Month: September 2018

Good Weather – Good Music

September 28, 2018 Street Level Radio

What Was

A lot has happened this summer for BDR. We were able to do some pretty fun remote broadcasts and outreaches alongside the coffeehouse and WOTS. One of the more notable was the Vintage Baseball game that is held at Phelan Park. We have been able to develop a good relationship with the different teams and it has been cool to be a part of this event for the last two years. The teams are all local (within a couple states) and they all come out to Menomonie to play this tournament. We were able to get a ton of interviews and interaction with the players and attendees. I think Ben Minder had the most fun! We also attended a few of the Menomonie Library’s Music over Menomins and were able to experiment with different broadcasting styles as far as set up is concerned. We learned a lot and were able to simplify the tech side of things quite a bit.

This fall we’ve been involved with Street Level’s Epic Garden Parties which is a big shift from the last few years – just in the size and paradigm of the events. The Street Level members have been taking on these parties – with the goal of getting to know and engage with students through each one. Our role as a station varies week to week as far as participation and it has been fun to see the effects of a more simple set up all the way around.

What’s Coming

We will be doing a remote broadcast at Stout next week and our hopes are to be outside with the coffeehouse and WOTS to get student polls. The best case scenario would be great weather and tons of traffic. Your prayers and support for this are much appreciated.

Please pray for us as we continue to reach out to the students. We want to do what is best for God’s kingdom and JFBelievers church!

And So It Begins…

September 25, 2018 Shofar Missions Cebu

Home Again

Britt and I returned to Cebu August 30 ready to hit it hard again! We appreciated the opportunity to return for the Ministry Retreat and Church Camp-Out! As always it is great to hear what God is doing in Menomonie, Duluth, and River Falls. Our trip back included spending 13 hours in the Chicago Airport but we did get some work done…a conference poster designed, lesson prep and various emails taken care of 🙂

Our first Monday back we caught up with the UV students for the start of intramural week. This was a great opportunity to spend some time with them and meet some of their friends. Before things actually got started for the day we were able to hang out with them in one of the Architecture classrooms.

Street Level

Since being back, we have continued setting up the bi-fold outside of a campus we are targeting. Rain or shine, we get out at least once a week with the intent of getting into conversations with students. On the days when its raining or we second guess going for one reason or another, we are reminded the students that attended the study would not have come unless they met us standing outside of their university! The month will end with a Live Street Level Radio Broadcast at Elicon House to promote the new BS Series and an upcoming movie night. We will pop some popcorn and watch “The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe” on the Roofdeck at Teofel Hostel.

Science Curriculum

When we returned I continued Science Curriculum at Southern Bethany and started lessons at the Nazarene School.

Lessons with students at Southern Bethany will finish at the end of September and I am looking forward to starting at a new school the first week of October! Mid-October I will be prepping materials to leave at a few new schools that talk about the curriculum and offering to meet with administrators to further discuss an opportunity to teach the lessons at their school. As I continue teaching at various schools I look forward to seeing how God will use this and how it could connect to other Shofar Mission ministries.

Please pray for the following:

The SLM One-Day Conference on November 30. That students would attend, a guest speaker, and preparation.
SLM Office Space. That we would continue looking and seeking God and where He wants the location to be.
That we would continue meeting students to promote the Bible Study, Word On the Street, and Street Level Radio Station. Also, for the current students attending that they would continue to seek God amid the family pressures.
Science Curriculum. Starting at a new school October 3 and visiting potential schools mid-October.

As we continue the mission, each day I am reminded not only that time is short, but God can and will intentionally put people in our path that He wants us to meet. We often comment that today’s plans become tomorrows to do’s and nothing ever goes as planned, but God is always faithful to remind us of His timing.

–Laura

River Falls News / September 2018

September 19, 2018 River Falls Ministry

We’ve now made the transition from Summer to school, which has meant a lot of changes, as well as some renewed excitement on our part to see what God is going to do this semester. We’ve restarted Street Level, and have seen a number of new faces around. Most are Freshman who are new to college life and are discovering all the new opportunities, relationships, and interests vying for this their time and commitment. It’s been refreshing to see them around, and we are praying that some get plugged in and can find what God has for them here at school. This year. we are are encouraging “involvement” in the Street Level, which means taking up regular participation in a ministry like WOTS.

In addition to the weekly meetings and doing some outreach tables on campus, we are also planning to partner with Street Level UW-Stout to engineer a few outreaches on the UWRF campus. These will likely take the form of food giveaways via the Mobile Coffeehouse. Our hope is that these outreaches will be fun way to meet new students as well as offer opportunity to serve with with the greater Street Level family.

