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Isreal

Posted in General Posts by Colin Langston on 12/11/2009

so we have since finished our month in Isreal and i didn't blog anything so i guess i can give you all a summation of what happened for me during the month of November. Upon arriving we were picked up by our contact and as a squad taken up north, our contact was a genious bible scholar and professor and he used our first day to show us around some of the sights of Galilee, such as the sea, the town of Capernaum (see mark 1-2) and bethsaida.

we then split into teams and went to our prespective ministry sights, we went to a town called Rama and spent our first 2 weeks of the month there then after moved South to Arad which is right near the dead sea.

one of the biggest suprises for me was how much i enjoyed seeing biblical sights, i came into Isreal thinking that seeing the sights there wouldnt be any different than any other country, i knew of people who had gone to isreal before and said it was great to see the places from the bible, at center street church they would have trips to isreal and they never appealed to me even at all. So it was a complete suprise to me that i so greatly enjoyed seeing some of the places from the bible in 3D. I have to start with my favorite place we went and that was likely mount Tamor which was the mountian were it is assumed that Jesus' transfiguration took place. there is a grand cathederal on top of it and it at first feels more like a church with large grounds than a mountain top but i enjoyed spending some time up there and meditating on the incarnation, how on this spot i was in was a place were Jesus drew back the curtians on his divinity a little more than in other places and times in his life. we also went to Nasereth were there is a museum like place that we went and toured. we went to jeruselum and to the temple mount, praying at the wailing wall was an interesting experience but it really didnt stick out. All in all seeing the places from the bible was a very enjoyable and rewarding experience

we spent a good chunk of our time in isreal teaching english to beduin children, it was there that i saw that God has given us an amazingly wide open door in these countries in the form of teaching english. English is something that so many poeple here want, we meet many people who want to talk to us simply so they can improve there english. teaching english also isnt the dreadfuly difucult task i expected it to be. All in all isreal was a great month and i enjoyed it very much.

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Bulgaria hour 1

Posted in General Posts by Colin Langston on 9/27/2009

so we took a train last night from romania to bulgaria and just landed here it is Sunday morning at 8 and we need to wait an hour before church opens. the reason we are here is that egypt fell through so our 6 teams from J squad were given 3 countries to pray into and 2 teams would go to each country the countries were bulgaria, ukrain, and montinagro we felt God calling us here so here we are. because the world race has never been in this country they didnt have any contacts for us but it seems to be working out great, the team we are paired withs "proclaim I 61" contact from last month told them about a church here in the capital so other than that i dont know what we are doing we have to leave for church now so bye and thanks for your prayers

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romania

Posted in General Posts by Colin Langston on 9/27/2009

so i guess now that our ministry time in romania is over a blog for the last 3 weeks is more than overdue. We have been staying in a 2 room house. it is a dueplex and usually our host family stays on the one side and there parents on the other but while we are here they are all on the one side and us on the other. romanian food is better than i expected. We were basicaly droped off a bus in our town of arcalia and told that they had only just started a church in this town and had had 2 services before we came the church consists of one family(the one other team in this town is staying with them) and maybe 3 other wemon. so there isnt much we are working with, our "host wife" works all day everyday exept sunday so we dont see her much, she is our translator and we all really like her, she is one of the three wemon in the church, her husband who recently lost his job is home durring the day and we see him alot. he generaly doesnt come to church but while our team has been here he has been seen hanging around the back of the services, he calls himself an orthodox christian, however i believe all that means in this country is that they get baptized as an infant and then "there in". only the men are able to preach here so the 4 of us from the 2 teams have been swiching it up, Geoff and i the first sunday it went well i spoke about the pearl of great price and how a relationship with jesus is the most important point of life. since our translator works all day (and i do mean all) we were a bit limited in our ministry here but it isnt as bad as i thought it would be we do alot of stuff with the kids stuff and houce visits, another big thing we do is spending alot of time praying for the city through which i have learned that i am alot more about action and doing stuff to share the gosple rather than steping back for extra time in prayer and that it is good and important to step back and pray more than i offten do. Basically romania was good and i am looking forward to going to bulgaria which we now know is our new country.

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ireland sumed up thus far

Posted in General Posts by Colin Langston on 8/27/2009

When we finished launch in Dublin, we came immediately to Galway where our ministry contact was. I wanted to write a blog about our ministry right away about what we were doing, how it was going, and everything but basically I had been somewhat disappointed with what we have been doing. i wanted to wait in order to be able to write that things are great. I guess I see now that it was more than anything my bad attitude about wanting to go around preaching to everyone everywhere (especially in a country were they speak english) and not wanting to do anything else but we have been trying to help the church by doing helpful things in the community of Galway such as cleaning parks, low income families' homes, and in the city center helping some of the members by doing such things as general around the house help for single moms. At first my heart dropped when I was told what we were going to be doing. I was not excited but after talking to people in the church it started to make sence. i always knew europe was a diffucult mission field but was amazed at talking to the locals, aparently the church has been handing out tracts, gum or pop and they have ended up tossed on the ground so the city council has told them if they hand out anything again they will imediatly be fined 200 euros so our atempts to simply do nice things for the city have merit.

