Fighting

This is the condemned bridge i warned everyone about... but as you can see... no one reads signs anymore! don't worry. i walked over it too!

Tuesday Is our normal meeting day here in the Victory Outreach International Church of Cape Town (VOICOCT for short). Today was a very challenging day for me.

Usually the first thing we do is evaluate the weekend and how it went. This is really constructive since we are really trying to build the ministry here. But this weekend I kind of struggled because of the stage set up and the fact that I was expected to perform on a very intuitive level like never before. So it was difficult. And i really got a lot of constructive criticism.

I felt like walking out of that room. It was a room full of people, all telling me what they think i should do, and how i could do it better.

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(you’ll see me do this from time to time. these dots represent my silence. in this case it was because i wanted to be angry)

Whether it was pride -or- my pride being hurt -or- feeling like they have no right to tell me how to play music since none of them play a lick -or- …pride, i’m not sure. That’s what i felt like. It’s a good thing my many years of experience have afforded me the wisdom (God has afforded me the wisdom through those experiences) to shut my mouth and keep my reaction inward.

Every single suggestions was right. And better than what i think i’m doing. I think i’ll take their suggestions. But it wasn’t easy to get to that conclusion.

But I was challenged in two areas. both areas brought the above reaction out.

1. Prayer

Not so much to pray. because i pray. but to change the way i pray. and that even though i did have a somewhat vibrant life of prayer with God whilst still in the U.S.. but a new country brings a mass of new “spirits” and problems to deal with. This is this is the Honest to God truth here. Though it is a lot of the same stuff i’ve seen before, i can tell the difference in the people and also the television.

It’s worse than Oprah over here! On the teli they show a show on sunday mornings about all the different religions here in South Africa. And there are many. 70% calim to be Christian… or to believe in God… but Cape Town is not a good picture of that. Thank God for Victory Outreach yeah?

On top of that, we live next to a mosque. Good thing i took that most excellent class called “Christianity and Islam in conflict”, otherwise i would not know what to think at all about it.

In fact. Every morning I wake up to the prayer call. Especially since they are in their time of prayer and fasting that they do for forty days called Rammadan. 5 times a day you can here the chant/call to prayer coming from the mosque out into the community. They are the most religious. Here.

Point of Interest: The Muslims pray and fast for 40 days… and nothing happens. People that love Jesus Christ (the one from Nazereth) pray and fast for two or three days and they are empowered with power like none other.

2. Gifting

This has been mostly with my relationship with pastor tim and his allowing me to speak freely with him. it has alot to do with what i am doing, and what i can be doing. prophecy. leading worship and all that stuff.

And to be honest. I’m super tired of just doubting everything and calling it an emotional experience. it really hasn’t gotten me anywhere. And it’s actually making me dislike Music. And music is what God gave me to glorify Him. I just need to stop believing every lie that i’ve been told. not by men, but by the father of lies.

I never really believed it before, but i can see how my mind is tormented by something outside of me. Causing me to doubt and to believe that i am right to doubt all spiritual experience and such. And it’s probably a veil that has been placed over a lot of people in America and over a lot of the people that write books and downplay spiritual experience. What i wanted was balance, but i often found myself unbalanced and on the side that nearly led me to disbelief.

I feel like it’s the same veil that was placed over those Jews that refused to believe that Jesus was the Messiah every time they opened up the Law of Moses to read from it. This is the way Paul explains it in one of his epistles… i think it’s the letter to the Romans… but I have a hard time remembering the exact Details.

My desire is to serve and please God. And i can see that i have been believing a lie about the gifting that i have. So i should let go of it. Not let go of balance, but to truly embrace it and know God in the fulness of Joy that he offers for my life. It is the same for you who read this today.

We also plan at our meetings. This week we planned the month of October. Pastor Tim and I currently have taken charge of the Sunday Night Services. We met in a separate room for about thirty minutes. When asked what kind of ideas i had,  i really had no clue. i was quiet for about the first five minutes of the meeting. but i was able to contribute something, even though i contributed nothing. at least not today. what i had to say could be used in the future. and not necessarily the near future. I was asked what my favorite times in church have been. and i remembered so clearly. i remembered simply being there in euphoria. praying. playing piano singing. nothing had to be said or done. we were with God, and God was with us.

