May
14
Celebrating the Journey
By Edison Tung
This past Friday, we got together to celebrate the conclusion of an era for the seniors in our group :) Crazy to think that one year ago, I was in their shoes..... Anyways, on with the rest of the night. We had a slideshow contrasting the freshmen and senior selves of each of the seniors during dinner, as well as some baby pics! Then, we heard Tina's testimony of how God's been faithful in her life as she is going down to Loma Linda for med school. The testimony led nicely into the message as Rick brought us a message from the end of Genesis, capping the end of our Genesis Bible Study series. Rick encouraged us to hold on to God during these "what is happening?" moments, and in doing so put ourselves in position to see God's faithfulness work in our lives. We then moved on to the dessert potluck and senior sharing/appreciation. It was a great way to recap how God has worked in each of their lives, and great to see how God's worked through them as well. Best of luck next year!
Apr
15
Wrestling with Jacob
By Amanda Garcia | 1 comment
This week James went over the aftermath of Jacob stealing the blessing from Esau, and the devastating effects it had on Jacob’s relationships and his own soul. James even shared about his own “Jacob experience" where he had to really wrestle with the consequences of his actions and confront the brutal truth about himself. Like Jacob, it was only after James stopped running that he found reconciliation, first with God, then others and found forgiveness. We were challenged to embrace those “Jacob moments” and were encouraged by God’s grace and forgiveness… I thought it was gonna be really hard to top last week’s awesome game of KAIROS Undead, but nothing is impossible with KAIROS (and God :D)! After munching on some delicious ice cream sundaes, we headed off to Memorial Glade to play many rounds of Glow in the Dark Frisbee. We ended the night coming up with as many creative & silly ways possible to use up the glow sticks. So much fun.
Apr
08
Unplugged and Undead
By Caleb Cheung | 3 comments
Last Friday, Nelson led our Genesis bible study, giving a message on the story of Jacob, a cheat and a scoundrel, stealing his brother's birthright and blessing. Yet God out of His grace keeps His promise to Abraham and blesses Jacob. After Kairos Unplugged, we tried out a new game called Kairos Undead! Moving in pairs, Humans had to fight, flee, and fret their way across campus to find several checkpoints while avoiding the roaming Zombie population! Humans that unfortunately couldn't get away from the Zombies joined their ranks and betrayed their Human friends at the next location. Few survived. Many stories. Lots of fun!
Mar
21
God, Abraham and Skating
By Tim Wai
As described in the title, last Friday night started off with a thoughtful Bible study led by James discussing Abraham's ongoing journey with God. Abraham managed to remain faithful even when asked to do the unimaginable: sacrificing his beloved son, Isaac. The night was then followed with an awesome trip to SF, where everyone put on their skates at the Yerba Buena Center (some for their first time) and marched bravely onto the ice rink. Those who dared, under the tutelage of James, even learned how to skate backwards. The night ended with some college student essentials: cup ramen and hot chocolate. That's it for now, hope that you could join us next time!
Mar
16
The Passion Experience
By Edison Tung
We are pleased to open up web signups for Passion Experience 2013! It will begin on Monday, March 18th. This year’s newly designed Passion Experience will take place at Durant Loft and Harbor Bay (HB-A MPR) . There will be 2 setups at HB and 2 setups at Durant Loft. Please sign up below for a time slot; all 4 setups are identical, so you only need to sign up for one time slot at the location of your choice. If possible, please try to save the evening slots for those who are unable to sign up for a daytime slot due to work, etc.The Passion Experience can be as long as you want it to be and it will end with a time of reflection and prayer. We’re looking forward to how God will touch lives through this year’s Passion Experience! The respective signup pages are: Durant Loft: http://bit.ly/passion-experience-2013_durantloft1 http://bit.ly/passion-experience-2013_durantloft2 Harbor Bay: http://bit.ly/passion-experience-2013_harborbay1 http://bit.ly/passion-experience-2013-harborbay2
Mar
15
Lent and Passion
By Tina Chan
Spring break, Good Friday, and Easter Sunday are rapidly sneaking up on us. Do you know what this time is called? No, not perpetual midterm season, but... *drumroll please*… Lent. Ok, before I lose you, yes, Lent is a 40 day period (excluding Sundays) of solemn observance that started on Ash Wednesday. Why 40 days? Because that's how long Jesus fasted in the desert right before he started his ministry, akin to how many years the Israelites wandered in the desert before entering the promised land (for those of you doing DT, this should sound familiar!). Also, that's how long rain fell for the Flood in Noah's day, how long Moses was up on Sinai when he received the 10 commandments, how long Elijah fasted and prayed on Mount Horeb, and how long Ezekiel lay on his right side as a precursor to the destruction of Jerusalem. 