Week Nine

This past week was our 24/7 week of prayer. How it worked was we had a specific room where everyone would pray in, and at least one person would always be praying for 168 hours. I signed up every other day at 3 in the afternoon, then every other day at 3 in the morning. I chose this time because in one of the sermons that I heard at New Life, Mark talked about the "3 am factor", where God would wake up people in the night to talk and meet with them - completely out of the blue. The example he used was God waking Solomon up around the third hour to talk to him. So I decided to try the 3 am factor. In this room, all our pictures were up on the walls with paper under our names, a cross in the room, dim lighting, and a bible there. It was so peaceful and every time I walked into the room, I could definitely feel that the Lord was there too. Over the course of the week, the walls filled up with prayers, the papers filled with encouragement and the windows were covered with faces to pray for. In that room is was so much pain, so much hurt and many many troubles. A lot of bitterness and brokenness and huge questions that were expressed in that room and that troubled me, but made me super thankful for the grace that I have experienced in my life. I loved what that room brought out in us. So many times I had incredible times of prayer with good brothers, either just two of us, or one night we had all the guys praying together. Even this morning, my brother was clinging to the cross today and weeping over his family, and we were able to share that time with him. I love the openness and vulnerability that occured in the room, and even though most times I was in there by myself, I felt like I became closer to others through praying for them and reading their prayers on the walls. This week I had to do a lot of homework. I wrote a paper on the dwelling place of God over time, focusing on the Tabernacle, the Temple and finally our bodies. So cool that now, God lives WITHIN us and we do not need a priest to meet with God for us! I learned so much from this paper and was one of my favourites to write. I had to do some power reading as well. I read What's so Amazing About Grace, and The Emerging Church for my Church Ministry class. Unfortunately, I missed going to the homeless ministry on Sunday because I had to do the homework. Church on Sunday was great, as Mark talked about having spiritual friends and how important they are. I am so blessed to be in a place where most of my friends here are "spiritual friends" or "Rafiki", as Mark called them. Here we are not only good friends, but we are encouraging each other, challenging each other and holding each other accountable. On Friday night at youth it was Fear Factor night, and even though I did not feel particularly useful, I had fun cheering on kids eating blended Big Mac combos, and other gross feats. My favourite thing about youth however was after it was done and me and Jon, another Kaleo, wrestled some of the guys. They loved it! And it was a great bonding time for me and them I felt. The guys here at Kaleo did a "UFC Kaleo - Friendships Collide" night. We all were wrestling downstairs and was so much fun. Another cool thing we did was play indoor soccer again with Edgar and some others from Duncan. This was great to continue this interaction with the community of Duncan. This week is our Church Ministry class, and it will be a great class and a great week. Please pray for me this week as I want to learn as much as I can about how I can be the church, and what that really implies. Please pray for continued friendships that go deep, pray that this place would really bring about healing to those who truly need it. Would love to hear from all of you! Look forward to Christmas.