Taiwan Mission Team

Hi guys, as you know, 47 of our brothers and sisters are in Taiwan now to share the meaning of Christmas with the Taiwanese students. Last Sunday, they helped to celebrate the first anniversary of Gracepoint Fellowship Church - Hsinchu! Here's an update about it from Steve and Eunice of a2f blue, who are leading the team:

Ni Hao Ma!
Yesterday we celebrated the 1st Anniversary of our GFC-Hsinchu church. Eugene gave a message on Jesus feeding the 5000, and through Kan's and Cynthia's testimonies we were able to marvel at how God had multiplied the "5 loaves and 2 fish" that our Hsinchu team had offered to God along with the rest of our church. We all had a chance to remember how our church had come a long way from all the funny and not so funny attempts at reaching out to people, including having the first bible study at Mr. Donut and out of tune electric guitar solos during praise. Attached is a picture of our Hsinchu Church. We were thankful that many of the students came to the anniversary service. We had the very first 'invitation time' at our Hsinchu church and several of our brothers and sisters rededicated...Later that night our WMT got together with the Hsinchu team to have some time for team bonding and for people to get to know each other. We ended the time thinking about our various connections with one another, even though we're from different ministries within our church. Kevin Tan (Kairos jr) shared how meeting Eugene and Cynthia during Cal Day helped him decide to come to Cal, Greg Davis shared how he was thankful that Eugene, who was so Taiwanese, reached out to a Caucasian guy like him and led him to Christ. We were reminded of the close community we share at our church and what we want to invite the Taiwanese students to experience as well.

Reminder: Sign-ups

There's alot going on this winter so please remember to sign up for the following ASAP:

Winter Retreat 2009. Fri-Sun, 1/23-1/25 (first weekend after school starts). This is the spiritual highlight of our whole year so please do sign up now and get the early bird discount.

G-Live Tech & Arts Camp. Mon-Fri, 1/12-1/16. This is an incredible opportunity to get trained in video work, Photoshop, scriptwriting, and much more by the best at our church, in preparation for this spring's Gracepoint Live, our huge multimedia and theatrical production! Don't worry, helping out does not preclude you from acting on stage.

Sophomore Discipleship Retreat. Tues-Thurs, 1/13-1/15. For Christian sophs. Don't miss this rare chance to be trained by Pastor Ed & Kelly @ Sierra Lodge and get to know your peers better.

This Week: Christmas Events and More!

This Friday (12/12) will be an all-college Bible Study at 7pm at First Pres. Church (on Dana & Channing). I know you're stressed with finals, but please don't miss this as it's one of our last Bible studies of the year.

After Bible study, we'll head to Dana House with Mike & Joanna's homegroup for our annual Xmas Party & Gift Exchange! If you've never done a gift exchange with us, you're in for a treat. They're full of intrigue, hilarity, wacky switcheroos, and memorable performances. :)

So please bring a wrapped gift valued at $5-$10 on Friday. Please bring something that you'd want to receive yourself! (read: no single rolls of toilet paper--yes someone brought that one year!). If you don't have time or can't think of a gift, just get a gift card from Peet's or some local restaurant.

Please join us to end our semester memorably as we eat, remember all that happened, and see each other before everyone goes home.

Also, Joyland Christmas Celebration (aka JCC) is this Sunday (12/14), 4pm @ Willard Middle School.

Joyland is Gracepoint's children's group. JCC is an awesome performance put on by kids (pre-school to 6th grade)—their own Gracepoint Live with singing, dancing, and amazing feats of verse memorization as they celebrate the real meaning of Xmas.

JCC is an all-out community effort as it takes our whole church to write scripts, manage and coach the kids in acting, sew costumes, make and move props, do fancy lighting and sound, give rides, cook food, and much more. There's nothing like it. Come and share this ultra-memorable time for not just the kids, but for all of us as well!

Some other news to note:

• Please remember that this Sunday's worship service will start at 1pm to accomodate JCC.
• Sign up now for our annual annual Winter Retreat to get the early bird discount. It'll be the first weekend after school starts (1/23-1/25).
  
  The winter retreat is the spiritual highlight of our whole year so I don't want any of you to miss out! They are always refreshing times of bonding with each other and hearing powerful messages and testimonies from students and staff alike as we prepare ourselves spiritually for the new year.
• If you want to help paint Sierra Barn, there's a workday this Saturday (12/13). You can sign up online.
• The sophomore discipleship retreat is 1/13-1/15. Sign up online.

That's it for now. Good luck on all your finals! You may see us sometime this week for a little surprise to encourage you in your studies. :)

Thanksgiving Celebration at Gracepoint Fellowship Church: Read Your Bible!

