Tuesday Night, June 17th, at Faith Lutheran—Pastor Ken Sinclair—the churches of Stafford and Sugar Land will be gathering for united persevering prayer for our city.
Our May meeting met at The Grace Center (Stafford) and we had 7 churches represented, and more importantly, fervent and united prayer going up to God for our area. I am asking the Lord to help us gather at least 12 of our community’s churches every month in prayer.
I am convicted and convinced that we are to mobilize the Body of Christ for our area, fan into flame the Church’s passionate Throne Room intercessory prayer, until the spiritual and moral temperature of our city is changed and we see transformation that can be quantified. That’s why we call it “The Furnace”—it is the mechanism by which the whole house is heated. We don’t understand furnaces in the South the same way it is understood up North, but it is a simple concept to grasp. A few praying people can change the temperature of the city.
Would you invite your church, and especially your intercessors, to join us at 7 p.m., June 17th, at Faith Lutheran Church, 800 Brook Street, Sugar Land. If you would let me know of your plans to attend it would help us to prepare the leadership duties for that night’s prayer.
Yours for the City,
Pastor Kerry Wood
City Catalyst (CSA 35)
Calvary Church @ The Fountains
Saturday, May 31, 2008
"The Furnace"-- Stafford Churches Come Together to Pray-- June 17th
Tuesday, May 20, 2008
Sugar Land/Stafford Initial Prayer Targets – June through July 2008
What is it that we are praying for?
We are asking God for nothing less that the spiritual and social transformation and revitalization of the Sugar Land/Stafford (SL/S) area – each person, congregation, neighborhood and community. We are asking to see God’s influence established and expanding in and through every facet of the SL/S community. We are asking for a unified Church that together employs spiritual and human resources to change our community through Jesus Christ for good.
1. Celebrations and Giving Thanks
“Give thanks to the Lord, call upon His name; make known among the nations what He has done. Sing to Him, sing praises to Him; tell of all His wonderful acts.” Psalm 105:1-2
• God is drawing congregations and Christians together in the SL/S area for His united purposes in fresh new way by His Spirit. Praise Him! Thank You that over the past few months You have brought together a tithe of the congregations in this CSA as a loving, praying, serving family and army to impact our community with God and for His purposes!
• God is uniting His children in a fresh new way to pray for and care for the SL/S area. Praise Him!
• God is building relationships with the educational sector of SL/S area – especially with the school district to bless and strengthen our lives and the community. Praise Him!
2. For the Reversal of and Healing in areas of Brokenness in the SL/S Community
“And the leaves of the tree are for the healing of the nations. No longer will there be any curse. The throne of God and the Lamb will be in the city, and His servants will serve Him.” Revelation 22:2-3
• Move Holy Spirit to stop the rate of criminal activity in our community. Reverse the plague of crime in ways that will cause Your light and redemption to grow brighter and brighter every day! Cause those captured by the snares of addiction to find their true purpose in life in You – in Jesus’ Name. Amen!
3. For the Unity of and Collaborative Actions by the Body of Christ.
“May they be brought to complete unity to let the world know that You sent Me and have loved them even as You have loved Me.” John 17:23
• Pour Your Spirit upon the Body of Christ in the SL/S area. We pray for renewal and revitalization of every member of Your Church. Make us one!
• Bless and anoint leadership to serve both in the local church as well as those leading Kingdom of God initiatives in the marketplace. Make us one!
• A united, informed, and engaged praying people are critical to transformation in this community and in the public schools. We pray that You would help us identify and enlist 50 believers in SL/S who will commit to regular intercessions for the spiritual and social transformation and revitalization of this area. May this number grow to 100 by September 1, 2008 – in Jesus’ Name. Amen!
4. For the Prospering of Greater Houston and for Church-Civic Partnerships:
“You are the light of the world. A city on a hill cannot be hidden. Neither do people light a lamp and put it under a bowl. Instead they put it on its stand, and it gives light to everyone in the house.” Matthew 5:14-15
• That leaders from local businesses would come together in the SL/S CSA and community initiatives to provide leadership and resources to help meet the immediate needs and transform our community by God’s grace and power.
5. For the Whole and Healthy Children efforts in the SL/S public schools:
“Then little children were brought to Jesus for Him to place His hands on them to pray for them. But the disciples rebuked those who brought them. Jesus said: ‘Let the little children come to me and do not hinder them, for the Kingdom of heaven belongs to such as these.’” Matthew 19:13-14
• Pray that God would call a minimum of 100 Christians in 2008-2009 to commit to mentoring a child needing one-to-one mentoring at Stafford Primary and Stafford Middle school. Pray that these relationships will be sovereignly arranged impacting children, families and schools.
• Pray for $10,000 to be raised by May 2009 to assist these schools help with needs above and beyond the regular school budget.
• Pray for schools all across the SL/S community. May God pour His love and presence upon all administrators, teachers, board members and students. Pray that God would give favor to those leading bible clubs and prayer meetings on campus.
Monday, May 19, 2008
Tracking results...
by Jim Herrignton
This weekend, Matt Register of the Gottlieb Foundation, sent me a note from his web site about the importance for non-profits to track results. It reminded me of a conversation more than a year ago when David Weekley gave me a copy of Good to Great in the Social Sectors that promotes the same idea.
When Mission Houston launched in January 1999, we spent an enormous amount of our time building relationships. We had a deep conviction that if the enormous negative social trends of the past 40 years were going to be reversed, it would take the whole body of Christ working strategically in unity across the entire greater Houston area. We knew that there were deep divisions in the Body of Christ – between Evangelicals and Charismatics, Protestants and Catholics, a wide range of culture and language groups, men and women, and urban and suburban congregations.
