change of course

Here is an interesting link that the homegirl Amy Walter sent me. Good lookin out

I have some thoughts about this blog. i realize that the last several months, i have mainly used it for posting ruched updates, random things of interest and pictures. Thats all good, but I have been inspired recently (mainly by two friends from the PA) to use this space as what i had originally intended it for-- a space for reflection, sharing and feedback on what God is doing (in me and in the world), my spiritual development, and particularly the ministry that i am involved in.

This will all depend on my own initiative of course. part of my motivation is that i desire more connectedness, more community. i realize that web logs and cyberspace is not true community, but we work with what we have at our disposal in our 'workaday' lives. I have also missed getting meaniful feedback from all you people who visit this blog, which i think i was getting more of back when i was posting more meaningful things from my heart. Rather than posting pictures of the kids, i want to write about them. You know what i mean?

I just returned from a week and a half in Albuquerque. The time was pretty laid back. Home is home, and it can be very comfortable or very frustrating. Now here I am in Pasadena, and i am realizing that i almost never make this transition back in a good healthy way. i feel very disconnected. i feel ( as i often do) that i ran away from God while i was at home, and i do not have the emotional energy or humility to come back to him now. this highlights a deeper theme: Whenever i fall into times of darkness, lonliness or sin patterns, i will isolate myself, wallow in shame and hide-- basically, it is hard form me to accept or believe in God's grace. I believe in it for other people, but not for me. It is hard for me to accept that God is patient with me sometimes, becasue my failures tend to be the same failures that i have always had.

But grace is beautiful. O how beautiful it is. That Our Creator would see us and not be angry, that he would see us without our stains, and would lift us up and keep walking with us, keep blessing us, and giving us good gifts.

I feel like i havent been 'me.' So it is hard to think of getting back into the flow of things with the youth-- to really step up into this new season. i prepared for it and prayed about it when i was home. I am excited about the mentoring relationships. but i think i really need to pray and think about grace.....if it were not for grace, i would not abel to do any of this.

O Brother

please observe my new list of links to your right. I am particularly excited about the addition of Lexie's Xanga, a chronicle of ministry life in Claremont.

also, i want to share my latest music interest. Last night i watched "O Brother Where Art Thou?" with my Dad. I love the Coen brothers' movies, and what particularly struck me was the soundtrack. 15 minutes into the film, i knew i had to have it.



For real, this is the gangster shit. I've been flirting with the idea of exploring 'bluegrass' or 'American roots music' Something about it has always intrigued me... this soundtrack is straight up S O U L. I cant even explain it. It is deeply, deeply spiritual, and also very honest about daily life, work, sin, redemption. Thats why i like the blues...it is similar to the blues, and influenced by it. I highly recommend this soundtrack, and i will for sure be getting down on more of this stuff.

Also new on the playlist:



Dj Z-Trip- "Changing Gears" Z-Trip is a DJ from Phoenix, who has appeared on many turntablist comps, mixtapes, live shows, bboy jams and collabos with other DJs. This is his first actual album. Pretty good, especially the track with Soup from Jurassic 5



AWOL One and Daddy Kev "Killafornia" AWOL is probably the most unusual hip hop MC you'll ever hear. Straight out of the Los Angeles underground scene, He is not a particularly skilled rhymer, but the combination of his voice and his thought process is stunning. You find yourself intently listening to what he is going to say next. A lot of it is hilarious. Best line on the EP so far: "I'm so underground, I should be a potato!"

posting from New Mexico

here i am, back home. This home is a place that is stranger to me each time I come back. yet, the familiarity is always nice.
I love the air here. To me, the air in Pasadena is thick and muggy. It is in a valley. I love Albuquerque becasue it is high in the desert. The air is clean, fresh and crisp, even when its hot outside. The first morning i was here, i took the best deep breath i've had in a long time.

The drive in was not too bad. 12 1/2 hours. I didnt get too tired.

