Partnering with an Elementary School and Serving the Community

Richard (who shared his testimony) and Joseph

Epiphany Fellowship Los Angeles has a  wonderful partnership with 54th St. Elementary in South Los Angeles offering an after school program and mentoring to the children. This past month we hosted a Sports and Performing Arts Camp to the children of South LA.  In the inner city there are very limited resources for parents and their children. 54th St. Elementary invited the kids of the school as well as the community to be a part of this week long camp.  Oceanside Christian Fellowship in El Segundo partnered with us as well to have their congregation serve with us as a 1 week local missions trip from their church!

It was an amazing week serving the community, loving on the children there and sharing the  gospel to the kids and parents.  The community was very responsive and wished it could have been longer for their kids.  We offered Hip Hop Dance Class, Acting Class taught by Christian actors and producers within the church, a   Soccer Clinic, a Football Clinic run by former football player from USC and the NFL and a football coach, and a parenting forum for the parents giving insight in raising their children.

Throughout the week the coaches and volunteers shared Bible Verses and godly principles.  The end of the week accumulated with a finale showcase for the children to show their  parents what they had learned and Richard from Epiphany Fellowship LA sharing his testimony to the children and parents.  It was a powerful, amazing week to the community of South Los Angeles.  Please check out the playlist we made below on YouTube highlighting the week!  https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLQjQrSbz0XP9Sc-tEYYGkNCkPQMYl-DXA

The Changing Face of Evangelism

This past February Joseph was asked to be a part of Cru’s Church Movements National Team.

He is helping to shape the direction in which Cru partners with hundreds of churches,denominations, seminaries and church planting networks.  This has been an exciting opportunity for him as he loves being a part of this team that is helping churches and Cru to partner together to spread the gospel and the love of Christ throughout the United States.

One aspect he has been developing with the Church Movements National Team is a training called: The Changing Face of Evangelism and the Well-Being of the City. It is a half-day  training for leaders evangelism within churches and movements that includes:

• Barriers to Evangelism
• Tools in Sharing Your Faith
• The Three Modes of Evangelism
• Sessions for Pastors and Missional Leaders helping them think and lead in terms of evangelism in the Church.

In the Fall Joseph will be leading one of these training times with multiple churches within Los Angeles.  Thank you for continuing to pray for this and for believers to gain a passion to share their faith—only 5% of believers share their faith.

Family Update…

We are treasuring this summer as we prepare for Luke to go to Cal Poly Pomona this Fall.  It is a hard   transition for us to see our oldest to go on to college but we are excited for the plans the Lord has for him.  Please continue to pray for Him (and us!) during this transition to college and adulthood.

During the last year the Lord has been moving in amazing ways through the churches here in Los Angeles! New Believers, New Baptisms, Community Outreaches into the neighborhoods and schools,  leadership development times, discipleship of women and men, and times of prayer and encouragement to others.  One of the churches, Epiphany Fellowship Los Angeles, Joseph has been working with, had their “official” launch service of their church on Easter Sunday and now are seeing 40-50 people attend regularly.  Epiphany recently formed a partnership with a local school in South Central Los Angeles (teachers pictured above at the local school).  The principal at this elementary school is a believer and they have been able to provide mentoring through an after school program at the school!  Epiphany also partnered with The Children’s Hunger Fund to provide regular meals to families in need that they develop  relationships with through the after school program.   This past Sunday Epiphany also celebrated with their first baptisms— 4 people desired to be baptized! Seeing so many lives changed with the love of Jesus! Through equipping churches in leadership development, prayer, outreaches, and evangelism within Los Angeles we have been blessed to see these  churches reaching the communities around them with the gospel of Jesus and lives are being transformed!

As this summer is drawing near our family is celebrating the graduation of Luke from High School and entering into college!  How did the years go by so fast? He will be going to Cal Poly Pomona entering into Kinesiology and we are so very proud of him and excited for the plans the Lord has for him.

Another update we have is a need for an updated car for  Joseph.  As he travels throughout the Los Angeles area he puts a lot of miles on his car and his current one is barely hanging on.  We recently hit 200,000 miles on his current car!  Because of this we are desiring to raise $5,000 to $7,000 to replace his current car this summer.

If you are able to help, go to http://give.cru.org/0487483 and follow the instructions. If you prefer to write a check, please make it  payable to ‘Cru’ with our account number #0487483 and you can mail it to the address below.  However the Lord may lead you to  respond, we are grateful for all your prayers and support.  Thank you!  We hope you have a wonderful summer as well and cherish the days with family and friends.

