Lots of cool stuff going on.  Wish I had time to write about it all. Here’s a quick update…

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On Sunday morning we celebrated wonderful news.  Two and a half months after witnessing Hector’s baptism and observing the difference Christ is making in his life, Hector’s wife Roxy* has decided to follow Jesus Christ and be baptized, too!  Praise God! 

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This Sunday the first church plant in East Hollywood will gather in Hannah’s* home for the first time! 

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Meri, who was getting to know a Buddhist family, now is getting to know a Hindu family and a Muslim family all from countries in South and Southeast Asia.  This is very uncharted territory for us.  Pray for open doors. 

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Today we met a transplant from Chicago who just moved onto our block.  He shares Ed’s and my interest in riding bicycles.  We’re planning to go on a ride together this week.  The Spirit can begin his transforming work with simple things like this!

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Tonight we had a spontaneous get-together with a family who lives nearby, after the women in the church prayed for opportunities to connect with this family.  Our neighbors came over for dinner to eat pizza and play games with our two families and Krista, a spiritual sister from the Hollywood Church of Christ.  The husband, who grew up Catholic in Guatemala, is turned off by religion.  Yet he shared a song he really likes about Jesus Christ.  This sparked a really cool conversation between him and Ed. 

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As I think about all these new acquaintances, and the other people we have met so far in East Hollywood, some of them have shared how they have been disappointed and excluded by religious people.  How wonderful it is to know that while religion excluded them, Jesus died to include us all!

*[Names have been changed.  All other details are accurate.]

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Right now I’m noticing churches everywhere in the U.S. are feeling the need to make cuts in their budgets because of the economy.  If history repeats itself, the first thing to go in church budgets is going to be “missions” (foreign and domestic).  While I don’t advocate this, I also don’t take a traditional view to things like missions/outreach budgets.  As your congregation navigates these financially challenging times, I’d like to speak a word to my supporters and friends. 

Why let money get in the way of supporting missions?  God doesn’t.  Let’s do missions in his image - by sending

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What if God told us we couldn’t have Sundays anymore?  What if he took away our our Sunday worship events, our church buildings and our paid ministers, and told us not to replace them? 

What would Jesus-followers learn? 

What would churches be like? 

How would their impact in the community change? 

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The public drunkard.  It seems every urban village has one (or several in some cases).  In our neighborhood the young people tease him, dare him to do foolish things, push him around in a circle.  Nobody takes this fifty-something man seriously.  And yet I recall the stories Ed tells us about how he watched men like this gradually transform into reliable men and godly leaders in his parents’ church.  Anything is possible with Jesus.

Inside the man’s apartment is a tiny old woman, praying, always praying for her lost son.  The pages of her Bible are frayed from thorough reading.  Worried sick, she verbally beats him down by reading highlighted scriptures that condemn him for drinking too much and doing drugs.  He whines at her to stop telling him things he already knows.  “I know I’m sinning.  I want to stop.  I know I need the Lord,” he complains to me. “He never listens.  El Diablo is in him,” she complains to me.

In his hands, the bottle is a taskmaster, controlling and condemning him.  In her hands, the Bible is a tool for controlling and condemning him.  Look at the mother’s face and you see the worry lines the son has put on her.  Look at the son’s demeanor and you see the spiritual scars the mother has inflicted on him.  Both have abused.  Both need to be liberated.  God, come to the rescue!

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You’re going to love this story Hector shared with me this evening.

Today Hector and Roxy are walking their girls home from school.  Madelina (age 6) is feeling bad that she forgot to thank God for her breakfast this morning.  She stops and kneels on the sidewalk and puts her hands together, thanking God for her food, her parents, her health and several other things that come to her mind.  Hector and Roxy look around - there are people passing by.  Get up, Hector thinks to himself.  But Madelina just won’t stop praying.  So Hector shrugs his shoulders, kneels on the sidewalk, puts his arm around his little girl and starts praying too, thanking God for everything under the sun!  When all is said and done, they get up and walk a little farther, but Madelina remembers she has forgotten something else.  So she makes her daddy kneel again to tell God thank you one more time.  Right there next to the busy street, crowds of Angelenos all around.  Do think God is pleased?

From the lips of children.

[Names have been changed.  All other details are accurate.]

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Yesterday I was moved by this story about the costly and mind-blowingly fruitful obedience of a Jesus-follower named Kumar. 

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We live next to two children’s hospitals - Children’s Hospital Los Angeles and Shriners.  Perhaps it is no surprise then that in the last year God has connected us with three families who have children staying in those hospitals.  The principal of our sons’ public school called us again to let us know of another family who is going through hard times and needs someone to demonstrate Jesus’ love to them.  A Hindu family fled Islamic persecution in Bangladesh and moved to the U.S. to find a better life.  Then two months ago someone was driving carelessly and ran over their 11-year old daughter.  The little girl survived but now she is severely injured, incapable of walking, and barely able to communicate or say “Mommy.”  Soon after the accident the mom and kids relocated from their hometown to East Hollywood so their girl can undergo experimental surgeries in Children’s Hospital Los Angeles, located a few blocks from us.  Meanwhile the dad continues to earn an income out of State, so the family is under a lot of stress, feeling disconnected and alone.  They have a 5-year old son whom they just enrolled in our sons’ school, which is how our principal came into the picture and introduced us to one another.  As her daughter lies in a hospital bed, the mother looks to the wall and prays.  On the wall are pictures of the gods she is pleading with.  One of these many gods includes a picture of Jesus Christ.  Meri visited the daughter in the hospital.  We’ve had the mom and son over for a playdate with our kids.  We’re trying to set up a dinner soon.  What happened to their daughter is horrifying.  Please keep this family in your prayers. 

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