Sunday, April 11, 2010
Website under construction
Hey everyone. I just wanted to let you know that we will no longer be updating this blog. Please check out our new website at www.pareacommunity.org. We will be updating the blog there and you will be able to learn more about Parea and who we are. We will also be creating photo albums and lots of other fun stuff. We are very excited about our new website!
Sunday, March 28, 2010
Website in the works!
Hey everybody! We have been taking some first steps in creating a new Website for Parea. We are very excited about this whole process. From now on, you can access our blog by simply typing in pareacommunity.org in your URL box. Stay tuned!
Monday, February 8, 2010
C.J. & Tisha's Visit to Eva Dell Park in CA
C.J. and I were are able to come down to CA to visit family & friends for a belated Christmas in mid January. In this time they were able to stop by Eva Dell Park (where Parea Community gathers every Saturday to hang out with friends) and see some old friends. It was such a joy to be able to reconnect with friends that we have know for so long. We hung out and bbqed hot dogs and caught up on what had been going on in each others lives. -Tisha (Group Photographs by David C., other photographs by Tisha Speelman)
Monday, December 7, 2009
Cold Days, New Days!
It's been a few months since we have updated the blog, partly because of this busy season encapsulating us in its grips. As the seasons turn and the cold Northwest winter sets in, we have a lot to be thankful for and a whole lot of exciting things to share with you!
We have been living with some amazing folks in community the last few months. Cory and Shelby are beautiful people who have incredibly hearts for God and serving people. We recently went through a season of fasting and prayer to gauge our commitments to each other and to our community. We really felt a strong sense from God that this time of living together was coming to its end. As happens often in community, we are having to say goodbye to some dear friends. Fortunately, they are staying in Portland and we will be staying connected with them! Tisha and I are remaining in our apartment complex but moving into a smaller apartment. We will take the next couple of months to take some time to deepen our relationship and to process all the things we have learned up to this point about our Northeast Portland neighborhood and living in community with other believers. We are strongly committed to two other ministries in our area and will continue to live and grow with them as well.
I would like to share a few things with you about those ministries!
HomePDX as you may know from other posts, is a close-knit community of people who live outside and inside. It has been a true blessing to be able to continue to build and form relationships with some of these amazing folks. We have learned so much about community and how to truly love each other from everyone at Home. It's very rare to be able to be yourself and still be accepted by a diverse group of people, and that is what we have found in this community! One of the most amazing facets of Home is that we are learning to love people with a love that transcends all boundaries... The kind of love that Jesus showed to prostitutes and lepers. As we are continually transformed by Christ, we give Him more and more of ourselves and it is only through that grace and love that we are able to love so extravagantly. It starts with sacrificing our own selfish boundaries that we are afraid to even let Christ into. What is the limit that you have set in your life for Christ to work in?
We have continued to grow with Bread&Wine over the last couple of months. Tisha and I have been leading a Gospel Community, which is a sort of house church model for doing church. It has been a great journey so far and we are loving every minute of it. We have several Rhythms that we as a church strive to follow. One of them is Generosity. This is a great challenge to many people, partly because of the negativity that the church in America has garnered from scandals and misappropriated funds and partly because we have such a deep connection to our money in an almost idolatrous way. We have been working as a community and church on a new project called the "Redistribution Experiment." This is truly exciting because we are able to redistribute our giving to those in need all around us. We believe that through relationship, we as a body of believers should use our financial resources to build the Kingdom of God in an outwardly focused way. 50 percent of our giving goes towards meeting needs in our neighborhood. We believe that through investing in people's lives through relationship, collectively meeting needs and pushing our personal boundaries that we will accomplish our goals! This is a radical approach towards giving and we hope that it will become a very integral part of our lives.
These are just a few of the exciting things that are going on in our lives! We hope that you will continue to check in on us! Give us a call or email us! We would love to talk to you!
We have been living with some amazing folks in community the last few months. Cory and Shelby are beautiful people who have incredibly hearts for God and serving people. We recently went through a season of fasting and prayer to gauge our commitments to each other and to our community. We really felt a strong sense from God that this time of living together was coming to its end. As happens often in community, we are having to say goodbye to some dear friends. Fortunately, they are staying in Portland and we will be staying connected with them! Tisha and I are remaining in our apartment complex but moving into a smaller apartment. We will take the next couple of months to take some time to deepen our relationship and to process all the things we have learned up to this point about our Northeast Portland neighborhood and living in community with other believers. We are strongly committed to two other ministries in our area and will continue to live and grow with them as well.
I would like to share a few things with you about those ministries!
HomePDX as you may know from other posts, is a close-knit community of people who live outside and inside. It has been a true blessing to be able to continue to build and form relationships with some of these amazing folks. We have learned so much about community and how to truly love each other from everyone at Home. It's very rare to be able to be yourself and still be accepted by a diverse group of people, and that is what we have found in this community! One of the most amazing facets of Home is that we are learning to love people with a love that transcends all boundaries... The kind of love that Jesus showed to prostitutes and lepers. As we are continually transformed by Christ, we give Him more and more of ourselves and it is only through that grace and love that we are able to love so extravagantly. It starts with sacrificing our own selfish boundaries that we are afraid to even let Christ into. What is the limit that you have set in your life for Christ to work in?