“For we died and were buried with Christ by baptism. And just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glorious power of the Father, now we also may live new lives.” Romans 6:4

EASTER CELEBRATIONS!

It brings us such joy to see the new lives the Lord has been raising up within the churches we are partnered with.  This Easter was a wonderful Celebration thanking the Lord for all His works!  Our family celebrated Easter with Epiphany Fellowship in Los Angeles as they had their Grand Opening Service in the Crenshaw YMCA!  It was so encouraging to worship with them and see how the Lord has been using them to reach the South LA Area and witness the many people who came to their opening service.

At Celebracion Latina in Covina Joseph had helped Pastor Marco plan an Easter Outreach Service and our good friend, Rachid, shared his testimony on how he came to know the Lord from an Muslim background. One woman who came to the outreach gave her life to the Lord!  Here is a link to hear more! https://youtu.be/D33jcYJMeFg

And at Solid Rock in Claremont, where Joseph has been working closely with Pastor Ruben to train leaders within the church, they had a wonderful service with 3 people being baptized and 7 more in May for Mother’s Day! 

 We truly feel humbled to be able to witness lives changed through these churches reaching out to their communities that the Lord has called them to.

END IT MOVEMENT!

The average age a girl enters sex trafficking is 12-14 years old.  The average age a boy enters is 11-13 years old.  Junior High Age.  That is why we count it a privilege to be able to go into the public junior highs in high risk areas and teach on sex trafficking prevention.  One school, South Junior High, in Anaheim has allowed us to come and speak to all their junior highers every single year—as part of their health curriculum!  Through this we were so encouraged to see these students put together an End It Campaign to raise more awareness at their school about sex trafficking and how to prevent it.  Here is a video explaining more about the END IT CAMPAIGN at the local school!

https://youtu.be/BpvOV-zIXrY

#ENDITMOVEMENT

IS A COALITION OF THE LEADING ORGANIZATIONS IN THE WORLD IN THE FIGHT FOR FREEDOM. EACH OF OUR AMAZING COALITION PARTNERS ARE    DOING THE WORK, ON THE GROUND, EVERYDAY, TO BRING AWARENESS, PREVENTION, RESCUE, AND RESTORATION.

https://enditmovement.com

FAMILY UPDATE!

Life is full and full of so many emotions right now!  Our oldest boy, Luke, will be graduating High School this May.  So many emotions to think of his graduating!  He is in the fun last days of school events, Prom, Graduation, etc..  Please pray for him and us as we process so many changes and emotions. Daniel is finishing up the 10th grade and beginning driving classes! Jessica is finishing 7th grade and Aleeya finishes up Kindergarten.

Thank you for your continual prayers and support to us.  We are so grateful for your prayers for our children, marriage and ministry. We thank the Lord for each one of you.

Every 40 seconds someone in the world dies by suicide; every 41 seconds someone is left to make sense of it…

SUICIDE is a permanent solution for a temporary problem. Suicide ends a temporary pain and can leaves a heart ache in those who love us for the rest of their lives. 

Joseph is on the leadership of LA Reaching LA, a network of pastors and church planters. This network provides training and coaching in the areas of leadership development, church planting strategy and evangelism. One morning, at a monthly training breakfast with LA Reaching LA, a pastor from a Spanish speaking bilingual church nearby, Celebración Latina, came to speak with Joseph.

“Can I meet with you, and can you help me with evangelism?” asked Pastor Marco.

Marco began conducting quarterly outreaches and encouraging the people from his church to bring their friends. He had a former gang member share his testimony, and 8 people came to faith and have been baptized. At this last outreach, 17 people came to faith after hearing the difference Christ had made for a suicide survivor! As the outreaches continue, the church has formed an outreach team. Our partnership helped to provide the motivation for evangelism and testimony speakers that this church body needed and it is so exciting to see many people from the community come to know Jesus, be baptized and become involved in the church!

To see a clip of the testimony shared at the outreach

check out this link: https://youtu.be/j0BlURpqjV4

A New National Role

This past February Joseph was invited to share at our National Cru City Conference, for those working within cities, about the ministry God is doing here in Los Angeles.  It is our desire to see churches multiply through evangelism, discipleship and through raising up leaders within the church. Joseph shared at the conference about one church we had helped form in Claremont that is now starting a Sinhalese speaking Sri Lankan Church, the first in LA ! 

During the conference Joseph was asked to be a part of Cru’s Church Movements National Team.  He will help shape the direction in which Cru partners with hundreds of churches, denominations, seminaries and church planting networks.  He is excited to be a part of this team as he enjoys seeing “the big picture” and visions for the future of churches and Cru partnering together to spread the gospel and the love of Christ beyond Los Angeles to cities throughout the United States.  This new role will still allow Joseph to continue to minister and live in Los Angeles, but will require a little more traveling.

