Walls came crashing down at our recent retreat...

We had such an amazing time at our overnight Dec. 3-4. God was so faithful to tear down walls within the group, as well as between individuals and Him.  Stories will be coming soon, but you can Click here for retreat 2011 photos.

Teens Conference in Manhattan

Iris and Edgar in front of K-State's Old Memorial Stadium

Thanks to some new friends from Wallula Christian Church, Edgar and Iris, two Teens Adelante leaders, were able to attend a youth conference in Manhattan, Kansas last weekend. They got to visit a college campus, meet new Christian teens, and learn and worship. The theme of the conference was "Compel," and the two of them came home with a spark in their eyes. The weekend revolved around 2 Corinthians 5: 14-21.

¹⁴ For Christ’s love compels us, because we are convinced that one died for all, and therefore all died. ¹⁵ And he died for all, that those who live should no longer live for themselves but for him who died for them and was raised again.

 ¹⁶ So from now on we regard no one from a worldly point of view. Though we once regarded Christ in this way, we do so no longer. ¹⁷ Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come:^[a] The old has gone, the new is here! ¹⁸ All this is from God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ and gave us the ministry of reconciliation: ¹⁹ that God was reconciling the world to himself in Christ, not counting people’s sins against them. And he has committed to us the message of reconciliation. ²⁰ We are therefore Christ’s ambassadors, as though God were making his appeal through us. We implore you on Christ’s behalf: Be reconciled to God. ²¹ God made him who had no sin to be sin^[b] for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.

Us with the Wallula teens and leaders

Iris was impacted by the workshop she went to about the "Body of Christ," which the Lord really used to prepare her heart for the first house-church meeting the following week. We were blessed to have lots of worship for all three days, which was a rockin', energetic experience to say the least. Edgar and Iris are both learning instruments, and have begun to play at church with both the teens and the adults, so seeing another way of doing things inspired their creativity. I am excited to see a passion growing in them for good worship music. They are beginning to realize that there is not just one form of worship music, and they are realizing they can make it their own, which is exactly what the other teens need; because David and I's taste is not the same as theirs! We are excited to see their passion for music and their passion for God melding into one thing.

Celebrating Edgar's 17th birthday on Sunday!

The Wallula Church's teens and their leaders were so welcoming to Edgar, Iris, David, and myself, making us feel like we were part of the family even though we just met. We all were able to take communion together before we parted ways, and reflect on what God wanted us to take home from the conference.

Summer Album part one

 

click here to check out our photo album (part one) from the summer!

Sons and Daughters

We went around the circle one by one, as each teen shared what the summer at Teens Adelante was all about for them. After four weeks of the boys and girls being separated to have a Purity study, I was anxious to see if the confidence I had seen growing in the girls community would transfer to the whole group. As we went around the large circle of 11 Teens and 9 leaders, every single one shared a truly insightful piece of what God had been teaching them. "Loyalty." "Brotherhood." "Respect." But what really got me was when I heard "Trust." It wasn't just the concept, but who it was coming from; the one teen who from the first night I volunteered at Mission Adelante tried to place a wall between us.  "Trust" was not in his vocabulary. Walls were safe for him.

Over the past year, his defenses have come down, stone by stone, and during the men's purity time something in him seems to have not only come down, but he has actually reached out. He offered his true self and what resulted was "Trust; I never thought I would be able to trust a group of guys. I have never been able to before." Not only did he find a group of teen guys and men to lead them as brothers in Christ, but he is discovering an identity in Christ that gave him the confidence to share his true heart in front of all Teens Adelante.

The four weeks with the girls was equally powerful. The first week was an awkward tension of defense mechanisms at their maximum load. The second week those defenses burst to pieces. The Lord had called a couple of the women leaders to share from the dark unhealed wounds of the heart. He called us to lead the way in modeling what it looks like to brings things into the light that can really feel painful to acknowledge.  Immediately after we penetrated the silence in our own hearts, they did in theirs. The chains of our sin and the wounds that others had inflicted on our feminine hearts poured out into the thick air that night.

But a temporary discomfort in facing sin brings complete salvation and freedom to never again sit in darkness or fear. Doors in every single one of the young women opened, to what I imagine will be a year of deep restoration. There is a Holy restoration to our identities as 'daughters of the King' that occurs when we simply gather to seek His face. I am now beginning to see in them a security in each other and in their womanhood.  They are suddenly radiating as a group of girls. They no longer see each other as a threat, but as sisters. 

