Two important prayer topics occupied my mind throughout last year in regards to New Life ministry. One was to hear from God where He would have us focus our time, resources and energy in doing missions. This need was shared with you through the 234 Prayer for 2006. The other was to develop the village structure and choose and establish village leaders to help our house church ministry become more effective and fruitful. As you know, through my sabbatical mission trip to Southeast Asia, God has clearly shown us the importance of concentrating our effort in Chiang Mai, Thailand so that we could eventually reach the surrounding regions. This has been ...

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I have recently shared with you that we are changing the direction of our house churches that are predominantly made up of college students. We are doing it primarily for two reasons. One is to reach out to and share Christ with college students more effectively. The other is to build and raise up student servant-leaders who would own and run with their house church ministry without relying on adult shepherds. Pastor Tae has been overseeing and will guide this ministry. On Monday he forwarded to me an email that he received from a student, who sent it out to all his New Life attending peers to encourage and challenge them to be faithful to God. With ...

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There probably aren't many churches in America where the number of people attending weekly small group/house church is about the same or exceed the number of Sunday worship attendance other than our New Life and the Korean speaking congregation of Seoul Baptist Church. Everyone who hears about this phenomenon is truly amazed. It truly is God who is doing something very special amongst us. Through our house church ministry we have come to realize the preciousness of caring for one another in Christ, the importance of reaching out to the lost, and the blessing of experiencing God in an intimate and personal way. We are receiving all these benefits ...

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There is no pastor who does not want to see the church that he is serving grow not just spiritually but numerically. And I am not an exception. That is why it grieves me deeply when I see people leave New Life to go to another church in Houston. I cannot help but to ask myself, "What have I done wrong? Have I hurt them? If so, was it intentional or unintentional?" And thinking about these questions discourages and drains me a lot. Moreover, every fiber of my being tells me to visit the person and persuade and convince him to remain at New Life. However, I have never stopped anyone from leaving the church when he approached me with his ...

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After two months of trip to Southeast Asia and to Korea, my family and I made it back to Houston in one piece this past Tuesday. Although I already miss certain people, places and aspects of our trip, I am realizing that there is no place like home. It truly is good to be back! I will be sharing more about the trip in the weeks and months to come especially about which areas of the world we will focus on to do our missions work more effectively, but these are some of the things that I have learned and experienced during the trip that I would like to share with you now. First, I have learned about the importance of participating regularly in ...

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There will be some changes taking place in our staff in the near future. As you know, we have been looking for an administration assistant for some time now. As a result, Phil Shin, our Missions Team Director, has been taking care of much of the administrative responsibilities for some time. We are in serious need of finding someone soon with the gift of administration so that the pastoral staff can focus on and fulfill their ministries that God has given them. This will help New Life to be strengthened and grow even more. After much prayer, Phil recently has been sensing that God is leading him and his family to overseas missions for possibly a ...

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This coming Tuesday my family and I will be leaving Houston to go to Southeast Asia for about two months for our sabbatical missions. I am both excited and nervous at the same time. I have never been out of the country this long and the thought of traveling with my family and living from suitcase to suitcase makes me feel somewhat uneasy though it sounds adventuresome. I think I can relate in a miniscule degree to what Abraham must have felt when God appeared to him and told him to leave his country, his people and his father??s household and go to the unknown land that He will show him. He must have been frightened and scared to death. But he ...

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