Monday, August 8, 2011

Starting a New Chapter

Today we leave...on the road heading back to Denver...totally in awe of the fact that 16 Days is finished. On Sunday, we had the student's graduation. A graduation that ended one chapter...but started a new one. This chapter is starting with new life...a life of LOVE and PURPOSE.

We entered 16 Days with a group of teens looking for something...they were searching for deeper things. God met them in that moment of searching and took them to places they could have never gone on their own. God led them through brokenness...and in that brokenness...brought life. LOVE was seen at the center of their lives...falling in LOVE with their Creator and King...and now their response to this world is LOVE. That is OUR response. With hearts on fire, they enter this world with their Father beside them saying..."I will not leave...I got you...just keep saying YES to me..."

So we drive. Driving into new adventures and new journeys. Always in our hearts we say "for King and Kingdom we LOVE". This has been 16 days of encountering God and His Kingdom in places that we may have never expected. We enter into the next chapter in God's story of LOVE...If our God is for us then who can stand against.

Abandoned Love

- The 16 Days Leadership Team

Saturday, August 6, 2011

The Journey Into LOVE

Graduation is tomorrow. It's crazy to think we are already at that point. It feels like we just started this adventure together yesterday. God has done powerful and great things. Lives are on fire...seeking and hungry for what God has down this road. There are many unknowns but God rules over any darkness and uncertainty.

Tonight we spent some time with the team working through "Intimacy with God" plans. This basically gives them a place to map out what they are sensing God is showing them about their time spent building their relationship with Him. As leaders, we had a chance to look over and read them...it was a beautiful moment. These teens are hungry for more of God! They aren't settling for the old...the past does not satisfy anymore. They long for something deeper...something that brings life and purpose. They long for intimacy with their Creator.

So as we enter the end of this chapter tomorrow, pray that hearts will be consumed with God's purpose and love. That this would bring the start to a new chapter in their lives...a chapter that leads the world to LOVE their Creator with everything...a chapter that, through these teens, the world learns to enter into a journey of LOVE...

Abandoned Love


- The 16 Days Leadership Team

Friday, August 5, 2011

Living out LOVE

The rain is pounding down on Gus as we drive through Missouri. We have paper towel where the water is leaking through...there's nothing better than a good and wet adventure.

Last night when we were at our hotel for the night, the team had a chance to live out the LOVE of Christ in an incredible way! The team met a man named Sean...and he started pouring out his life to them. God was all over their conversation. By the end of the night Sean started a relationship with Christ...God is so good!

What was incredible to see was how, as a team, they didn't create the moment. God created the moment...and the team said "YES". Because obedience ruled over personal agenda...God moved. What would happen if we just started saying "yes" instead of coming up with excuses every time God said to move? May we continue to say "YES"...May we have faith and trust that God is larger than our questions and doubts. God has us in His hands...may we live our lives, in every moment, knowing and believing this...we live to serve the KING...because we LOVE.

Abandoned Love

- The 16 Days Leadership Team

Thursday, August 4, 2011

Discovering True Life

God makes beautiful things out of the dust. The last week or so has been full of God tearing away and building up. God continues to strip away the layers of ourselves until the deepest parts are brought to the light. When these deep places are brought to the light...this is when God dives in and washes us clean.

The 16 Days team is continuing to let God take them to these extremely deep places. He is revealing new and incredible things. Surrender is taking over their hearts. I don't think there is anything more beautiful to watch than a heart breaking and becoming totally surrendered to LOVING God with everything.

We started sharing our "hot seats"...basically our life stories. Their stories are full of God's healing physically, emotionally and spiritually. Every story has its breaking moments...where there is no other place to turn but to the Father. Through brokenness true life begins. True life begins when we realize that we have nothing. That our hearts on their own have nothing. But when God completely takes over a broken heart...THAT is where passion lives and passion grows.

God is bringing TRUE LIFE to this team...so we push forward on this journey...living in expectancy that God will do great things. We LOVE because He first LOVED...by this people will know who we are surrendered to. Greater things have yet to come...God you are good...

Abandoned Love

- The 16 Days Leadership Team