I am joyfully anticipating building on this foundation of sisterhood that Jesus laid in them. My prayer for all the Teens as we begin a new school year is that this communal foundation will give them strength to live a life that is set apart and that they will experience the Body of Christ working in all it's glory. Despite all of our differences at Teens Adelante, there is a group of women and group of men that will gather to seek wholeness in Christ, and demonstrate our love for each other through "loyalty", "respect", "trust", "vulnerability", and "brotherhood."

His heart is in the ER

When I found out last night that one of the teen girls was waiting at the ER with her family to get her grandpa seen, I wasn't really sure what the point in me going would be. I haven't had much experience at hospitals (thankfully), and God knows better than to try to make me the translator for medical procedures...haha!  Someone might end up with an amputated arm instead of a few stitches. So despite my uselessness as an interpreter, and my lack of any medical advocacy, I decided to go.

When Sara texted me that she was starving, and tired, but couldn't leave the ER, I realized that she had an obligation there. It was not to be a supportive daughter or granddaughter, but to be the only pathway through which her mom and grandpa would understand what was happening; the voice of the family in an emergency. At 14, she was expected to be the one who translated through the receptionist, the nurses, the doctors; to make sure that everything was getting done to take care of her grandpa, and communicate that to her mom. And nobody had to ask her to do that, she assumed this role immediately, as she so often does.

So I took Sara's complaint about being hungry as her maybe wanting me to be there and brought some fast food. The receptionist somehow gave me a family pass (thanks God!) and the four of us sat in the hospital room as different nurses and students entered and looked at me oddly, took vitals, and slid out of the room. One of the nurses was inspecting us so carefully, Sara's mom pointed it out to me, irritated that it was so odd to them that a Hispanic family would have a white friend.

The doctor eventually came and began to ask questions about her grandpa's injury and Sara translated. She asked her grandpa, Jose, health questions, as he tried to remember his health history and who diagnosed him with what, when and where. Jose couldn't remember the name of the doctor he had seen, because the name was American (Imagine trying to remember a long Hispanic name, or how to spell it). Jose tried to remember the names of the prescriptions he has as we all tried to translate letters of some lengthy pharmaceutical name. The ER doctor  was direct and cold in his demeanor, seemingly impatient with a language barrier and a long list of rooms full of tired, needy people. He told Sara that he would not be able to count her as an official interpreter because of her age, but continued to use her until they got an interpreter on the phone.

The nurse got the interpreter on the phone and Jose and the doctor were able to communicate uninterrupted by Sara, her mom, or myself trying to fill in the gaps of what we didn't know how to say medically. Sara let out a frustrated breath and rolled her eyes as the doctor asked the same questions through the phone that she answered for him, as if he was nullifying her hard work. The doctor and Jose both hung up the phone, and those few minutes of clarity in communication were over. Nurses and technicians continued to come in and out, and I helped Sara to understand what they were doing, so that she could explain to her family. After several visits of that same nurse staring at us, he finally began to prod Sara. "So you are the grandaughter..." and Sara playfully said, "yeah," as if she knew where this was going.

His gaze turned towards me, "and..." he was hoping I would jump in. I didn't.  "She's my sister," Sara was looking for a reaction. I just remained silent to let the two of them play this out, it was just too funny. The nurse's curiosity was killing him, you could feel it in the air. He didn't respond. Sara burst out, "I'm just playin....but somethin like that." The nurse was slow to speak, "so you are friends?" "Well...yeah," Sara answered. He expected me to be insulted by her hesitation to say we were friends, hoping to get a reaction out of me, he hissed "aww, she's saying your not friends!" Again, I just kept silent and let Sara be the one to explain our relationship, interested myself in what she would say. I'm sure the nurse was hoping now he had never asked. Sara eventually replied, "we go to the same church," which just hung in the air.

As the night went on, it seemed as though peoples attitudes towards us were changing. The impatient doctor began throwing in Spanish words, making an attempt to step into their comfort, and out of his. After we asked that same suspecting nurse for a blanket, he came by again and again to make sure we didn't need more. Later Sara and I were looking all over for a microwave to no avail, to warm up the food I brought hours earlier. After we gave up and sat down in the room, a nursing student came in and asked, "can I bring you guys anything warm to eat?" and I nearly laughed at her... because God is just so like that.

In my exhaustion after a long week, I had nothing to offer but my presence. I look back at last night and see his hand comforting and holding not just their family, but me as well, in that hospital room. I see Jose's laughter and jokes in the midst of intense pain as joy from the Lord. I see those nurses and doctors turning from silent uncertainty, to heartfelt hospitality, as God serving this immigrant family a glass of water on a desert journey.

