2 Timothy 2:24
"And the Lord's servant must not be quarrelsome but kind to everyone, able to teach, patiently enduring evil."

The week is quickly coming to a close! Today was our last day of Backyard Bible Club's. It was sad, yet at the same time it was exciting to sit down and hear about how many men, women, and children have come to know the Lord this week!

"Today has been a really exciting day to see God really work in my club. I had to change teams after the first day so that I could help them speak to the kids there since most of them only spoke Spanish. We really weren't making progress with them with the gospel until today we decided to have one English Gospel and one Spanish one (which I ended up telling). As a result of this we actually had one kid from each group accept Christ for the first time!"
-Daniel Harris

The day started off rainy, but God works in awing ways. BYBC's were NOT canceled, nor were Summerfests! God knew exactly how to work it out for us. Tomorrow we will be doing service projects as well as running a Summerfest tomorrow night! Please pray that this all runs as smooth as possible!

-Erica Harrison

Pictures from Go Austin!

At Rosewood Apartments the BYBCs are getting better as the week progresses. Kids are responding to the gospel and enjoying themselves a lot. In this picture a bunch of kids are singing the Shark Song.









Frontier Valley Trailer Park our construction project for the week. Our teams are building a beautiful playground which includes two benches and various new equipment for the kids. While working at Frontier Valley the teams discovered many kids longing for relationships much like our BYBC kids.

This is a BYBC at Malibu apartments. Today was wet and wild Wednesday. The kids played a game called drip drip drop and got SOAKED!

Wednesday!

John 4:23
"But the hour is coming, and is now here, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for the Father is seeking such people to worship him."

WET AND WILD WEDNESDAY! Today, as you may or may not know was Wet and Wild Wednesday at BYBC's. It was a crazy, fun, and challenging day for sure! Every team has stories today about how God is working in each of their groups. We are excited to have many new little brothers and sister's in Christ today!

"Hey everyone!!
Today my team, team five, went to Frontier Valley Trailers. The group continued to work on the play ground that the community has been waiting two years for! Since there were not enough shovels for everyone, Autumn, Leigh, and I had the fun job of taking a couple kids to the pool. We decided that this would be a perfect time to share the gospel with them. Margarita, Jennifer, and Usetha prayed for salvation and are very excited!
Keep praying for us,
Katie Van Der Bogart"

Tonight's worship service unexpectedly went longer than normal. The presence of God was totally in our midst tonight. It was encouraging and exciting to keep singing God's praises even after the music stopped! We know that God is at work through us. I personally have been learning about overflow. We do not need God to just pour into us so we can take that out and pour into others. While that can work, living in the overflow is even better. We need to constantly be taking in all of God that we can so that we OVERFLOW into the lives of others, not only pour out.
-Erica Harrison

Please keep us all in your prayers! Pray that the Lord will give us energy as it is getting late in the week! Also pray for our two Summerfest's that will be happening tomorrow night! Praise God today for working in our city!!

Tuesday!

1 Peter 4:10
"As each has received a gift, use it to serve one another, as good stewards of God's varied grace."


Day three is coming to an end and the Lord just continues to bless! About 10 more kids made first time decisions today along with a couple who rededicated their lives to Christ and even two adults! We all had Back Yard Bible Clubs again this morning and this evening when the leaders got together to report how it went, it was amazing to hear stories about how attitudes have begun to change toward the team. Rowdy, rough kids are using their manners, parents are coming to ask questions along with many more children coming! God truly is doing a work in East Austin as well as Dripping Springs! In Dripping Springs, the canvassing for Summerfest that was done yesterday has gotten tremendous feedback already. The canvassing has also helped HCBC Dripping Springs to gain a member for their worship team!


Our worship service this evening was one of great hope. We learned about being transformed. The interesting thing about real transformation is that it is actually a metamorphosis, not just a change. Change can undo itself. Metamorphosis cannot. One transformed, you can never go back. This is what we hope to bring to the city of Austin in the days to come. Transformation of souls.


After worship, we got a special treat...ICE CREAM SUNDAES!I am not too sure who came up with the idea of late night ice cream, but I'm pretty sure they were our favorite people in the world tonight!

