Through Jesus...

We are on our way to Syria with a team of 13 people.

We are to be one for the glory of God, but also for His glory we are to be different as different are the parts of our bodies or the fingers of our hands.

The problem is we struggle because we are different... we don't always like different, we prefer what is like us, thinks like us, sees like us.  In ministry - specially the ones that take us out of our comfort zones and require deeper lever of faith in relationships - this struggle is used to tear down, do divide and ultimate destroy what God can use as an instrument for His purposes.

Syria will be a challenge in many ways, one of those will be relating with each other inside the team as we are very diverse in all kinds of parameters.

A good friend of mine reminded my this morning we need to learn to "relate with each other through Christ." What a great word just when we need it!

Yes, we are different... as the pages of a book.  Each one can tell a different story - or part of the story - each one has a different context, gift, skill, ability... but we all are one instrument, we all represent one purpose, we all are one... one story, or the story of the One who - as a mighty binder - holds us together and coherent in His purpose.

Pray for us please, pray we may relate to each other through Christ, pray He will hold us together... pray 'your eyes Lord, your ears Lord, your heart Lord... your manners'

Thanks : ) 

Now you are the body of Christ, and each one of you is a part of it (1 Cor 12:27)

Finally, on our way to Syria...

We survived Ike : ) As much as this times have been challenging, they have been also an amazing opportunity for Houston to demonstrate love and service. I am encouraged to see how neighbors are helping neighbors… and in many cases talking with them for first time. There are blessings in the storm, and also opportunities.

We are leaving this next Thursday, Sep 25th to Damascus. I will be back on Oct 12th. The final group has 13 members and we have had good opportunities to know each other, I catch one of them in a video you can watch on-line.

As you may know, our work in Damascus is related with Iraqi kids, whose families have gone to Syria due the war. They are refugees and are exposed to very hard experiences, especially kids who are weaker and often used and abused. If you want to read more about it, check the last part of this e-mail where there is some research and some useful links.

I’ll try to post updates of the trip every week, but I'm not really sure of the availability of Internet access.

Please, pray for us. Pray for protection, pray for love and pray for purpose...

Eph 2:10 says "For we are God's workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do." We are indeed for Him and His purposes – not for our comfort and ourselves but for Him -, in Christ exactly shaped for the deeds God has intended for us. My prayers are for the release of this mindset in my soul, for the release of the gifts of God given to us by the Holy Spirit, and for the release of the deeds we are called to complete. There is no time but for these… finishing them should be our food as it was for Christ.

Pray for our spiritual readiness:

• May we all in the team remain in Christ, abide in Him since in Him we were all created for a time for this one. (Acts 17:28)
  
• May we all in the team be free to trust in God’s work in us and through us in this trip. (Gal 2:20)
  
• May we all in the team can release the gifts we received from God, as He releases the deeds He prepared for us to do. (Eph 2:10)
  

Pray for our needs:

• For our leaders, Mark, Anika, and Silva; and the leaders in Syria.
  
• For logistics and immigration issues.
  
• For Divine guidance in planning and preparation of daily activities in Damascus.
  
• For cross-cultural preparation and understanding.
  
• For protection.
  
• For better understanding of gifts and skills of the members of the team. Harmony and love between us, and through us.
  

Pray for Syria:

• For salvation of the lost.
  
• For fulfillment of God’s purpose for the nation.
  
• For encouragement, protection, growing and guidance of the Spirit for the Church in Syria, and her missionaries.
  
• For workers called to serve in Syria. 
  

My main task will be related with teaching. Pray for clarity and relevance, for a message that is not prepared in our human experience, but revealed by God. A message able to heal, as a man full of faith believed 2000 years ago and said to the One who owns the message… “just say the word, and my servant will be healed…”(Mt 8:8)

Blessings,

marcos

Reading Material:

• http://www.christianaction.org.za/articles/whyprostitutionnotdecrim.htm
  
• http://www.churchtimes.co.uk/content.asp?id=38965 This site has some really good quotes, and advice, especially at the end of the article.
  
• http://www.ncapuk.org/content/resources/ National Christian Alliance on Prostitution (NCAP)
  
• http://www.icapglobal.org/about_us.htm International Christian Alliance on Prostitution (ICAP)
  
• http://www.internationalministries.org/read/3779 International Ministry
  
• http://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2007/january/16.29.html a really good article, especially Page 2.
  
• http://dir.salon.com/story/news/feature/2005/06/24/prostitutes/index1.html 
  
• This is a devastating article from 2005, the realities of prostitution outbreak in Damascus, of Iraqi refugees, the realities of what’s going on there. Make sure you get through page 3.
  