Sara's family didn't need me to save the day and make everyone feel better last night, as he is often reminding me of. He didn't need me to "be" anything.  I'm not Sara's friend, I'm not the translator, I'm not the youth pastor or the advocate. I am not defined by what I do and who I serve. God has been convicting me to just trust him in me and let him do the work.

"...it is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me..." (Gal. 2:20).

God just wanted me to be the girl that "goes to the same church," a family member in Christ; a sister. "Somethin like that," as Sara said, was pretty accurate. They didn't need me to be there, God just wanted me to be where his heart is and enjoy it; to see how capable he is. He wanted me to go and find compassion, joy, and restoration in the most unsuspecting places. God's heart is in the emergency room. He is with the hurting and hopeless. And I praise him that we can sit in those moments of exhaustion, waiting for help, and be restored by his presence while surrounded by disaster.

And the LORD said, “I will cause all my goodness to pass in front of you, and I will proclaim my name, the LORD, in your presence. I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I will have compassion.
Exodus 33:18-20

The Dead Come to Life

The Dead Come to Life
written by David

Have you ever seen something dead come to life? If you belong to Christ, you’ve experienced it in your very own heart, but there’s something truly moving about seeing it happen in someone or in a group of people. We recently had another Wednesday night of Teens Adelante in which we faithfully pushed into a time of group worship which was mostly sung by the volunteers. Nonetheless, I strapped the guitar around my neck expecting to fearlessly lead the teens in an inevitably distracted and self-conscious expression of singing to the God of the Universe. There wasn’t anything noticeably different about the setup or even the mood that Spring evening, but something happened that night. Something new in the teens came to life.

After finishing with the second song, the teens started to become somewhat restless with tambourines, egg shakers, and claves still lightly clamoring in their hands. And then, all of a sudden in the middle of the silence between songs, Salma blurts out “Why don’t we sing Somos el Pueblo de Dios?” I started to tell her that we were planning on singing other songs that evening, but I realized almost immediately ( Holy Spirit moment ) that her heart wanted to sing that song to God, and that she could lead her peers with the passion she was ready to express. So I said “ Alright everyone, Salma is going to lead us in this song, so follow her.” What happens next almost makes me drop my guitar up there on the stage and forget what song I’m playing. Salma proceeds to stand up on her chair followed by every single one of the the other kids, and they start belting out the words to the song at the top of their lungs. It was so loud that I literally couldn’t hear myself singing through the sound system! This level of worship continued on the next song, and the following song after which they actually chanted, “otra vez! Otra vez!” which means “one more time”. By the time we finally finished I was as tired as I’ve ever been from doing worship with them, but I had the biggest smile across my face.

The breakthrough had finally happened, the breakthrough that had to happen, and they got to experience the joy and blessing of worshiping God in spirit and truth. There is a rebirth that happens when you decide to put yourself out there in corporate expression to the one who saved you.  You give Jesus an inroad past your flesh and into the deepest part of you where spirit resides.  I don’t know a greater joy than seeing a group of broken teenagers die to themselves and all at once be swept up in a beautiful chorus to be brought to life into Christ.

“And if the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead is living in you, he who raised Christ from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies because of his Spirit who lives in you.” - Romans 8:11

More worship pics from 3.30.11

Last Thursday I watched my husband, David, give Iris her second guitar lesson. He was delighted that she had come back with all her chords memorized and had clearly been practicing. My joy comes from knowing what this means to Iris' heart. Through a discipleship relationship with her, I have seen the typical teen struggle to discover her identity and what God has made her for. The beauty in her heart is that she has sacrificed other things that she loves, that she felt were taking her away from singing to God. Iris is always humming and singing...music is always pouring out of her. She is succeeding at something she once gave up on because she is motivated by her desire to please the Lord.

expectations

Iris and Nayeli; girls in my discipleship group

written by brooke

I am ashamed of how little I can expect of teenagers. During this winter break, the leadership of Teens Adelante was praying for how to continue our discipleship format. Under the Lord's guidance and a gift of faith, we made the decision to stop teaching lessons on Wednesday night. No more bible teaching on Wednesday nights. Wait what?

I know. Crazy. So no more "curriculum" on Wednesday nights. We aren't teaching a planned lesson anymore. So how are they growing? They are doing it themselves!!!!
Starting last January 26 the kids are expected to read their bible five days a week, with a guide we created for them.  So as Teens Adelante was about to start I realized how crazy this was and had a little wave of doubt and worry. Then I remembered it was God's idea, not mine.

But after two weeks of not being together as a group because of the snow storms, I began to worry again. Last night I prepared for the worst so I wouldn't be disappointed. I tried to think of a plan to help them make-up the readings this week for what they didn't do the past two weeks. Shame on me.