I hope you all had a wonderful Thanksgiving. Just in case you were tempted to forget about our performance last week, here it is so you can relive it once again. I'm so thankful that many of you got to participate in this memorable Thanksgiving Celebration and experience the rich community we have here at Gracepoint.

And here's some more videos from different performances:

Praxis: Scary Green Guys
Element: Planet Earth Teens, the Musical
a2f Gold: Under Pressure!

Vamos a la Gracepoint! Videos & Pictures

It's been called historic. Monumental. An affront to the senses. Or just gross. Here's the Vamos a la Gracepoint video by a2f Gold from this past Sunday's Thanksgiving Celebration. Watch at your own risk.

Also, thanks to the SF Campus for putting together this cool slideshow with pictures from all the performances!

While you're all at home with family, drop us a line in the comments! What was your favorite moment/act/element from Thanksgiving Celebration?

Thanksgiving Week Schedule

Wow, Thanksgiving Celebration was incredible. Stay tuned, we'll try to have pictures and video from the event up on this site soon.

Since it's a short week, Bible Study will be tonight (Tues) @ First Pres. @ 8pm.

If you guys are staying here for Thanksgiving, you don't have to be by yourself! You can come over Wed night to Dan/Hannah's place for a nice hot pot dinner. Or, on Thursday (Thanksgiving Day), we're having a potluck dinner all together at our Northloop building in Alameda.

If you wanna come, just email me so we can be sure to give you a ride. Happy Thanksgiving everyone!

Thanksgiving Celebration is Here

Thanksgiving Celebration is this Sunday (11/23) @ 1:30pm @ Alameda High School.

Starts with a special Thanksgiving service with lots of videos recounting what happened this past year. Then it's time to laugh (or cry, or both) at everyone's performances. We end the night with a wonderful turkey dinner!

Please let one of the staff know if you'd like to join us. We'll be giving rides from Berkeley @ 12:15pm.

Tim's Terrific Turkey

Dish-Gracepoint is a great blog run by Tom, one of the staff of acts2fellowship who is our in-house food scientist! Check it out, it's got tons of useful recipes and tips.

For Thanksgiving, Tom enlisted his good friend Tim to share Tim's tried-and-true secrets for the perfect turkey. But you'd better block out some time to read this, it's engaging stuff, and it'll get you excited to cook your own bird. So be a good son or daughter this Thanksgiving--impress your parents and relatives by volunteering to cook the turkey this year!

Important Change: No TC this Friday (11/21)

Hi everyone, there's a change in plans, and we will NOT be having a Koinonia in-house Thanksgiving program this Friday. Instead, ALL Koinonia homegroups will get to perform on Sunday at our church-wide Celebration! How exciting!

So the schedule this Friday is:
7pm - Bible Study
Afterwards - final Thanksgiving Celebration practice (with costumes)

Friday's Bible Study is @ the Lipman Room (on the 8th floor of Barrows Hall).

First Thanksgiving Celebration Practice

Here are some snapshots of our exciting first practice last Friday at the Y. Thanks Robin for these pictures.

Thanksgiving Celebration has launched many a rappin' career.

Rui, Paulina, Lindsey, Yanhui, and Sheri ham it up!
Or should I say, lamb it up. Ha!

Ruby is one with the moves. She's totally into it.

Afterwards, we celebrated Nov birthdays: Karen, Robin, Dennis, and Nin!

Hope you can all join us for our second (and final) practice this Friday. It's not too late to get in on the action!

More Than a Face & Gone Music Video

Special presentation tonight (11/12), 8pm, Norton Hall Main Lounge, Unit 3. Vivian and Kathy from homegroup 8 are giving a talk called "More Than A Face." It's a presentation they've given a few times already to great reviews. They will talk about how the media portrays women and how it profoundly affects the way women view themselves. If you're free, you can come and invite your friends to this.

In other news, we had a great time at our special event, GONE, last week. Kevan from hg1 and Paulina from hg3 have already penned nice recaps from the event, so you can read about what happened here and here. Below is the music video we showed at the event, set to the night's theme song, appropriately called....Gone. The guy in the video is Howard, a junior from hg1.

GONE - A Special Event (11/6)

Our three college groups are sponsoring a very special event - GONE. Included in the program are a live band, personal sharings/testimonies from fellow college students about some of their life experiences and journeys, a thought-provoking talk from a Christian perspective, and food. Please join us for this exciting event!

Koinonia Zip Hooded Sweatshirt Preorder

With the weather getting colder, don’t you wish you had another warm sweatshirt? We just finalized the design for a cool new black, zippered, hooded, Koinonia sweatshirt.

But we’re only ordering the amount that we get pre-orders for, so please pre-order your sweatshirt by this Friday. Here's the design:

Front

Shoulder

Thanksgiving Service, Celebration, Dinner (Sunday 11/23)

Sunday 11/23 is going to be a packed day. Following our special Thanksgiving service at Gracepoint Berkeley, we're having our annual Thanksgiving Celebration, a song-dance-video-rap-comedy-with-meaningful-elements extravaganza! We top it all off with an all-out Thanksgiving dinner with turkey galore and all the trimmings! Yum.

