Jesus Burger Healing

This last Saturday I saw once again God do what He can only do...I was out front standing next to the grill when a young guy came right to the front of the line without waiting his turn for a hamburger in hopes of bypassing the whole line. When I saw this I spoke up and said, "Hey bro, the line starts back there. You will need to wait it out like everyone else." When I said this, the young guy began to tell me he was handicapped and could not wait in line. I was thinking right, this young, energetic, well-built 20 year old was handicapped??? This guy wanted a hamburger and was hungry; however, I said, "what's up?' He then proceeded to tell me about two surgeries he has had for his acl on his knee and how he is in pain all the time. Instantly, I believed if I prayed for him that he would be healed, so I wasted no time and told him to follow me into the house because I knew Someone who could heal him, ie Jesus. So he sat down on the couch and I was about to pray, but right before I prayed I felt like it would be important for him to see right away that he was healed so I told him to do something with his leg that would cause pain. He then put it up on the coffee table and said that just resting it there was painful. Now for whatever reason I just believed if I prayed for this guy, Jesus was going to heal him right there so I grabbed my buddy Danny and we laid hands on him and asked Jesus to heal his knee. When I finished, I told him try it out, as he was already aware that the pain had left while we were praying. So he stood up and started moving up and down, and to his dismay, he was 100% pain free and fully healed! Come on Jesus! I then was able to share the good news of God's love, forgiveness, and mercy with him and his buddy. His buddy and him both listened intently after witnessing a miracle that only God could do...what was great too was that he was in IV to party for the weekend from LA, but it looked like God had other plans.

Once we went back outside to the happening party in front, he gnudged me on the way out of the door and told me to tell people what happened. I looked at him and said, "You're the one that got healed, you tell people what happened." Next thing you know, he was testifying to a gal in the line about his knee that was healed. In the ministry of Jesus & the early church, healing was normal, not abnormal...I am praying that yet again in my own life and in the church that healings would be normal for the life of every believer.

"And as you go, preach, saying, 'The kingdom of heaven is at hand. Heal the sick, cleanse the lepers, raise the dead, cast out demons: freely you received, freely give.'" (Matt 10:7-8)

Jesus Burger Article

Here is a recent article on Jesus Burgers from the front page of Westmont's newspaper "The Horizon."

http://homepage.westmont.edu/horizon/articles/?p=252

God is Moving!!!

This Sunday I (Holly) was looking out the kitchen window just before the Sunday gathering was supposed to start, when I saw a few new people walking up...and then to my surprise saw a few more new faces following behind, then a few more still coming behind them!  I was so excited to soon hear that this was a bunch of Real Life students that were just hungry for more of the Lord and had been told about us and our house and our Sunday meeting from some of the students we disciple!

It was an awesome time on Sunday and lots of people stayed late, wanting to learn & experience more in hearing from and encountering God.  They are so hungry to grow in Christ, and it is such an honor & blessing to get to pour into these beautiful students!

Halloween Weekend

Halloween in IV this year was special, as the Lord heard our prayers from 24/7 prayer leading up to this weekend. I heard of many people praying to receive Christ or recommitting their life back to Him, not to mention countless stories of God's love touching people and helping people through us on both Friday and Saturday night.

There was a guy named Alex from San Diego that a few of us started praying for because he had broken his arm several months back but was still experiencing pain. When we started praying for him he said, "I don't need prayer for my arm, but for my heart. I need Jesus." After we finished praying outside, I took him into our prayer shed where I continued to listen to him and pray with him. By the time I was done praying, he was crying and confessing His faith and need for Jesus in his life.

Ah, so many amazing testimonies this weekend, God is so good!

Check out Derika's blog for a few pictures:

http://derikabrendsel.blogspot.com/2009/11/picture-this-halloween-2009.html

Chinese Church Retreat

This last weekend I traveled about an hour and a half north & gave four talks for a Chinese Church retreat of 70+ college students and a few post grads. It was such an honor to be able to speak into these people's lives and impart what the Lord has given me over the years.