The pace of life is much slower here. For some reason, it seems more like a small town than the last time i was here.

I will probably go see my grandparents tonight.

Hopefully i will also have some time to reflect. Right before i left, I accepted a job at South Pasadena High school, as a Special Needs Aid. I will be working exlusively with Sean, a 16 year old with cerebral palsey. He has almost no physical ability, so i will go with him to classes, take notes for him, transcribe his homework, take him to the bathroom....
This will be challenging work, but the prospect of developing a friendship that would probably otherwise not occur is exciting to me.
I have also been thinking a lot about adolescence and the youth. I think i have been very frustrated with the 14-15 year old age bracket. Since being home with my 15 year old brother, this has greatly increased. I guess i struggle with really understanding and having patience for where they are emotionally, developmentally, socially. I really want to love them, but often this is a challenge. Even though i am often confused and troubled by them and the things i see in their lives, I am anticipating really good relationships with J and F this year, as i hope to get to know their families and school lives. I pray that they (and I) would be open to God's words and will. Also for my brother. I was thinking last night that really, my absence for the crucial 10 to 14 years old age range had a bigger effect on him than i thought. I think that if i had been there to be a friend, a guide, a mentor to my brother, then he would be a different person, or at least a little more well adjusted and emotionally stable...maybe even mature.

This is hard to think about, but i think i need to face it. I need to understand what it means that i have re-located and chosen God's will in another place far from home....

i have a job interview with South Pasadena High School today
and another one for Odyssey Charter School in Pasadena tomorrow.
On Wednesday i will be driving to Albuquerque for a week.

oooooooo

Good News

Today was special.

With very little preparation, I spoke the Gospel message to all the children at the summer program today. We remembered some of the things we learned at VBS. I told them how much God loves us and how we can be close to Him. I told them what kind of life God offers.
After Charlie gave her testimony (she is much cooler than i am in their eyes) almost all of the kids in the room raised their hands saying they wanted to let Jesus into their hearts.
We (me and the interns) were joyous. Afterwards, we broke off the talk with the kids about thier decisions in small groups and pray with them. It was the first time i had been with anyone in their decision to follow Jesus. It was exciting for me on many levels.

Knowing that for some of these kids, this day would be the beginning of a life of faith, healing, community and blessing...that future leaders are being born this summer, that some of the kids were compelled to share some of the pain and struggles they deal with very intimately with us, in the hopes that trusting Jesus would give them strength.
I love these kids a lot, and it made my heart glad to get a glimpse not just of a cool event/decision, but of the advancement of the Kingdom among a people that God loves so so much.

Please pray that God's Spirit would rest powerfully on these kids' lives

Praise God

Go Dukes!

Here is a picture of the Albuquerque Dukes mascot, the Duke. This was the old minor league farm team that was an Albuquerque institution for many generations. I have fond memories of going to Dukes games and taligate parties not too far from my home where the satium was. Now it no longer exists, and the Isotopes have taken the place of the Dukes. Needless to say, there's no school like the old school. The Duke represents the city so much better than a stupid Isotope.

anyway....

I have not been posting too much personal stuff. But I have been blessed, encouraged and exhorted by my continued reading of all my friend's blogs (which has been rarer, because i dont have a computer)
It has been a stressful time, but a good time. God has been bringing up deeper sins to my attention-- in myself, and in the community i am surrounded by every day: the young people of the summer program. In a real sense, I feel like this is my family. i feel like i have a bunch of little brothers and sisters that i care about so much. Please pray that the kids would have left this summer with an encounter with Jesus' love. There is so much need in the community, so much that could be attended to with far more time, resources, committment, love than i or any of us have. I treasure the small moments of talking to one of the kids where i am let into just a little bit of how they experience their family, their neighborhood, their culture, their relationships.....

Hope is a discipline

There is a God in Israel.