Does anyone remember “The Gathering”? I liked it a bunch. it was really good for the time that i was there. and i am glad at all that i learned while being there. i really learned to play along with a band and not just for myself. it was good. It also gave me a great way to see “church” done well. i had never experienced that before. I offered the “round table” concept. and the short praise and worship set up front… like 7 minutes. and worship at the end for about 30 concept. all stuff that can’t be used now.

i was asked to do something impossible. i felt so overwhelmed. like there was nothing that i could honestly do it anything about. and there really was nothing that i could do about it. so i stayed quiet and listened. And i came out of the meeting more encouraged than when I came in. By the urging and caring of God and my fellow missionaries, it was a better day. It’s hard to believe that God brought me here to be a part of this team. But i’m here, so i guess i better start believing it!

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I spent all of monday at the UTC. They had their “get to know you day”. I was invited for the sole purpose of having fun. which i did. our day consisted of going around and finding a bunch of stuff that we should be taking care of anyway. a scavenger hunt! for instance. we had to find a place to get our laundry done. which i did that earlier that morning. 40 rand gets your laundry done and folded! we had to exchange money, go to the beach build a sand castle. that kind of stuff. the team i was on lost. and one of our tasks was to find something of our favorite color and bring it back. though it was kind of hard to find my color since it’s blue and there are no real natural occurrences of “Sureño Blue”. i found a bottle cap. in trash can. down by the river. well it’s really more of a lagoon. o and we crossed a condemned bridge to get back to the UTC.

And apparently only girls want to separate themselves and go to the UTC. this class, which will last through December, had EIGHT girls from the states! it’s just kinda sad seeing as to how the guys are supposed to be the ones that are all leaderish and stuff. where the “Warriors” @! Represent?

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Weekend.

This past weekend was probably one of the more exciting ones. Though, do not get me wrong, because i have found myself more and more encouraged at every service. However, we did have the LIVE drama called “The Puppet Master”. This drama deals with drugs and gangsterism (as it’s called over here), but that is not the focus, or at least the emphasis of the drama. It has to do more with the family and how the family is torn apart by this “puppet master” which is another name for Satan in this case. It shows how the devil will influence just one in the family towards a life of crime and drugs and somehow end up tearing the entire family up.

it touched my heart.

The whole time i was watching it i couldn’t help but remember spending time with a bunch of families in the churches that i’ve been to and just seeing the same anguish on the mother’s face. the same, “Why is this happening to us?!”. the same cry for help that would grab the heart of anyone’s heart.

It’s so pertinent too! Because out here that’s mostly what i’ve seen. I wrote in an earlier entry that we prayed for “mommy’s” one sunday, but this particular subject continues to unfold in a very profound way. To see how families are torn apart by this lifestyle. People only thinking of themselves and of the money they could make. being driven to say things that they don’t really mean. causing reactions which totally cause chaos!

In fact i heard a story today of something that is almost common out here. So common at least, that they dropped the case in a few months’ time!

There was a family here just last November that had a terrible tragedy happen. The mum attended a church here in Cape Town and son ran off being a drug addict. After many chances and forgiving, the line was crossed. And it’s hard to cross the line here. The family loves you here no matter what state or what you’ve done. Or, so I’m told. But the son, for drug money, has stolen everything that was of value to the mommy one day and ran off. he didn’t return for a long time. And when he did return, he returned as though nothing had happened. After all, it was his mum he was returning to.

she killed her son.

it’s unbelievable right? you think i’m lying or making this up, don’t you? but this is reality. This is what really happens here. They are rare supposedly, but common enough that they are usually dismissed in court. It’s so sad. It makes me want to yell at the top of my lungs asking, “WHY GOD?!”

it’s all the more reason to be here.

Week.

(i went kind of backwards and all around no?)

Last week i got to take a walk around the neighborhood here. it’s probably one of the worst neighborhoods to walk through. Lots of drugs, lots of gangsterism, lots pain, lots of hurt. I walked through those streets. Dirty, littered, shacks for houses, old, unkept buildings.

I had a flashback.

I remembered growing up. I remember walking through the streets as a young boy with my dad looking for a fix. I remembered walking around my towns. the places i used to live. I remembered Salinas and the east side. I remembered the places that i lived. and i thought… “I Lived in the ghetto when i was young!”. It was a sudden realization that i grew up in the same kind of situation. it dawned on me like something i had forgotten as if it were from another time.

I also realized that i feel most at home in the humblest of situations. I feel like i can reach the stars. I feel like i am free to give God every bit of me. I remember now. I remember what it was like not to have enough money to pay the electricity, or to not have a computer, or to have eat just beans and rice for weeks on end, or even cheese and chili soup. that’s all there was in that soup. Praise God for humble circumstances. It hurts, but it is most edifying to feel alive again.