God is in the Details!

This past Sunday we had the privilege of being a part of the initial Night Church launch at Graffiti Church in the Lower East Side. During the teaching time Pastor Taylor Field reminded me that God is often not found in the great and mighty wind, or the powerful earthquake or the consuming, burning fire, but instead He is found in the quiet, gentle whisper (1 Kings 19:11-13). 

For many of us that are followers of Christ we often pray for God to intervene in the big details of our life. We pray for Him to show up like a mighty wind, or an earthquake or a fire. Sometimes we fall victim to turning over the big stuff to Him, but keeping the simple or small stuff to ourselves. This past month, God has drastically reminded me that He is not only willing to provide for the big things, but He wants to get involved in the minutia and details of every aspect of our lives. I've been reminded to listen for the whispers of God. Well, He whispered this morning.

I don't usually share the exact details of some of our financial needs of living and doing ministry in NYC. However, for this story I need to because God is in the details. Over the last couple of months our family has experienced some major unexpected financial costs. We had not anticipated Natalie attending her private Christian school again this year. However, when we learned that the new middle school being built beside our apartment was only offering 6th grade this year, we made the decision to keep her in her current school for one more year. Secondly, a few months ago I was diagnosed with a genetic disorder called Hemochromatosis, basically an issue with my liver that makes the iron levels in my blood dangerously high. The great news is this disorder is very treatable and has not caused any lasting damage. However, during the diagnosis I had to have a number of major medical procedures completed. All this to say, over the last two months we have had unexpected expenses of $8,641. 

Now the amazing part. Over the last two weeks, we have received several unexpected donations to our family and ministry as well. It didn't really hit me what was happening until this morning when I got online and noticed we had received another substantial contribution. I was taking a moment and praying and thanking God for this, when He gently whispered to me, "Add them up." My first thought was, why? And again He whispered, "Add them up." Honestly, my skepticism was telling me, "Patrick, this is all in your head. Of course God is providing, but not that specifically." One more time He whispered, "Add them up." So you know what I did. I went and added them up.

Over the last two weeks we have received 7 unexpected gifts. These gifts have come from friends, family and even a group of children. And when I took the time to add them up, can you guess what the total was? An astounding $8,641. As I write this I'm still in shock and overwhelmed. I don't have the words to communicate my thankfulness to God and to those that were obedient to listen to His whispers in their lives to meet a need in ours. I'm so thankful I serve a God that gets involved in the details of our lives. I can't wait for the next whisper!

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Seasons Change

Well it finally feels like winter is over! That seems like a crazy thing to be saying in mid-May. When we lived in Georgia mid-May usually meant temperatures already in the high 80's and dealing with the constant onslaught of pollen. To be honest with you, I'll happily trade the longer winters for no pollen! And now that it is spring, New Yorkers head outside to enjoy this city. The other day I even spotted Big Bird and Elmo out for a stroll in Central Park.

Going through our first season change here in the city reminds me just how much our lives have changed in such a short time. Tomorrow we will have been in NYC for four months and the truth is, we are becoming New Yorkers. Katie and I were discussing this the other day walking home from the subway. Here are some of the changes we have noticed:

• We have a great view of the Empire State Building when walking from the subway to our apartment. Now that trees are starting to bloom it is blocking our view. The other day I commented, "They need to cut these trees back, so we can see the Empire State Building!"
• We've learned to determine who are tourists and who are locals. The easiest place to spot the difference is on Times Square. Tourists always are looking up and don't know when to walk across the streets and they love to stop in the middle of the sidewalk without warning to point at something or take a picture.
• We don't miss driving, and would prefer never to drive again! The public transportation system in NYC isn't perfect, but I wouldn't trade it for a Porsche 911 (those of you who know me well know that is my dream car!). PJ and Natalie are as adept as we are at getting around this city. Ask them how to get to the Lower East Side (LES) and they will tell you to take the 7 to Grand Central then the 4/5 to downtown to Union Square to catch a M14 across town. 
• We are understanding how important food and dining is in this city. Olive Garden isn't good italian and we will never order pizza from Domino's again! People in this city connect with each other over food, really good food.

We could not have asked for a better start to our life in NYC than we have experienced over these first few months. Sure we have had our moments of missing family and friends. We have all had to learn how to operate in this city and adjust to some new realities. But God has open some tremendous doors and opportunities for our family and new church. 

Below are some pictures we took last Saturday in our backyard (Central Park). Thanks for you continued prayers and support!

