I'm up at Camp speaking to some Inner City youth, and the camp director announces that out next activity is Paintball, I've never seen young men so excited. Immediately I thought "okay great here it goes guns, welts, and way too much agression". Instead is was incredible to watch as these young men entered the obsticle course and quickly learned to create a plan and communicate with each as a unit. Ended up being a Great way to build teamwork and to get students talking about Strategies. You wouldn't believe how deep the conversation was after! Looking to do some team building in your youth group, think outside the box. Something like paintball might just be the answer that you're looking for!
Tonight I was speaking at the Oaks Camp. After I gave my message, we hiked a couple miles in the pitch black darkness to the top of a mountain overlooking the city of Landcaster. When we got to the top there so many stars it lit up everything around us. After staring into the sky for a few minutes one of the camp leaders said now look down and you see those three big lights in the city. That's a prison I used to be locked up there, and now I'm standing here at the top of this hill a free man teaching young men how to be free men. What an incredible experience, I was so deeply reminded about the power of our Testimony!
As we celebrated our Independence and the Freedoms that we enjoy in this country last night with Fireworks. I was reminded of all the people that live in war torn countries around the world. I felt like the constant barrage of illegal Fireworks on my block, mixed with an occasional Gunshot all around us until about 4am. Gave me the very slightest glimpse into the fear these people must feel every night as they try and lay their head down to rest. Yesterday I Prayed for my Country and my Family's continued freedom, today I pray for the freedom of all people and all nations.
We had the last gathering for the Spring Semester at our LBCC Intervarsity Group today. It's Been an Incredible Semester with new students coming to the Lord, being launched into ministry positions, baptisms, getting connected at local churches, and so much more. Stay updated with us during the Summer and we pray and seek after the Lord every Thursday at Noon in preparation for our fall semester launch.
Making a difference starts with being willing to let God use you. To understand you are called to be an Agent of Change, and not to worry about what people are going to say or think about you. So get up and get there and live it out.
Have you ever had a dream? A desire for something that you so desperately wanted? Maybe it's to get married, or have kids. Maybe it's to lead worship or create your own business. What ever your dream may be, do you trust God with it? Here's my story of Victorious Faith + trusting God with my dream.
Starting this year, I came up with a list of words that inspire me. I wrote them on my white board to remind myself every day of the things that inspire me; that get me fired up and passionate. Here's some of those words:
It was so funny because as I was writing this list, I was getting excited! I'm a words person (if you haven't already been able to tell) and these were firing me up! One word that I wrote was "wildfire". It was the first time I had written that word & felt so inspired. It was speaking something to me... I want to see revival in Long Beach spread like a wildfire. I want to see the Gospel spread this earth like a wildfire. If you know anything about wildfires, you know that they spread rapidly and they take over everything! That's how I see Long Beach and surrounding areas being ignited and on fire for Christ. This is my vision for our city, and this world.
Rewind about 1 year before this moment... I was praying that God would allow a dream of mine to come true. I had always wished, prayed, and planned for an opportunity to be in a band. I'm talking some serious planning. I would Pinterest outfit ideas for the band, come up with band names, write songs for this "someday band", and always think about it. One day I realized that this was not the time for that, so I gave it to God and said "Your Will be done".
So it's about a year later, I just wrote these inspiring words, got this "wildfire vision" in my head, and I'm pumped beyond belief. It didn't occur to me right away that this wildfire vision could have anything to do with my dream. But days went on and I had some funny dreams while I was asleep at night about having a band. There was one in particular that I woke up from and I couldn't shake it off! I started to see a correlation between that night-dream & MY Dream!
I didn't do anything about it right away. Instead, I kept the dream in God's hands and asked Him to take care of it. I prayed that God would lead me to this band when the timing was right.
A month went by, and I was asked by the Celebrate Recovery leader at our church to get a worship team together for a Tuesday night and lead worship. I lead our youth team + have been a part of multiple worship teams here and there, but something felt different about this opportunity.
Concurrently, I was leading worship at our InterVarsity group on campus at Long Beach City College with some friends. I thought, "well, it's worth a shot to just ask if they could help me out. It's just one Tuesday night." And they were down!
I'll tell you what... That Tuesday changed the way I lead worship. It changed the way I organize a band. Everything was so wonderful that night, I couldn't believe it. We all worked together so well and I saw my worlds collide: church family, school friends, InterVarsity friends all together worshiping on the same stage.
After that night, the Celebrate Recovery leaders asked us if we could make worship at CR a monthly thing! It was such a shock to me that they had enjoyed our band so much! We prayerfully considered + accepted the offer. Every third Tuesday of each month, we began leading worship. From month one, I had started dialogue with some of the musicians and vocalists about what it might look like for us to do music together indefinitely. As we began talking and sharing ideas, God brought us to a place where we were all in the right place to say yes to a band.
We began working on music, making videos, sharing our hearts for worship, and fellowshiping together. We started this hashtag called #startingwildfires after I had shared my heart about the "wildfire vision". After some push and pull on a band name, we agreed to call ourselves the Wildfires.
Now, I want you know, I had a whole marketing strategy laid out, dates for announcements, all that jazz. But none of it happened that way. It was so organic and I'm so thankful for that. The past month that we did CR worship, our band is up on stage after our set, getting ready to play for offering when our CR leader announces that we are the Wildfires band! I was so shocked that he had said that because I didn't even know that he knew! My jaw dropped a little as I laughed because my marketing strategy had nothing on this organic announcement. It was perfect, and it was just the way God wanted it.
So here's what followed... We had our announcement. We played at the #LLCFCoffeeHouse as an official band (you'll be seeing more about THIS soon). Now we are looking forward at the doors that God is opening for us.
I want to tell you all something... Your dream is not too big. It's not too small. It's not impossible, and it's not out of reach for you. If God has placed something, a desire, in your heart, He will see it to fruition. He is not a God of disappointment. God is a God of miracles, so trust in Him with your dreams, desires, and plans. Give Him full control & see where He leads you!
Here's our Debut Performance at the #LLCFCoffeeHouse!
You can follow our journey with God on instagram @wildfireslb