• http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/middle-east/50000-iraqi-refugees-forced-into-prostitution-454424.html Another article from June 2007, it has not gotten better since the 2005 article, its gotten worse.
  
• http://www.nytimes.com/2007/05/29/world/middleeast/29syria.html?ex=1338177600&en=8caf56b484d2ebb9&ei=5124&partner=digg&exprod=digg Another informative article from May 2007 from the New York Times, prostitution in Syria, make sure you get to page 2. “Nightclubs are known as casinos, a local euphemism, because no gambling takes occurs.”
  

The blessing in the storm...

In the aftermath of IKE

• Prayer Col 1:9-11
9For this reason, since the day we heard about you, we have not stopped praying for you and asking God to fill you with the knowledge of his will through all spiritual wisdom and understanding. 10And we pray this in order that you may live a life worthy of the Lord and may please him in every way: bearing fruit in every good work, growing in the knowledge of God, 11being strengthened with all power according to his glorious might so that you may have great endurance and patience,

• We ask or spiritual wisdom and understanding… only given and revealed by the Spirit

• Wisdom that sometimes is opposite to the wisdom of the world:

• a. Loose your life to gain it
  
• b. Humble yourself and you will be exalted
  
• c. Right things that are no righteous
  

• Wisdom we need at all times, specially times like now when our city lives challenging times where some sort of suffering and sacrifice is required:

• a. Lack of services like power, running water, gas
  
• b. Lack of comfort
  
• c. Tangible need
  

• We have been studying 1 Samuel, and so far we may have learned a principle: Sometimes the big movements of God happen in the context of great suffering and sacrifice / see the case of Hanna, Disciples, Prophets… and Christ

• TODAY we need to meditate what God is allowing to happen in our city. It’s the movement of God in this hour and we need to join Him, so we may do things different today.

The right perspective in the storm
We may ask why? We need to remember:

• God is Sovereign & Powerful (Psalm 135:6-7)
6 The LORD does whatever pleases him, in the heavens and on the earth, in the seas and all their depths.
7 He makes clouds rise from the ends of the earth; he sends lightning with the rain and brings out the wind from his storehouses.

• a. We seek human logic; fairness but we will not find them. God does His will. But we can remember that He has one purpose: reconciliation; redemption and all is a call for that. (Jesus comment about Galileans who died…)
• b. In the storm we can compare the power of God and the power of men (Buildings rising the sky in downtown, falling with the power of God.)
  
• c. God sovereignty gives us an opportunity to TRUST and develop our FAITH.
  

• God is Good and Faithful (Psalm 136:1)
1 Give thanks to the LORD, for he is good. His love endures forever.

• a. His love endures forever repeats 26 times in 26 verses.
  
• b. He is a better provider than men; His provision is never interrupted and fills us when we ask for it. Covenant with day and night, life, peace, patience, health, protection, and family. The storm makes us remember some priorities we have.
  
• c. We don’t appreciate their value until we loose them.
  

The great opportunity in the storm (John 13:34-35)
34"A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. 35By this all men will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another."

• Love. Real love, not Valentines, but the one that cares, serves, helps, ministers those in need. The one that does not complain but produces good, walks the second mile, looks after its own needs to see the needs of others.

• a. When there is a need, there is space for provision
  
• b. When there is desperation, there is space for peace
  
• c. Where there is hopeless, there is space for hope
  

• That was the example of the early Church; that was the testimony that conquered the world… in the Roman coliseum or in the quarantine because of deadly sickness… if the Christian leaves… who will help?

• When trial there are 2 ways:

• a. See just our needs and comfort, we complain, there is no time for others, I have my own problems… ANYBODY can do that. A kingdom divided will not prevail.
  
• b. See ahead my own needs and comfort, don’t complain but fill the space of the need of another in the name of Christ. That is one of the most powerful examples and testimonies of love… LOVE IN ACTION. Jesus is the example, when you see it, you see His reflection.
  

• Prayer is always needed. But there are times when action is as important as prayer because is the very answer of prayer. Sincere and powerful prayer comes when you are willing to be the answer of it… God knows our hearts. It’s by your deeds that your faith is revealed. (James 2:14-17)
14What good is it, my brothers, if a man claims to have faith but has no deeds? Can such faith save him? 15Suppose a brother or sister is without clothes and daily food. 16If one of you says to him, "Go, I wish you well; keep warm and well fed," but does nothing about his physical needs, what good is it? 17In the same way, faith by itself, if it is not accompanied by action, is dead.

