Book Club during our Weekly Thursday Gatherings
Winter Fitness Fun
Dunn County Sheriff’s Department Tour
Valentine’s Day Bingo!
February 27, 2023
The Homeschool Ministry
Month: February 2023
February 27, 2023
The Homeschool Ministry
February 24, 2023
Shofar Missions Cebu
It has been an exciting month in the Philippines… keep reading to see what God has been doing through Shofar Missions!
Teamwork
At the end of January, the first missions team of 2023 arrived in Cebu. We’re thankful for the time spent serving God alongside of them. There were three Ministry Training Institute classes taught on different islands: Bohol, Cebu, and Bantayan. We had many returning students and built relationships with new ones. The two-day classes were meant to equip pastors and church leaders in “Knowing the Voice of God.”
We also held a Street Level Summit in Balamban with a special Friday night gathering for SLM members. On Saturday, 19 students and young people gathered to study the book of Jonah and find the practical application to their lives. Jesse and Matt were both able to preach at different churches, and we also visited the TV stations to add new content to Shofar TV programming.
Please pray that the ministry that was done with the team would continue to bear fruit!
Street Level Ministries
While the team was in Toledo, we held a remote radio broadcast across from the University of the Visayas. We met a lot of students and asked them trivia questions for a chance to win a Street Level Radio t-shirt. It was a great way to meet students and get the word out about Street Level meetings in Toledo.
In an effort to reach students who have classes on Wednesday nights, the Cebu group has been having micro-Bible Studies at various times and locations near universities. A lot of students say they’re “busy,” so we ask if they have 15-minutes for a short Bible study and discussion about the “Crazy Things Jesus Said.” These discussions are meant to be short, impactful, verse-by-verse studies in between classes.
At our regular meetings, we finished the series “Living Life… Jesus First.” The groups in both Toledo and Cebu have been confronted with the idols of self, money, work, family, and relationships to assess whether Jesus really is first or not. Please pray that students would prioritize Jesus, build relationships with each other, and that God would continue to help us connect with the students He wants us to meet.
Exploring Creation Science
Recently, we had an opportunity to connect with the School Principal and Field Director at an orphanage in our neighborhood that we have worked with before. We look forward to teaching there once a month starting in April. Exploring Creation Science lessons have resumed at 4 schools throughout Metro Cebu. We also reconnected with a school we taught at before COVID. However, they recently had several students exposed and test positive, so we pushed pause until next month.
Since returning in September, there have been opportunities to attend staff devotions at schools. The opportunity to lead devotions at Banawa Nazarene has been offered, along with joining junior high and high school staff to discuss topics relevant to those in Christian Education. The last discussion was about Sexual Orientation and Gender Identification (for those that do not know, there is a bill out there giving people the right to choose and sanctions for those that discriminate against them). Please pray for staff that they would be good Godly examples for students and that students would challenge their classmates, especially those in Senior High School.
February 19, 2023
River Falls Ministry
Find out about what we have been up to this last month in River Falls – including coffee giveaways, plant sales, broomball, and even a showing of The Chosen.
Street Level
Street Level and The Blind Munchies Coffeehouse teamed up to do a few outreaches this last month. We started by doing a coffee giveaway on the River Falls CVTC campus. We didn’t bring the trailer this semester (It is the middle of winter), but we set up our kiosk inside. We also hosted a plant sale geared toward college-aged people in the community at the coffeehouse. We had about 60 people stop in and were able to invite many of them to the events we have going on.
Additionally, Street Level attended a few events on the UW River Falls campus. After preparing 5 gallons of Sweet Iced Latte a group of us headed to campus for Midnight Mayhem. This was a late-night event that the university hosted. We were one of a number of campus organizations that contributed to the event. There was everything from bouncy houses to wheelchair races. The following week a few students set up a booth at the Involvement Fair.
We also got to join the other Street Level locations for a fellowship event. A bunch of us piled in the church van for our annual (or something like that) Street Level broomball tournament. Twin Ports, Menomonie, and River Falls spent Friday night hanging out together followed by a Bible study and broomball on Saturday. We may have broken a record number of brooms this year.
Blind Munchies Coffeehouse
Just this last Friday, the coffeehouse had the opportunity to host a showing of The Chosen. People from Campus Church, Street Level, and a few new faces joined us. We hope to do this more often, so keep your eye out for future dates.
Prayer Requests
- Pray that we would continue to meet new people in the community that have the desire to know God
- For maturity and commitment in the group
- Continued vision and direction for the ministry
February 10, 2023
River Falls Ministry
I recently heard a song with the lyrics, “The time has passed for choices…” I imagine the writer was expressing something each of us will experience at some point: the realization that we’ve run out of time. We all know the feeling. Maybe it’s the deadline for that ten-page paper that just came too fast, or perhaps something more difficult, like realizing we’ve crossed the point-of-no-return and ruined a treasured relationship. Whatever the case, we can find ourselves bankrupt of the time that once seemed a luxury.
For Tomorrow We Die
The world apart from Christ has conflicting notions about how we should use our time. On one hand, the message is, “eat, drink, and be merry, for tomorrow we die.” On the other, we see countless schemes teaching us how to work hard now so we can relax in the future (some call it retirement). While we Christians likely presume we have a different way of doing things, it’s entirely possible that we’re not handling our time in the way God intends.
Spending Time
If we stop and think about it, most of us treat our time like our money. We’ll “spend” time on what like to do and what makes us feel good. And, for those of us who think we have a lot of time, we’ll spend a lot of it on a lot of inconsequential things. We can act like ridiculously wealthy billionaires with a near infinite amount to spend. But this thinking is wrong. No matter who we are, all our spending eventually catches up with us – we all eventually run out. And if we’ve handled it poorly, that’s when regrets and questions set in: “Why did I procrastinate?”, “What was I thinking?”, or “If I could only go back in time, I would do things differently…”
Buying Time
Unlike money, we can’t save up time – we can only learn how to better spend it. The Apostle Paul taught the Ephesian church how to think about their time:
…“Awake, you who sleep, Arise from the dead, And Christ will give you light.” See then that you walk circumspectly, not as fools but as wise, redeeming the time, because the days are evil. Therefore do not be unwise, but understand what the will of the Lord is. Ephesians 5:14–17 (NKJV)
To redeem something means to buy it back, to regain possession of it. So when Paul says redeeming the time he means for us to make a lifestyle of wisely taking back our time for the will of God.
When it comes to doing the will of God, our excuse can never be that we didn’t have enough time. It can only mean that we didn’t figure out how to use it well. God has given each of us the same amount of time every day: 24 whole hours. The time He gives you will match the tasks He gives you. It is possible by God’s Spirit to learn how to redeem the time, and it is possible to understand what the the will of the Lord is. If we don’t seek these things out, we’re likely headed for serious regret. I wonder, when your time has passed for choices, will you be eager for the Lord’s review of your life or will you be embarrassed for how you spent it?
Questions for Reflection
- Have I ever critically examined how I budget my time in a given week?
- Am I seeking to understand what the will of the Lord is for today? (Ephesians 5:17)
- Are there ways I’m spending my time right now that is setting me up for certain future regret?
- Imagine myself 1 year from now: is how I’m investing my time going to give a return for God’s Kingdom?