40 days: very tied to a period of repentance as well as anticipation for something new. Ok, back to Lent. I haven't exactly fasted for 40 days before (World Vision's 30 hour famine was enough for me) but hey, there's only 2 weeks left and there's still ample time to prepare your heart for what we will receive during Passion Experience and GF/Easter services. So what do people normally do for Lent? I haven't really participated in Lent before myself but I used to hear about a plethora of things that people would do: fast from sweets or meat, undergo a media fast, refrain from buying certain items and giving that money away to charity, serving in a soup kitchen or homeless shelter, etc. It seemed to me that for some, the point was to engage in some sort of self-denial in order to use those particularly personal painful pangs to build character or to reach some sort of health goal. I never quite understood that point of view because I didn't see how that was different from the many attempts (and failures) of health-related New Year's Resolutions. I failed at enough New Year's Resolutions so I didn't quite feel like engaging in a new one. Another reason why I avoided Lent before was because I thought that perhaps people were just inflicting pain on themselves just for the sake of doing it and forcing themselves to become stronger under fire. I somewhat understand this second alternative view but didn't want to associate with that because I could see myself falling into the cyclical torture of trying, failing, and feeling-guilty-for-failing-and-barely-resolving-to-try-again. However, this year, things are a little bit different. I thought about Lent mainly because I heard about it more than usual and saw how this period of Lent didn't have to be just a "fix yourself" time or a "build character through pain for fun" time. An awesome way to spend the days of Lent were to better identify with the complete self-denial and pain that Jesus underwent on his way to the cross, and what better way to do that than engage more fully in one of the regular practices of connecting with God: reading the Bible, praying, sifting through and repenting through the otherwise dark and unreached areas of one's heart, and sacrificially relating to or serving people? Luke 9:23 gives a pretty clear description of what it means to be a disciple of Jesus: If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me. Deny self. Take up cross daily. Follow. Lent sure sounds like a time to revisit the basic callings of Christ and what it means to be a Christ follower, especially the "deny self" part. Quick look at Jesus' period of fasting in Matthew 4:1-4: Then Jesus was led up by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil. And after fasting forty days and forty nights, he was hungry. And the tempter came and said to him, “If you are the Son of God, command these stones to become loaves of bread.” But he answered, “It is written, “‘Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God.’” "It is written" are the beginnings of the powerful words that Jesus uttered to counter the devil (who’s pretty darn smart by the way). Jesus knew the Word, and he fed on the word of God above feeding on physical food. It is interesting to note that this quotation (as well as the two other "it is written" quotations that follow this conversation with the devil) comes from Deuteronomy, during the times that the Israelites were wandering in the desert, when they were moving or remaining still quite literally day by day according to God's instructions. And they were also dependent, quite literally, on God's provision of food and water. So, I'll just leave one Lent example for you, based on Deuteronomy 8:3: And he humbled you and let you hunger and fed you with manna, which you did not know, nor did your fathers know, that he might make you know that man does not live by bread alone, but man lives by every word that comes from the mouth of the Lord. My Lent example that maybe you could try is this: if you love food, you can spend this time of Lent matching your physical hunger with hungering for God's word. Practically, this looks like spending a bit more time doing DT than usual (or doing DT, period) or simply thinking about a phrase from a certain verse throughout the day. Nothing killer. If you are tight on time, you can maybe even shorten your mealtimes and eat just what you need for the hunger pangs to not be distracting. (I am NOT suggesting to diet or fast for the sake of losing weight, torturing yourself, or to be Pharisaic.. Hopefully you get what I'm trying to say here). With the extra 10 or so minutes you have, you can spend 10 or so minutes feeding your soul. Yum. Any other personal Lent practice would be great, depending on what you think you need right now. There are still 2 more weeks before Good Friday and Easter, and Passion Experience is quickly approaching. What will you do to prepare your heart? Works cited: 1. http://www.crossroadsinitiative.com/library_article/7/forty_days_of_lent.html 2. The Bible
Feb
19
A Manly Night
By Edison Tung | 1 comment
The night started off with a manly meal of brisket sandwiches and BBQ sauce, as well as some manly potato salad. Then, Ben gave a message about Abraham, the father of faith. Afterwards, we had an awesome game of surveillance (a.k.a. the Bourne Ultimatum game). We learned to trust each other as the only eyes that each asset had to keep him from danger were the eyes of the handler. Pictures will explain the game later. Then we finished the night off with some arm wrestling. All in all, very manly.
Feb
19
Picture of the Week: Bullseye
By Nelson Wong | 1 comment
An action shot from a night full of action. Here the asset terminates the target during the Bourne Ultimatum game at our Brothers Night. Notice the bullet flying through the air! Check out the recap of Brothers Night!
Feb
19
Sister's Night Recap
By Tina Chan
It is difficult to recapture Sisters Night in a post. So I will default to expressing myself through pictures, hoping that each is worth a thousand words in addition to the captions. All in all, we were definitely well fed, able to get to know other sisters and a part of their story, challenged through the examples of women who were agents of love instead of fear (Shiphrah and Puah, Pharaoh's daughter, etc), encouraged to lean on the church through personal testimonies, personally prayed for after receiving a gift from an older sister, and hopefully a huge step closer to embracing our identity as a Beloved Daughter.
