Woman's Dream Gathering Becomes Real at Grace City LA Church

Kimberly Yu’s dream from more than a dozen years ago to hold a gathering that highlights the transformative life stories of women who have suffered much and gained hope through Jesus becomes real this Saturday (May 12, 2018).“I know God can heal broken hearts and broken souls and that’s really what this conference is about,” said Yu in an interview with TogetherLA about the upcoming HOPE Conference to be held at Grace City LA. “We want women to know that they are not alone and that there’s hope.”Yu, who said she experienced a myriad of difficult times and bad choices, believes God clearly showed her a dream or a vision of a meeting in which five “regular” women walked up in front of a gathering of women, one at a time to speak about how their lives used to be and what God has done in their lives.Pastor Steve Cha of Grace City LA, a young church in downtown LA, said the HOPE Conference is the church’s first ever. This is a women’s conference designed to exhort women struggling in depression, anxiety, hopelessness, lack of purpose, and sin issues that can only be healed in the gospel of Jesus Christ, the church stated.“It is also a great equipping day for women desiring the practical tools to help exhort other lost and hurting women in the faith,” organizers said.The guest speakers include Marlene Barba, Kimberly Yu, Hope Delabar, Cynthia Shutt, and Liza Uriarte. A time of worship, fellowship, Q&A, and prayer will also be included. The free conference is scheduled for 10 am to 4 pm.Yu, who will also be one of the speakers, described the speakers as not necessarily experts in the sense of having a professional identity. “We are experts from the school of hard knocks. In the street game. How to survive when you don’t have a choice,” she said.“There’s lots of stories I can tell you right now about how I shouldn’t even be alive right now,” Yu said. Testimonies of transformation will include periods of homelessness, prostitution, addiction, physical and mental abuse, and the loss of loved ones.Yu said she was shown through attending a recent marriage conference that it’s okay for those giving testimony to still be going through a process.She said that she heard from people that “still need healing and [their testimonies] are still very real and raw.”“That’s what God wants to bring to that stage. He wants those testimonies not to be powdered up and read from a paper word for word. He wants it to come from the soul of those women just like the vision he gave me more than 12 years ago,” she explained.This conference is FREE. Please RSVP here to reserve a spot for you and your guests.

Engaging Culture Well: How to Share Your Faith Critically and Contextually

In every time period and historical context during which it has been shared, the gospel has confronted culture in one way or another.

By ED STETZER

During the years of Christ’s ministry, it challenged the mistreatment of the poor.During the Reformation, it drove Martin Luther to condemn the selling of indulgences.During the late 1700s, it inspired William Wilberforce to abolish the slave trade.The message of Christ’s redemptive love and free gift of forgiveness for all has been the force behind centuries of social change. Christians who understand the implications of this gospel can’t help but find ways to apply its principals as they live and work in secular society.For obvious reasons, however, cultural engagement brings with it unique challenges and complications. Many find themselves wanting to charge in, speak prophetically, criticize openly, and then expect to wait and watch for meaningful change to occur. But as Christians work to identify issues of concern in communities—either our own or those elsewhere—a posture of respect becomes critical.Ultimately, it’s not about forcing others into agreement or ‘winning’ a debate. It’s about sharing the message of hope that we have and trusting God to change hearts and minds.

Pursue Understanding

When we find ourselves in conversation with individuals from other cultures—particularly, those who don’t see eye to eye with us on spiritual matters—it can be easy to enter into ‘prophetic preacher’ mode. An attitude of superiority and condescension quickly cloud our witness and prevent others from receiving our message.Sometimes, though, the most effective way to share is with our mouths closed.When Paul visited Athens in Acts 17, we know he spent time reasoning with Jews, Greeks, and philosophers alike. But, he didn’t do so without first getting some context; he pursued understanding of these people’s culture before entering into the conversation.We see him remark on observations of Athenians religiosity—he tells an audience of Athenians that he “walked around and looked carefully at your objects of worship” reading their inscriptions and considering their philosophies (Acts 17:23).Like Paul, we must practice a certain level of cultural literacy; before offering criticism or commentary, we need to understand who we’re speaking to and where they’re coming from. When we do this, we learn how to share truth in a way that others can recognize and relate to.

Build Relationships

People respond well to the gospel in relational contexts. While I’m confident that God can and does work through a variety of evangelistic efforts, I know from personal experience that the gospel is best shared between two people who’ve established a certain rapport with one another over a period of time.When trust is established, people are generally much more willing to open up and share their story.This is why it’s so important for followers of Christ to enter into community with those who are different from them. When we build relationships with people from other cultures, backgrounds, and belief systems, we build bridges and pave the way for the gospel message to be shared.A relational approach to evangelism requires just as much intentionality as other forms; in many cases, even more. It means being diligent in the development of new friendships, prayer, and generosity with our time among other things. It means being the hands and feet of Christ in ways that take us out of our comfort zone and into a place of dependence on God.