Ireland can use all your prayers going around on the streets there is a real hunger for something more, iv seen only a few kids outside and asked them were everyone else there age is to which they responded all the youth simply get drunk. suicide is rampent over here aperently 80% of people would know someone in there family who has commited suicide and its not just confused youths but also perents leaving behind small children, the country has also been so hurt by the cathlic church that they immediatly are cinical of us, however as much of a strong hold as satan may have God is still stronger please pray for discovery church our local church we are helping, they have a passion and a hunger for the lord and there desire for reaching others is unlike any church i have ever been in, howver they are in such a tough environment that they could use all your prayers.

as for myself i have been doing okay i have realized how reliant i am and need to be on the lord, my prayer of late has been for a fresh new revalation. although i was exited about street evangilism i have definatly found it diffucult but rewarding. something else im comeing to grips with is the fact that we are leaving for Romania on tuesday now that i feel i have got the hang of whats going on in Ireland but oviously that is something i will have to deal with the whole trip.

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launch thoughts

Posted in General Posts by Colin Langston on 8/27/2009

so i have to start by saying sorry for not writing, I guess there wasn't a great reason why I haven't, but I will try and be better in the future.

So I can tell you all about launch although it was a while ago. The idea behind it was not so much to teach us specific skills but rather to fill us with the Holy Spirit and let us lose equiped with that, more than anything trying to make it really sink in that we haven't been given a spirit of fear but rather of love, power and sound mind. At first, I personally hated it. I felt so restrained, that I had come to Ireland to actually do something and here we were in meetings so often. However, by the end I started realizing how important they were. For me personally nothing really changed, maybe a bit more passion, but there wasn't some whole new approach I took to evangelism or ministry. There weren't any new gifts of the spirit poured out on me, I wondered at the time whether it was okay but at the end of launch a man prayed over me about walking in the gifts and strengths I do have and also walking in power, upon further deliberation I saw how our team is supposed to be a body. A lot of the teaching was about God giving spiritual gifts to everyone almost to the point were we are all complete in and of ourselves, but I think it's more important to realize what our part of the body is. and work out of that. Thanks for all your prayers.

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traveling

Posted in ireland by Colin Langston on 8/13/2009

what a long trip these last couple days, 4 days, 5 nights and 8 time zones. my genius idea to take the bus to new york and not fly was actually rather good, it was nice to be able to just chill after a rather hectic summer. i was not that worried about crossing the boarder untill i got there, yet again i squiked by by the skin of my teeth, thank you lord. (the boarder guard was unsatisfied with the paper work i brought and actually logged on to my blog on which i posted my first blog an hour before leaving) when i got to JFK i spent several hours in international arivals thinking it was simply arivals and was so confused why no one was showing up and why no one spoke english. Ireland is nice yesterday we were jet legged and sleeping on a bus 4 nights made me quite tired. i am so exited to get started going but were doing kind of a training time until sunday, i cant help but just want to get going but so far it has been a good time of empowering and building us up. thanks for your prayers

Colin

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expectations

Posted in General Posts by Colin Langston on 8/7/2009

This year I have some expectations, maybe expectations isn't the right word but i think these things will happen:

That I will grow closer to the lord

That will wish and pray that I could understand more languages than just English.

That I will enjoy and try to encourage our local contacts

That living in this community may be tough but that we will push each other to greater heights

That I will question God about the amount of suffering we will see

I will see God move in ways I haven't before

I will realize how much we have and don't have in North America (spiritually and economically)

That I will become more okay with preaching

That there may possibly be a shift in my thought of the importance and place of social justice within whether it becomes more or less prominent I don't know.

That I will become better at discerning what the spirit says.

That I will grow in faith hope and love

That my theology will grow and expand

That it will be way harder and way easier than I expect

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Bio

Posted in General Posts by Colin Langston on 8/7/2009

So I guess I should tell you who I am. I come from a small town called Lumby in British Columbia, I have an older brother and sister and a younger sister. I grew up in a Christian family and always going to church but when I was 15 I realized I was following my parents faith and not my own, I saw that I hadn't given my life to Jesus for a long time I struggled through that not willing to hand over control and let Jesus truly be my lord and savior it was a tough step to give Jesus my whole life but all in all I have since been extremely thankful that I did. I went through high school being a Christian but not really being a light. after graduating I went on to do three years of bible college which is were I truly fell in love with Jesus I saw how great life can be when you follow him that the reward is not simply heaven alone but greater and fuller life on earth. I am going on the world race because I want to be able to share the good news of what Jesus has done with others

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