BABY ELLA UPDATE - 9/16/09

(From Peggy Helander)

Just wanted to let you know that Ella is doing well. She had an x-ray of her shoulder yesterday. I got to see the before and after x-rays and even my eye can see a big improvement in her bone structure in her shoulder.

I'm not sure why the bone had been thicker and is now back to the thickness of the surrounding bones, but that is what has happened. The blood tests have no sign of infection. So her health is much improved.

She is still tiny, only 8lbs 4 oz, but is now steadily gaining weight (though slower than the doctors like)

She is a sweet little girl. I've had the pleasure of spending time with the family and holding her… (she likes to be held most the time - go figure!!) But, I like that. She is so cute when she stretches while she's sleeping.

Thank you for your prayers… the family feels the Lord's arms around them.

Peggy

Pray for Baby Ella

Baby Ella had an MRI today and they found that the infection has spread to the bone. So she's on her way back to CHOC (Children's Hospital of Orange County) for more intravenous antibiotic treatment.

Please pray for healing.

THE MISSION: A Family of God

Thanks to our own Kelly Tague for these awesome photos of some of our recent Mission gatherings.







See a whole lot more over
HERE

THE CHURCH OF "ONE ANOTHER"

The New Testament is full of letters written to instruct, not men of authority (pastors) but an entire Body of Believers who are called to submit to one another out of love as everyone submits to Christ Himself.

Here are a few of the "one another" passages from the New Testament:

John 13:14
Wash one another's feet.

John 13:34 -
Love one another.

Romans 12:10 -
Be devoted to one another in brotherly love.
Honor one another above yourselves.

Romans 12:16 -
Live in harmony with one another.

Romans 13:8 -
Love one another

Romans 14:13 -
Stop passing judgment on one another.

Romans 15:7 -
Accept one another.

Romans 16:16 -
Greet one another with a holy kiss.

1Cor 1:10 -
Agree with one another

2Cor 13:12 -
Greet one another with a holy kiss.

Galatians 5:13 -
Serve one another in love.

Eph 4:2 -
Be patient, bearing with one another in love.

Eph 4:32 -
Be kind and compassionate to one another
Forgive each other

Eph 5:19 -
Speak to one another with psalms, hymns and spiritual songs.

Eph 5:21 -
Submit to one another out of reverence for Christ.

Col 3:13 -
Bear with each other and forgive whatever grievances you may have against one another.

Col 3:16 -
Teach and admonish one another with all wisdom,

1Thes 5:11 -
Encourage one another and build each other up

Heb 3:13 -
Encourage one another daily

Heb 10:24 -
Spur one another on toward love and good deeds.

James 4:11 -
Brothers, do not slander one another.

1Peter 1:22 -
Love one another deeply, from the heart.

1Peter 3:8 -
Live in harmony with one another; be sympathetic, love as brothers, be compassionate and humble.

1Peter 4:9 -
Offer hospitality to one another without grumbling.

1Peter 5:5 -
Be submissive to those who are older.
Clothe yourselves with humility toward one another

1Peter 5:14 -
Greet one another with a kiss of love.

1John 1:7 -
Have fellowship with one another

1John 3:11 -
Love one another.

1John 3:23 -
Love one another as he commanded us.

1John 4:7 -
Love one another

1John 4:11 -
Love one another.

1John 4:12 -
Love one another

2John 1:5 -
Love one another.

JON ZENS - SATURDAY, JULY 11TH

Author and theologian Jon Zens will be coming to Orange County to speak to the local Orange County house churches on Saturday, July 11th from 9am to 12pm.
(LOCATION TO BE ANNOUNCED)

Event is Free. Must RSVP to attend. Please send an email to register or to get more info to:
ochousechurch@gmail.com

About Jon Zens
Dr. Zens has a wide-ranging theological background. He holds a B.A. in Biblical studies from Covenant College, a M.Div. from Westminster Theological Seminary, Philadelphia, and a D.Min. from the California Graduate School of Theology.

Zens' groundbreaking articles in the late 1970s, "Is There a 'Covenant of Grace'?" and "Crucial Thoughts on 'Law' in the New Covenant," were highly instrumental in developing what came to be called "New Covenant Theology."

For the last thirty years, Jon has been the editor of a magazine entitled Searching Together. He's not only a NT scholar, but he's an expert on church history. Jon also served as a pastor for a number of years, but moved on after concluding that full reformation within the existing institutional church system was unworkable.

Also, for the past thirty years he and his wife, Dotty, have been ministering in small fellowships concerning living under grace and learning to extend grace to others.

If you'd like to read more about Jon Zens I've included a link to an excellent debate between Jon and Ben Worthington on hierarchy in the New Testament church
HERE


More details on this as we get closer to the date.


