We've Moved!!!

Well, technically not until next weekend. But our blog has moved. TrumanAndAmber.wordpress.com This is mainly a message for the 5 people that actually check this blog out, but hopefully over time, we'll get some more traffic at the new site. So check it out, leave a comment, tell your friends!

Deja Vu

Tony Scott. The director that brought us great profound movie lines like "I don't like you because you're dangerous." "That's right! Ice....man. I am dangerous." Or good mind numbing action dramas like "Crimson Tide" or "Enemy of the State". "Deja Vu" did not disappoint. I enjoyed it for several reasons. Denzel. Enough said. The movie was filmed and released in New Orleans while I was living in the city post Katrina. And the never-gets-old idea of time travel. But something that really stuck out to me was a simple dialogue exchange that happened twice in the movie.

Being a follower of Christ, my desire is to know Him and love Him as best as I can. Integral to that is to love others as best as I can. And in loving others as best as I can, it would only make sense to share with them that which is most important to me, that which promises a fullness of life, that which promises hope and freedom.

In my line of work, talking to students about Christ inevitably yields a wide range of responses. More often than not, students choose to pursue their own "god", be it their success, material gain, social acceptance, etc. When I wrestle with our responsibility in evangelism, or challenge the students involved in our ministry with evangelism, a common thought always comes up. My friends just don't seem to be responding to the gospel. I'm afraid I might offend them. Should I keep sharing?

Tony Scott has directed his fair share of movies and definitely knows how to entertain. But one thing he showed me in "Deja Vu" was that he understood another simple truth that so many Christians often forget.

"What if you had to tell someone the most important thing in the world, but you knew they'd never believe you?"

"I'd try."

Hearing God

Prayer is an interesting thing. What is it? How does it work? Does it work? Growing up, I was taught that prayer is talking to God. But that's hardly a recipe for depth and intimacy in a relationship. Imagine if all I did with Amber was talk to her, never once stopping to hear from her. Well, a little later, either in high school or in college, I remember hearing that the way it works is that you talk to God through prayer, and you hear from God by reading the Bible. Is that it? Is that the formula?

Hearing God's voice has been something I've been trying to understand better. And thanks to Can You Hear Me? by Brad Jersak my thoughts on prayer and hearing from God has really been challenged.

As it turns out, the other day while I was driving, a name pops into my head. And it must have been from God, cause I don't see any other reason why my friends name would have come to mind while I was listening to sports radio. So, I decided to give him a call. After catching up for about 30 minutes, we both realized how much we both needed that call. We were able to pray for each other and really encourage each other through our similar circumstances. God knew I needed the encouragement. God knew my friend needed the encouragement.

If I had ignored that little voice that said my friends name, we would have both missed out on how God wanted to bless us that day. A friend of mine once said - "delayed obedience is disobedience." Well, as I'm learning more about prayer, if you hear from the Lord, even the faintest whisper, you best respond!

The Light...

...at the end of the tunnel. Yes, I can finally see it. After being "homeless" as newly weds for the past 5 months, Amber and I finally have a date set to move into a house. Well, assuming everything goes well from here on out. After looking at all our options to renovate the house I actually own, we decided it was best to sell, and find a house that was move-in ready. With much thankfulness, and full of praise, I gladly report that as of Sunday, we are now under contract to buy our first home and to sell my first home (not suitable for a married couple).

There have been many lessons I've learned since being married. But the one that has been the most "in-my-face" (one that I've been learning since I put my trust in Christ), is ironically how to trust Christ. In this case, it's trusting Christ with providing for my family. Especially with my wife's sickness (she has fibro), my tendency to control and provide is more apparent.

God sometimes speaks to me through my dreams, and recently, I don't think I've been listening. Since we've been back in Austin, when we first started looking to remodel, to most recently looking for and selling a home, I haven't slept well. Pretty much every night is filled with stressful dreams. And it continually got more and more intense. Pretty much a sure message of "HEY! You need to ease up. Stop stressing about things and trust me. Know that I am God and have rest!" But I didn't listen.

This past Sunday was the Chicago marathon, in which our friend Jen successfully finished. She decided to pray for someone different each mile, and we were mile 6. When I first learned that she wanted to pray for us, I was thinking, "Wow! That's a really cool idea, and really nice that we made the list." I had no idea how important mile 6 was really going to be.

If you're reading this, I don't know what your take on prayer is, but at least consider that God really does hear our prayers and responds. After waiting a week of negotiations on the house we were trying to buy, and listing our house for just a few days, on SUNDAY, God heard the prayers during mile 6, and the sellers accepted our offer, and we received a full price offer on the house we're selling.

