4/6/25

This past week was filled with a variety of different ministry expressions; however, the aim of all remained the same: to reconcile a broken world to a healing God. It can become quite easy to toil away in distracted and aimless efforts when I forget the ministry we have been given. I appreciate the simple practicality that comes with remembering the objective in ministry pursuits. Like driving a car, a gaze that forgets to focus on where it wants to go will soon be going everywhere but there. In contrast, eyes fixed on the goal will have the perspective to recognize when they have drifted from the path.

Last Sunday, Nick and I visited East Whittier Friends to share more about the different methods of evangelism that we have used in our ministry, and we have begun trainings with Friends Church Fullerton today with an exercise in prayer walking after our Sunday morning gathering. In this time, we created small groups that were sent out into the neighborhood surrounding our church's meeting house. As we went, we prayed for eyes to see where God was already at work and where He would like us to join Him in the work. We prayed for the people living in the houses we saw and prayed that God would be at work in reconciling this community to Himself. We can learn from the life of Jesus, as portrayed in chapter one of Mark's account of the gospel, that Jesus prioritized prayer and sought the will of the Father in ministry, not assuming all opportunities equal (1:35-38). Prayer walking is a great way to ask God where He wants your partnership as well as a great way to become more physically available for those you wish to minister to. There were a number of wonderful testimonies resulting from our prayer walk that were only possible because we made ourselves available to be used by God in a physical way for our neighbors.

Last Monday, Nick and I met with *Nicodemus who is an Indian student at Cal State Fullerton and talked to us at our whiteboard. We had met him the previous week on campus, but he wanted to meet again to learn more about Jesus and Christianity. As we met with *Nicodemus, we found that he is very open to God and appears to be actively seeking the truth regarding God. *Nicodemus grew up in a Hindu family, but God has clearly been at work in drawing him near. We had a wonderful conversation with *Nicodemus, filled with very good questions about many religions, and as we concluded our time in prayer, *Nicodemus prayed that God, if He is real, would reveal to him which god He is so that he can follow Him! After we wrapped up our meeting with *Nicodemus, Nick and I had the first official meeting of our new DMC with *Jacob and *Dumas.

Monday evening through Wednesday morning I spent visiting a friend of mine who lives north of me in California. I had a good visit and enjoyed seeing my friend and his family, but I was fascinated by a late-night conversation we had with some guys from my friend's small group. The group's meeting had concluded, but a few of us hung around to talk about various subjects that were of interest to different people. Of the many interesting topics, I was fascinated by one young man's interpretation of Jesus' teaching in Matthew 5 on lust and adultery. Many angles of the argument were presented through isolated "word study" as well as inconsistent comparisons via analogies, but the conversation became more and more clearly an attempt to justify sin. As I reflect on this conversation and the conversation had hours before with *Nicodemus, I am astonished at the stark difference between someone seeking truth and someone seeking themselves. There was a sobriety that *Nicodemus had, even despite the confusion that he might have been in amidst the many religions to consider, that allowed him to recognize that he was in sin. *Nicodemus, before our closing prayer, asked if God would hear him despite him being a sinful person. This is drastically different in heart than the other young man I talked with who's aim was not obedience to God, but rather service of self. How concerning that those more abundantly exposed to Christianity can become so blind and calloused to the proper fear that should accompany anyone seeking to house the Spirit of the Living God. Today, in the sermon shared at Friends Church Fullerton, Teddy Omondi posed a powerful question asking us to consider if our hearts truly desire the way and path of God (paraphrased for application). The young man in the small group seems to describe a tragic way of living which embodies a commitment to Christ that extends as far as we agree with Him. This is not following Christ but idolatry as we don't actually seek to obey Christ, but rather only seek to obey a false image of Christ formed by our desires. This ideology is a plague that convinces people that they are committed to Christ when in fact they have no allegiance but to their own desires and self-benefit. May we rather adopt the way of living similar to *Nicodemus that desires to know and follow the truth regardless of the cost it demands us to pay.

There were many other things that happened this past week, but this is a brief insight!

Here are some photos from the Friends Church Fullerton prayer walk.