January 2012 Breakfast

Thanks to Ken Schmidtke for hosting us at the Youth For Christ office.  The coffee was strong and the donuts were sweet and that is a good combination. 

Jeff, Rich, Ken and myself spent the time to catch one another up on how things are going in our various ministries.  We've been at this thing for several years now and it is good to see that the 'developing trust' part of our mission statement is proving to be true.  Though we have several differences between us, there is an underlying sense of trust between one another that allows us to share both our success and struggles without fear. 

Along those lines, one of the themes that i felt emerge from our sharing was the theme of 'hard realities.'  While I won't go into the details of each story, a couple of us shared about facing things in our lives and ministries or helping others face things in their life and ministry that are not fun to hear.  How do we best do this?  What do we do with these things that are not good news?  We can ignore it, but that doesn't seem good.  On the flip side, we can listen, sift what isn't truth but then deal honestly with the reality.  Sometimes, facing the hard reality will lead to greater depth and faith in Christ.  It can also lead to greater depth and connection with one another.  These are certainly good things, right? 

Before closing with prayer, we spent some time talking about the size of the group and discerning if we'd like to have more people at the table.  Though we know it would change things, we were unanimous that more ministers in South Tacoma could benefit from this place and South Tacoma could benefit from more ministers being at the table.  And so, we'll pray and call and invite towards that endeavor.

Our next breakfast is at Evangelical Reformed Church which is just of 74th Street between South Tacoma Way and Tyler (7435 S. Madison) at 8:30am on Wednesday, February 8th.  The agenda is as follows:

8:30 Gather
8:40 5 minute check in on our last month of ministry and life
9:15 Question of the day, (Rich will bring this)
9:30 Opportunities in South Tacoma
9:35 Prayer
9:45  Depart

Grace and Peace,
Ken