All our various college groups are brainstorming and preparing our acts right now. Practices will start next Friday. I hope you can all participate in this fun and meaningful event. This is when we discover all sorts of hidden talents, especially among the freshmen.

Here are some more memorable moments from past Thanksgiving Celebrations!

• Manny Kim's 15 seconds of fame
• Mama's Boys Music Video
  
• Disco!
  
• Thanksgiving Carol (with rappin' ghosts and the Phantom)

C'mon now, don't tell me you don't want to be part of this stuff. :)

Berkeley Good Eats & Big C Adventure

Recap of last week from Steve Choi:

Last week was a fun-filled time for Homegroup 4. On Thursday night, we got together with a bunch of new friends and went on what has definitely got to be one of my favorite outings: The Berkeley Good Eats Tour! Berkeley is home to a lot of delightful restaurants which new students probably don't know about. From not-so-well-kept local secrets like Gregoire, to nationally recognized establishments like Chez Panisse, there's a ton of good stuff out there if you know where to look! We hit up some of the best spots in North Berkeley's Gourmet Ghetto.

We started the night with some pizza from The Cheeseboard. Of course, there was no room in the pizza shop nor on the sidewalk for a group of 20 or so culinary tourists... Thank goodness for the median! Next we sampled some of Gregoire's signature Potato Puffs. It was my first time having it and I definitely liked it. From watching them prepare it, it seemed like a simple yet tasty dish that anyone can make! Next time you come over to my place, ask me to make you some Choilicious Potato Puffs and you can decide for yourself. The guys also ordered fried appetizers at Barneys. As the last stop on our tour, we stopped by Nation's for some delicious pie. I think Natalie's group ordered 5 slices... Dan and I shared a slice of what looked like an enormous "dan-ta" (Chinese custard). Food always tastes better in the presence of good company, and our group had a great time getting to know one another better.

Friday night was another signature Berkeley experience. At Bible study, Pastor Ed talked about how we can know that the Bible is reliable and accurately transcribed across the centuries. Afterward, we joined up with Mike and Joanna's homegroup to hike up to the Big C. It was many of our freshmen's first time being there, and believe it or not, it was the first time for some Berkeley alumni and long-time Koinonia staff as well, namely Mike, Joanna, Dan and Hannah! The view from the top was beautiful and I'm thankful that we got to go on such a perfectly warm and clear night. Afterward we hung out together at Dana House, where we played foosball, celebrated Mike's birthday, and listened to Dan recount some of Dana House's best stories, including the time when Dan chased a burglar across Berkeley armed with nothing but his bare hands!

Here are more pictures from the events.

Stay tuned, there's more fun to come this week!

Steve Got a Job!

Steve got a job offer today. That makes us happy! He'll be working at an energy consulting firm. If you didn't know, he graduated from Cal last year, spent this past summer in Taiwan, and has been actively job-searching. An email from Steve:

Hi everyone,
Thank you everyone for your prayers. I received an offer from MRW, one of the companies I interviewed with in Oakland! I wanted to thank you all for your encouragement and prayers for me. I am blessed to have so many people who care about me, and I want to become more and more a grateful and hardworking partner in the Gospel with you all. Please continue to pray that I would steward this opportunity properly!

Indebted,
Steven

Now he can buy new glasses!
No, j/k, his glasses are fine.

Gracepoint Austin Inaugural Service

Last Sunday (10/5) was the inaugural worship service for the newest member of the Gracepoint family, GFC-Austin. A team from Berkeley went down to Texas for a week to help our brothers and sisters there plan for the event and just encourage and be with them for this historic occasion. Bryan Song posted a blog entry about the Inaugural week too. I'm so thankful we can share such camaraderie with our Austin team because of our bond in the Gospel. As Pastor Ed shared in his message at Gracepoint Berkeley yesterday, let's claim people to love, and we can start by always remembering GFC-Austin in prayer.

And if you're a student, just imagine some probable counterpart on the UT-Austin campus as you pray for them. I've heard the Austin students are like Cal students in so many ways. Except that for Austin students I bet the word "football" does not similarly conjure up mixed painful feelings and cause them to put their hope all the more in something more sure and secure, like God.

My Fan Club

Ok, I have to make a rather embarrassing admission: I have a fan club. Actually, I didn't know I had one until today, when I read the Gracepoint worship team's latest blog post. Anyway, you can read it for yourself.