The Lord was faithful to sustain me as I fought off sickness all weekend; however, it gave me a new appreciation of 2 Corinthians 12:9 when Paul says that God's grace is sufficient for us, for His power is made perfect in weakness. It was amazing, as each time I went to speak, the power of God filled me and removed the sickness for the 30 to 40 minutes I talked...praise the Lord! The topic of the retreat was "Freedom in Christ" and the title of the four talks were:

Session # 1: The truth: you are free in Christ
Session # 2: The battle is won & lost in the mind
Session # 3: Do you know who you are?
Session # 4: The kingdom of God is offensive, not defensive

24-7 Prayer

One of the things I (Holly) am the most passionate about is prayer... and for so many different reasons...
1. I love that prayer is simply coming before our Lord and communing with the heart of God
2. I love that prayer changes things & God hears our prayers & moves on behalf of them
3. I believe that prayer is the key to seeing Isla Vista reached and redeemed for the King
4. I love that prayer changes US, and gets us stirred up more about God & who He is, and how He wants to move in people's lives

So, for these reasons as well as several others, I am so stoked that 24-7 prayer is happening this week in IV in the prayer shed behind the Del Playa houses!

I got to have the blessing of helping my dear friend, Annalisa, who is in charge of the prayer ministry for Real Life (Campus Crusade), set up the prayer shed for this "event", and I even got to go spend an hour or so in prayer there last night. It is so awesome that day and night prayers are being lifted up to the Father on behalf of this city right now! Praise the Lord for the gift that prayer is -- that we get to participate with God in bringing about change on the earth!

Article on Jesus Burgers

A UCSB newspaper, The Bottom Line, interviewed our good friend Derika and I for a feature article on Jesus Burgers:

http://thebottomline.as.ucsb.edu/2009/10/saturday-night-d-p-sustenance-jesus-burgers

The House of the Lord

"God, let Your Presence be made manifest here in this home in such a real and tangible way." This is one of my frequent prayers recently as the Lord has been speaking to me so much lately about our home and the various purposes He wants to use it for. There is of course the obvious role this home plays in being a place of dwelling for our family, but there is also the role of it being a sanctuary for us, especially for Jason, to come in from the busyness of work and life and find rest and peace here. But beyond these things, our home has become a sanctuary in an even broader sense now that we are having our Sunday gathering for IVC here!

It has been a blessing for me to have my world becoming more cohesive, that as I focus on helping our family life and home life run well, Isla Vista and the students that come in here will be blessed.

We have been in "operation simplification" for awhile now, working towards getting things in order in several difference senses of the word -- having our physical surroundings simple and in order (getting rid of excess, having places for everything and keeping those things in their place!), having our schedules simple and in order, getting organized and simple with meals and food, cleaning, and many of the other things that come into running a home well.

God has been speaking to me every since we started praying about having the Sunday gatherings in our home about the house and the tent of the Lord. So I have been growing in my understanding of what being a homemaker is, with the added blessing of getting to steward a house used for God's Kingdom to be advanced in this city, and in which we can invite others into!

This last Sunday a guy my good friend Lindsay whom I disciple had met at Jesus Burgers last year came, and he was overwhelmed by what he called a "really big energy" and the love in the place! I laughed, thinking, yeah, the Holy Spirit is in fact quite a really big energy! Praise God that this guy was able to sense God's presence in our home and to be touched by Him!

I would love prayer to continue to be able to simplify and bring things into order in our home life, with the vision of being a blessing in this community!

You will know the truth, and the truth will set you free - Jesus

Jesus makes this profound statement in John 8:32, "You will know the truth, and the truth will set you free."

