by Daniel Gee

Never a dull moment in youth ministry. And that’s not because those two juniors wrestling almost made me spill my drink over a freshmen who, on her phone, almost tripped over said juniors.  Although, yes, stuff like that happens, too.

Contrary to all appearances, occurring beneath the surface of the Friday night mayhem are moments of great growth, maturing, and love.  Our students are growing in their care for one another. They love to pray for one another. They are growing as worship leaders. They are learning the challenges of honoring God at their school. They are stretching themselves to reach out to those they don’t know. It is our joy and privilege as youth advisors to walk with these young men and women as they journey through these uniquely formative years of their lives.

Of course, beneath all this is more. We find immaturities. We find ourselves (my peers included) in a generation increasingly apathetic, thoroughly entitled, and with an impatience cultivated by constant phone usage. These immaturities even find their way into our students’ moments of growth. Showing love to a friend might be mixed with the selfish desire to be needed. A student worship leader, while on the outside appearing the paragon of holiness, is internally struggling in a war against temptations of pride, judging others, and the fear of man. Add hormones to this great human paradox of feeling both arrived and yet far off and, well, you pretty much get adolescence right?

I believe one of the fundamental premises of youth ministry is that there is more than meets the eye; God is not done with these young men and women. Amidst all the fun and joys of youth ministry, we are also confronted each week with our students’ immaturities, awkwardness, growing pains, and frustrations. Nonetheless, we see this in the context of a greater narrative, one that subsumes the present circumstance: these young men and women are in progress, and by God’s grace will be more than who they are now. We are able to take seriously our students’ immaturities, and yet also in the very same breath affirm that God is apprenticing a skillful artisan, training a courageous soldier, and nurturing a loving parent for beautiful and redeeming work in his Kingdom.

And in this do we not find the deepest truths of the Gospel we hold so dear? God is determined to bring redemption, through Jesus Christ, to the world, in spite of our sin. We can still hope when all is not as it should be. We can trust God to justify us and to sanctify us. We are called to both pursue tenacious discipleship and seek daily forgiveness. All the while God calls into being that which is not yet arrived.

Thus, as the youth are, so are you and me. Yet I sense us old(er) folk find it harder to acknowledge this in ourselves.  We feel as if we are supposed to have it all together. Immaturities, ignorance, naivety are supposed to be long behind us. But if I’m going to be honest, I see in the youth my own immaturities and indeed my own being “not there yet.” The same temptation to be needed lurks in my mentoring, and the same pride is at my heels when I lead them in worship. “But where sin increased, grace increased all the more.” (Rom. 5:20). In my time as a youth advisor, years very dear to me, I’ve seen that God is indeed rich in mercy and grace for our youth. Today, may we give thanks that so he is for us all.

by Shannon Inouye

I am personally so thankful for the generous heart of Evergreen SGV to partner with Options to provide support for women with unplanned pregnancies. November 15th was my first day back to work after taking maternity leave to care for our first baby, Wonder. Becoming a mom has given me an even deeper respect and love for the women we serve and the children they are carrying.

As Garrett and I stare at Wonder, and we could do so endlessly, we marvel at her design and how someone so tiny and fragile can be so resilient and strong! God has been showing me that He looks at us the same way! We are His children that He smiles upon and can’t get enough of. This is how He looks at you, this is how He looks at the women who come into Options, and this is how He looks at their babies! It’s funny how raising a baby teaches one about the Father’s heart for us. 

One day, I was asking the Lord if it was silly that I get so excited to plan out little ways to document Wonder’s life and growth. I felt like God showed me that He does the same thing with us. He has plans in place, all laid out, and He gets excited to see us step into them and captures the moment in His heart! I wanted to share this because I feel like it’s for you! God wants you to know how He cherishes you and all the little things you do!

I have been back to work at Options for about three months now, and I continue to have the privilege of seeing women understand that God cherishes them too! I want to share with you one cherished woman’s story (used pseudo names) in particular.

Whenever someone invites Jesus into their hearts at Options we sing the worship song “No Longer Slaves”. This song’s lyrics powerfully proclaim, “I am a Child of God”. We sing it as a prayer over the women and change the lyrics to “She is a child of God!”