Don't worry, I'm not actively soliciting members for this fan club. I'd rather talk about Koinonia and the different events we have. :)

Dis-Gracepoint - Featured Blog

New students, you've heard rumblings about a blog that everyone's been reading... Dis-grace-wha? What in the world is that? Dis-Gracepoint is our church's humor site that's provided us endless laughter and shock, as well as camaraderie for those (un)lucky people who make wonderful faux pas and end up getting immortalized on the site. So if you need a quick jolt to your senses as you're nodding off at your desk, check it out.

And yes, this is not some fancy Photoshop, the man you see here is now one of our beloved pastors at Gracepoint. Awesome.

Course 101 - Starting next week

We're now offering Course 101 on Wednesday evenings (7-8:30pm, at the YWCA), starting next week. This course gives an intellectual basis for answers to some of the most commonly asked questions about the Christian faith and addresses misconceptions about God, Jesus, and the Bible. Both those who have experience with Christianity and those just beginning to consider it will have the chance to explore how Christianity addresses questions about the meaning of life, our purpose, and the longings of our hearts.

Highly recommended for anyone interested in learning more about Christianity, starting with the basics. No prior knowledge about the subject is assumed.

Please sign up online if you're interested. You can preview Course 101 excerpts here.

College Missions Night!

This Friday (9/26), 7pm @ First Presbyterian Church (corner of Dana & Channing)

In lieu of normal bible study, join us to hear testimonies and watch videos/slideshows from fellow college students from acts2fellowship, Koinonia, and Kairos about their experiences this past summer going to places like Honduras, Taiwan, China, Kyrgyzstan, and Cambodia!

A Divine Symphony @ Gracepoint Fellowship Church

This was part 2 of 3 videos we did for a message series called "Divine Symphony" at Gracepoint Fellowship Church awhile back. The messages were about God's plan for the church to be a beautiful collection of people who lose themselves as they collectively worship God and love one another, similar to how a marvelous symphony can only be produced when individual instruments faithfully play their distinct parts.

This video is meant to illustrate how absurd it is when one member of the church doesn't accept or embrace his/her important role and instead envies others. I'm posting it for your enjoyment as it stars our very own Sheri! (who, if you didn't know, is an excellent violinist when she's not acting...)

Koinonia Bible Study this Friday (9/19) &Gracepoint Fellowship Church service time change

Wow, this post title is long.....

Just a reminder that Bible Study is at 7pm at 155 Dwinelle this Friday. Afterwards, we're joining some other homegroups to go bowling! Please bring $10 to cover the cost of games/shoes.

If you're free for dinner on Friday, we'll grab food together at 5:30pm at the Durant Food Court (aka Asian Ghetto), then walk over and eat in the Dwinelle courtyard.

**Also, a reminder for those of you who come to Gracepoint Fellowship Church on Sundays, our service is now at 1:30pm, starting this Sunday.

We have dorm pick-ups from 1:00-1:15pm for Foothill/Stern/Bowles/Clark Kerr, and walk groups from 12:45-1:00pm for Units 1, 2, and 3. Details are here.

Barbeque this Wednesday (9/17) instead of Small Groups

Update: we're moving this to Alameda. We'll still meet at 6:30pm at Dana House and drive there together.

Hi all, we are postponing small group meetings this week. Instead, so that you can get to know the other guys/girls in our homegroup, we're having a good ol' fashioned barbeque!

It'll start 6:30pm this Wednesday at Dana House (2440 Dana St., between Haste & Dwight), which many of you are quite familiar with now as the hub of much of our group's activity.

Everyone's welcome and you can invite friends too, but please sign up online so we can prep the right amount of food. Hope to see you all there, as I haven't even met all of you personally yet. :)

The first sophomore small group meeting!

Yesterday was the first meeting this semester for the sophomore girls' small group! Now that most of them moved out of the dorms and have settled into apartments like real adults, we met at one of their places. We started off with a game called "this is not funny" where you have to say ridiculous lines and manage not to laugh. Of course, our resident 'laugher' Lindsey, who laughs at anything and everything, lost the game because she couldn't keep a straight face while reading, saying or listening to the lines. Actually, she was laughing at other people's lines even though the person who was saying them wasn't! So we punished her by making her
act like sizzling bacon in a pan (yes, you read that right). Then Sheri "the veteran bacon demonstrator" showed us what sizzling bacon is supposed to look like! (The video clips are available on Youtube – just kidding!) Anyway, after playing silly games, we reviewed last week's message at Gracepoint Fellowship Church on John 4 about the Samaritan Woman who sought after all the wrong things to fulfill her need to be loved unconditionally. We discussed what we do to put up masks to fulfill our thirst for love and how we often disguise and hide because we fear rejection. But my hope for our sophomore small group is that it will be a place where it's safe and honest without any pretense or disguise and all of them will experience God's unconditional love this coming semester.

What are you looking forward to most about small group? Leave a comment!