New to our weekly schedule, we have nailed down official regular “open study hours”, which are every Thursday evening, 5pm-9pm. During these hours, we are running the Street Level place much like a “coffeehouse”, with the espresso bar open and music on, the goal is to make the space conducive to study, projects, or discussion. There have been several students and wanderers-by who have visited over the past few weeks.

Our Sunday evening gathering continues, and we continue our chapter-per-week pace through the New Testament letters. Joining the studies and discussions have been a few new faces – also due to school restarting. We are consistently encouraging people from Street Level to consider and pursue involvement in the local church. For many, their “church” is back home, and, for a variety of reasons, fail to seek out a Biblical fellowship dynamic while they are away to college. This is an unfortunate pattern that we see being set all too often for students that consider themselves Christians.

Please pray that we are, with discernment, providing the right teaching, personal challenge and friendship to the new students that have been joining us this semester, to the end that they can participate in all that God has for them.

October Calendar

Sundays: 5pm / JFBelievers Bible Study, 6pm / Meal
Tuesdays: 6:30pm / Meal, 7:00pm / Street Level Meeting
Thursdays: 5:00pm – 9:00pm / Open for Coffee and Study
October 26-27: All Street Level Retreat

Online

Street Level Start of the Fall Semester

September 16, 2018 Street Level College Ministries

The Students are Back

Over the past month, college students completed their annual migration back to Menomonie for the start of the UW-Stout fall semester.

Last week on Monday, Street Level met for our first Dinner+Bible Study! It was an exciting night – we met many new students for the first time, and reconnected with returning students from last year. The food was great; dinner is an amazing time of conversation and fellowship. The bible study afterwards started our fall series in which we will be looking at the lives of Jacob and Ruth…

Busy in the Backyard

Street Level had also spent parts of the summer gearing up for the UW-Stout fall semester by planning a series of EGP’s: Epic. Garden. Party.(s). The goal was to transform our Music on the Hill event from a 1-day blowout into multiple lower-key hang-outs throughout the months of September & October.

We’re two weeks into our schedule, and, as advertised, the first two EGP’s have been, well, epic! (and garden-y..) We decked out the circus tent in the backyard with lights, signs, plants, antiques, free food, ping pong, bean-bag toss, “Rock Band”, one dining room, two living rooms, etc… Burning Dog Radio supplies the music, and the Blind Munchies goes mobile from the front driveway!

Word on the Street – 75 Issues

This past week’s time we celebrated the 75th issue (if you can believe that!) of Word on the Street (WOTS) Magazine. There was poetry reading, nachos, and some live music by Ben Noble. The vibe was great: a group of friends hanging out together and celebrating God’s work – and inviting new people into the fun.

JFB Duluth Update

September 13, 2018 Believers Church Duluth

JFB Duluth: End of Summer Wrap Up

Summer has ended, and three weeks from now there will be snow on the ground. Yikes! August was a busy month for us here in the northland. Our big events started with our church bike ride to Lester Park, stopping at the New London Café for lunch in between. Next, we had our church workday, making the church look fresh one coat of paint at a time. To wrap it up, Duluth had a great time camping with the rest of the JFB family in Danbury, WI at Camp Croix. Thanks be to God for keeping the weather nice when we needed it!

Teaching

We just finished up 1 and 2 Peter and are now moving on to the book of John, learning who God is through his son Jesus Christ. For our Wednesday night studies, we are in the book of Psalms, learning how David handles his struggles by putting his faith in God. As for our Dinner and Bible Study nights, we just finished the Great Exchange series and starting Francis Chan’s Forgotten God series.

Street Level Updates

Towards the end of August, Street Level printed 850 copies of Word on the Street with their new (used) printer! The first week of student’s coming back to school has been a great success and have met more students than we have in the past, roasting s’mores, handing out ice-cream, slacklining, and playing multiple games. For the month of September, Street Level is meeting on campus on Sundays from 5-7 pm and for the semester, meeting on Tuesday’s at Big Apple Bagels! Upcoming Street Level events include our canoe trip on the Brule River and still in the works is Open Mic Night at Big Apple Bagels.

God is on the move, and so are we! We can’t wait to see what God has in store for us next!

Nodding Off

September 10, 2018 Pastor Justin Thomson - Duluth

I was once (and ever so briefly) part of a ministry that did some work in California. Years ago, a team of volunteers (myself included) travelled out West together in a great big, 72-passenger school bus, with only one of us in the entire group who was legally qualified to drive it. His name was “Wayne” and Wayne had a Commercial Driver’s License, so Wayne became our chauffeur by default. The trip was over 30 hours on the return, and Wayne drove the whole way, by himself, non-stop, without sleeping. Needless to say, we needed Wayne.