We have continued to grow with Bread&Wine over the last couple of months. Tisha and I have been leading a Gospel Community, which is a sort of house church model for doing church. It has been a great journey so far and we are loving every minute of it. We have several Rhythms that we as a church strive to follow. One of them is Generosity. This is a great challenge to many people, partly because of the negativity that the church in America has garnered from scandals and misappropriated funds and partly because we have such a deep connection to our money in an almost idolatrous way. We have been working as a community and church on a new project called the "Redistribution Experiment." This is truly exciting because we are able to redistribute our giving to those in need all around us. We believe that through relationship, we as a body of believers should use our financial resources to build the Kingdom of God in an outwardly focused way. 50 percent of our giving goes towards meeting needs in our neighborhood. We believe that through investing in people's lives through relationship, collectively meeting needs and pushing our personal boundaries that we will accomplish our goals! This is a radical approach towards giving and we hope that it will become a very integral part of our lives.
These are just a few of the exciting things that are going on in our lives! We hope that you will continue to check in on us! Give us a call or email us! We would love to talk to you!
Friday, September 25, 2009
Updates From Portland
As the summer is quickly turning into fall up here in the great Northwest, we are caught off guard by the many blessings that we have received this past few months. I truly regret not updating our blog as much as I would have liked, but at the same time, we have been very busy making important connections and building a firm foundation for our community and neighborhood in Portland. We have been living in our apartment now since April and have adjusted well to living in our amazing neighborhood. I would like to quickly update you on what we have been up too:
HomePDX:
We have been serving some amazing people with this group that we have connected with for the last few months. HomePDX is really a community of people who live indoors and people who live outdoors. We meet under the Hawthorne bridge in downtown Portland and we share a meal, stories and love. It has been such a blessing to be a part of this! We will have more stories to share later.
Bread and Wine:
Bread and Wine is a new church plant here in the Northeast section of Portland, which is the neighborhood we live in. We are based out of three house churches that we affectionately call "Gospel Communities." We have quickly fell in love with all of the people who are involved in this endeavor to spread the Gospel and serve our neighbors. Recently, Tisha and I were asked to lead the third "Gospel Community," and we take it as a great honor to be able to participate at that level. Much of the vision of Bread and Wine aligns with our purpose of moving to Portland and I encourage you to check out the website to get a much better understanding of what Bread and Wine is.
These are just a couple of the ways that God has been using us in Portland. We are so excited to see what will happen in the future and we are working hard to make connections and to simply love people. Please continue to pray for us and check back soon for more updates!
HomePDX:
We have been serving some amazing people with this group that we have connected with for the last few months. HomePDX is really a community of people who live indoors and people who live outdoors. We meet under the Hawthorne bridge in downtown Portland and we share a meal, stories and love. It has been such a blessing to be a part of this! We will have more stories to share later.
Bread and Wine:
Bread and Wine is a new church plant here in the Northeast section of Portland, which is the neighborhood we live in. We are based out of three house churches that we affectionately call "Gospel Communities." We have quickly fell in love with all of the people who are involved in this endeavor to spread the Gospel and serve our neighbors. Recently, Tisha and I were asked to lead the third "Gospel Community," and we take it as a great honor to be able to participate at that level. Much of the vision of Bread and Wine aligns with our purpose of moving to Portland and I encourage you to check out the website to get a much better understanding of what Bread and Wine is.
These are just a couple of the ways that God has been using us in Portland. We are so excited to see what will happen in the future and we are working hard to make connections and to simply love people. Please continue to pray for us and check back soon for more updates!
Wednesday, April 8, 2009
Parea PDX update
Hello! It has been a fascinating couple of months up here in Portland. Tisha and I are loving every minute of our experience here in the Rose City. It seems like everyday we are finding new and exciting opportunities to be involved in what God is doing up here in the Northwest. I would like to take a few minutes of your time to update you on some of the things that are going on.
About a week ago, Cory, Shelby, Tisha and I moved into a low-income housing apartment in NE Portland in what many locals might refer to as a "bad area." If you have spent anytime hanging out with us you will know that our heart is bring seeds of Christ's love into these so-called "bad areas." Our move from the Southeast area to our new home was, in our opinion, Divinely orchestrated. We had been pounding the streets, searching high and low, for a house that would be able to not only house our community but also house any "ministry" related ventures as well. We were looking for the perfect place to base our operations out of if you will. We had a couple of guidelines: the house needed to be in an impoverished and culturally diverse neighborhood and it had to be affordable. We stumbled upon the McCoy Village after almost loosing heart during our month-long search. Not only is this apartment complex in the exact middle of where we wanted to be, we are also surrounded by opportunities to love and nurture precious people in the name of our Lord. What a blessing!
We are in the beginning stages of developing some things that we feel could be very meaningful and beneficial to a lot of folks! Its very important to take slow, intentional steps when trying to become a part of a neighborhood, especially a neighborhood where there has been a lot of oppression and poverty. A lot of people do not trust us, we have to be able to show them love humbly and respectfully in order to be able to truly effective in gaining their trust. It's very exciting to see the connections that we have been beginning to make in the neighborhood just in the last couple of days! Stay tuned...
