Reading the Bible by the Fountain

"We want to get the bible in the hands of all peoples", I explained to German.

We met in the time-window at the interfaith chapel between his Roman-Catholic mass ended and our setup for Sunago Wednesday night.

Today, we met at the fountain, talked about Jesus, the Gospel, the important role of the Holy Spirit in our lives, and various differences and similarities between Protestant and Catholic Christians.

I gave him a New Testament and encouraged him to read the bible daily so that we can learn the Word together.

Pray for German as he reads a chapter from Mark's Gospel daily and for our conversations to be led by the Holy Spirit for the glory of God!

Early morning surprise: It was all worth it!

I was wondering why I was up till 3am, till I got a call from Japan.

My cell was on vibrate far from our room, and I just happened to be beside it, reading the bible, and James (one of my best friends) calls me.

We had such a priceless time talking till 6am, from phone to Skype, so that James and Audrey could see Isaiah!

James and Audrey have recently moved to Japan with the JET program, and have been witnessing God's glory everywhere they go.

James was a student leader at Sunago last year, until he felt the sudden and urgent call of God to apply for JET and move to Japan for two years (minimum).

Pray for James and Audrey, as they face various joys and trials, times of growth and countless adventures.

Late night thoughts

I once wrote in a song: "is it a late night or is it an early morning?"

I feel like I might be asking that very question soon.

I had such a good day today, filled with prayer, preparing for the night's message "Crucial: Community", and connecting with students. Sunago went really well last night (considering all the technical difficulties with electronics)!

But the combination of having a coffee (of which i am so much more sensitive to than before) around 9am and all the ministry events/ideas that have unfolded and that are to come, I find myself wide awake through the night...jotting down ideas on my flash cards as I lay in bed.

Some thoughts:
Students I want to contact this week
Questions for discipling meetings
Sermon ideas and notes
Ideas about plans
Ideas about how to plan ideas
...these are all general examples of the specific notes I've been staying up thinking about.

You might think: "Addison, you have a busy day tomorrow, a wife and kid to care for, a cold to recover from...should you just go to sleep? Maybe just stop thinking? That idea of drinking that coffee wasn't too bright eh?"

My reply is: "Yyyya, I should've only had a half cup of coffee or just tea. I've tried not thinking...no avail. I've tried praying about sleeping...he said no, my grace is sufficient for you. I've spent time praying for people, for strength for tomorrow, for health, for sleep...I guess I'll just see what God gives me, and I'll give him thanks. :)"


Last thought: I think I'll take a nap tomorrow.

It's 2:30am, I'll stop taking your time.
I think I'll read the bible and try round two with the Sandman.

Good night, or should I say, good morning?

Final Shout-outs: to Andy Moore, for being so Kingdom minded and partnering with us at Sunago; Mike Biddell, for having a cameo at Sunago and sharing his heart with our group; Tim Buckler, for investing time into what we're doing, by God'd grace, on the campus; Dave Gray, for joining me in my joy full-time on campus.

Pray for Nasrin!

I met a sweet girl at the bibliocafe and we started talking about Jesus and the gospel and we cleared up some misconceptions from her Muslim upbringing. God loves her so much, so pray that her eyes would be opened, heart softened, and ready to receive the gospel.

God, may your love and grace be magnified in her life.
May she see your beauty and come to you with great joy in your salvation, in Jesus' name!

Eccentric dance guy

So there's this really cool series of events that happened today involving Japanese students I met, an eccentric dancing guy that crossed our path, and a conversation about Jesus. Ask me about it sometime!

ESL Outreach

A hundred students have expressed the interest of connecting to our co-hosted Campus Alpha event, a group that meets over a free dinner to discuss the meaning of life from the Christian perspective.

A dozen students are ESL and mostly speak Mandarin and Cantonese. So I asked Thomas (left) and Hao (right) if they would be willing to lead a table of ESL students through this spiritual journey. 

They are planning to meet with the students at Starbucks this saturday, pray that they will be able to share the love and hope of Christ with these students.

Sunago BBQ Success!

We had over 100 students come out to our BBQ by the beach.
We played soccer, we connected with students, we ate food.

It was such a great way to bring students into Christian community
and we also had a group of new students come over to Dave's to watch a movie after it all.

Sunago's First Night @ The Interfaith Chapel

God has added to our numbers in wonderful ways. He has equipped us with disciplers, servers, gifted people in many ways, and many new students.  The house was packed last night and God was glorified. I'm very excited to meet all the new students, get them connected, and see them grow in Christ. Pray for much spiritual fruit in the lives of our students!

Connecting with new students

Since the beginning of the school term, we've had the chance of connecting with hundreds of students at Uvic. So far we've had over 75 students sign up for our email list. Pray for these students to get connected to Christ through our community. Pray for us as we undergo another 6 hours of connecting with students tomorrow at Clubs Days.

Learning languages

"Do you mind if I put my drink here?"
I had my hands full. Who knew that a question like that would open into a great conversation and begin a friendship. I met Michelle and Chris at the Biblio Cafe, she started teaching me Mandarin, I was exchanging questions in English, and it was "Hun yo shu!" (very interesting)!
We'll have them over for dinner sometime and they're excited to get connected to our community at Sunago!
May the students at Sunago love Jesus to the extent that it overflows in all facets of their lives!
Pray for the many international students we are meeting, that we might share the hope and joy we have in Christ.

Great first day

Dave, my new campus ministry friend at Sunago, serving full-time, joined me in connecting with students on campus today.

Us and 4 others met a couple hundred students, had opportunities to share the gospel, and connect people to our Christian community.

Pray for lots of students to get to know us and Jesus through our BBQ tomorrow night.

Praying, Planning, Preparing

We had a great first Sunago leadership meeting of the year.

It was so great praying with such quality servants of God.

I'm so excited to serve the campus with these friends and many others at Sunago.

The meeting was focussed, and then we got to having fun playing games and being silly.

 Above: (from left to right) Addison, Dave, Dakota, Hayden, Chantal, Bill, Emily, and Brent. Bellow: We attempted to write S u n a g o (Hayden was the cross on our logo).

Please pray for us, as tomorrow we will meet with many of the 3,000 new students at UVic. We will tell them about our new-student BBQ, about Christianity Explored, and hopefully we'll strike up some conversations about Jesus. :)