FAMILY UPDATE:

Our girl, Jessica, just celebrated her 13th Birthday!  It is so hard to believe she is already a teenager.  We spent the day with her drinking tea, seeing horses and going to a play her friends were in.  Then dinner and cake as a family that evening. She is a beautiful girl, inside and out, and we are so thankful for her.

Aleeya is loving her jazz dance classes and preparing for a recital in June. Luke just finished playing his last season of basketball for our city league—it was so sad to see this season come to an end as it is his last now that he is graduating.  Daniel continues to bring joy to our home through his music and continues to be stretched on the track team running long distance!

Thank you for your continual prayers and support to us. We thank the Lord for each one of you.

Church Planting Legend ‘Loved Everyone No Matter What’

Don approached Joseph about 2 years ago and asked him to help lead a church planting organization called LARLA (Los Angeles Reaching Los Angeles).  Little did we know that through our partnership with LARLA our ministry would be so blessed and our lives so touched by the founder, Don Overstreet.  Don quickly became a friend and mentor to Joseph as a man who loved Jesus deeply and had given his entire life to serve Him in Los Angeles and around the world.  He was a part of launching more than 500 churches worldwide in his 50 years of ministry and his heart’s cry was to love everyone no matter what.  To share the love of Jesus with all.  Don passed away in December and we were blessed to share in his Celebration of Life and saw hundreds of lives he had touched right here in LA. Please pray for, LARLA, that Don had founded.  It is continuing with our leadership team and we are praying the Lord would continue to use it to saturate Los Angeles with the love of Jesus through the churches. What God has done in a little over 2 years is incredible and God is still moving powerfully ! We wanted to share some amazing praises of what the Lord has done through LARLA these past 2 years and through our leadership team (pictured below) pouring into the lives of pastors throughout LA.

We are currently working with 115 new churches! 62 in LA County and 50 all over the world. We have helped start indigenous churches all over LA.

• 20 Spanish Speaking Churches
• 7 Iranian-Armenian Churches
• 2 Nepali Churches
• 1 Nigerian Church
• 1 Kenyan Church
• 31 Multi-Cultural Churches
• And around the world in: Nepal, Philippines, Mexico, Guatemala, Honduras, El Salvador, Tanzania, Cameroon, Kenya, Northern India, and Thailand.
• We have  Provided 35 Jesus Film backpacks, 4 sets of puppets (to India and Cameroon) and a motor scooter for a church planter in the Philippines.

Gospel Changes Lives from Slavery to Hope

I praise you, for I am fearfully and  wonderfully made. Wonderful are your works; my soul knows it very well. –  Psalm 139:14

Michelle has had the blessing of being able to be a  spiritual mentor to women in a trafficking ministry (Redeeming Love) that we are partnered with.  Redeeming Love has a safe house where women are rescued from trafficking and find peace, trauma therapy, education or job skills training, healing and experience the love of Jesus.  Each week she is part of a Bible Study with these women for exploring the faith and she also meets weekly with the ladies for spiritual mentorship.  *M and *S are 2 women in the program who recently gave their lives over to Jesus and were baptized!  God is so good! Please pray for their love for Jesus and desire to follow Him.  Please pray for these ladies as they heal from so much intense trauma, finish their high school diploma, gain job skills and begin college, and allow the Lord to heal the deep pains in their lives.  Please pray for Michelle as she loves on them and helps them seek the Lord with their questions, process life and help them to continue to grow in their relationships with the Lord.

As we do believe that every past can be redeemed, repurposed and made new.

Family Update…

Luke is awaiting college news and continuing to pray about his next steps.  Daniel is now doing track at the High School as well as recently competed in a Skills USA competition in videotech. He did a great job scoring 14th out of 65.  Aleeya has begun a jazz dance class and loves it and Jess continues to love her dance classes.  Life is full! Thank you for your encouragement, prayers and support to us and the ministry here in Los Angeles!