For six years that was our primary focus, and we had a lot of success in building authentic relationships of trust in many places. (And yes, there is still much work to be done in that arena.)
At some points along the way, different folks said, even if the only thing you are currently doing is building relationships, you need to find a way to track and measure your progress. For a variety of reasons we didn’t do that. Over time that came to haunt us. It resulted in what some in the business world call “crisis in investor confidence.” You might be surprised to know this but most of our funding does not come from congregations, though there are some great congregations that do support our work like Memorial Drive Presbyterian, Calvary Community Church, Cypress Bible Church, Copperfield Baptist Church – just to name a few. The vast majority of our funding comes from individual believers who work in the private sector. Their call for clarity about tracking and measuring things began as a suggestion and grew steadily to heartfelt cry.
And we finally began listening. . .albeit slowly. For our resistance to listening we repented about a year ago. We have spent the last year clarifying and refining our measures for success. Ultimately we are after the spiritual and social transformation of the city. Those measures are very long term and include things like impact on the number of people coming to faith in Christ, decline in the poverty rate (especially among the children in our city), the divorce rate, and things like that. But in the Whole and Healthy Children Initiative, we believe that mobilizing the Body of Christ around children in our educational systems and tracking progress there will make a significant impact on the long term measures. So in the Whole and Healthy Children Initiative, we are tracking these things.
1. The number of communities that launch an initiative. Our goal is to launch in at least five to six communities in school year 2007/2008 and to increase that every year until we have an initiative in all 45 communities across the greater Houston area.
2. In each community where an initiative is in place our goal is to have:
a. 100 mentors for 100 children in three schools with high percentages of at risk kids.
b. 100 intercessors praying for each of the mentors and child they are mentoring.
c. An annual campus beautification project in each school.
d. $10,000 raised from the private sector for the faculty and administration of each school.\
Are these the right measures? Time will tell. But they are the measures to which we believe the Lord has led us and for which we are going to be accountable. Our Board has agreed to these measures. Our staff is deeply committed to being accountable for these measures. We will report to you on a regular basis about progress being made.
Wednesday, May 7, 2008
The seed of a relationship between the Church and the School.
On Tuesday, May 6th, Missouri City/Fresno's Mission Houston CSA was able to minister in a significant way to 93 teachers, administrators and support staff at Ridgemont Elementary, located in Fort Bend ISD. Each one received a small tote-bag filled with personal items, stickers and other awards for their students. A custom designed mouse pad with the Ridgemont logo on it was also included. Perhaps the most enjoyed item of the day was the package of homemade cookies that each received as they viewed a video of themselves teaching throughout the year! Finally, the pastors of the Missouri City/Fresno CSA included a letter of appreciation and expressed commitment for future involvement through ministry and prayer. All were extremely well received!
Mary Green, Campus Improvement Specialist hired specifically by FBISD to improve teacher's morale and skills and bring the school's academic performance to a higher level, said that the church had made a meaningful deposit in the future of this school. She told one of the organizer's there that the teachers would be skipping and smiling the rest of the day!
Churches participating were Baca Christian Center, Colony Creek Community Church, and Together We Stand. Each church provided a meaningful contribution- from money used to purchase items, to homemade cookies and labor to put the gifts together.
Honoring the teachers on Appreciation Day was just the beginning of this new and ongoing relationship. A Compassion Project in response to the 90 Days of Blessing our Community is currently in the planning stages for July 1-3.
If anyone is interested in being a part of this event, please contact David Carter of Youth for Christ at 713-385-4130/ efbcl717@aol.com or Vickie Dalton at 832-439-9545/ vdalton@staffordrise.org for details.
...His part of the bargain.
By Jim Herrington
Recently I had a lengthy breakfast conversation with a friend. This man is a successful executive leader in the city. Here is what he said to me. "I was given a faith by my parents that is now sustained by the congregation I attend. When the fluff is cut away, at the heart of what I embraced was a kind of quid pro quo with Jesus. I would be a good man – pray, study my Bible, serve, and give. In return, Jesus would give me the good life. I don't mean that he would make me rich or famous. But, if I kept up my part of the bargain, my life would become increasingly easier, my kids would turn out well, I would gain some level of status and esteem from my peers, and though life would have its challenges, Jesus would give me a life of growing ease and convenience."
This friend then went on to describe in detail his great disappointment in the choices and challenges that his young adult son was facing. He described the suffering that his son was going through, in part, because of that son's choices. He was on the verge of tears as he described the great burden that he and his wife were carrying out of their love for their son. And finally he got really transparent and told me how angry he was at God for not keeping His part of the bargain.
He went on to say, "If there is no personal benefit in following Jesus – if I am going to suffer and struggle whether I am a Christian, a Buddhist, or an atheist, then why follow Jesus? Where is the Good News in that?"
We spent a long time in this conversation. I walked away keenly aware that the message of Jesus has been so deeply conformed to the patterns of this world, that it has lost its power and is no longer Good News. And I heard Romans 12:1-2 ringing in my ears. Don't be conformed to the patterns of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God's will is – his good, pleasing and perfect will.
Where did the gospel of ease and convenience come from? How did it make its way into our congregations? What happened to strong men and women of God who sacrificed their lives and fortunes for the common good? What happened to put on the whole amour of God, take up your cross every day, and the road is narrow and few are they who enter in?
Until we can hear and act on Jesus' call to a fellowship of suffering, transformation will not occur... for us as individuals or for the communities of our city. Lord, help us to hear the gospel anew – for the Good News that it is.
