disciple, husband, father, college minister
Stanford rocks in every area!
On a triumphalist note, I should mention that Stanford has won the Sears cup AGAIN
! That makes 8 in a row. And not only did we win–we won by a lot. Here are the point totals:
1. Stanford 1499.0
2. Texas 1110.5
3. Florida 1078.0
4. North Carolina 1065.5
5. UCLA 1026.0
See how each individual sports teams did.
In case you’re wondering, the Sears Cup is awarded each year to the best overall collegiate athletics progam in the nation. In other words, we rock!
A big thank-you to the women’s ministries of the Northern-California/Nevada district of the Assemblies of God for their wonderful missions boutique.
In case you didn’t know, the Assemblies of God is divided into districts, and in moving from Missouri to California we changed districts. We’re now members of the Northern California/Nevada District.
Each district is pretty autonomous when it comes to interacting with missionaries, and so we’ve been delighted at how warm our reception has been here. Today we were able to visit the District Missions Boutique, which is a collection of very cool stuff (towels, sheets, kitchen items, etc) that the women’s ministries of churches throughout the district accumulate to give to missionaries. Wow! Thanks to all the women who participated in this program–you are such a blessing.
Links to photoso from our move.
We have uploaded some photos from our move, click here to see them! It took us 7 days to make the trip but we were able to lots of friends and some really cool attractions.
We’ve also got a few pictures of our new apartment online now. (Many thanks to Ikea for making such excellent, cheap furniture!)
Our new roommate–Andrew Wright!
Wow–we’ve been living here seven days and we’ve already got a Stanford student moving in with us!
His name is Andrew Wright, and he’s a sophomore here at Stanford. His major is technically undeclared, but he’s planning on International Relations.
Among other things, he writes for The Stanford Review.
God is really opening up doors for us on campus–and we haven’t even started yet! (We’re not allowed to begin formally ministering on campus until we’ve secured 100% of our funding as mandated by Assemblies of God Home Missions. We’re currently near 70% of our assigned budget–pray that God would provide the rest by our September 23rd deadline.)
We’ve got our first California church service this Sunday! Paula and I are driving up to Dobbins, CA at Dobbins Christian Assembly, where Jack Overbey is the pastor. We’re pretty excited to begin sharing our vision with the churches of the Northern California/Nevada District of the Assemblies of God. Pray that God would grant us favor!
2674.6 miles later and we’re finally here in Palo Alto, and we’re loving it! Our life is consumed by cardboard boxes right now, but we’re slowly eradicating them from our lives (forever, God willing).
It took a while to get our Internet connection set up (although now we’ve got a smokin’ fast T1 connection!), so we apologize for being out of touch for so long.
Soon we’ll post some pics of our new apartment for those of you who are curious about such things, and we’ll also upload the story of our move. It was more relaxing than I thought it would be, and we got to see some truly amazing sights (Carlsbad Caverns, the Grand Canyon: two of the most famous holes in the world. After seeing them, I understand why people make such a big deal about them.)
Why Stanford is one of the most strategic mission fields on the planet: today they learn, tomorrow they lead!
Today They Learn, Tomorrow They Lead
In a very real sense, schools like Stanford function as a steering wheel
for our society. Whichever way they turn now determine how our society
will turn out a few decades down the road.
Alumni include
In other words, Stanford is one of the most strategic mission fields in the world! For an even fuller list of alumni, check out the Stanford famous alumni list!
Cover these first two Chi Alpha students in prayer!
There
are a few students currently involved with the Chi Alpha group at Stanford.
The three most involved are a junior named Luis Trujillo [last name
pronounced “true heal”, he’s the guy on the right], a freshman named
Andrew Wright (he’s the guy on the left), and another junior named Wilbur Montana (he’s the invisible guy in the middle).
Please pray that God would grant them favor with their peers as
they seek to reach out and favor in their studies so that they may get
good grades! Also pray for encouragement–it’s challenging to maintain
your faith at Stanford.
Why we are convinced the term ‘partners’ is more Biblical (and healthy) than ‘donors’.
I sometimes conceptualize missions as a stool supported by three legs: proclaimers, providers, and pray-ers (or for a completely different set of labels we could use intercession, investment, and involvement). Without any one of these legs, missions simply cannot be sustained.
Which leads into my point… you may have noticed that we prefer the term ‘partner’ to ‘donor’ in our conversations and in our writing. This preference emerged from a study of how ministry was funded in the Bible. A crystal-clear conviction emerged: God considers those who contribute financially to ministry to have a share in that ministry! Consider, for example, 3 John 8:
Therefore we ought to support such people, so that we may become co-workers with the truth.
Echoing the same theme, Paul says the Philippians are sharing in the gospel (Philippians 1.5).
This is why we talk about building a support team rather than raising funds. The emphasis is on the relationships and not on the money.
Even more significantly, however, it forces us to remember that those who decide to aid us financially are, in actuality, joining us in our ministry: they become co-workers with us.
How so? Think of it this way: your money is a representation of your life: it is what you get in exchange for time at work. By giving of that, it is as though you were taking time and serving on the mission field!
It’s kind of amazing when you think about it. We all have a part to play in the Kingdom of God. Some of us work in office buildings, some of us work in homes, and some of us work in churches, but we all work together. All are necessary for God’s work to go forward.
A summary of the biblical precedents for missionaries soliciting funds so that they can devote themselves to full-time ministry.
How should missionaries be paid? Biblically, there can be only one answer to this question. As Paul says, the Lord has commanded that those who proclaim the gospel should get their living by the gospel (1 Cor 9.14). The teaching is very explicit. There are many examples of this principle being practiced in the Scriptures. Here are just a few:
In summary, there is an extremely strong Biblical case for missionaries raising financial support from the Body of Christ.
Which bring me to my point: we’re missionaries and we need your partnership! If you’d like to support our ministry financially, here’s how.
Incidentally, the word that we prefer to use when discussing financial supporters is partner. That word was chosen very carefully. If you’re curious, read about how missions is really a partnership
If you still have unanswered questions about supporting missionaries, you might be interested in our answers to common questions about supporting missionaries.