Mother's Day

Just a quick prayer request for this weekend… On Saturday the girls and I are having a Mother’s Day Dinner for their mothers. This is an idea that I got back in the fall and it’s exciting to see it actually happening. There are two purposes behind this. The first is obvious: to honour and celebrate these moms for all the work they do and the important role they play in their daughters’ lives. The second is to provide an opportunity for me to continue to build deeper relationships with these moms. Generally, it is hard to get parents in this community to come to social events and be involved in the lives of their kids outside of the home but, much to my amazement, it looks like all the moms are coming. Please pray that the moms would indeed show up, that they would see how much I love not only their girls but how much I care about them as well, and that this would be a stepping stone towards a greater level of involvement in the lives of these girls’ families.

"The Rescue"

I want to shift gears from Cloverdale for a minute and tell you about another group of people that are very close to my heart… the children of Northern Uganda. For those of you not too familiar with the situation, for over 20 years the Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA), led by Joseph Kony, have been terrorizing the people of Northern Uganda in what has become the longest war in Africa. This conflict has become best known through the “Night Commuters”, thousands of children who would leave their homes in the village every night and walk to sleep in the streets of cities to avoid being abducted from the LRA. Since the war began an estimated 30,000 children have been abducted by the LRA and another 1.8 million individuals have been displaced, forced to flee their homes and take up residence in impoverished, over-crowded Internally Displaced Persons (IDP) camps. Peace talks over the last few years have put an end to night commuting and allowed approximately 900,000 displaced people to return to their homes. However, peace talks have since collapsed. Approximately 90% of the LRA is made up of abducted children and while others are slowly regaining their freedom, these children are still out in the bush under the control of Joseph Kony.
This weekend I will be joining about 200 individuals here in Montreal along with approximately 100,000 people in 100 cities worldwide in an event organized by Invisible Children called “The Rescue”

(http://therescue.invisiblechildren.com/). We will be ‘abducting ourselves’ on behalf of the abducted, walking to an ‘LRA camp’ and spending the night there waiting to be ‘rescued’ by local political leaders, celebrities, etc. who will take a stand and make a commitment to take action to rescue Joseph Kony’s child soldiers.
I have not yet had the opportunity to visit Northern Uganda and meet the children there yet when I look into the eyes of the children I have come to love in Jinja, Kampala and Luwero I am struck by the realization that if they lived just a few hours North they too might have been abducted into an army where they were forced to kill even their own families.
Proverbs 31:8-9 says: "Speak up for those who cannot speak for themselves, for the rights of all who are destitute. Speak up and judge fairly; defend the rights of the poor and needy." I have committed myself to being a ‘world-class Christian’, to advocate justice for the oppressed and defend the cause of those who have no voice with which to speak for themselves. That is why when I heard about what was happening this weekend I knew this was something I had to be a part of.

If you think of it over the next few days, would you pray about this event that is happening all around the world this weekend? Pray that as people of all different nationalities come together that awareness would be raised, that government would indeed ‘come to the rescue’ and that the day of freedom for Joseph Kony’s child soldiers would not be far off.

THE FOUR POINTS

1 – God loves me;
2 – I have sinned;

3 – Jesus died for me;
4 – I need to decide to live

for God...

It’s called “The Four Points” and it’s an increasingly popular evangelism tool that I learned while with Metro Ministries in New York (for more info check out www.thefourpoints.com/). Anyway, those four points were the basis for our devotion time at Friday’s sleepover and as always, they sparked a lot of discussion. What I love about the four points is how simple and clear they make the message of the gospel and the emphasis they put on our need to make a decision. As we worked our way through each one I saw things click and the lights go on for several girls for the first time as they truly understood, “It doesn’t matter how much good I do, one sin is enough to separate me from God… There really is no way I can save myself… That’s why Jesus had to die…” Still, the spiritual battle was as strong as ever and it was clear that the enemy did not want the girls to hear this message.

Yet God’s promise is clear:

“As the rain and the snow come down from heaven, and do not return to it without watering the earth and making it bud and flourish, so that it yields seed for the sower and bread for the eater, so is my word that goes out from my mouth: It will not return to me empty, but will accomplish what I desire and achieve the purpose for which I sent it.” (Isaiah 55:10-11)

Please join me in praying that God’s Word that was spoken to these girls this weekend would accomplish what He desires and achieve the purpose for which He sent it.

Next Sleepover

Just a quick prayer request… Our next Girls’ Group Sleepover is going to be on this Friday, April 10th. As it is Easter weekend, our discussion time is going to be focused on what Jesus did for us on the cross and the girls will have an opportunity to respond and make a decision to live for God. Please pray that God would begin even now preparing them for what they are going to hear and that they would be open and ready to hear what He has to say to them and make a decision to follow Him.

Thanks, I’ll let you know how it goes!

March Break

Last week was March break for our kids which gave us a chance to pull back from our usual hectic schedule and get some other things done that we don’t normally have a chance to do (such as some much needed ‘spring cleaning’ at the center). I also took the opportunity to spend some extra time with the girls, stopping by their homes to say hi, taking a couple of them out one-on-one to Tim Horton’s, etc. Most of these girls come from large families and as a result, many of them have younger sisters at home. As you know, Girls’ Group is for girls 9-12 however when I go to pick up the girls from their homes their little sisters often beg to come along, sometimes with tears… Those of you who know me know that 6 and under is actually my favourite age group and so it breaks my heart every time. Anyway, last week we decided to have a sort of “Bring Your Little Sister to Girls’ Group” day! We went sliding at a park just outside of Cloverdale and the girls had a great time...

Welcome To My Blog!

Well, considering this blog has been up for about three months now, I figure it’s about time I finally start posting… The purpose of this blog is to keep you up to date with what’s happening in ministry and what God is doing in my life as well as provide you with current prayer requests. I’m hoping to post every few weeks so please keep checking back.

For those of you who received my latest newsletter (which at this point is probably all of you), you may be wondering how our girls’ group sleepover went last weekend… well, it was a lot of fun :) The weekend revolved around a Valentines Day theme with lots of candy, games and even a chocolate fondue. The topic of our discussion time was love, more specifically, the extent of God’s love for us. I’ve been challenged over the past several months however to do things a little differently for this devotional time and instead of just telling the girls about how much God loves them, to invite them to experience it for themselves. We spent some time worshiping and I encouraged the girls to cry out to God and ask Him to speak to them. I could definitely feel the presence of God in that room. I could also feel a real spiritual battle going on. By the end of the sleepover I was much more exhausted then the other times and was drained not just physically but spiritually as well. God has reminded me to keep fighting in prayer for these girls. Would you join me? The seed has been sown but the enemy wants nothing more than to grab it back, to choke it out. Would you pray that the girls’ hearts would continued to be softened, that they would receive the words that God is speaking to them and that God’s work in their lives would grown into something lasting and beautiful.