Here is a pic from the Summer Program. This has been a lot of fun for me. As Edna Mode in The Icredibles said, "It has completely confiscated my life, dah-ling." Well, not completely, but as much as a job i love will. It has been a blessing to see the junior staff jr high and high schoolers grow in maturity, responsibility and character--- much of it through difficult and challenging situations.
One thing I've realized about working with kids is that the kids themselves do not necessarily push my buttons--- it is the unpredictability of large groups of kids in a daily schedule that really keeps me on my toes.

I bought this yesterday. Now I am one step closer to becoming Mixmaster J to the IzzAke.

the heat changes things.
i think it has changed the way i think about my life.
its strange that some added physical discomfort would highlight all the other, more deep and irritating discomforts that you spend your time trying not to complain about to your friends.

more later

this was my brother John when he went home to Albq. from Iraq last month 

whew

this weekend's highlights:

saw OZOMATLI for FREE on Friday night in downtown LA. So much fun. At one point, the crowd burst open the barriers and went into the fountain in front of the band. I went for it, shoes and all, and it was worth it.

Saturday night kicked it at home with the homies Rob One and Eric Sermon, watching the Chapelle Show. Havent been entertained like that in a long time

Sunday, Church at Epicentre, then to Will Rogers beach with Tina, Reza, the Partida girls and some other kids from the summer program (and Jorge) that was a lot of fun. In N Out afterwards. Later on, some Settlers with Rob, Eric and Greg over some beezys

Monday, Sabbath in the afternoon in Eagle Rock, then a barbecue in the park at the Rose Bowl..good friends, good weather, good times...and the fireworks.

Today.....first day of the summer program,

Ask me about it.

Endings and Beginnings

Today marked the end of a season in my life. It was the last day of school at TAS. We went on an all-day beach field trip, where we (the teachers, some parents and our kids) got to just have fun in the ocean.
It was one of the funnest times i have had in a long time. Such a good end to a long, rich, fruitful year.

The emotions and thoughts that were going through me as i left that campus were many, and overwhelming. My year there has been so much for me-- learning, challenge, truth, failure, insecurity, joy, vision, affirmation, confirmation.....I have a deep love and gratitude for that place and what it represents for South Central LA.

I pray that God would look down and have mercy
I pray that TAS students would be the leaders who turn LA upside down.
I pray for repentance and that teachers' and families' lives would move toward the kingdom.

I thank God for many reasons, but one of the major ones is that in a very real way, when i walked into my first day back at the beginning of October, God had prepared TAS as a place where I would be prepared to lead the NWN summer program. i am absolutely sure that if i had not worked at TAS, i would not be ready to take on this task in the next season of my life.

So, the summer begins for me. A new job, a new place to be each day, new relationships, new study (gifts, and Acts) and new need to trust God (for the fall and beyond, job-wise)

thank you friends for walking along side me.

I guess you guys found me out.
I just want to say that I am really grateful to Tyra for seeing in me what I knew was there all along. Thanks, Tyra, for being so understanding and letting me have some time off to pursure my dream of urban youth work!

I guess there is more to life than being really, really ridiculously good looking

check out this website

http://micro.magnet.fsu.edu/primer/java/scienceopticsu/powersof10/index.html

i will be going to Toronto, Canada for the next week. I am excited to see my family but a little nervous about how it will be with them. whenever i go home, things get hard spiritually.

volver

havent been posting much recently. A combination of business, and just a lot of processing stuff on my own.

I got an 80 GB external USB hard drive on Ebay a couble days ago. it should come any day now. I will be able to have all my music in one location. ooooo

Spiritually, this has been a season of new wine coming into old wineskins. Daily following God and recieving all the teaching and experiences coming my way has been like waking up out of a deep sleep every day. Like dying a little bit, then a little bit more.
I'm in it for the long haul.

In a week i will drive to Las Vegas to meet my family, and then fly from there to Toronto Canada. It will be my first time in Canada.

here are some pictures from our recent field trip to El Campeon farms in Thousand Oaks.

the whole crew 

Maria: "Whatchyoutalkinbout, Willis?"