This last weekend Neil Anderson, my favorite author on the subject of spiritual warfare, was in town doing a seminar. The only problem was I was out of town. However, a few of my friends attended the 2-day seminar through the IVSOD and reported back excellent things to me!
http://www.ivsod.com/discipleship_counseling.html

Neil Anderson has a gift in teaching people how to walk in freedom by knowing the truth of who you are in Christ. Throughout my years following the Lord, especially my early years in the faith, I experienced radical freedom/deliverance from understanding my identity in Him. The book "Victory Over the Darkness" written by Neil Anderson has helped me more than any other book I have ever read in understanding who God says I am. Over the years now I have given out countless copies and have seen similar results.

People sometimes forget that when the devil came to Christ in the wilderness, the first thing he said to Him before any temptation was, "if you're the Son of God..." We must not be foolish and think if the enemy tried to get Christ to question His identity that he will not try to get us to question our own.

Here is a list of a few 'Who I am in Christ' truths:

http://www.ficm.org/whoiam.htm

The Sueno Tabernacle

Yesterday was our 1st gathering in The Sueno Tabernacle located in our backyard...it was awesome! We had a great time of worshiping Jesus together, taking communion, sharing the word, eating dinner, and just being family. The Lord is so good to have given us a place to meet this year in Isla Vista...Holly and I are so honored to a be apart of all the Lord is doing in this city!

New IVC Website

After many years with the same website, we now have a new one! This time of year is like January 1st for us. It's our 8th year as a church, and we are excited about all of the new things that are happening:

- New IVSOD in Isla Vista
- New Sunday location
- New Upper Room gathering on Saturday nights
- New Home Fellowships
- New year of Jesus Burgers & a new night serving them
- New DP house people
- New students every year

Thank You, Jesus, for the fruit I am beginning to see of probably the busiest summer of my life!

http://www.islavistachurch.com

End of Summer / Beginning of the School Year

This summer is pretty much over for us now, UCSB starts this Thursday!

We had a wonderful summer as a church body, enjoying some sweet low-key fellowship, worship, and teaching in the park all summer. It was our last week meeting at the park by the ocean in IV, which had quite a wonderful view. Praise the Lord for summer days by the ocean, singing worship to our God!

Now it is time to move on over to the Lomelino household for the school year -- check out Jason's following post!

Please pray for us as the school year begins and as we host IVC at our home this year.

Sueno Tabernacle

Over the course of the last month the Lord had been speaking to me about building a "Tabernacle" like- structure in our backyard to meet at this next year...well by grace alone, some unexpected provision, willing servants, and surrendering our home afresh to Him, we have built the structure.

Our 1st gathering is this Sunday @ 4pm, dinner to follow...of course dinner to follow as it's IVC.

These are a few pictures of the work being done, we even had Hope working the garden. We will try to shoot more this Sunday as we begin our 8th year as a church in IV!

Samuel's 1st Game

Our little boy, becoming big boy, had his 1st game last Saturday! He did great running up and down the field, smiling, and not taking anything too serious. Dad, on the other hand, well, I get a little more passioante about kicking the ball and scoring...by God's grace, I will maintain my excitement this year.

Holly and I are looking forward to the season and time together as a family. It is great too b/c the games are walking distance from our house in Isla Vista.

Wedding in SB

This last weekend Holly coordinated a friend of ours wedding at the Natural History Museum in SB..it was an incredibly full weekend, as I had all 3 munchkins and no momma around some of Friday and all of Sunday. Overall, the weekend worked out great and the wedding was awesome... Paige looked beautiful and Holly did such a great job!