I am so joyfully blessed to tell you that many of the kids have been pursuing Jesus on their own time. The delightful surprise was Iris, the oldest teen girl,  who came with her reading notes, every day  done, ready to talk about everything she had been learning and pondering (none of this a requirement).

Our small group time was pretty much the opposite of what I imagined.  I answered questions and  watched as the three younger girls in the room watched Iris diving into the Bible and our God. Something was happening that I could never do for those girls. They saw a peer, someone they want to be like, demonstrating the pursuit of Jesus.

God is so amazing. He knew they were ready for this...I didn't. But thankfully He reigns. These teens are more capable than I am to spread His love and goodness to their age group. Many of them have been fearless in this new reading and devotional plan, and some are still struggling. But I see that He is equipping some of them to lead the rest and it is humbling and glorious to watch. They are taking ownership of their walk with the Lord and he is growing them deeply.

Please pray for success in our continued pursuit of the Lord together, as the Teens Adelante leaders and youth read through Genesis this trimester. 

:) amen brothers and sisters!

Something in the Water...

Written by Brooke Coon

Sunday evening I had the great joy of watching Salma, one of the Teens Adelante girls, get baptized. I will never forget sitting on her porch in the intense heat this summer, the only place where we could talk in private. She was asking questions about traditions and liturgy done in quinceaneras (the coming of age party for Hispanic girls) as well as the meaning of baptism. Salma is a fiery, passionate girl, and she doesn't want to do something that she doesn't believe in. But when she is in, she is 100% in. The blessing I've received through Salma has been watching what she decides to put her 100% in. The things that she commits to are becoming more and more righteous.

Sunday night after her baptism, I stopped by her house to drop something off, and she didn't want me to leave. So she corralled Jessica, another teen who lives next door, her little sister followed, and we sat on the floor in her bedroom. She was flipping through her newly gifted pink bible and firing off questions about how God changes us, how we still fall, and how we are a new creation. She talked about what it meant to die with Christ and be resurrected in Him. She talked about how she has started to control her cussing and asked me if there is anyone on earth that has never cussed. She asked if there was anyone who has ever read the entire Bible and I could see in the fire in her eyes that she just couldn't get enough. Suddenly, the Bible had become very real and interesting to her and she couldn't believe all the topics she was coming across.

The girl was on fire for God that night. She was the one asking all the questions and pondering God. I was overwhelmed by her passion (the 100% thing) and I could hardly answer one question before she posed more. I want to say there was something in the water, but I know the truth is that there was something in the blood of Jesus Christ. He has been pursuing Salma and her mom Mayra as well, in the midst of traumatic loss and pain in their family this year. The blood of Jesus has given them new life, and Mayra made that public declaration by being baptized that night, too. Something very special happened in their baptism, and Salma's heart was lighting up her bedroom that night in a way that marveled the other three of us girls.

Glimpses of our Leaders In Training (LIT) Kids

by brooke coon

On Sunday December 19, a group of Bhutanese and Latino kids, plus a handful of leaders, boarded a big yellow bus bound for Westside Family Church.  The Mission Adelante kids were invited to join the Westside kids to sing a couple Christmas songs and bring to life the coming sermon on the joy and wonder of Christmas. Like proud mamas, the leaders had tears in their eyes as the kids began to sing. However, what really moved me was what continued as we sat through the service.

Our kids sat down and another children's choir performed. They vibrantly sang "I'm trading my sorrow for the joy of the Lord." One of the Mission Adelante girls sitting next to me leaned over and asked, "What does trading my sorrows mean?" My heart just melted as I have never heard such an important question from this pre-teen. I whispered back to her, "It means we are giving our sorrow to Jesus, letting him take our sadness from us, and receiving joy from our hope in Him." There are times when you think kids aren't paying attention at all and then there are times when they desire to understand every lyric of a worship song.

As the sermon went on, the congregation passed around a bowl for offerings and commitments for children's programs that Westside has in other countries. The same girl asked me what the bowl was for. After I explained it to her, she told me she had five dollars in her stuff upstairs. The simplicity of her response was beautiful. She didn't need to think about it and she didn't need to ask any more questions. She just knew that there was a need and she wanted to help.


I praise God for these precious moments where we get to witness Mission Adelante’s youth seeking to know Him more. They are the treasures that I store in my heart to keep me going through the daily tasks of children's ministry.  There was a beauty that Sunday that spoke to the wonder of God...that He is so complex yet so simple. He is so approachable that even children can grasp the gospel of salvation and peace. He works through every creature, young and old.  And oftentimes,  the greatest blessing can be when the children reach out and minister to us!