Currently, we reconnected with a woman who received services from Options when she was seeking an abortion. I already knew Melissa’s story was powerful, but throughout the course of the conversation she shared things that we didn’t even realize! We saw how God was pursuing her and her baby Olivia. Melissa shared that when she first walked into Options it was like there was something warm on her head and her head got hotter and hotter as she sat in the consultation room. She later identified the warmth as the Holy Spirit! Melissa came to the conclusion that she could not go through with an abortion declaring, “I am a child of God!” When she said that, I was overwhelmed with God’s goodness because Melissa didn’t know we sang those lyrics over our clients. How wonderful God’s works are that our declaration for her would become her declaration for herself!

To see the inner workings of God’s story in individual’s lives is something I will never get tired of! I have the blessing of seeing firsthand just how much God cherishes these women and the babies they are carrying. You are part of helping women see the purposes and plans God has for their little ones. Thank you for believing with me that those plans are worth protecting!

by Pastor Terry Gee

An old worship axiom goes as follows: Worship like you are being watched.

Wait. Isn’t it the opposite? Aren’t you supposed to worship like no one is watching? I thought we were supposed to forget about everything and everyone around us in order to focus on God!

Ah, yes, that is the real axiom, and we should appreciate the sentiment - focusing on God during worship is paramount, as is refusing to bow to the fear of what others think of you. But let me flip this oft quoted concept on its head and let it round out a more complete picture of worship for us.

Let’s step back for a moment: The fact is that others are watching you everywhere you go. You are being watched at work. You are being watched at school. You are often being watched at home. Yet no one would tell you in those cases to pretend like you’re not being watched - “Remember, whether you eat a gallon of ice cream for breakfast in front of your children is just between you and the Lord…”

So not only are you are being watched, you are often responsible for what others think about what they see. It’s just a fact of life. But rather than ignoring it or being paralyzed by this, God says this is an opportunity. Did not Jesus command us to “...let [our] light shine before others, so that they may see [our] good works and give glory to [our] Father who is in heaven” (Matt. 5:16)? So yes, we are watched. And if we live right, God is praised.

Now back to worship on Sunday morning - there too, you are being watched. You are being watched by your children, or other people’s children. You are being watched by those in your Branch or community group. The guy behind you is watching you and, even if you sit in the back row, you have the sound and multimedia team to contend with (and there have been unconfirmed reports of Pastor Cory sightings in the multimedia booth as well)!

Now before you get the heebie-jeebies about all this, before you start feeling uncomfortably observed, let’s quickly flip things on their head. The worship gathering is filled with opportunity to let your light shine (Matt 5:16 again). Nothing encourages me more than seeing a sister who I know is going through an incredible trial turning her eyes up to God, lifting her hands to Him and singing out of her need for Him, her trust in Him, her belief in His faithfulness. Or maybe it’s seeing a brother who is passionately pursuing God’s glory on his high school campus, standing firm as he sings of God’s coming reign. Perhaps nothing stirs my own heart like seeing someone else whose fire is blazing brightly in their worship to God. In seeing my brother worship, I am built up. When I see my sister’s faith, hurting yet alive, my own faith is bound up with hers and taken to a place of strength that mine would never have gone alone.

So you have a chance every Sunday to bring light to those who are watching you. Small sparks set fields on fire. Your deeply rooted, passionate expressions of worship will serve to build up those who are weak, those who are failing. You are being watched - and your worship testifies not only to the world, but to a watching church, of whom each member requires the fire within every other to burn for their own to glow in fullness. Your worship matters to God. Your worship matters to the entire church. Let us therefore bring worship to God that would build up those who gather with us.

Alexander Pope was an 18th-century English poet. In his “Essay on Criticism” he wrote “To err is human, to forgive divine.”  We should be grateful that Pope’s assertion is absolutely correct.  We, human beings, are ever so prone to sin, but God is one who knows how to forgive.

Over the next several blogs, I will be sharing some thoughts on forgiveness as advertised in the message I delivered this past Sunday.  I hope the blogs will be helpful in our understanding of forgiveness.

The noun, forgiveness, means “discharge, setting at freedom”.  The verb, “to forgive”, when used with a personal object means, “to send forth or send away, to release somebody”.  In classical Greek literature, forgiveness is used to indicate “the voluntary release of a person or thing over which one has legal or actual control”.

Hence, to forgive means “to acquit, to let go without the responsibility of guilt, obligation or punishment”.