Human Trafficking Awareness Month

January is Human Trafficking Awareness Month.  Human trafficking is a form of modern slavery—a multi-billion dollar criminal industry that denies freedom to 20.9 million people around the world. And no matter where you live, chances are it’s happening nearby. From the girl forced into prostitution at a truck stop, to the man discovered in a restaurant kitchen, stripped of his passport and held against his will. All trafficking victims share one essential experience: the loss of freedom. (PolarisProject.org)

Did you know there are:

• 20-30 Million people trafficked Worldwide
• 80% female, 50% children
• 1.5 million in the US alone

It breaks our hearts that  trafficking is all around us now.  California harbors 3 of the FBI’s 13 highest child sex trafficking areas on the  nation: Los Angeles, San Francisco and San Diego.  Part of our focus in ministry is partnering with ministries and churches that are fighting sex trafficking within Los Angeles to help prevent children from the lure of traffickers as well as bring hope and the gospel to survivors rescued from trafficking.  A couple months back we were a part of an outreach to the community with a survivor named Emily, who shared her story.  Emily now works to help other women escape from trafficking and find healing.  Through Emily a young girl named *R was rescued by the police out of sex trafficking near us.  Emily connected her to a ministry, Redeeming Love, whom we partner with.  Redeeming Love provides a safe house for sex trafficking survivors and brings them job training, trauma therapy and the love of Jesus.  *R has now been in the program for 2 months working through school and trauma therapy.  Michelle is now connecting with her weekly as a spiritual mentor.  Please pray for *R as she has faced a great deal of spiritual  persecution.  Pray for her as she seeks to know “Who is God and Jesus?” and struggles in her self worth and the path ahead of her in emotional freedom and caring for  herself.  Pray she would come to know Jesus deeply and allow Him to satisfy those painful places of hurt within her. 

• • Average Age Children Enter Trafficking:

Girls: 12-14 yearsold
Boys: 11-13 years old

•  86% were from social services or foster care when they ran away and were lured into trafficking.
  

This is why there is such a need to help these young children know the signs of sex trafficking and how to prevent it from happening to them.  The Lord has opened up so many opportunities for Joseph and 2 interns from a ministry we partner with (EveryOne Free) to speak at JH and HS public schools.  One Christian health teacher of  a JH school in a high risk area has asked us to come every quarter and share with all 800  7th graders in her health classes.

• 76% of sex trafficking incidents begins on the internet or through social media— Snapchat, Instagram, Twitter, Facebook, and Kik

When we share in the schools we ask a show of hands of how many of them have been approached online through one of these apps by a trafficker.  It saddens us each time to see the many hands raised and then to hear personal stories of many of them who have been approached.

Please continue to pray that the Lord would lead us to the schools He desires to us to share at and  for His protection over the children that traffickers are targeting.

Family Update… 

We hope you had a wonderful Christmas and New Year! We enjoyed a relaxing time at home, exploring LA, finding “fake” snow 🙂 and seeing family.  Thank you for your encouragement, prayers and support to us and the ministry here in Los Angeles!

We hope you have a Wonderful Christmas Celebration and a Happy New Year!  Thank you for all your prayers, encouragement and support to us and the ministry here in Los Angeles.  We are so thankful for each one of you.  Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!  We can’t believe another year is coming to an end and 2018 is almost here!  We hope you are doing wonderful and enjoyed Thanksgiving with family and friends. 

God is so good!  We are so humbled when we think back upon this year and see how the Lord has been moving, changing hearts, bringing people to Him and allowing us to be a part of His purposes.  We love seeing lives changed by the love of Jesus and it is a true joy to be used by Him to reach the city around us! Whether through partnering with others to fight sex trafficking, equipping churches to reach Los Angeles or adoption/foster-care ministry—the need is so great.

A young 16 year old girl, Estelle, near us in Covina impacted our lives recently.  Estelle was living with her mom, who is addicted to drugs, and shared how her mom was faced with a decision.  Use the money they had to care for Estelle or use the money for drugs.  Estelle’s mom chose the drugs.  Estelle’s heart broke—she felt worthless and not cared for, she felt that the drugs meant more to her mom then she did—so she decided to commit suicide.  Estelle  swallowed a bottle of pills and closed her eyes.  Praise God her father ended up coming to the home soon after and found her.  He rushed her to the hospital and the doctors were able to save her.

Soon after, Estelle heard about an event we were helping with called “A Night With God” at a local church.  She came, heard the gospel and accepted the Lord into her life!  Estelle has hope now, was baptized and is going to church.  Estelle has a purpose for living and is experiencing the Lord’s presence and love within her.  Seeing lives changed for the Gospel is our greatest passion and we rejoice in Estelle coming to know Jesus this year ! Thank you for being a part of changing Estelle’s life… bringing her hope and peace and a purpose in her life to live for Jesus! Feel free to click on the link to hear Estelle share her testimony briefly.

 
https://youtu.be/aaQE0lZd6-o

We greatly appreciate the sacrifices you are making on our behalf through your prayers and financial gifts. We can not be a part of seeing lives change here in Los Angeles without you.  THANK YOU!