Freshman Angel Island Trip - Sat 9/27

Coming soon!

Freshman Angel Island Trip

Date: Saturday (9/27)

It's become a Freshman year tradition. You get to meet all the freshmen in Koinonia while trekking through one of the most scenic places around. Come with us, and we'll take a ferry ride to San Francisco, take an easy and beautiful hike with sweeping views of the Bay, and finish with a BBQ lunch afterwards, all with your friends. How's that sound? Check out the Angel Island webcam for a preview.

More information to follow, but please mark your calendars. A year from now, you won't wanna be the one missing in all the Angel Island trip pictures!

San Francisco Tour

Update 9/5 - Sorry, we'll have to postpone this trip to a later time. Hope you can join us then!

We're taking a short day trip to San Francisco this Saturday. After lunch on the wharf we'll hit some of the most famous sites in the city - Pier 39, Lombard St., and of course the awesome Golden Gate Bridge.

If you haven't seen SF yet, you'll want to do so before the crush of papers and midterms! (And while the weather is still sunny and clear)

Please sign up online so we can plan for rides. See you soon.

Small Group Kickoffs this Week!

Hey everyone! Now that the dust from the two Welcome Nights has settled, some of you are asking, how can I get plugged into Koinonia? That's where small groups come in.

What's a small group? It's a weekly meeting where we enjoy homecooked meals, share stories, get to know others, discuss topics relevant to Christianity (or just life), explore a tough intellectual question or two, commiserate about our midterms, and of course, have a lot of fun.

Join us for our kickoff sessions this week to meet other students and find out what kinds of small groups we're having this semester. Anyone not currently in a small group is welcome. And you don't need to be a Christian to join.

• The guys will be meeting this Thursday, 6:30pm at Sun Hong Kong/Kip's (they're 2 restaurants in one!). It's on 2439 Durant Ave., next to Yogurt Park, across from Unit 3. There'll be free pizza too!
  


• The girls will also be meeting Thursday, 7pm at 258 Dwinelle, starting with a homecooked dinner.

In case you missed it, here's the cool small groups video we showed last week.

NSWN was Awesome!

Wow, our first New Student Welcome Night was incredible! We had over 1,000 new students join us, and I heard we had to turn away a few hundred more due to lack of space. I'm so thankful for all the hard work each person at our church put in to make this event possible. I've been hearing such a buzz from many students around campus who were impacted/impressed/awed/intrigued by the program.

Don't forget, part 2 is tonight! A new video, skit, more music (with alot more singers), another great message, ice cream, sports/games @ Maxwell Field. Sure, it's packed, but hey, you have Monday off to rest. :)

We're meeting @ Crossroads at 5:15pm for dinner and then heading to the program together. If you were there for the first one, you know that seats are gonna go fast. See you tonight!

Welcome Week Events!

Hi guys, Welcome Week is upon us and that means LOTS of activities. A Berkeley tour, In-N-Out & Ghiradelli, a Kakigori (Japanese for shaved ice) party, and more Ultimate Frisbee that you can handle! Invite your friends and join us. Or, if you're just bored and by yourself, come anyway!

Miscellany

• For a fitting end to an exciting summer, we're having an all-Koinonia BBQ this Friday @ 5pm in Alameda. Join us for food, sports, and fun all together! Afterwards we'll head over to my place for Bible study.


• Our praise leader, James, is taking a new poll on the Gracepoint Fellowship Church Berkeley Worship site: What's your favorite worship song?
  
  http://gracepointworship.wordpress.com/2008/08/19/favorites-gracepoint-fellowship-church/
  


• And while we're in the polling mood, vote on Pastor Ed Kang's poll to indicate what you'd like to see more of on his blog. Vote before it closes!
  
  http://edkang.wordpress.com/2008/08/16/gracepoint-fellowship-church-pol
  


• For those of you who use Twitter, there's a new Gracepoint Twitter feed. Check it out and follow Gracepoint!

My friend is going to Gracepoint Austin...

I can't believe that in less than a week, Joyce, Del and Maurice will be leaving to join Gracepoint Fellowship Church - Austin! Joyce's departure is especially sad for me since I've worked with Joyce for the past 3 years at my current job. I've known her since she was in high school through her older sister, Grace Kim, who's my peer and rather famous (or infamous) on Dis-gracepoint. It doesn't seem that long ago when, during the winter break of my sophomore year, my peers, Joyce and I went to Disneyland. Joyce was only a sophomore in high school back then and we had so much fun together as we rode on amazing rides, ate yummy snacks and took pictures with my favorite Disney characters like Alice, Ariel, Woody and Buzz. Before I knew it, she was an excited yet clueless freshman at UC Berkeley! Boy, time flies. But over time she grew into a person who loves God and cares about others deeply. As I saw her reaching out to her Joyland kids, serving faithfully in acts2fellowship and loving the co-workers at our work, I just thanked God for changing and shaping her over the years. I can't believe that she's now married and will be moving this week to Austin with Del to help out our church there. I'm inspired by her courage to leave her home of seven years to go to a place that she hasn't even visited yet. As I pass by her empty cubicle, I already miss her. But I am very thankful for all the years I got to know her and excited about what God will do through her life in Austin.

