Southbrook Trip Blog

If you have been blessed this week and would like to be a part of helping make these kinds of trips available to more people, you might want to consider becoming a prayer or financial partner of The Center for Short Term Missions . . . or take advantage of one of our fundraisers.

For more information, email us at bob@shorttermtrips.org. It has been such a joy to serve the Lord together this week.

Thanks again for choosing to use your time to be a light for Him in New York City.

In His Love, Bob and Lauren Wright

Hard to believe today is the last day of ministry before the bus arrives tomorrow morning to pick everyone up.
Yesterday, a small group worked at Grace doing some more cleaning, and community outreach. Some of the members had much success giving away smoke detectors to the community and even got to share a little (really helps if you speak Spanish or Chinese around here!). The church is almost ready for day camp next week when over 100 kids will be invading the church. :)

More than half of the team went to Coney Island on a sunny, hot Thursday. They started with a briefing by David and Pastor Slava highlighting approaches to evangelism and some helpful resources (e.g., a survey designed to target the substantial Russian population on Coney Island). After dividing into small teams, they set out for several hours of engaging leisure-seekers along the beach and boardwalk.

The kids reported how truly helpful and enlightening this experience was for them, as they returned EXHAUSTED from an afternoon of engaging a huge variety of folks from numerous religions, ages, ethnic groups, and birthplaces to proclaim the Gospel. Everyone took turns "doing the talking" while the others silently prayed, helped to engage the individuals, and/or jotted survey responses. Sometimes they even asked the individuals if they could pray for them.

Of course, we all enjoyed some refreshments along the boardwalk (and some enjoyed an occasional amusement or tossed a frisbee on the beach). Boy, were they TIRED when they returned!

After dinner we all got on the subway and headed for Manhattan. Half the group went into Time Square, observed, and came up with ideas to serve and minister people around them. The idea here was to get us to open our eyes to the idea the ministry just doesn't happen on a mission trip, but it happens all around us where ever we go. There are always ways we can serve, minister and share God's love with those around us.

The other half of the group went to Covenant House where we worshiped, shared more testimonies, and prayed for those who wanted prayer. Several kids from Covenant House filtered in and out from the meeting. We got to pray with one guy who was beginning to sense the Holy Spirit and said "I was an atheist, but I'm starting to think, there is a higher force." After hearing his story, we asked to pray for him and we prayed for God to reveal himself to him (which He has already started to do) and that this young guy would accept Jesus as his Saviour. We also saw a couple of kids we met Tuesday and were able to chat some more with them. It was a great time.

Today we will finish up some work here at Grace and do a couple more community outreaches. There is also a team finishing up some work at E-Free down the road.
Tonight the team will be serving at Grace's SR High Youth Group and then we are hoping to have a great time of worship and debriefing as a team. Please pray for these last few hours as we serve and minister. We need the strength that only the Lord provides.
Early tomorrow morning we will clean the church and pack up to get on the bus. Thanks for all the prayers, blog comments and love.

HI all!
Wednesday we had a busy morning. Some of us worked at Grace (still working on cleaning up the church). Some of us worked at E-Free doing some more scraping and painting. While some of us went out into the communtity offering free smoke detectors.

After lunch, everyone got a well deserved shower and got ready to go into the city for either the Broadway show or the Mets game. The report was this morning that the Broadway show was fantastic, wonderful and just completely amazing. All the Broadway fans loved it! The guys had a great time at the Mets game and took 2 of the young adults from here at Grace with them.

Today more work is being done here at Grace and in the community with "Park Ministry". Two groups went down to Coney Island with pastor Slava to do the Russian Surveys. It's a beautiful sunny day, so we told eveyone to put on their sunscreen! Looking forward to hearing their report later.

Tonight we'll head into Manhattan again to go to Covenant House and Time Square.

Thank you for your prayers!

Can I just say, We serve the most amazing, awe inspiring God! We ask for opportunities and He gives them in abundance.
Yesterday, we continued with our work at Grace and E-Free, plus sent a group to Coney Island for the day to do surveys. At Grace, much work has been done to get ready for the day camp which starts here next week when school finally lets out. The kids are working hard and having fun doing it. The staff here at Grace is grateful for all the help.

At E-Free, a team finished up plastering the places on the walls and ceilings that were in need of repair and the painting the iron fence out front. When they were finished they had some time getting to know the grounds keeper and his 2 young girls before dinner. They were able to share with him and his girls, pray for him and his difficult situation, and shower his little girls with some "girly" attention. They braided the girls hair and put make-up on them. This pleased their daddy very much and the girls were thrilled to look so pretty. Please keep this gentleman and his girls in your prayers as life is very hard for them right now.

At E-Free there were also stories of people stopping to thank the kids for working on the church to fix it up. There were two young girls who were also inspired to also volunteer to help, to which they quickly found something for them to do. The team is making quite a stir in the neighborhood.

The Coney Island group had a challenging, but fruitful time. Everyone was instructed on how to do the surveys by Pastor Slava. He explained the "do's and don'ts" and informed them of the kind of people they would meet. He's very gifted in this form of cold evangelism. I don't think many of them were comfortable with this approach, but to everyone's credit, they all tried. They were faithful to try. :) There was a lot of rejection, but eventually several of them had a good experience.