Blessings,Keith
http://www.missionhousechurch.com/
http://www.ochousechurch.com/

UPDATE: ILLEGAL BIBLE STUDY IN SAN DIEGO

In late May of 2009 county official overturned the warning issued to the Joneses.

In a statement a county CAO Walt Ekard responded saying:

"I have received dozens of e-mails and calls from people concerned about reports that the County is attempting to muzzle religious expression by shutting down a neighborhood Bible study.

"As the Chief Administrative Officer for San Diego County, I want to say in the most direct terms: the County has never tried to stifle religious expression and never will."

FULL STORY
HERE

Relax everyone. The issue is resolved. Our religious freedoms remain intact. This is still America.

BIBLE STUDY ILLEGAL IN SAN DIEGO?

A local pastor and his wife claim a San Diego County official threatened escalating fines if they continued to hold Bible Studies in their home.

FULL VIDEO CLIP VIA ABC NEWS SAN DIEGO
HERE

So, what would I do if it suddenly became illegal to continue hosting house church gatherings in my home?

What if it became illegal to continue passing out free groceries to the poor or the homeless?

Would I continue to obey Jesus and risk being arrested, or thrown into prison, or fined thousands of dollars by the county?

Maybe I'll find out sooner rather than later...?

ROBERT HIGGINS

For the last several weeks I have been doing my best to spend time with Robert Higgins. He's a 77 year old man who lives alone in the motel where we serve each month.

The manager of the motel, Pete, is the one who helped Robert get off the street and into a room there just over a year ago. Pete and I confer together and do our best to make sure that Robert has food, is doing well, and is cared for as much as we possibly can.

Just about a year ago Robert fell and broke his arm very badly. They put a plate in his arm to help it heal but now, after 11 months of agony and endless back and forth visits to UCI for CAT Scans and MRI's, he is still in pain and unsure of what to do next.

Today I took him lunch (he loves Taco Bell burritos) and we sat and talked about his situation. I prayed for him and he finally agreed to go and see an M.D. about his other symptoms - emphysema, vertigo, chronic fatigue.

I've also been trying to help him get back in touch with his son (Robert Anderson Higgins) and his daughter (Cynthia Anne Higgins). So far I've had no luck getting in touch with either.

As I stood up to leave his room this afternoon, Robert hung his head and said, "Thank you so much for keeping up with me, Keith" and I saw him pause and his face contorted and his eyes squeezed shut and I knew he was trying hard not to cry.

I touched his shoulder. "I'm happy to do it, Robert," I said. "God bless you."

Whether or not Robert ever gets in touch with his children again, and whether or not he ever gets his medical situation worked out, I think his greatest need is simply human contact. He needs to know he is loved. He needs to be reminded that God sees him and loves him and has not forgotten this little, fragile, old man.

Pray for Robert today if you would. Pray that God would reveal more of Himself to Robert and bring healing to his heart, and to his soul.

Amen.

Holy Week

We started off by celebrating Palm Sunday in the back yard of Mary Ann's brother, Gordon. Together with many of Mary Ann's friends and family, we gathered to remember her life and celebrate her influence on our lives.

While the children held crosses made from palm leaves, the adults stood up, one at a time and shared their memories of Mary Ann and how she had touched their lives. A circle of red-tailed hawks flew in a thermal over our heads as we lifted up our voices and sang "The Old Rugged Cross" together.

I stood and reminded those who had gathered to remember to honor the living while they are with us, and to practice letting go. Letting go of toys to embrace responsibility. Letting go of fantasy to accept reality. Letting go of anger and hard feelings to embrace forgiveness and receive love. Letting go of life in this world to embrace eternal life in the Kingdom of God.

Last night we gathered again, this time in the home of Betsy Kollberg, to celebrate the Passover Seder. It always amazes me that God instructed the Israelites to observe Passover on a specific date every year, and on that date to blow the shofar at 3pm when the passover lamb was slain, so that roughly 6,000 years later when His Son was hanging on the cross, ON THE SAME EXACT DAY, and they blew the shofar at 3pm, Jesus would say, "It is finished."

On Friday we will celebrate Good Friday together in my home. We will enter quietly and move silently from station to station as families to tear cloth, drive nails, taste vineagar, touch a crown of thorns, tumble dice, and leave our red handprints on the same paper curtain.

Afterwards, we will sit around a low table and light our candles, sing worship songs, share communion, and one by one voice thanksgiving for what Jesus has done for us, blowing out our candles as we go. When the room is dark we will leave as silently as we have come, or perhaps revisit one of the stations to reflect more on the love of Christ for us.

On Sunday morning, we will meet in the morning, on a grassy hill, under a tree and surrounded by passing cars and sunlight we will raise our voices to celebrate the resurrection of our Lord, read scriptures of the events and experiences of that first Easter, and share our thoughts and open our hearts to one another on resurrection and what it means for us.