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Survey Says

I don't know about you, but I've always been a fan of the show "Family Feud." I remember the old show with Richard Dawson, the ultimate game show host. Katie and I both enjoy playing "Family Feud" on our iPads as well. However, that show always made me wonder, who actually goes out and does these surveys? Do they just knock on your door and ask you a question like, "What is your favorite part of the chicken to eat?" or "Name something people alphabetize?" I know I never had someone come up and survey me on these questions, although I admit I always wanted to be part of the "100 people surveyed."

Well this past week we did some surveying of our own. With the help of a number of mission teams (more about them in the next blog post), we were able to engage over 100 people in some spiritual surveys. Our goal was to help us better understand who is living in our community and how they approach spiritual matters. We asked them six simple questions, and I wanted to highlight some of the responses for you here.

The first question we asked was "What is your view of God?" What we found to be true is that people in our area have one of two views of God. First, he doesn't exist. The majority of people answered that they were either atheist or didn't believe in a real God. Some thought there might be some force out there, but it isn't knowable or really intelligent. The second view of God that was prevalent can be summed up in one word, distant. Many people responded that God was up there or out there. They have the idea that God is detached from this world and from them.

The second question we asked was "How do you make peace with your God?" Again the answers fell into two categories. The most common answer, even for those who claimed to be atheists, was good works. Many people responded that they try to live a good life or do more good than bad or love others. The second most common answer was that they didn't know. It was something they hadn't thought about before. I was expecting some people to ask us back the question, "Why do I need to make peace with my God?" But we never got that. I think for most people, they knew they needed to make peace, but hadn't really thought about how to do it.

The third question was "How does Jesus relate to God?" This got all kinds of responses like: God's Son, a prophet, a good guy, fictional character, and an alien. But the one thing this question seemed to do to just about everyone is make them a little uncomfortable. We even had a couple of people refuse to answer and stop the survey at that point. It was so interesting to see time and time again that people know in their hearts they have to decide something about Jesus and that makes them uncomfortable.

The remainder of the questions related to their view of church and what they would be looking for in a church. These answers will help us shape when we meet and some unique ways we can engage our community around the Gospel.

I don't know if I'm ready to host the spiritual version of "Family Feud" yet, but these surveys provided us with some valuable information and insight into the spiritual hearts and minds of our community. We will continue to do more surveys with our mission teams over the summer. Please continue to pray for us as we seek to speak the truth through grace and peace here in NYC!

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My New Nemesis: FIRE HYDRANTS

One of the things I absolutely love about living in NYC is walking everywhere. I am being totally serious. Over the last year God has given Katie and I a real love for walking. When this first started in our lives we had no idea it was to prepare us for living in NYC, but in hind site we can see that just as God was preparing us in other ways, he was also preparing us for this. 

However, one of my biggest issues with walking in NYC are the fire hydrants. On more than one occasion I have been walking on a busy sidewalk, stepped out to pass someone and walked right into a fire hydrant. My problem is that I'm looking up and forward and not down. I have no clue that I'm about to walk into an immovable object that will drastically slow down my forward progress while leaving a tangible mark on my shin.  I have begin to call these marks 'shin dents', because they literally leave a dent on your shin when you walk into them.

My latest shin dent experience came this past Sunday. Our family was getting off a bus and I was hurrying to get out in front and cross the street. I was looking up for the cross walk sign and looking around for traffic and walked right into a fire hydrant so hard the I almost ended up face first on the ground. Needless to say Katie, PJ and Natalie expressed their overwhelming compassion for my through fits of laughter. While I was walking home, now with a considerable limp, God brought to mind a spiritual truth for me related to my latest 'shin dent'.

Those of you that know me well, are not surprised by this story. When ever I get focused on something I move forward and I move forward fast. If you have ever been to Disney with me you have experienced this first hand. But sometimes moving forward and moving fast causes us to overlook pitfalls and dangers that might be in our way. Sometimes in my life I can be too forward focused and and forget to do the little things that need to be done in the here and now. I do a great job of looking ahead and seeing what is next, but sometimes lose my focus on my immediate surroundings.

Hitting that fire hydrant caused me to walk a little slower, but it also caused to walk with others. It made me walk with my family and neighbors not in front of them. It made me walk behind people as a follower instead of being out front as the leader. Limping home that day, God challenged me to remember that fire hydrants are here for a reason. One they help to save people lives when a major disaster hits, but second they are their to slow people down like me who sometimes need a not so gentle reminder to slow down, enjoy the walk, enjoy the moment that God has you in, enjoy who you are walking with, enjoy the scenery around you and then look forward to see what He has for you next. Hopefully, I'm learning my lesson both physically and spiritually!

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A Warm Bus for Cold Souls!