God knows the very number of hairs on our heads (Luke 12). God is intimately involved in our lives, every detail he cares for us, and will love us. Will I finally learn that I truly can trust Christ?

A Different Beginning

Every fall for the past 8 years have been marked by a new group of incoming freshmen, their hearts a blank slate ready to be written on by the influences of the college campuses. As a collegiate missionary, my prayer and hope is that every freshmen that steps foot on the campus will have an opportunity to hear the message of Christ. They will decide to surrender the lordship of their lives to Jesus, and experience the fullness of the joy and blessings of being a child of God.

But this fall is different for me. Instead of getting on campus and meeting these freshmen. Instead of meeting with staff and planning on how to plant on grow spiritual movements on these campuses. Amber and I are busy raising our financial support. It's an odd fall for me not being in the thick of all the high momentum of the start of the school year. But it's also been a blessing.

Amber and I have been on the road since we got married back in May. Yeah, that's four months of living out of a suitcase, staying in a dorm, sharing space with other people. Not counting our honeymoon, we've had maybe 2 weeks total that we weren't sharing space with other people. Through all this transition, however, we've had to learn quickly how to communicate well. We've had to learn how to still find rest and joy in the Lord even when everything is less than ideal.

The transition continues as we are finally back in Austin. In addition to working on raising our financial support, we are having to settle into our house. Unfortunately, that's not without some challenges. I know I've made my mistakes in the past, but forcing my wife to move into a flea and rat infested house will not be one. So, until we can rid the house of those pests, and gut and redo the kitchen and bathroom, we will be sharing space yet again. This time, with my cousin and 2 little boys who apparently only have two voice volumes-loud and louder.

Stay tuned as our journey towards normalcy continues.


yeah, this hole in my home actually opens up to the outside

Conference update

(This update was taken from a friend and fellow epic staff from Oregon...with his permission, of course)

Thank you so much for laboring with us in your prayers for the EPIC conference [Feb 16-19]! It was so awesome to fellowship with about 150 students and 50+ staff from all over the country. It was such a momentus and historic time. And as you know, this conference was not without obstacles & opposition. Sherry Slaughter's [staff woman] house flooded just as she was leaving to drive up and set up registration on Friday, Jaeson Ma [one of the main speakers] got intense abdominal pains on Saturday morning and almost headed to the ER instead of coming to San Jose for the conference, Tommy Dyo [Epic national director and speaker] (who was still recovering from fever/sick symptoms) delivered his first talk to the EPIC movement with incredibly loud and distracting party music next door making it nearly impossible for students to concentrate on what was being said, Sunday morning we woke up to find some kind of convention next door to our main meeting involving tarot cards, sensual dancing, palm reading, & the like. Strange things were happening, and indicative of the spiritual warfare & deep strongholds that are engrained in AA communities. But despite all this, the reality of spiritual warfare brought people more to their knees in prayer and more proactively attentive to what God was doing in our midst. We prayed and were reminded that He who is in us, is greater than he who is in the world.

Students were challenged by Vivian Mabuni (who saved the day big time and delivered the first 2 talks when Tommy was sick), Tommy & Jaeson to connect with our Father in an entirely new way unlike how they'd been treated by earthly fathers, to realize our uniqueness of being bi-cultural & how God wants to use us to reach out to others through this new understanding of our identity, and to be committed to prayer & a passionate love for God. Students were challenged to take the gospel to our partnerships throughout the world on summer projects, STINTS and internships. Students were trained in seminars to walk in the power of the Holy Spirit, to make wise/godly decisions for their futures, to plant spiritual communities, and more. Students who had never been hugged by their parents received hugs from their "spiritual" family during a powerful session Sunday night, which then ended with an awesome last worship set with students literally rushing the stage to dance, jump, and shout out in praise to our Father. Students & staff celebrated the Lunar New Year with a festive party filled with egg rolls, rice crackers, karaoke, boba tea, Asian candies, & more.

On our day of outreach, we went to the Vietnamese New Year festival (which was expecting over 60,000 people & represents the least reached subculture in the Bay Area) and saw:

323 spiritual conversations/exposures initiated
164 shared the gospel with
16 people accept Christ
81 people prayed on the spot for
8 people rededicated their life
Praise God!

Jaeson Ma said that we can't be passionate (& in love) with God until we realize just how much He is passionately in love with us. We love because He first loved us. What a great take away for all of us as we leave this conference. Please continue to pray for our EPIC students as the story is just beginning for many of them.