Please continue to pray as tomorrow is Wet and Wild Wednesday! Pray that things run smoothly and that kids have fun, but also that they gain an understanding of why we do the things we do! Also continue praying that we would be God's little tools this week to further His kingdom by telling every man, woman, and child about the love of Jesus Christ!
-Erica Harrison

Monday!

1 Corinthians 3:16
"Do you not know that you are God's temple and that God's Spirit dwells in you?"

Well, today began our week of Back Yard Bible Clubs! Overall we had 134+ children in attendance and 16 decisions for Christ! How awesome is our Lord? It is only the first day and already God is working in us and through us! Some of our locations included Westcave, Santa Rita, Rosewood and Highpoint, among others. Some of our groups experienced trials such as language barrier, unruly kids, and intense heat, yet through all of this, God is providing!

"Today God has shown me that these kids in my BYBC at Booker T. Washington deserve to be shown love just as Christ loved us and that we may shine His light on them. In my club, there were a lot of kids that obviously did not know God's love and how to share it or what it looked like. I realized that God has called me to this area for two years in a row to create an impact in these children and to show them what it means to be loved. 1 John 4:7-8, 12 says "Dear friends let us love one another, for love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. Whoever does not love, does not know God, because God is love. No one has ever seen God; but if we love one another, God lives in us and His love is made complete in us."'
-Marc Gutierrez

As the day progressed, we moved on to our service project time. Today many of the Dripping Springs teams spent time canvassing for Summerfest! In only one day we passed out fliers to over 2,000 households! Another team began a Sports Ministry in the Park that will continue throughout the week. Today there were only a few children, but we are hoping and praying for more as the week progresses.
Thank you for your continued prayers and support this week!
-Erica Harrison

Prayer Requests:
-For kids to bring friends!
-Hearts to be open
-Understanding communication, to reach the Spanish speaking kids

Sunday!

Isaiah 61:1(a)
The Spirit of the Lord God is upon me, because the Lord has anointed me to bring good news to the poor, He has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted...

This morning, we went to Church Under the Bridge, which is an organization run by Mission Possible along with the help of many other local churches. Church Under the Bridge is exactly what it sounds like. It is not a literal church building, rather a gathering of people coming into the Lord's presence in order to learn more about who God is. Most people that attend CUB are either in poverty or are homeless. These men and women are broken, hurting, dirty, and very much in need. Upon arriving at the Bridge this morning, the team began to mingle with people and discover more about their stories and who they really are. We would have never heard these incredible stories had we not taken time to listen to the Lord and where He was leading us.
One man, Jerry, was actually shot in the head and lived to tell his story! I have met very few men with as great a faith as Jerry.

"Today we went to Church Under the Bridge. While we were there, we talked to many people, but a conversation with a man named Daniel really stood out to us. As we were talking, he confronted each of us with something he had been struggling with. He showed us what we were doing wrong and what we needed to do to fix it. It was amazing to see God teach us through a person whose life was in poverty. We learned and experienced God using an unexpected person to teach us a lesson."
-Lauren Cielonko and Zach Hawks

As I also began hearing others tell stories about other people they had met, I began to see a familiar pattern...We attended Church Under the Bridge praying and hoping to bless these people in the Lord's name, when really they blessed us!!
All people are the same. We all strive for one thing, really-to be LOVED. Only when we begin to put ourselves on the same level as others no matter what they dress like, how they worship, or whether they have teeth or not, we will begin to see them for who they really are - God's beloved children.

After dinnertime, we all headed to Mount Bonnell for a time of worship and prayer. As we sat, we faced the city. We could see everything from downtown to the rolling hills behind us. As we worshiped our Lord through prayer and song, we praised the Lord for who He is and what He is doing in our lives as well as what He will do this week. We begged Him for strength and to be made strong in our weaknesses. We realize that we are a broken people and without God, we can do nothing. We believe that God will use us this week!
-Erica Harrison, Student Ministries Intern

Please pray for:
-Weather
-Health (as we go out into the hot sun, hydration)
-Open hearts and minds to recieve Christ
-Energy & Patience
-Discernment

Go Austin Team

This is the team of people that are going to Go Austin this year. Woot!
We leave early in the morning tomorrow and this week we'll be staying at Huston Tillotson University in East Austin. I can't wait to see what God is going to do through us this week! If you all have time we would love to have your prayers! Go Austin lasts from July 26th-August 1st and we'll try to post updates every day. : )