We are learning that Winter in NYC can be difficult. In our first couple of months here we have experienced multiple snows (one with over 10 inches of accumulation), temperatures in the low teens, regular rain and an almost constant wind. And we get to experience all of this with our main form of transportation being walking and the subway.

The other night Katie, Natalie and I were walking from the subway to a bus stop, the temperature was around 15 and the wind was blowing at about 30 mph. I was literally having to hold on to Natalie to keep her from blowing away. My face was numb and my ears felt like they would shatter if someone touched them. When we finally reached the bus stop I had never been so happy to get on a bus before in my life. As we began to feel the warmth of the bus and were able to talk again, we all kind of laughed about the situation!

Believe it or not, looking back on that night makes me realize just how much we love our new city, our new way of life and our calling to plant a church here in NYC. There have been times in my life when difficulty and challenges have caused me to doubt my calling or grow frustrated and insecure. I think in the past this has been because deep down inside I always believed that my success in ministry was based primarily on what I did instead of what God does. 

This call on our family to NYC is something so much greater than any of us could accomplish in our own strength. Planting a church in a city where the spiritual ground is hard is beyond me. Seeing people that are currently far from God being transformed through the Gospel of Jesus Christ is no work of my hands. I have come to realize that this is the beginning of faith. For most of my Christian life faith was my belief that God would come through when I couldn't. Now God has taught me that faith is knowing that God will come through regardless of what I have to offer. 

That cold and windy night a couple of weeks ago will always be a reminder to me that God is our shelter through the storm, not from the storm. As we walk this path there will be cold hearts, windy, unstable circumstances, and times that we feel like we are out of control. But still God is leading us. He is leading through the storm, through the cold and through the wind so that when we finally reach our place of shelter He will be the one that receives all the glory, honor and praise!

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One Single Step - Our First Worship Gathering

"A journey of a thousand miles begin with one step."

Our lives are filled with examples of this truth. Katie and I celebrated 20 years of marriage this year and it all began on our first date on October 20, 1989. We now have two teenagers in our house and that journey began on PJ's birthday, April 10, 1998. Last night will hopefully be another one of those meaningful nights in our lives. On Sunday, February 17th we held our first worship gathering in connection with New City Church.

In our initial planning we were not anticipating having any type of worship service until at least this fall. However as I would introduce myself to people in our community as a new pastor in town of a new church they would always ask, "Where do you meet?"

Also over the last month we have connected with a number of other believers that are relatively new to NYC as well. Many of them are like us in that they have moved to NYC to plant a church. Others are praying about what God has in mind for them in this city. But one of the ideas that continued to be raised was creating a place for believers going through similar issues to gather together for prayer and encouragement.

So, we began to pray about beginning a monthly service that would meet both of these needs. We would have a place to invite new friends that we are making in Long Island City and we would have a place for believers to gather together and pray for one another. We shared this idea with a number of people and got commitments form three other families to be there. We made plans to rent the community room of our apartment building and began to invite others. And then God did some amazing things.

As we began to plan we knew we needed 3 things: a worship leader, $300 to reserve our community room, and people to come. In less that a week from deciding to do this here is what happened: one of our new friends Trey and Caitlin, who are gifted worship leaders, volunteered to lead worship, a local organization donated $300 to us to cover the cost of the facility rental, and 15 people committed to come to our first service.

Even with God answering such specific prayers, I'll be honest I was a little nervous heading into our worship gathering last night. Fears like, will anyone come, will they enjoy what we are doing, will we honor God in our gathering, all began to creep into my mind. But God in his faithfulness set aside those fears.

Last night we had 19 people join us for worship. It was an amazing time of celebration, Bible study, music and prayer. God brought a real sense of community among those who came. I could not have imagined a better first step on the journey of a thousand miles!

Thanks so much for all of your prayers and support. It overwhelms us every time we hear someone say that they are praying for us.

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Finding Nemo - Snow Pictures

Well we have experienced our first real snow here in NYC. Officially we received about 10 inches of snow in our area. Some friends of ours out in Long Island got over 2 feet of snow. The snow came on Friday night. By Saturday morning it was beautiful and sunny outside, a perfect day to go out and experience the snow.

Our entire family spent much of the day in Central Park playing, taking pictures and just having fun. Snow in NYC is very different than in Georgia. First of all, it is a dry, powdery snow. Not real good for making snow balls. Second, the city doesn't go crazy when snow hits. Although we went to our local store to pick up some food, it just happened to be our natural shopping day. No schools were closed, no church services were cancelled on that Sunday. 

Below are some pictures of our day in the snow.

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