Day 14 of the 21-day fast: The encouragement of Angel Tree

This morning for the morning prayer, I knew that I would be on the phone for about an hour since we’re combining two prayer meetings into one. So what I did was actually get into my car and drive out to a place to pray. This was strategic because I can turn on my car and use the heater in it to get warm in the short few minutes I am driving. I located myself to the local park where there is plenty of parking and essentially nobody around at 6am. Well, there was one guy, but he left shortly thereafter. I stayed in the car and was completely undisturbed and unrestricted by the volume of my voice.

What a wonderful time still to pray and how encouraging it is to have new people join.

The highlight of my day actually was the Angel Tree luncheon for all the volunteers. Angel Tree is an organization that partners with mothers and fathers who are in prison. During Christmas, they want to send a gift to their child. But because of their circumstance, they have no options. This is where Angel Tree comes in. Through Angel Tree, the parents tell the different churches who participate what they think their child might want or what they want to give to their child. In return, and this is all by the congregation’s own donation, the churches will buy the gifts, host a party for the children and their caretakers, and give them the gift on behalf of their parents.

Day 13 of the 21-day fast: Breaking Bread

I felt creative, so I did a little photoshopping based on a tongue and cheek suggestion last night from my pastor to call the new direction of the group ‘Breaking Bread.’

Last night might have been a breakthrough for my Life Group. After detailing about my concerns of the group the other day, I was apprehensive about how the group would move forward during a time in which I felt there was a lull. Instead, God answered our prayers and we had a miracle breakthrough session.

I won’t go into too much detail about what transpired, but I can say that this group is running on God fuel. I think what we happened was that we just dove right into our deepest feelings and just expressed what we wanted from our group and what we envisioned for it. And thanks to scripture, particularly Acts 2:42, we were reminded what a true fellowship was about.

We had to devote ourselves to the teachings of the Lord. We had to dedicate to each other in fellowship. We had to enjoy one another’s company and eat together. We also have to dedicate to prayer. These are the essentials. The early disciples following the resurrection did all this daily and God added to their numbers the same. It’s amazing how something so simple as loving one another as God loved us could produce so much good fruit. But it’s no surprise. Nothing from God should ever surprise us.

Day 12 of the 21-day fast: Eating a can of soup with a ‘best by’ date from 3 years ago

This morning I didn’t go to my car and pray. I didn’t want to be out in the cold car again, so this time I stayed in my room with the heater on. I was afraid that I might be too loud and wake everyone up. But it didn’t happen and it was a good time of prayer. Even though I have been trying my best to get enough sleep, I still went back to sleep for another hour afterward.

Now because I am off social media and I can’t Netflix or whatever, I have so much more time on my hands. It’s during these times I just think that prayer is the best solution to pass the time. It’s starting to be on my heart to pray more. The problem is that praying by myself is still a hurdle for me. Maybe it’s because I know I can still get distracted easily and my focus on prayer isn’t always there at times.

But I realized that during this fast, there are a lot more prayer requests out there and things that I could be praying for. Or even things that I should be praising. But here I am today and I realized that I am praying for the littlest of things. And maybe that is a good thing.

Day 11 of the 21-day fast: Pleading with God for deliverance

A bumper sticker I saw today.

Since yesterday’s OSL meeting and really digging into some of the lessons from the plan today, I started to wonder about the direction that I am going in. I know that I have a lot on my plate, but I still don’t know if I am THAT occupied that I can’t give more to God. Could I still be making excuses of why I don’t want to do something or reasons why I might not be qualified for something.

One of the things that came across to me was that Jesus gave up so much for me. Yet here I am not even giving 50% of my all for Him. How selfish am I?

So this is where I am right now. I feel that my efforts and my time should be focused on two things and these two things I already am involved with: Prayer team and Life Group.

Day 10 of the 21-day fast: Prayers answered and I am sick

First of all, I am sick. I blame this on myself. I was wearing a T-shirt and it was cold inside my cousin’s house. I didn’t wear my sweatshirt. Now I have a stuffy nose and I am sneezing. It’s draining some of my energy but I just gotta find a way to not do too much and keep myself warm at all times.

But here’s a cool story from last night. MC Jin and I had been talking about a new clothing line he was about to launch. At that time, it was on the hush hush until he told me last night what it was: iknowHIM.com

(This doesn’t technically break my media fast since it’s only secular media I have to fast from)

But here’s the cool part. He wore this design on a sweatshirt a few weeks back while freestyling on a show. It was an amazing testimony as he incorporated his faith into his raps. My friend whom I told you about having lunch with last week, actually told me he watched the same freestyle and wanted that shirt real bad. He googled it trying to find it. And the following week, his prayer is answered. How crazy is that? God somehow answered that prayer through the faithfulness of Jin. Sure, it’s just a shirt, but a shirt with a message so powerful that it is an attention grabber. And for all the right reasons.

