

The real start to project

So project has finally reached the point where staff leaves. It’s something that we’ve known and have anticipated. Staff leaves halfway through the project so that they can attend a national Campus Crusade staff conference but now it’s viewed as a chance to empower the students as leaders to carry on the work here. We had a banquet where the staff shared and commissioned us to continue on. It was really sad to see them go but also exciting to see what God has in store for us.

Each student has picked up different responsibilities that the staff once held in order to keep everything running. Things still operate the same way for the most part but with the added responsibility. My new role is operations project director. I am one of three project directors that together lead and coach the entire team. We are here to help each student grow as leaders in their respective roles. I also have an added emphasis on finances for the team and logistical issues.

Project without staff has only just begun but things have been going well. We weren’t quite prepared for the rest of the week but God has provided and is working. Historically, projects start to take off and amazing things happen after staff leave. We've been given the opportunity to truly take project and run with it. I’m excited and hopeful, knowing that God does have great things in store for us and will deliver mightily.

Schedule

Sorry I haven’t blogged in a while. It’s been busy and I’ve been lazy. I was talking to some of my friends the other day and I realized that I haven’t really talked about what a week to week schedule looks like for us so I’m going to lay it out for you guys right now.

Sundays we have church in the mornings, time to meet, and then something called Ohana time where we meet together as a team and are able to share and grow.

Mondays, Tuesdays and Thursdays we go out in 3 groups and go through a rotation. One day is working with the homeless, one sharing at the beach, and one sharing on campus at University of Hawaii. We do this from 9:30am-3pm on those days and then we have debriefing at 5pm as well. At night on those days we have training, small group, and other meetings at night.

Fridays we have body mode evangelism and men’s and women’s time. Body mode evangelism is like inviting people into the body of believers and through a fun game or whatever and then talk to them and share with them.

Saturdays is either a creative outreach or a team social. What we’ve done so far is on july fourth we went sharing and last Saturday we went to swap meet and dole plantation.

That pretty much wraps up a typical week for us. Of course details are different each week but here’s a general feel for what we’re up to. It’s a busy schedule. Sometimes we go from like 8am-10pm pretty much straight and it’s pretty draining. Earlier this week I was definitely feeling pretty tired but it’s better now. 3 weeks left. Let’s push it now.

Reason to CELEBRATE!!!

There have been a lot on my mind this past day or 2 but there is nothing more important to share than the experience today. I celebrate today not because of independence day for the United States but rather the awesomeness of knowing that 5 people have accepted Christ! My partner today Tim, and I had the privilege of seeing 3 of these 5 accept Christ.

Today we went sharing at Magic Island where many gathered and camped out in preparation for the July 4th festivities and fireworks. The story that resounds most for me today was seeing 2 guys, Taylor and CJ come to know God. Tim and I had been walking around talking to people for a while and we hit some what of a slump. People just didn't seem to want to talk and we couldn't find people that weren't sitting in giant groups hanging out. We noticed a guy sitting on a ledge by himself and Tim was like, "Let's do this." While we approached, some of his friends approached him as well. I was like, oh shoot, more people, what are we gonna do? I did not want to initiate. But Tim decided to still initiate and so he started talking to the guys. He asked if they were willing to listen to what he had to share about something that had transformed his life and they said sure. So there were a couple guys but the main to were Taylor and CJ. Tim basically jumped straight into the gospel and started sharing the four spiritual laws in our booklet that we use.

I then decided to sit with CJ and share a booklet with him so he could better follow along as Tim read and explained it. They were both following along well. At one point, I was slow to turn the page in the booklet and CJ took the booklet from me, turned the page and gave it back to me. We get to the end of the four laws and ask if they want a life with themselves as the center on the throne of their life or one with Jesus in the center on the throne with them yielding to Him. They both decide the life with Christ as the center. At this point, I was like wow, hmm, this is something. And so we went to talking about the prayer to accept Jesus Christ. I read through the prayer with CJ and afterwards asked him what it meant. He highlighted how Jesus died for our sins and our sins are forgiven. He mentioned how we can have eternal life by believing that Jesus is our Lord and Savior. Then I was like, this is it! He's got it. And so we prayed the prayer together. I mean I was just reading it and I look over and CJ has his head bowed and eyes closed and he just repeats after me. And afterwards, I'm just in awe of what God has done and excited to be there to see this new brother in Christ. I talk to Tim afterwards and the same thing happened for Taylor as well. How awesome is that!

And so God totally worked in the lives of Taylor and CJ. Keep praying for their walks as well. We saw how powerful prayer was today, asking God for an external perspective, to be filled and guided by the Spirit, and to see God to work in powerful ways.

Buy into it

Last week we had men's time which involved some running, heavy lifting, and most importantly communication. One of the activities that we had to do was walk a certain distance with 2 planks of wood positioned like skis with all 7 students on top of the boards at all time. For the first half of it, I was in front, pulling the planks of wood while we tried to step in unison. In the beginning, everyone was trying to take the lead and keep tempo or whatever and it was a giant mess. After a while the other guys were like, listen to Kevin, he's in front. He should keep tempo because he has to pull the wood. So I was trying to lead it and it was really frustrating. We would start going then someone would lose footing or the board wouldn't move as far as we wanted it to and we'd have stop and begin tempo again. What I didn't realize until later is that I was having a hard to leading mostly because I didn't buy into the way we were approaching the challenge. I wanted to try doing it a different way. I kept on asking the guys if they had any other ideas. I wasn't on board with the whole process and it hindered us.

So can you lead if you don't believe in it yourself? The short answer is no. How can you inspire your team if you're not inspired? How can you lead people a certain path if you don't trust the path you're on? How can you lead others to buy into what you're doing if you're not sold yourself? That's why it is so important to cast vision and to catch on to that vision. To be sold to the mission at hand.

That's how I felt for that activity but it's also how I've been feeling so far for project as a whole. I personally feel like I have only begun to catch vision. I've been feeling lost in everything that we've had to do as a team and have not been able to believe and trust in God's plan for us this summer. Sometimes I feel like I'm just going through the motions while talking to strangers, being in small group, participating in everything we've been doing as a team. And through God's hand I've only begun to buy into God's plan to see a movement grow, to see people come to know Jesus, and to capture this campus and island for God. I'm also starting to see how God's wants to embrace each and everyone one of us on project to love us and grow us as well.

Pray that we'd be able to see and catch vision that will spur us to do God's work like none other, to keep each other accountable to our mission, and to continually rely on God.