The verb, to forgive, occurs 142 times in the New Testament, which implies that forgiveness is important to God.  The noun occurs only once in the New Testament.  This would suggest that forgiveness is an action in the mind of God.  It is something we are supposed to do and not something we’re supposed to be.  Forgiveness is not a condition, it’s an action.

Here is a working definition of forgiveness: “the act of setting someone free from an obligation to you that is a result of a wrong done against you.”

Let’s take a deeper look into forgiveness by considering what forgiveness is not.  According to Professor Robert D. Enright forgiveness is not:

1.     Forgetting - deep hurts can rarely be wiped out from one’s awareness.

2.     Reconciliation:  reconciliation takes two people, but an injured party can forgive an offender without reconciliation.

3.     Condoning:  forgiveness does not necessarily excuse bad or hurtful behavior.

4.     Dismissing:  forgiveness involves taking the offense seriously, not passing it off as inconsequential.

5.     Pardoning:  a pardon is a legal transaction that releases the offender from the consequences of an action, such as a penalty.  Forgiveness is a personal transaction that releases the one offended from the offense.

Adapted from Robert D. Enright, in Niki Denison, “To Live and Forget,” Wisconsin, Nov.-Dec. 1992

According to Rick Warren, Senior Pastor of Saddleback Church:

1.     Forgiveness is not minimizing the seriousness of the offense.

2.     Forgiveness is not the instant restoration of trust.

3.     Forgiveness is not resuming the relationship without any changes.

Rick Warren, “Offering Forgiveness”, 1997

If forgiveness is not the above, what is the act of forgiveness?  What do you think?  How do you go about forgiving someone?

Something to think about…

by Daniel Saechang

I started attending Evergreen SGV the first day we hived and started worshipping at Rio Hondo when I was in 2nd grade. The Lord revealed Himself to me over the years and I decided to surrender my life to Him in High School. By His grace I was called into Full-Time Ministry and have been faithfully serving the past eight years at Sila Church as the English Ministry Pastor. God has graced me with the immense honor and privilege to preach, mentor, and shepherd His people over the years and has grown my heart for His Kingdom.       

When the Lord called me back to Evergreen SGV it was exciting and at the same time quite frightening. When God calls His people to obedience, it often requires much faith. Often times, God calls us into the unknown, into the unseen. The Bible teaches that we must walk by faith, and not by sight and unfortunately I don’t have much sight to begin with or much faith that the Bible speaks of. But God gives so much grace.           

Coming back to Evergreen SGV has been filled with tremendous joys and painful challenges. As I walk around the church campus I am reminded of such fond memories growing up at Evergreen SGV as a kid. I remember the first day we hived and moved to Rio Hondo. No one knew where to park and you had to have this green parking pass that our family would constantly lose. There were memories of making the long trek up Rio Hondo to Sunday School. I remember counting the days to attend youth group in Suite C at the church office across the street from Golfland. I also remember the day we moved into the property we are at now and how exciting it was for us to finally have a physical home. God is good. God provides.           

However coming back to Evergreen SGV I realize that things are so different now and the memories I had are like fading memoirs. It’s been —— different. And —— that’s okay. And that’s really the lesson God has been teaching me in this season. Change is okay. Sometimes change may not necessarily be what I want. It may not necessarily be what I envisioned or had hoped for. But when change comes from the Lord then it needs to be embraced. When we trust in our Good Shepherd, we must trust that He will lead us to green pastures and still waters. He knows what He is doing and His timing is always perfect. Sometimes God will lead us through valleys and challenges to get to the green pastures. Sometimes the journey gets dark, confusing, and can even feel lonely. However it is through these seasons we must remember that God is with us and He is for us. He has not abandoned us nor will he ever. Thank you Lord!           

Dealing with change has been painful. The yearning of comfort, familiarity, and memories of past can hinder our embrace of God’s plan for tomorrow. And as I transition into a church that is going through so much transition, I feel like I have a unique opportunity to encourage the church family. So I encourage you with two words. To Trust and to Pray. Trust that our Chief Shepherd is Good. Trust that God has good plans. Trust that God is in control. In order to truly trust God we must know God and know God’s heart. Therefore I encourage you to pray. To seek the heart of God in the midst of transition and to know that our Good Shepherd is with us wherever we go.