They reported to have talked to about 14 people yesterday. One leader had the opportunity to share the gospel 5 times and said, "It never felt so right to share the gospel!" They were all impressed with Pastor Slava and how persisitant and happy he was to engage each person. Overall, even with the tough approach, all grew in some way as they stepped out into new territory and were stretched as they trusted God.

In the evening, half the group went over to Grace and ran their JR High Youth Group. They all had a great time serving the kids. When they got back, we had a wonderful time of worship where the spirit of God really moved. Everyone was praying for people they had met and talked to so far during the trip, which then moved into praying for each other and more worship.

Debriefing was full of wonderful stories of how God moved during the day. It's just so wonderful and amazing to hear all the kids share what they experienced, saw, said, did and what God did through them. Every debriefing just gives us more fuel for the next day to go out there and do it again, try something new and press on.

We are so grateful for all of your prayers. We feel them and know you are praying. Please keep remembering to pray. Tonight the group has free time and will be going to Broadway and a Mets game. It'll be good for them to take a small break and come back tomorrow strong. Pray for safety, protection, continued opportunities (even when we are not technically "ministering"), good sleep, that God would continue to move in our hearts and move through us, and growth would be evident. Keep the leaders in prayer as they have the hard job of keeping everyone accounted for and safe. We need wisdom and discernment.
Thanks!

Today was our first trip into the city. Everything went well. We had 3 native NewYorkers who offered to be our guides. Very helpful!! One team went into Time Square and observed. They wrote down many new ideas for ministry in NY. The ideas were flowing and the kids seemed to be pretty excited about it.

The other team went to Covenant House. It's a home for teen runaways. When we arrived there were only 3 kids there waiting for us, but when Ryan and the kids started worshipping, several others filtered in. There was not a dry eye in the place as testimonies/life stories were shared. We prayed for all who wanted it and it was an amazing time. No one wanted to leave. By the time we left there were over 20 kids all around, pulling up chairs and wanting to meet the kids. So many stories to tell... so little time.

Tomorrow work continues at Grace Baptist and 2nd E-Free. We've got lots of hard workers.

We also sent out a team with Pastor Slava to Coney Island this morning to do Russian Surveys and share the gospel. Can't wait to hear their stories.

Will share more later.
Thanks for prayers! They are being answered in abundance!!!

We had a meaningful devotional time talking about the Fear of Man today. We talked about how this sin keeps us from living for God and glorifying him in everything we do. After such a wonderful devotional, I think we were all ready to put aside our fear of man and go out there and do some ministry.

The team is doing great with their first day of projects. One team is at the E-free Chruch scraping plaster ceilings and walls and replastering them... as well as scraping an iron fence and repainting it. I heard them out there singing worship songs on the streets of New York as they scraped the fence this morning. They are working hard and making fast progress. Roy keeps thanking me. ;)

The smoke detector teams started today, and at lunch I was told about a house they went into and had a GREAT chat about the Lord with a Catholic woman and her family. They were able to encourage her in her faith, share God's truth with her, pray for her and invite her to Grace which she enthusiastically said she'd like to attend. All the smoke detector teams are at the park this afternoon doing "park ministry". I'm eager to hear their reports tonight.

The team here at Grace is busy getting the church ready for camp... cleaning, organizing all kinds of tasks. Heard a story how one group of kids were cleaning up glass off the side walk when they were stopped and asked why they were doing that. They were able to share with him and got the chance to pray for this older man who just cried as they prayed. He asked them to pray for his wife too and they were happy to do that. Amazing how simple tasks can bring GREAT opportunities. ;)

Tonight we'll head into the city to Time Square and Covenant House to do ministry there. Please pray as we take our first subway ride and walk the busy streets. Pray that we would have many opportunities to share and that God would be glorified! We're all excited to see what God will do in the hours ahead! Thanks for praying.

Hey Everyone,
Thanks for checking in and thanks for your patience with these blog entries. They are coming through West Virginia so it may take alittle longer to happen but it will happen.

Even though the team was a little tired, Sunday still went well. They spent the morning at Grace Baptist Church where they helped in the children's Sunday School class and joined the teen and adult classes.

It was a special time when the team was able to participate in communion services in both the English and Hispanic services.

Much of the afternoon was spent on a prayer walk through Brooklyn. One young man commented on how helpful the prayer walk was to learn more about the community they will be serving in while committing their ministry fo the Lord.

The day wrapped up attending the Russian Service at Grace. Several were able to share their testimonies during the service.

Hey Everyone,
Thank you for checking in on your team. It will be such a blessing for you to hear from your team and for your team to hear from you.

The team arrived safely after receiving an unexpected tour around the city by their bus diriver. They moved in to their rooms and sat down to a wonderful dinner.

Tomorrow is a big day so it was off to bed to get a good nights rest.

Please pray for your team as they begin their week of learning to be like Jesus. Pray that the Lord would have His way as it relates to each part of the trip and that each team member will embrace His leading with all that they have.

Thank you so much for checking your teams trip blog. Daily entries are tentatively scheduled to start the first evening of the trip. Please check back for the first entry.
Also, we would love for you to add your comments to the team throughout the trip. Just click the "COMMENT" tab to leave your prayers and encouragements.
We look forward to keeping you in touch with your team in New York.