Make the Message Relatable

Often when sharing the gospel with people of different cultural contexts, it’s easy to get caught up in ‘Christianese’ speak.But what would it look like if we made the message of the gospel more relatable and easily understood?There are certain things we all share as human beings; among them a desire to be known, loved, and valued. But so too there are aspects of Christ’s gospel that speak to each of us in different ways. For those living in want, Jesus as the bread and water of life are powerful metaphors. For children who’ve suffered some form of abandonment, the notion of God as a devoted, faithful Father is equally as redemptive.As we desire to deliver the gospel far and wide, we must learn to show the ways that the message speaks to them specifically. How does it fill the empty space in their heart? How does it challenge their preconceived notions of the divine? How does it speak truth into and transform their life?The gospel is powerful, but so too are the ways we deliver it to people. Let’s learn to share it through relationships, with understanding, and accessibility. Check out our latest resource, Our Gospel Story, to help you get started.Ed Stetzer holds the Billy Graham Distinguished Chair of Church, Mission, and Evangelism at Wheaton College, is executive director of the Billy Graham Center, and publishes church leadership resources through Mission Group.This article was republished with permission and originally appeared here.

The Reality of Urban Church Planting: Fear and Faith

There's something different about someone who acts on their deepest desire to impact lives, ultimately leaving them feeling both vulnerable and fulfilled in their own life.That is the heart of a church planting pastor.There is a certain level of uncertainty to planting something that is counter-cultural to the current state of society. As an urban church planter, there have been times of great joy and extreme lows. Church planting in any context is difficult because you are trying to introduce people to something that is greater than themselves. In the same breath, church planting is about being the mediator between hurt and hope. It is the ability to be in the midst of the vicissitudes of people’s lives, yet offer the solution to their problems. But at the core of this organization or organism, known as society, is the church planting pastors.Urban church planting pastors, who are looking out for the proverbial Gotham City known as their communities, live to transform the lives of the people in their cities. In addition to that, there is something that is very telling about being a church planting pastor in the urban environment. As urban church pastors, there is this idea of being used by God that is beautiful in theory but then there is the reality of actually being in the community doing life with folks.

READ: Urban Church Planter - First, What Does the City Need?

There is a certain level of fear that is part of planting a church for urban pastors. It is not what you might think either. It is not that urban pastors are fearful for their lives or scared to walk down the street in the community where their church lives. But it is fear of failure, the fear of not being able to fulfill the great commission of making disciples.There is fear in the unknown. Will people show up to bible study? Will someone show up for Sunday service?It is the fear of not having the budget to get outreach done or evening having enough to pay the monthly rent for facilities.In the midst of societal race issues, there is the fear of stepping into the center of that tension to be the voice of reason, yet not lose your identity or your “cultural hood card” in the process.There is fear of inadequacies, lack of resources, not having a large congregation, or not having the right words for the wrong situation. The fear of being urban church planting pastors can be enough to have the toughest person walk away, willing to simply go back into the fray of just being a participating member of the local church.Despite these and a lot of other fears, there is hope. The hope in faith is the essence of what drives urban pastors who are planting a church in their community.Faith is the safe place for urban church pastors. Fear is an ever presence, but faith is always there, calming the heart of urban pastors. Jesus went to the Garden of Gethsemane due to the stress of his call, his assignment to save the world. His prayer was for God’s will to be done. It was in this moment that Jesus knew that his demise was at hand. This was a prayer that reflected faith in the will of God.Urban pastors are constantly on the pendulum of operating within the divided, between fear and faith. The ability to balance between fear and faith is always a presence in the mind of the urban church planting pastor. It is that balance that keeps the urban pastor in the face of God, with the knowledge of knowing that things are truly working for the good of those that remain faithful. It is faith that enables urban pastors to not give up during those lean times of planting the church.It is faith that lets urban pastors know that it is not about the number of people in a church service but the number of blessings. It is faith that lets the urban pastors know that they are transforming lives just by having coffee with the man or woman who is returning from prison. It is faith that lets the urban pastors smile knowing that what is not recorded in the offering plate, is being celebrated in heaven. It is faith that positions the urban pastors to stand whether there are two people or two hundred people. It is faith that urban pastors have to stand for the underpaid port worker, for the under-resourced community, the underrepresented youth, and the overly sexualized young girl.It is that same faith that doesn’t keep track of every hurt, knowing that it should be charged to the head and not to the person’s heart.Fear and faith are the bookends of this thing called ministry, which is where urban pastors learn to live.