I (C.J.) also just returned from a trip to Nicaragua where I was able to minister and continue to build relationships with some very incredible people there. You may have heard of my desire to become a coffee farmer and to use a coffee farm to grow the Kingdom of God in various ways, this is one of the main reasons I went on this trip. I was able to search out and see a coffee farm that was for sale just to get a small feel for what the process would be to purchase, own and run a coffee farm in Nicaragua. It was an amazing experience! The team I was a part of literally had amazing adventures the whole time I was there including almost running out of diesel in the middle of no-where to getting in a very bad car accident! God truly protected us the whole time we were there!
We do have a couple of financial needs if you feel God is moving you to give financially. The first need is about $700.00 worth of bike tools. We have already started trying to fix bicycles for kids in the apartment complex. Unfortunately, we did not have the tools or the parts to fix a little girls bike already and we do not want to have to turn away anyone else because that would be very counter-productive. Please consider helping us out with this! Also, we need to start raising money to buy bulk foods like beans and rice that we will be able to use for feeding the hungry.
Thank you so much for taking a little time to read this update! I hope that God richly blesses you!
About a week ago, Cory, Shelby, Tisha and I moved into a low-income housing apartment in NE Portland in what many locals might refer to as a "bad area." If you have spent anytime hanging out with us you will know that our heart is bring seeds of Christ's love into these so-called "bad areas." Our move from the Southeast area to our new home was, in our opinion, Divinely orchestrated. We had been pounding the streets, searching high and low, for a house that would be able to not only house our community but also house any "ministry" related ventures as well. We were looking for the perfect place to base our operations out of if you will. We had a couple of guidelines: the house needed to be in an impoverished and culturally diverse neighborhood and it had to be affordable. We stumbled upon the McCoy Village after almost loosing heart during our month-long search. Not only is this apartment complex in the exact middle of where we wanted to be, we are also surrounded by opportunities to love and nurture precious people in the name of our Lord. What a blessing!
We are in the beginning stages of developing some things that we feel could be very meaningful and beneficial to a lot of folks! Its very important to take slow, intentional steps when trying to become a part of a neighborhood, especially a neighborhood where there has been a lot of oppression and poverty. A lot of people do not trust us, we have to be able to show them love humbly and respectfully in order to be able to truly effective in gaining their trust. It's very exciting to see the connections that we have been beginning to make in the neighborhood just in the last couple of days! Stay tuned...
I (C.J.) also just returned from a trip to Nicaragua where I was able to minister and continue to build relationships with some very incredible people there. You may have heard of my desire to become a coffee farmer and to use a coffee farm to grow the Kingdom of God in various ways, this is one of the main reasons I went on this trip. I was able to search out and see a coffee farm that was for sale just to get a small feel for what the process would be to purchase, own and run a coffee farm in Nicaragua. It was an amazing experience! The team I was a part of literally had amazing adventures the whole time I was there including almost running out of diesel in the middle of no-where to getting in a very bad car accident! God truly protected us the whole time we were there!
We do have a couple of financial needs if you feel God is moving you to give financially. The first need is about $700.00 worth of bike tools. We have already started trying to fix bicycles for kids in the apartment complex. Unfortunately, we did not have the tools or the parts to fix a little girls bike already and we do not want to have to turn away anyone else because that would be very counter-productive. Please consider helping us out with this! Also, we need to start raising money to buy bulk foods like beans and rice that we will be able to use for feeding the hungry.
Thank you so much for taking a little time to read this update! I hope that God richly blesses you!
Friday, February 13, 2009
Our First Week in Portland
Hello all! Greetings from Portland! Tisha and I have had a wonderful and eventful week up here in Portland. Mainly we have been adjusting to life in our new house and building relationships with our housemates! We left for Portland on Monday the 2nd of February. We got here the next day after a long and tiresome journey through California and Oregon. Its almost exactly a 1000 mile trip! My Mom, Dad and little Sister traveled up here with us in a separate vehicle with a bunch of our stuff.
On a ministry note, we have been taking time to plan some of our next moves with our housemates. The folks that are living with us in community will also be sharing that ministry burden with us. They are very experienced with the city itself and have been involved in meeting the needs of the poor and needy for the last couple of years as a YWAM base. We are really very excited to be working with these wonderful people and we know that God will be opening up some incredible doors for us in the very near future! Stay Tuned!
If you would like to get into contact with us... please email us at pareacommunity@gmail.com
Thanks for all the support and prayers!
(This is me in front of our new house!!!)
On a ministry note, we have been taking time to plan some of our next moves with our housemates. The folks that are living with us in community will also be sharing that ministry burden with us. They are very experienced with the city itself and have been involved in meeting the needs of the poor and needy for the last couple of years as a YWAM base. We are really very excited to be working with these wonderful people and we know that God will be opening up some incredible doors for us in the very near future! Stay Tuned!
If you would like to get into contact with us... please email us at pareacommunity@gmail.com
Thanks for all the support and prayers!
(This is me in front of our new house!!!)
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