Baby Ryan is Born!

Ryan Park was born to Helen and Ben of Homegroup 3 this past Tuesday! What's he doing in this pic? Is he singing like Ben, or welcoming us like Helen? Or just trying to be funny?

Regardless, we're thankful that Ryan is healthy and that he (and his parents) is doing well.

Announcements for Week of 8/11/08

Hi everyone, here's what's coming up this week and beyond:

Friday (8/15) – Dinner, All-College Bible Study and Fellowship
Time: 6:00pm
Location: Northloop
Please join us for some fun and fellowship after your finals. After dinner and Bible study, we'll play games and watch the Olympics!

Sunday (8/17) - New Time and Location for Service
Time: 1:15pm
Location: Pauley Ballroom
Our service is permanently moving to 1:15pm. But for the next 2 weeks only, we'll be having service on campus at Pauley Ballroom.

Wednesday (8/27) & Friday (8/29) - New Student Welcome Night!!
There's so much excitement in the air as we prepare for these 2 nights! Be sure to invite your friends, especially those who are new students to Cal.

Saturday (8/30) - Extended Gracepoint Monthly
Time: Saturday, 9am-6pm
Location: Golden Gate Baptist Theological Seminary
Cost: $10; Sign up
It's been such a packed summer, with mission trips, the start of our Austin church, new homegroups, discipleship retreats. Whew! Join us for this special time to recount and share all that's happened at our church. Please sign up here so we can plan for the right amount of food. I really hope all of you can make it.

Another Normal Vs., a Gracepoint Berkeley Classic

I've been waiting to get this. The Normal Vs. video about Jin and Yumi, my friends from Homegroup 8, has been posted on their site. I think this is one of the funniest Normal Vs. in recent memory. And when you see Jin and Yumi, say hi and get to know them. They're great people!

New Student Welcome Night for the last 10 Years...

By now you guys have probably seen our awesome trailer for the New Student Welcome Night (NSWN). Every Fall, the NSWN is our biggest event and it's all hands on deck as all of Gracepoint mobilizes to make it happen! As our praise leader, James Kim, reminisced in his latest post on the Gracepoint Berkeley Worship blog about how this year's NSWN will be the 10th one for which he's led the traditionally rocking praise time, I also realized that 10 years ago, the NSWN of my sophomore year was the first time I played the drums for our church. That was at 2050 VLSB, a room that has become for so many of us a place of many indelible memories. It was the first time I'd ever used one of those electronic drumpad thingys you've seen around church, that just don't quite compare to the sound of a real live drum set.

It's been 10 years, 10 New Student Welcome Nights. We've moved on from VLSB; last year we packed Wheeler Auditorium and this year we'll pack Pauley Ballroom. But NSWN never gets old. Each is just as much the exciting adventure the last one was as we get to see how God uniquely works among a new group of eager, wide-eyed students, many who hear the Gospel for the first time at NSWN. Since I'm always on stage or sitting in the front of the room, over the years I've always had a great view of their varied reactions--awe, surprise, amusement, deep thought. I can't wait to see who finds their way to this year's event, can't wait to hear many new stories about how people were impacted by something in the program.

I bang the drums extra hard every NSWN. It's just the right thing to do. And I'll keep playing as long as my arms don’t fall off and I don’t go deaf, although after playing for this past Saturday’s awesome Centrifuge event held by our Element Youth Group, I think my hearing’s life-span got shortened by about 20 years, which means 20 fewer NSWN's I can play for, I guess.

Marathon Man

The talk of the town has been Steve Suh, who ran the SF marathon this past Sunday! He's the man, and the only over-30-year-old at our church who has ever done this. He finished with an official time of 4 hrs, 37 min too, the time it probably takes most of us to run half the distance. :)

Watch as John Chung salutes Steve in this tribute video. Be sure to vote in his poll too, so that we can see future tribute videos to Kenton, John Ko, or John Chung. I think if all 3 of them ran together, that would defy the boundaries of awesomeness.

BTT (Bible Teacher's Training) @ Gracepoint Berkeley

I can't believe its been 3 weeks since I went up to Sierra Lodge for BTT. Time sure flies. It seemed like only last week when we were huddled together late at night as we waited to take off from Northloop. That was a fun drive, getting to know a lot of Abe's class, people like Jon and Allen who just recently got back from Taiwan, and Mark from SF. They are a fun class to hang out with. Each of them are very interesting characters... you'll know what I mean if you spend some time with them. This BTT trip was mostly made up of the younger staff, around 26 of us, so from our home group that included Sheri and myself.

