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Serving the Campus with
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Harvard-Radcliffe Christian Fellowship |
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Outreach: Thanks for your prayers for us here! As I mentioned last month, I did meet with a Japanese international grad student, and also his wife. Kogos and I treated them to dinner as we talked about their spiritual questions. They came from a Shinto background where there are gods in mountains, rivers, etc. We wound up talking about how a good God must be distinguished from nature as far as character goes, and what the problems are with creation and humanity. I also shared how Christian faith was present in Japan prior to the 600's, based on physical evidence of buildings and scraps of the Gospel of Matthew; they did not know this. It was an excellent time; please pray for the Lord to stir up more questions and curiosity in them, and to equip Kogos further as he sees the grad student most often.
Thanks also for your prayers for my personal relationships with a few students. The student who felt hurt that her romantic relationship with a non-Christian made me question her capacity for leadership patched things up with me and apologized for overreacting; she then promptly launched into a bunch of questions that her non-Christian friends were asking her.
Concern for Few Frosh: Thanks for praying that the Lord would stir up more spiritual interest in frosh; please continue doing so! Two new frosh came out to visit our Wed Small Group! And Ian and Hannah, two of the other frosh, said they'd like to be part of the worship team. Currently, HRCF has only 3 frosh coming out with consistency. |
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Boston College Asian Christian Fellowship |
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Missional and Formational Content: After Winter Retreat, we will continue on the theme of Dreams and Ambitions. We're addressing issues like career, decision making, and working for social justice in whatever field one chooses. I've enjoyed conversations I've had about my devotional reflections in Matthew's Gospel. Several frosh are really stepping up on their patterns of studying Scripture and reaching out to people. Our Core leaders are setting up the proxe station on Desire independently of me and training other ACF'ers to man it! That's a dream come true for me.
Spring Break Trip to New Orleans (KRUP: Katrina Relief Urban Plunge): This March 2 - 10, I will take my fifth trip to New Orleans. We have 20 students signed up so far, and our deadline is Feb 10th. We have spots open for up to 30 or 35, so please pray that the Lord would work in people's hearts to come!! We are on track for hitting a 50-50 ratio of Christians and non-Christians. |
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Other IVCF Staff News |
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Uganda and South Sudan: I'm also beginning readings and concrete meetings in preparation for Uganda, along with Sang Yang and Connie Bahng. Thank you so much, for those of you BC alum who gave towards the first Jan 31 hurdle of purchasing the airline tickets. Both Sang and Connie made it! This shaves a few hundred dollars off the cost of our air travel. |
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Impacting Global Poverty Through Lazarus at the Gate |
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Another reporter wrote up a story on Lazarus at the Gate. This led to a flurry of new hits and downloads on our Lazarus website! Hurrah! |
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Serving the Boston Urban Community |
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Dan Cagua-Koo will be hosting a nutrition workshop this Saturday 2/4. It's open to our neighborhood and friends. This reflects his heart to address food and nutrition inequities in lower-income areas. As you probably know already, the presence of fast food, junk food, and misinformation leads to higher rates of obesity, diabetes, heart disease, etc. I also asked the new Dean of Gordon Conwell Theological Seminary's Boston Campus, Dr. Mark Harden, if he would be interested in using the seminary's Boston campus to host nutrition and healing workshops and he was very interested. Perhaps we can tie these threads together.
Laura Mitchell bought her house on 72 Esmond Street, which is only 2 streets down!! We're going to pray for God to bless the house next week. |
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Family News |
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In January, as I mentioned above, we went to Colorado and New Mexico, to take the C.S. Lewis class and then visit the Armitage family on the Navajo Reservation. We were impressed by the beauty of the landscape!! We also saw Travis and Moyra Stiles with their three sons in Denver, CO, our former Dorchester neighbor Lydia Sullivan in Durango, CO. Although it was very troubling to learn that the U.S. government allowed leftover uranium scraps (uranium is mined in that area) to be scattered all over the Navajo Reservation in the 1980's, utterly polluting the land. I've put some pictures here of John at the balancing rock in the Garden of the Gods, CO; a river flowing out of Box Canyon and Ouray, CO; and Ming and John at Mesa Verde where we walked through an old pueblo cliff dwelling. Please check out more pictures here.
Ming's counseling business is up and running, with five clients so far! For anyone in the Boston area, please do check out her website, Lifewise Counseling at www.lifewiseboston.com. And feel free to make appointments or referrals. |
Missional and Formational Content:
A number of students have shared about family brokenness
and pain. So at our winter retreat, we talked about "Jesus and
Your Family" where we reflected on our inheritance from our families.
We had 20 students come, including a few new folks! We explored
how Jesus engaged with the inheritance he received from his own earthly
family, and his heritage in Israel, to see how he retold his people's
story through his own life in order to redeem it, and how he might do
the same in us. We are starting a new series called "Tell Me the
Story". This Friday, 2/3, Andy Ober at Tufts will talk about Jesus
and the White American Evangelical Experience, highlighting the
positives (mission, a legacy of
Roger-Williams-style-freedom-of-conscience) and negatives
(ethnocentrism, a legacy of John-Winthrop-style-theocracy). Next
week, 2/10, Harvard professor Dr. Marla Frederick will talk about Jesus
and the Black American Experience highlighting the relationship between
Jesus and social justice and the positive contribution of the black
church as an organization. The following week, 2/17, will be a
Veritas Forum where philosophy professor Dr. John Lennox will talk about
Miracles and the supernatural. On 2/24, we will talk about Jesus
and the Experience of Women, exploring issues related to Scripture and
women.
Winter Retreat, 1/20 - 22, on
"Dreams and Ambitions": We saw
about 90 people come to our retreat! Core and I counted 10
non-Christians that we knew. Although two students made
decisions that were close to a decisive step of faith, I don't
think they actually "crossed the line". But we remain
hopeful in our follow up. I was especially grateful for
Core (Clement, Connie, Dasom, Nick, Sarang, Susan) stepping up
to lead workshops on various topics: career discernment,
spiritual formation and rhythm of life, and studying Scripture.
In some cases, they had help from alum: John Byun, Eugene
Choi, Nameun Cho, and Kisuk Kim! (Thanks guys!) 
C.S.
Lewis Class: The class on Jan 4 - 11 with Dr. Gary Deddo
has got to be the most fun academic experience I've ever had.
I had not spent so much time with C.S. Lewis before. I
read about 1400 pages of his enormous body of work, and it left
me hungry for more. Even taking the final was a lot of
fun, and I'm currently writing a paper on Lewis' Theology of
Atonement. Ming audited the class with me, and John sat
patiently doing homework or reading. Meanwhile, Zoe went
to visit Maia Armitage and the Armitage family in
New Mexico on a Navajo Reservation.