The blessing in the storm
The opportunity is already a blessing, but there is more (1 Pet 1:6-9)

…now for a little while you may have had to suffer grief in all kinds of trials. 7 These have come so that your faith—of greater worth than gold, which perishes even though refined by fire—may be proved genuine and may result in praise, glory and honor when Jesus Christ is revealed. 8 Though you have not seen him, you love him; and even though you do not see him now, you believe in him and are filled with an inexpressible and glorious joy, 9 for you are receiving the end result of your faith, the salvation of your souls.

• Is trough friction, tension, pruning, purifying that we are transformed. How can it be if not? As the gold is purified by fire, we are purified by tribulations… This is what Paul refers – I think – as the WHOLE will of God. Not just one-prayer salvation and all comfort in this world but sanctification, holiness, being conformed in the image of Christ

• There are different sins in every land… India, Ecuador, China… The sins of this land I believe are:

• a. Individualism / being independent. My own car, my own room, TV, cell, bathroom… I don’t need other people, I don’t need to know my neighbor; I’m independent. NOT GOD’S MODEL (dependence of God, interdependence with people, community)
  

The blessing in the storm is that I need to talk with my neighbor, I need people, I need community.

• b. Comfort. Everything should be easier, faster, lighter. That robs discipline and produces laziness, weakness and makes us dependant of the wrong things. We judge, become spoiled.
  

The blessing in the storm is to set me free from the wrong dependence, to remain me my flesh does not run the show.

• c. Consumerism / Materialism. It’s another form of idolatry since puts my focus in the wrong things and priorities, seeing what passes away and not what is eternal.
  

a. The blessing in the storm is seeing the fragility of material possessions, seeing how they come and go; and giving me a real perspective of what is first.

As we have lost much on little, we are together in this city…
• We will not prevail if we are divided, each man for himself
• We will not shine if we focus just on our needs
• We will not be transformed if we don’t let God challenge us
• We will not honor God if our love is like electricity… interrupted

In the middle of a presidential election...

It's amazing... and confusing sometimes.

Being, first of all, a follower of God but also being an immigrant in USA and coming from a really different background in life; I'm challenged in this season participating - as a witness - in the process that is core for democracy in a country that is seen as the icon of freedom in the world. The process is the election of the new President of USA.

Just 2 main political parties with defined positions seemed to me would make the process easier, specially coming from a country where we count parties by dozens. But is not. The human nature of men where goodness resides as we were created in the Image of God, but also darkness rules as consequence of our disobedience and separation of God, is reflected in the use we chose to make of our decision to serve our community, or our decision to support who does it. Not just decisions, but also the way we express them and the way we act on them.

This means we can use politics for good or bad; we can use it as an instrument to built up those who Christ died for; or to manipulate things to get our way. This old battle between good and evil is real everywhere.

For me the saddest testimony is to see the division the use of politics inflict among those who are called to be salt and light of the world. It's not just about the destination but also is about the way you walk there, and the way you face conflict, disagreement and difference in others... I guess that would be the biggest testimony about a heart, after all it's easy to be a 'good Christian' when there is no conflict or disagreement, or among people who think the same as you. Knowledge puffs up, love builds up. The man who thinks he knows something does not yet know as he ought to know. But the man who loves God is known by God.

I wonder what would be the answer of Christ to the question of vote today... seems that giving Caesar what is Caesar's, and God what is God's would fit somehow. I'm not suggesting the the way is non-politic view; but rather a redeemed-politic view, where God - and the wise civil application of our rights and duties that can only be given by the Spirit - really are ruling over all.

Out of all the things I have been hearing and reading about the election process, this one is the one I would share today. It's take form Jim Wallis' blog:

So maybe we should have some rules of civility for this election. Let me suggest "Five Rules of Christian Civility."

We Christians should be in the pocket of no political party, but should evaluate both candidates and parties by our biblically-based moral compass.

We don't vote on only one issue, but see biblical foundations for our concerns over many issues.

We advocate for a consistent ethic of life from womb to tomb, and one that challenges the selective moralities of both the left and the right.

We will respect the integrity of our Christian brothers and sisters in their sincere efforts to apply Christian commitments to the important decisions of this election, knowing that people of faith and conscience will be voting both ways in this election year.

We will not attack our fellow Christians as Democratic or Republican partisans, but rather will expect and respect the practice of putting our faith first in this election year, even if we reach different conclusions.

On Nov. 4, Christians will not be able to vote for the kingdom of God. It is not on the ballot. Yet there are very important choices to make that will significantly impact the common good and the health of this nation -- and of the world. So we urge our Christian brothers and sisters to exercise their crucial right to vote and to apply their Christian conscience to those decisions. And in the finite and imperfect political decisions of this and any election, we promise to respect the Christian political conscience of our brothers and sisters in Christ.