Man our days were so packed, we spent our days preparing bible studies, working on different projects around the house, and of course having a lot of fun! You read that right, we were learning how to prepare bible studies, not just listening to bible studies. That was definitely very different. I've always been the receipient of a message, so to be on the other side and trying to give a bible study was a new feeling. After preparing 3 messages, I'm just much more appreciative of Pastor Ed Kang and Pastor Manny when they give the message on Sundays or during Friday bible study. They spend a lot of time working on the message and a lot is taken into consideration, which we only began to scratch the surface. We gave bible studies to each other, and Pastor Ed will critique us, helping us with our message and showing areas where we need to improve or areas that we did well. I was pleasantly surprised at how good the bible studies were actually. None of us spoke anything heretical, which is good. Who knows, maybe sometime in the near future, one of us will be giving a bible study in our homegroups, applying what we've learned ^_^

We also spent some of the time working on different things that needed done at the house, from building a landing underneath the deck so we can use it to store bins and coolers, building a spiral staircase up to the loft, putting up blinds, etc. I worked on the staircase, along with my other Mech E friend Richard Leung, and some of the other engineers. How many people does it take to put together a spiral staircase? Apparently it takes at least 4-5 Berkeley engineers. Haha. Next time you go up you can see the beautiful work that we did, just don't look too closely. There's something about using machine tools, and working with your hands that makes you feel really awake and alive. We cut wood, used nail guns, etc. It felt good. Maybe its just me... Anyways, we got a lot of work done around the house, everything just keeps getting nicer. I can't wait until we get to build the barn in the coming months, that should be a lot of fun.

And of course, being the Sierras, how can we not go out and enjoy the nature?! We spent some time at Lake Spalding, which is literally 5 minutes away from the house. Its super close, and we brought with us a bunch of kayaks and a paddle boat. Kayaking in the beautiful lake, enjoying the nature...wait, thats not exactly what we did. We actually spent most of the time splashing each other with our paddles and trying to flip people who were too dry over as they got close to shore. Needless to say we all got pretty wet. I don't think anyone got away dry...except maybe Pastor Ed and Kelly Kang, but we'll let them go this time around. Everyone else, from Isaiah and Stephan to the rest of us, we were all pretty drenched afterwards. We also tried out archery back at the house. Shooting a bow accurately is much harder than I thought. For some reason I expected it to be like Legalos or something...but it was definitely not like that. Although some of us at least hit the target, which is pretty good. On our last day, how can we not spend some time playing basketball and volleyball on the new court? We got some bball action going with a bunch of the guys, and then played volleyball when everyone else joined us. We got some good rallies going, and just seeing people do weird things is always fun.

I'm really thankful for the time up at Sierra Lodge, not only did I get to know the rest of the staff more, but I feel like I got to know Pastor Ed and Kelly a lot more. Sometimes we only see them on Sundays, giving a message or leading prayer time, but to just eat with them and learn from them around a table, is quite different and very special. I learned a lot, not only about how to give a bible study, but all that is involved, just the things that are taken into consideration. And being together, working on the house, having fun together, it was just awesome. I can't wait for the next time we get to go up, BTT 2.0! ^_^

Pictures from Gracepoint Austin!

Kevan Ho recently went to Austin for a business trip and got to spend some precious time with Pastor Manny, Sunny, and the others who just moved out there for our Gracepoint-Austin church plant. He took some really heart-warming pictures during his trip. It's so exciting to see what God's doing there—through these images you get to see the first Bible study, first prayer meeting, alot of firsts!

Seeing these made me miss them that much more, but encouraged me to pray hard for them as they strive to be a light to many UT Austin students. Let's pray, partnering with them in the Gospel, and expect great things from God over there!

Taiwan Team is Off!

If you didn't hear, our last mission team for the summer left last night for Taiwan. The team will be holding an English Camp at National Tsinghua Univ. According to Emily of Homegroup 7, who is part of the team, 13 brothers and sisters from Gracepoint Berkeley will be joining 30+ other TAs and teachers from across the States to teach classes on Western Culture & Leadership and build friendships with 200+ incoming freshmen. 10 more helpers will leave Friday to join our Gracepoint Hsinchu team to help out with tons of team-building activities, sports, and games during the camp.

Remember, our own Steve Choi is over there helping out with the camp. And no, for those of you wondering, he has not gained weight despite all the cheap, wonderful Taiwanese delicacies, unless Skype video makes you look smaller. Let's pray for our team!

I'll post a pic of the team later.

How well do you know Gracepoint Berkeley's Pastor?