This was risky business. Falling asleep at the wheel, at any point along the way, would have been bad for not only Wayne, but for each passenger stuck in the bus with him…and everybody knew it. That’s why we all took turns up front, sitting on an upside-down pail, right next to Wayne as he drove. All through the night someone was there talking to him, listening to him, watching, sometimes praying. We did whatever we had to do to keep him awake so he could keep on driving. My shift was in the wee hours of the morning, and it was challenging in more ways than one. Not only was there the loss of sleep to cope with, but I also knew that if Wayne crashed the bus, it would be partly my fault. Lives were on the line, so Wayne and I worked together that night. It would be fair to say that Wayne probably did as much to keep me awake as I did for him, but we both made it through the night unharmed.

Not every trip, however, ends as well as ours did. In Polk County, MN on May 7^th of this year, a bus driver fell asleep at the wheel, lost control of his vehicle, and injured a dozen students. Or a couple of months before that in Washington County, TN when a bus driver dozed off, crashed into a tree, and sent 5 students to the hospital. Needless to say, people can get hurt when someone thinks they can drive all the way from “point-A” to “point-B” without any help, especially when they get tired & fall asleep at the wheel somewhere in between. Stories like that aren’t hard to come by if you have access to Google.

…or a church.

We’ve seen lots of folks come into our fellowship over the years who started out with a fair amount of enthusiasm. It lasted for a while, but as the miles ticked by, their interest faded, and lethargy set in. The drive got monotonous and they slipped into what you might call “highway hypnosis”, where they were still going forward, but no longer conscious of it. Even now, I’ll bet it’s happening to some people. They’re getting drowsy. They’re going right along with the traffic flow of church-life like they always do, but they aren’t really paying attention anymore. They’ve been on the road long enough to “settle in”, and a quick nap doesn’t seem as dangerous as it used to. They’ve surrendered themselves to a certain dose of non-lethal sin that’s produced nothing but spiritual drowsiness. The diminishment of their Christian joy & zeal is one of the most obvious side-effects. They’re no longer impressed by deeply significant matters. They’re drifting off to sleep…

…And somebody needs to wake them up!

You have a responsibility toward everybody else in the fellowship that you may be overlooking. You’re supposed to be paying attention to those around you within the community of believers, talking to them, listening to them, watching them to see if their eyes are still on the road like they should be, and to warn them when they start nodding off. The Lord has told us to do this for one another, and refusing to do so is sin. If they crash the bus, it might be your fault:

“Be careful dear brothers and sisters. Make sure that your own hearts are not evil & unbelieving, turning you away from the living God. You must warn each other every day, while it is still “today,” so that none of you will be deceived by sin and hardened against God. For if we are faithful to the end, trusting God just as firmly as when we first believed, we will share in all that belongs to Christ” Hebrews 3:12-14

Are you taking your responsibility seriously? What do you do when you see somebody growing cold in their worship? Do you talk to them about it, or are you afraid of bothering them? It’s important to remember that, at this point, we’re all still riding in the same vehicle. Be aware that your own survival, in part, depends on whether you keep the people around you alert to the dangers they face. If you neglect them, they’re liable to turn away from Christ, and if they do, who’s going to keep you from falling asleep like they did? If they drive off the road and crash into a ball of flames, what makes you think that you won’t get hurt yourself? The spiritual lethargy of your fellow passengers should be making you uneasy & anxious. If it doesn’t trouble you, maybe it’s because you’re the one dozing off.

A pilgrimage like ours is a dangerous trek, and none of us are meant to walk alone. Accountability is the golden thread that God has woven into the cloth of Christian fellowship, and when that thread gets pulled out, the entire fabric of a man’s life starts to unravel. We need each other. Some drivers don’t like to admit it, but it’s true of us all:

“Two people are better off than one, for they can help each other succeed. If one person falls, the other can reach out and help. But someone who falls alone is in real trouble. A person standing alone can be attacked and defeated, but two can stand back-to-back and conquer. Three are even better, for a triple-braided cord is not easily broken” (Ecclesiastes 4:9-12).

When our ministry team left California that summer, we all trusted Wayne to help us get home safely, and Wayne trusted us to do the same for him. We needed Wayne, but Wayne also needed us. As good a driver as he was, Wayne couldn’t have made it home without our support. Somewhere along the way he’d have fallen asleep and we’d all have been sorry. But unlike some trips, our journey had a happy ending. We made it home safe. All of us. Together.

We all want to get home safe, don’t we? Well then, let’s help each other stay awake.