So I placed my order and I will wear it whenever it comes to my doorstep. Jin liked that story about my friend so much that he said he wants to share it on social media. Since I can’t go on social, I guess I have to just wait until the fast to see it. But I trust it will be great and glorify God.

Day 9 of the 21-day fast: Driving when sleepy with no music is not the business

The Grapevine approaches.

I woke up at 4:45am this morning and promptly prepared my drive back to Los Angeles. Doing my math, I should get back home before noon and that’s what happened. But it was a really tough drive because I got to bed at 11pm last night because of work. Then when I woke up to go for the drive, I was struggling real bad. I knew that I couldn’t afford to take minor naps at rest areas because I have to get to work back at 2pm in Santa Monica.

So it ended up coming down to me eating some pastries I packed in my car, drinking lots of water and screaming out loud while trying to stay awake. The water drinking made me take two early rest stop breaks but it helped a little. Still, it was so hard to stay awake.

I threw in an old sermon CD I had from Andy Stanley. Because of where I was, there was no reception for radio and no good service on my phone, so listening to some Christian music was not an option. Seriously, I was so tired and no music doesn’t help at all. Enduring this fast away from secular music is so tough and it could have been disastrous. But luckily enough, I listened to the sermon and it lasted me just enough before I got into some area where reception for radio was better.

Day 8 of the 21-day fast: We dance because we’re happy

Church was great this morning. Powerful message and great worship team.

I finally got to sleep in a little this morning and when I finally got myself mostly awake, I went out to Cornerstone Missionary Baptist Church for service. This is my second time there and the same premise was the reason this time. I have a friend from high school who preaches there every now and then I visited him there two years ago. Since I was free up this Sunday, I decided to return for a visit.

Even though it was a black church and me and a white dude were the only people there not black, I didn’t feel like I was out of place at all. People there were loving and welcoming, getting to know me and it was great.

During service there were great interactive songs of praise and it was so welcoming and free to shout out joys to the Lord. Even during the time to pass the peace, we were encouraged to dance with one another and sing how Jesus is in all of us. Dancing with strangers is awkward. But dancing like this didn’t feel like it. That’s what happens when everyone in the room has something in common: we love Jesus! That made me so joyful and happy.

Day 7 of the 21-day fast: Prayers answered and outdoor hockey

How crazy is that my devotional for this morning talks about exactly what I have been trying to do this week?

I stayed over at my friend’s house last night. In fact, it was the same house I lived in when I was working my final season covering the 49ers. I slept on the couch. Good times. I woke up this morning wondering how I was going to do my morning prayer knowing that it will be a combined group prayer and then our regular gang afterwards. I was wondering how I was going to do this knowing that even though the house is big, every room is occupied so I don’t want to be loud and wake someone up. Luckily I remember there is a side door that doesn’t lock when I exit, so I snuck out the side door and went to my car, which was parked a little ways out and prayed.

Can I just say how much better I feel every time I pray with the group? It is so encouraging every time to hear people pray for one another and just to hear them call out to God for deliverance. Also, it uplifts my soul. It gives me a sense of relief from all that goes on in my mind and in my heart. It’s amazing how God can just uplift and encourage simply through prayer. It is that powerful.

One of my answered prayers in a way just came about 45 minutes after the morning prayer. I was asked if I could lead one of them on Tuesday. My heart for prayer is growing and I feel that I can have a bigger more prominent role and being asked to help lead is a step in that direction. Amazing how God just works great things in ways that I would never have expected. God is good!

Day 6 of the 21-day fast: More driving and back to work

I woke up this morning and did my normal routine of going to my car and joining the morning prayer conference call. It was a good session of praying for outreach and evangelism. That is still such a tough topic for me because I still find it really hard to bring up the good news without at first thinking of how I want to approach it and if I should establish a trust with the person before I start bringing up the topic of Jesus.

This also coincides with my quota from OSL of inviting one new person to church and inviting one new person to join me to OSL. I’ve already started strategizing this because it’s not just something you bring up. I could just informally invite people through email (and if I was on Facebook, a lot easier) but this will all be in person, which is fine except I haven’t had that opportunity to bring it up. I could have forced the issue but I haven’t yet.

I knew today I will be doing driving so I went back to sleep after prayer. Then when I awoke, I continued to do my devotionals and my checklist for OSL. I wasn’t feeling it today. I just don’t know why I feel so distracted even though I am not really distracted at all. I did my 10-minute prayer and asked God to get me out of this rut that I am in. Maybe I just need that good drive to work and a good day at work to get me back on track.

Day 5 of the 21-day fast: Wait, do I hear music? Am I allowed to listen?

I woke up this morning and scurried my way to my car to do the morning phone conference prayer. I could have done it anywhere in the house actually. I have a big house with two other rooms and I could have gone downstairs to pray in peace and quiet. But the car is kind of my safe haven. Sitting out there in the car in the cold just works for me.

After the prayer, I returned to my room and started getting some reading done. The first thing was to catch up on the devotionals that I had started earlier this year. Take a look at this amazing story I read from my devotional.