If you guys don't know Pastor Ed that well, he had quite a colorful--and often difficult--childhood. His latest story on his blog, A Story with Way Too Much Information, is a window into the kind of thin edge between hardship and hilarity that many of his experiences rode on. Check it out, and check back regularly if you want to see the kinds of things that have shaped who Pastor Ed is today.

On a related note pertaining to the creatures featured in his story, I know all about the dangers of them running along the ceiling. My apartment in Japan was home to many a roach (though nowhere near as bad) and it was always exciting to see certain unnamed brothers from our Gracepoint church cower in fear at the sight of one. Once, some people were gathered for Bible study, when a hapless roach lost its footing on the ceiling and fell--right on top of the speaker's head. I'm sure roach and person were equally startled.

Oh and after you're done laughing and squirming at Pastor Ed's story, you'll want a change of pace, so how about something refreshing and cleansing? Check out Kelly Kang's blog. She shares meaningful insights from her devotions and her years of ministry at Gracepoint Fellowship Church.

Forum @ Gracepoint Fellowship Church

Daniel Kim, our resident apologetics expert, has a new site called Gracepoint Forum. It's a place where he'll post apologetics resources as well as a place anyone can ask difficult questions about Christianity. For those of you who were in SET, there's also some very useful notes and additional points pertaining to "The Reason for God."

Monterey Trip

Here's some pictures of our action-packed day in Monterey last Saturday!

DISH-Gracepoint!

If you guys don't know Tom Kim, he's a staff member in acts2fellowship1, but he's also the Chef de Cuisine in many respects when it comes to preparing food for our various gatherings.

Well, he's launched a new food blog: Dish-Gracepoint. Lotsa recipes and instructions on how to prepare cheap yet tasty food for large groups, Gracepoint-style! Plus inside tips on weekly meat specials (Tom knows meat price trends like day traders know the stock market). Thanks Tom for this helpful site! Mmm...today's special is banana bread....

A Gracepoint Classic - Normal Versus

Ok, we're gonna make a sacrifice here. As your homegroup leaders, Hannah and I have made the difficult decision...to show you this video so you can get to know us better. These "Normal Vs." videos have become a staple of wedding and farewell programs at Gracepoint Berkeley. We're lucky to have friends who know us so well. :) Enjoy!

30-Hour Famine 6/28-29

This year Gracepoint Berkeley had the wonderful chance to participate in World Vision's 30-Hour Famine so we could experience a bit of the hunger that's an everyday reality for much of the world and raise money to help fight this problem. In the end, we raised almost $107,000! I'm thankful that people were so zealous and creative in their fundraising efforts, but I think we all realized at the end of this that given how much we have, it was the least we could do to help those mired in hunger and poverty.

We started the day of the fast by driving down to Fremont to see an AIDS in Africa exhibit. Each of us was given an iPod to listen to 1 of 4 stories of an African child as we walked in the child's shoes for a first-person experience of fear, starvation, or being orphaned after seeing one family member after another fall to AIDS. It was a deeply moving experience and I went away praying for those kids, praying for my heart to keep being broken, just like God's heart is.

After that, we teamed with Jin and Yumi's homegroup to serve food at Clinton Village, a convalescent home in Oakland. I was just happy to be all together and do what we could to bring some joy to that place. I thank God for this whole experience. Let's be grateful for all we have and continue looking for ways we can serve those who are needy around us! And hope to see more of us do the Famine next year!

Gracepoint Fellowship Church's iMix

Ever hear a great new song at Gracepoint Berkeley, vow to remember the name of the song or lyrics, only to forget everything afterwards because you're deep in thought mulling over Pastor Ed Kang's message? Don't worry, check out the Gracepoint iMix! With songs from old and upcoming praise sets, so you can stop trying to scribble that song name on your Sunday program. You can subscribe via RSS too. And while you're at it, check out the new Gracepoint Fellowship Church Worship blog.

Steve's in Taiwan

Don't know if y'all know, but Steve Choi is also part of our new group. That's him 3rd from the left in the picture. Steve's in Taiwan, having stayed there after the mission trip. He'll be helping out with our English camp in August, but he's been keeping busy teaching English, doing language exchange, scouting new trip locales for Gracepoint Fellowship Church, Hsinchu, playing in the band and just helping out with whatever needs to be done at church. Let's keep him in our prayers!

Hello World!

Woohoo! I finally got around to getting this site up. I am quite excited about our group and the kinds of memories we'll build together. It's nice to have this summer to get to know each other more before the zaniness of the Fall hits!

Last Friday was just our second homegroup meeting, but we had a great time. Chef Wenjie cooked up a Chinese storm! After we feasted with mirth and gladness, we shared insights from Isaiah 1, then were treated to Wenjie and Sheri as freshmen in Christian Festival. Didn't that inspire you all for the next G-Live?

Thanksgiving Retreat 2008 Trailer