This year our financial support has fallen because all giving is voluntary and we understand when circumstances change and people are no longer able to give.  We recently have been receiving short paychecks and working hard in raising additional monthly support. If you are able and would prefer to make a contribution online please go to our secure Cru giving page at     https://give.cru.org/0487483 and follow the simple instructions.

We consider it a great privilege to share our prayer needs as well!  We are grateful and take comfort in knowing you are standing with us for the gospel and for lives like Estelle. Thank you!

Because we consider it a special privilege to seek the Lord on your behalf please respond to this email and let us know how we can be praying for you as well during this holiday season.  Thank you for considering and may you have a wonderful, blessed Christmas celebrating our Lord! 

In Christ’s Love,

Joseph, Michelle,  Luke, Daniel. Jessica and Aleeya Butlig

Una Noche Con Dios –  A Night with God

 In the beginning of October we had the opportunity to partner with a church in West Covina that was having an outreach to the community.

Joseph was part of the planning with Pastor Marco and it was exciting to see how the Lord moved through that evening.Joseph was part of a panel speaking about sex trafficking right here in Southern California and helping parents to know the signs of how to prevent trafficking from happening.

We were able to have a sex trafficking survivor we know come and share her story of her bravery, escaping from sex trafficking and how her life has been transformed by Jesus.  She now devotes her life to helping other women escape from trafficking.

We rejoiced in the 5 people who put their faith in Christ that evening after hearing her testimony and Pastor Marco share the gospel!   It was encouraging to see so many come to the event and also hear how Jesus is the God of Miracles!

Please pray for the upcoming Night With God events Joseph is helping Pastor Marco plan.  Pray that many people from Covina and beyond would attend and we would see many more people come to know the Lord!

If you would like to hear a testimony of a girl who came to know Jesus through one of these events check out this link!

https://youtu.be/aaQE0lZd6-o

Reaching the World through Partnerships

Joseph, Pastor Sati Adamu (Nigeria), Pastor Bernard Lobe (Cameroon) with white shirt, and Pastor Davis (Kenya) in blue shirt.

The partnership Joseph is on the leadership team for (LA Reaching LA) is partnering with International   Theological Seminary.  Pastors from overseas come to this seminary to receive theological training. LA Reaching LA is working with Pastor Sati from Nigeria to help him learn more about addiction recovery after Nigerians come to Jesus. Drugs are killing his villages and he needs help to know how to help his people in this way.  We have been taking him to a drug recovery ranch to learn how to implement this ministry back in Nigeria.

Pastor Bernard Lobe desires to start a seminary in Cameroon to train pastors working in church planting within Cameroon.  As he learns in the seminary we are also working with him to help plant Cameroon churches here in Los Angeles and mentoring him in church planting strategies to carry on to his country of Cameroon when he returns.

One of the church planting strategies we are helping these pastors learn is how to use the Jesus Film.  The Jesus Film is a ministry of Cru and shows the story of Jesus from the Gospel of Luke. This can be brought into villages and used as a tool to share the gospel.  We will be giving a Jesus Film Backpack to Pastor Sati,   Pastor Bernard and Pastor Davis to bring back to their countries. Please pray for these pastors.  That their time in seminary and with us would prepare them well to carry the gospel to the countries of Nigeria, Cameroon and Kenya and the Lord would do amazing work in and through them!

Family Update… Special Moments!

Luke’s Homecoming Dance as a Senior -growing up too fast! Jessica is loving her voice lessons and dance classes! Daniel has been improving his guitar through the Azusa Conservatory of Music and Aleeya is on her first soccer team and scored a goal last week!  Life is full and we are very thankful.

This summer Michelle and I celebrated 19 years on staff with Cru! 

We recently returned from our biennial U.S Staff Conference in    Colorado.  There were 4,819 staff (and 2,082 kids!) representing 49 countries present! It was a time that broadened our world vision, equipped us more in ministry and encouraged our souls through the various speakers and seminars. The theme of the conference was “With” and there was an emphasis on oneness and unity within Cru as well as the importance of partnerships with other organizations and  churches to help fulfill the Great Commission.

Jimmy McGee III (director of Impact Movement) shared about lamenting in light of recent social justice issues.

Cru President, Steve Douglass and Judy Douglass sharing with Cru staff

Andy Crouch sharing his heart

Experiencing Encouraging, Powerful Worship times together!

Pastor Eugene Cho talks about partnership and collaboration in the Luke 5:17-20 text.

Thank you so much for your continual prayers, encouragement and support to us. We are very thankful for our time in Colorado growing in our relationships with the Lord and becoming more equipped in ministry. We thank the Lord for you.