Pray:
- that the things the students learned will take root in their hearts
- that many of them will decide to be on a summer project
- that many of them will go back as missionaries on their campuses

A little overdue

For those of you that have not had a chance to hear, I figured I'd post the story (from Amber's perspective). I’ve added a few comments in [ ].

From Amber:
He is here for our December visit and he asked me last week before he came if he could plan a day of our time together. I asked if he had a preference of what day and he picked Saturday. He came in and woke me up around 7:30 and we got ready and headed out. Our first stop was Michaels, to pick out a scrapbook for "us" since I haven't started one yet. [Amber loves to scrapbook, and I love taking pictures] Then we went to Peaberry at Colorado Mills and had some coffee and breakfast. Tru told me that since we weren't together for our 6 month anniversary, he thought we'd celebrate our 7 month anniversary, which was
Thursday. (I totally fell for the 7 month anniversary explanation and was clueless all day!) We read through some of our first stages of communication on eHarmony [yup, we meant through eHarmony]...a lot of that beginning communication took place while I was at a coffee shop. Then he gave me the first of 7 cards....one for each month we've been together. They were all handmade cards with paper cut out's/folded images on the front (hard to explain) that represented something written inside. He wrote memories of our time each month or significant points in our relationship that month inside each, and each also had pictures inside from our visit that month or representing that month in our relationship (to add to "our" scrapbook.) Along with the first card was another card that listed "7 things I like about you." Around 10:30, we headed West...I knew we were going into the mountains but didn't know where...and he took me to Vail. [Vail was a place she’s always wanted to go. And I knew it had a very European feel to it, which I knew she would love.] We had lunch at a little local pizzeria then wandered around Vail village, took some pictures, and just enjoyed the afternoon. All throughout the day, he gave me the cards. Truman suggested later in the afternoon that we take a walk down a little trail that went along the creek in front of Vail Village. We walked for awhile and found a spot with a bench tucked away beside the creek, snow all around, trees overhead. We sat and chatted for awhile, then he asked if I wanted the last card. It reviewed our Nov. visit, then he said, "I lied, I have one more card." He read it to me, and it was a list of "7 Reasons I Can't See My Life Without You." The last one was I Love You, which we hadn't said yet. I was all thinking, oh, that's so sweet, he said “I love you” and I can finally say it back. We were just enjoying that moment and I completely thought that was it! Then he said, "would you like one of your Christmas presents early?" [which was supposed to clue her in on what was happening, since I was quoting the movie we watched the night before] Still not thinking a thing, I said sure! He gives me one final card to "go with" the last gift and when I opened it, it had a picture of a guy on his knee proposing to a girl. At that moment, I realized what was going on and he was on his knee with the ring. I was completely shocked!! I had no idea. I was not expecting it for a few more months and he did a great job of keeping me in the dark. (We watched Miracle on 34th St the night before and there is a proposal in it. After the movie he said "don't get mad at me, but when it comes time to get a ring, do you want me to pick it out on my own or do you want to help and give me input? We talked about it and he suggested that we go ring shopping this weekend and look together. That was a perfect way to throw me off!!!) He was normal all day, didn't act anxious or weird or not himself. I was shaking and teary and of course I said yes!! He had made dinner reservations for us at a really nice restaurant in Vail village, so I got changed and we went to dinner. Then we walked around Vail village to see the lights, and called family and friends to share the news on the way home.

Epic Conference 07

It's the first morning of the Epic Conference: Chosen 2 Proclaim. That's the theme for this year as we challenge students to consider who they are in Christ - that they have been "chosen". Not just chosen to be in His kingdom, but also chosen with a purpose. That purpose being chosen to proclaim.

I've had the privilege to be one of the directors (the program director) for the conference. We have about 150 students and 52 staff who will be part of this conference. And I am coveting your prayers for the weekend.

Please pray for the students. Pray that many of them will be filled with passion for God's kingdom. That they will go back to their campuses and be so filled with compassion for the lost...that they be compelled to plant spiritual movements that will shake this world when they get home. Some of the students attending may not even know Christ as their savior yet, so pray for these students' salvation.

Pray for the staff. For many, this is their first foray into Epic and Asian American ministry. Pray that this will be an eye opening and heart opening weekend for them. Pray that this will be life changing in their perspective in understanding what it's like for a minority student to have to live in a majority culture other than their own.

Lastly, pray for the logistics of the conference. The speakers, the seminar speakers, the day of outreach (we're sending all the students out to the Lunar New Year celebration in downtown San Jose on Sunday...projected to have about 60,000 Vietnamese in attendance), the worship through music, etc....

The Holy Spirit will be moving mightily this weekend. Please join in praying that happens. Thank you.