A Family Trip To Nor Cal

16 of us from the IVC family went up to Redding, California this last week for the UCSB Spring Break...there is a church located in Redding that is experiencing the love and power of God in a radical way. It was such an honor to be involved with this church for a week and meet different students that are attending The Bethel School of Supernatural Ministry. The majority of our trip was just being together as a family and going to different meetings, attending some classes, and immersing ourselves in their culture. As you can see from these pictures we had an incredible time!

And without me writing a small story book, we had a crazy experience at in In & Out restaurant in Fresno on the way back to IV...healings broke out & we prayed over several people between eating our food - it was gnarly! The one picture you see is of this gal whose arm was in a sling because she had messed up her rotator cuff and could not use her arm. After two of the gals on our trip prayed for her, God completely healed it right in the middle of the restaurant...c'mon, amazing! She ended up taking off her sling and moving her arm around, and she was tripping out to say the least...God is good, always!

We Love Our Kids

Here are a few pictures taken by our friend Rob Wang this last weekend...we're so thankful for our children, each have brought tons of joy to our life!

"Behold, children are a heritage from the LORD, the fruit of the womb is a reward" (Psalm 127:3)

Family Time

These are a few pictures from one of our Sunday gatherings taken by our friend/adopted college daughter Krissy...Holly and I are beyond blessed & grateful to be apart of a church that loves the Lord and one another so much! God is doing great things in IV!

Take it to the streets....

"Then the master told his servant, 'Go out to the roads and country lanes and make them come in, so that my house will be full.'" - Jesus

It's interesting how comfortable we as believers can get in our lifestyle and forget that Christ asked us to go to the places where the broken, hurting, and downtrodden are living and invite them into relationship with Him.

Normally on Saturday we host Jesus Burgers in the front lawn from about 11pm until 2am (& some people stay out even later on certain nights). However, this last Saturday we decided to go to the streets instead of do the Burgers...so about 25 of us went out and realized afterward that God had gone before us.

The group I was with was able to give words of knowledge to several people, pray over a few people, and then get into two really long conversations about Jesus on Del Playa, the infamous party street that everyone walks on going from party to party on Friday and Saturday nights.

One conversation we got into was absolutely amazing, as the guy began to open up his life to us and his honest need for Jesus and people like us in his life. We talked to him for about 45 minutes and he wanted my number. I gave him my number in a Gideon Bible and handed him it. He was so thrilled to receive the Word and my number, but literally right when he was rejoicing in his Bible and the conversation with us, the police pulled him to the side because he had a beer in his back pocket and was under age. They ended up taking him away and telling us he had several warrants out for his arrest. We're praying for our new friend, but the timing of us meeting him was a sheer act of God.

Our friend Derika blogged about her night too: http://derikabrendsel.blogspot.com/2010/03/praying-in-streets.html

Learning to skateboard

The kids thought it would be cool to learn to ride the skateboard...Samuel pushed, while Hope and baby J tried to keep their balance. These kids are always up to something, causing momma and me to laugh all the time.

For instances, I came across Hope the other day in our backyard hovering over a bush with her pants down. In a state of shock of what I was looking at I asked her what she was doing. Only to have her respond, "Samuel just peed in this bush I want to do the same daddy."

Daddy Time

I love Tuesdays, as I attempt to make it my day of rest. This is not always possible with the lives we live, but it is something I really need to do as often as I can on this day. Today I had one-on-one time with Samuel & then with Hope. For those of you who don't know, Holly feeds the kids a lot of healthy food, which is why dad needs to keep them somewhat exposed to some of the fine delicacies of life like frozen yogurt.

Watching the kids eat their yogurt with so much joy today always serves as a subtle reminder to me of the Father heart of God who delights in seeing His children enjoy life...kids have such a way of expressing satisfaction, excitement, and thankfulness in its purest form.

Come Love the World

This last Friday 4 of us traveled south to Ventura for an event called Come Love the World. The event brought together different mission organizations to share what is going on with their ministry.

They asked IVC to come and share about the Jesus Burgers, and invite others to come join us on Saturday nights. I think we were one of the only local ministries, as many of the other organizations were doing work overseas or in other cities. It was a great night as I shared for about 3 minutes to the entire group concerning what we are doing in IV, most of that time being used to talk about the Jesus Burgers.

Check out this slide show: http://annajoyphoto.myshowit.com/comelovetheworld

Here are my favorite pictures #11,60,63,70,82.

"God so loved the world that He sent His only begotten Son..."

The Gospel of Grace

The last two Sundays God has had me preaching a message of grace to the fellowship...the gospel that says that we can do nothing to earn forgiveness, righteousness, love, acceptance, or salvation besides faith alone in Jesus. The gospel of grace is amazing when we really get it because it frees us from living by laws, rules, standards, and opens us up to a love relationship with God. It's interesting how we tell people before they come to Jesus that they can do absolutely nothing to earn salvation besides trusting in Jesus, yet once they do that, and come into the church, we often start giving them a list of things they need to do now. The Christian life was meant to be lived by grace alone, not rules and laws. And only Jesus can live like Jesus, our role is to allow His life to be lived through our life by abiding/resting in Him. This kind of life naturally produces fruit as my orange trees naturally produces their fruit...I have yet to see my orange trees stress out trying to be an orange tree and produce fruit, yet I have often seen in my own life and others Christians this being the case.

There is a reason we are called human-beings, not human-doings. When we learn to be with Him and allow for Him to live His life through our life than doing/fruit bearing is not something we even try to do, rather it's who we are.

One of the great Bible expositors of our time, Martyn Lloyd Jones, once wrote this about the gospel of grace:

The true preaching of the gospel of salvation by grace alone always leads to the possibility of this charge being brought against it. There is no better test as to whether a man is really preaching the New Testament gospel of salvation than this, that some people might misunderstand it and misinterpret it to mean that it really amounts to this, that because you are saved by grace alone it does not matter at all what you do; you can go on sinning as much as you like because it will redound all the more to the glory of grace. If my preaching and presentation of the gospel of salvation does not expose it to that misunderstanding, then it is not the gospel.