Aftewards, we'll return to our home and help the children create resurrection rolls and continue to share and worship and love one another as Christ loved us.

I love Holy Week.

Mary Ann is at home with Jesus

Last night our dear sister in Christ, Mary Ann, went home to be with Jesus. She had been battling brain cancer for several months and at last she is in her Savior's arms.

Mary Ann was a light and a blessing to all of us at The Mission over the last year and her smile, her compassion and her great faith will remain with all of us forever.



Today at House Church everyone took a stone and, one by one, each person stepped forward and laid their stone on this altar and shared how Mary Ann had blessed them. Then we sang her favorite hymn, "The Old Rugged Cross" together and also "My Redemmer Lives".

We were all very blessed to have known Mary Ann. She made our family complete and we look forward to the day when we can embrace her once again in the Kingdom of God.

Peace,
Keith

PICTURES FROM THE PURPLE PALACE IN TIJUANA, MEXICO

Our house church has been blessed to serve the wonderful kids at the Purple Palace orphanage in Tijuana.

Here are some photos from recent visits to bless these awesome children.

MOTEL CHRISTMAS - SUNDAY, DEC. 21

While our family was in El Paso, Texas for vacation, our Mission House Church family was delivering Christmas gifts to the children (and our friends) at the California Studio Inn in Santa Ana, CA.

Our church family was joined by our brothers and sisters in Christ from Orange Coast Christian Church who provided 50 boxes of food for the families living here.

This is what Christmas is all about!

Christmas at the Motel - 12/21/08

This year the Mission House Church will help to provide toys for the families living in the California Studio Inn in Santa Ana.

Last year we were very blessed to have Cartoon Network donate a ton of toys for the kids, along with items purchased by our own house church family.

This year we have the blessing of partnering with a few 4th grade elementary classes locally as well as Cartoon Network (thanks again), and our own house church family, of course.

We're also planning to pass out the toys alongside another church in Orange County that will provide 50 meals to 50 families in the motel.

On Sunday, December 21st, we'll pass out the gifts, pray for the families and help distribute the food alongside our brothers and sisters in Christ, and local school children.

Praise God for everyone who had helped, planned, donated, and wrapped to make this all possible!

To me, this is what Christmas is really all about.

Shalom,
kg

Like Sheep Without A Shepherd

On Saturday several of us from The Mission passed out free groceries and hosted a bounce house for the families and residents of the California Studio Inn in Santa Ana.

It was a great day. We had a chance to pray with a lot of people, some of them even hung around and talked with some of us, others shared their pain and their struggles with us and we did our best to give them assistance, advice, phone numbers to call and organizations to seek out for help.

One person really impacted me. His name was Vic. He told me with tears in his eyes about how he had just gotten off of drugs after many years of struggling with addiction. He was about 17 months sober. He and his wife had an adorable little baby girl who was only about 6 months old with them. After losing his job about a month ago, and then losing their apartment soon after, Vic had been in a motorcycle accident a few weeks ago and was needing surgery on his knee. Then he told me about his father who had just passed away from a massive heart attack a week and a half ago.

Could it get any worse, I thought? This guy has been through more pain and more disappointment than almost anyone I've ever met. Still, he talked about his faith in God, and about how he knew that God would see them through this time. I had a chance to encourage him a little and, of course, we prayed for him and his family. I even gave them a phone number to see if they could get set up at the Village of Hope in Tustin, but still I felt that there was still so much to do.

As we stood around talking I caught a flash of something in my mind. Maybe it was a vision, or maybe just a stray thought, but I saw these residents sitting in folding chairs and worshiping Jesus. I saw myself teaching them from the Bible. I saw others from the Mission praying with them in small groups. I saw us laughing with them and eating with them and playing with their kids. I saw us being in community with them.

Then I heard a verse of scripture, just part of one actually, that said, "They are like sheep without a shepherd".

The next day at house church I opened my Bible and found this verse. Here's the entire passage in context:

"Jesus went through all the towns and villages, teaching in their synagogues, preaching the good news of the kingdom and healing every disease and sickness. When he saw the crowds, he had compassion on them, because they were harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd. Then he said to his disciples, 'The harvest is plentiful but the workers are few. Ask the Lord of the harvest, therefore, to send out workers into his harvest field.'" - Matthew 9:35-38

These dear people at the motel need more than free groceries once a month. They need more than a free breakfast and a sermon every other week, what they need is to be part of a loving community of mature believers who will help them and stand by them and pray for them and invite them into the fellowship of the Family of God.

What does this mean? I'm not exactly sure. But I do know that I believe that our house church needs to pray about investing more than we have so far in the lives of these people. I can see now that they are like sheep without a shepherd and since one of my primary giftings is to shepherd I can't help but feel compelled to pastor them. I would prefer not to do this alone. I pray that others from our house church would also decide to join us in "being the Church" to these dear people a bit more...whatever that might mean.