Samuel's 1st Soccer Practice

It felt like yesterday that I was taking my little man home from the hospital...now we are taking him to his 1st soccer practice, what the heck? I can't believe he is almost 5! It's been nothing but joy watching Samuel grow up, including watching him get so fired up and excited about his 1st soccer practice on Wednesday. We were about 20 minutes late as the directions were not the greatest; however, as a family we prayed and by the grace of God we located this remote hidden field in a residential neighborhood. Once we discovered that we had actually found the right team, after we had first approached a few other teams throughout Goleta, Samuel was nothing but smiles! The boy was worried so Holly and I were stoked that God got us to the right place...our God is a God of details, He definitely cares about what seems like little things in life. More pictures to come of his first game in a few weeks :-)

Church Camping Trip

There is something special about living life together with other people, not just doing church together. I think this is why I (Jason) absolutely love retreats! I even love the ones that when you show up at 3:30pm on Friday afternoon in your air-conditioned van and the temperature gage reads 107 degrees outside! About 20 of us headed up the 154 off of Paradise Rd, about 30 minutes or so from IV, to go camping this last weekend...like always, it was a great time together!

I dropped Holly off at the SB Airport early on Friday with baby J to fly out to Oklahoma to her grandpa’s 90th B-Day, which means I was in charge of Samuel and Hope. Let’s just say I am no momma; however, the kids had a blast and thought sleeping in a tent was awesome….not to mention going to bed a bit later, eating a few things mom is not a big fan of, and missing a few naps. The ship seems to drive a little differently when dad is steering it, not always intentionally, it just kind of happens.

On Saturday we took about a 15 minute drive to Solvang to a great park that had lots of grass and most importantly, lots of shade. One of the highlights from the weekend was this epic water war that broke out while we were at the park. The pictures give you a good idea of what happened, especially the one of Jose sneaking up on Robyn with a few gallons of water. Samuel was cracking me up during the war, as he was running around with his little gun shooting people with water, while others were pouring gallons on each other. Let’s just says that mercy triumphing over judgment got the boot during the water fight. Afterwards we got some ice cream together and headed back to our site for dinner and hanging out together.

The last picture was taken by Paul Carr in the dried out riverbed by our campsite of a battle between a deer and a crawdad…the winner is = the crawdad!

Family Camp in San Diego

Holly, the kids, and I had an amazing weekend in San Diego...we went to a Family Camp through a ministry that Holly gets magazines from called "Above Rubies". The focus of the camp was to encourage dads and moms in their calling to raise children in the Lord. It was such a sweet time of being taught, fellowshipping with others parents (25 families in all), eating some good meals, and having tons of fun together!

In the midst of all the many blessings God showered on us, one really special one was He put this couple in the cabin next to us that was about our same age, had been married about the same amount of time, and have four kids that are five and under. Check out the bottom two picture to see all of us together...Holly and I, along with the kids, absolutely loved this family.

We're more convinced than ever that children are a gift from the Lord and are such a blessing from our Heavenly Father.

"Behold, children are a gift of the LORD, the fruit of the womb is a reward. Like arrows in the hand of a warrior, so are the children of one's youth. How blessed is the man whose quiver is full of them; they will not be ashamed when they speak with their enemies in the gate." (Psalm 127:3-5)

1st Baptist Church

This last Sunday morning I had the priviledge and honor to speak at the SB First Baptist Church. Both Holly and Scott went with me, along with the kids. It was so great being with a different part of the body of Christ, in addition to being with many people who are three to four times older than the most of the family in IVC. The first two people I met had been attending the church for over 40 yrs...needless to say it was encouraging to see the faithfulness of people who have loved Jesus for so many years!

The text I preached out of was John 17:18, which is Jesus saying to the Father, "As you sent Me into the world, I also have sent them into the world." It was a great reminder for all us that we have been sent into the world to love the world, as Christ loved the world.

At the end I showed this video on prayer in IV and had Scott close with a short word:

http://www.ivsod.com/videos.html

Some 1-on-1 Time

We took this picture on our way out of the house before the big 30 celebration. Holly and I went to her favorite restaurant, Sojourner Cafe, that night before the Natural Cafe. It was a no kid night, which was super sweet. Those are few and far between these days & we are thankful when we get one...life changes when you get married, life changes even more after one kid, life drastically changes after having multiple kids.