This is something for our house church to pray about together and to hear from God about. Does it mean a monthly church service at the motel? Does it mean something more often? Does it mean changing the way we minister there? Right now I don't know exactly.

Please God, show us what you would have us to do in this place as ambassadors of your Gospel and carriers of your Kingdom.

-kg

This Saturday - Motel Ministry

This Saturday (11/22/08) our house church will serve the people living in the California Studio Inn in Santa Ana by passing out free groceries, praying for them as they have need, hosting a bounce house and game time for the children, and spending time listening to them as friends.

My wife and our 2 boys have been serving at this same motel now for over 7 years. It's become a monthly habit for us to go and serve there. We've seen some of the same faces over the years. Some have died. Some have moved to better places. Others have moved to worse situations or simply relocated to other motels.

We've made new friends and we're in the process of learning to love everyone we come into contact with here.

Even though we've been doing this a long time, I pray it will never become a habit for us. I never want to just go through the motions. Instead, I pray that God would always keep this ministry about Jesus and about serving and loving the people who live here.

Our ministry isn't flashy. It's not "big". It's nothing to marvel at. It is simple and humble and very straight-forward. Hopefully the people we serve here know that we love them, and that Jesus loves them, more than anything else.

If nothing else, we have the opportunity to see Jesus in the eyes of these people in real need as we give them something to eat and pray for their families, their relationships, their finances, and their dreams and hopes.

I always feel that we could do more...that it's never enough, really. But our only job is to serve and to be obedient to God as He leads us, and mainly to practice loving others as Christ loved us.

Peace,
Keith

PICS FROM THE PURPLE PALACE TRIP LAST SATURDAY

BIG CHANGES AT THE MISSION

Hey Missionaries,

If you weren't with us last Sunday then you missed an historic gathering and discussion about where we've been, where we are today, and where God is leading us as a Church.

It was really great for me to hear everyone share and confirm this new direction of shared ownership and increased transparency among us as a Family of God.

I can't possibly sum the entire thing up but essentially, starting next Sunday, I will no longer be the facilitator in our gatherings. Instead we'll allow each person to take a turn at leading us as we gather for worship, share time, communion and dialog. I will sit quietly in the back of the room and observe along with everyone else (and contribute whenever necessary), but we as a Body will now become less "Keith-centric", or as Liz so eloquently phrased it, "You'll be shutting up more?" ---(Can I get an "Amen"?)

Seriously, it's been painful for me to realize it, but our group isn't nearly as organic and peer-lead as I had hoped to inspire us to become. One big reason for this is related to the fact that I take the lead on everything and you guys are left waiting for me to direct traffic. So, in order to correct this and to put us on a path where everyone really does share ownership and take a more active role in this Church on a regular basis, we'll be rotating our facilitation each week to individuals and/or families who volunteer to lead. (No one will be forced to partcipate in this, but we do hope everyone will take a turn at least once). We're even planning an all-children day where the kids lead us in worship, communion, and share time. (Maybe that means the Adults can leave early and go into the living room to watch videos or play outside?)

I cannot wait to see how God stretches us and grows us as we move forward in this.

-kg
**

IMPORTANT LINKS AND RESOURCES:

*"THIS IS HIS CHURCH" by Keith Giles (How we got here and where God is leading us):
CLICK HERE

*Awesome Video: "Don't Ignore the Poor" (Or "Why you should re-think the Orlando Outpouring")
WATCH HERE

*MORE PROOF THAT BEING A "CHRISTIAN" DOESN'T MAKE YOU A FOLLOWER OF JESUS:
READ HERE

*JESUS FIRST by Keith Giles (Are we followers of Jesus, or of Paul the Apostle?)
ARTICLE HERE

*"THE ROYAL PRIESTHOOD" BY W.C. KETCHERSIDE (A great, free, online book)
READ HERE

MISSION IN THE PARK - AUGUST 10

This summer our house church has intentionally tried to break our regular Sunday morning liturgy by adopting a policy of "expecting the unexpected".

So far we've had great times together breaking out of our normal routine and embracing new and different ways to enter into God's presence and learning new ways to share together.

Last Sunday we met at 3pm in a local park to play kickball together, toss around some water balloons and eat dinner together under the shade of a large tree.

It was so great many of us are thinking of doing a Sunday evening gathering once a month just to hang out and play together more.

Pictures coming soon.

kg

2ND ANNUAL PANCAKE BREAKFAST

Our family hosted our 2nd annual community pancake breakfast this morning.

Great meeting new neighbors and re-connecting with others. Prayfully these relationships will grow into deeper friendships over the next few months.

This is our mission field.

kg

FAMILY FUN