Snow Trips, GTS, and GLive practice!

Here's the news for this week:

Snow trip this Saturday! For the freshmen, it's an All-Freshmen Snow Trip to Sierra Lodge across all of Koinonia, Kairos, and a2f. Sign up online. You'll be out all day, from 8 am to 8 pm.

The upperclassmen, not to be outdone, are going on a snow trip of our own. It'll just be Koinonia, sophomores through seniors, and we'll hit the slopes at Soda Springs, home of killer sled runs and lots of fresh snow to give your friend a mid-semester present. Sign up online so we can figure out rides and food.

Our GTS (Gracepoint Training School) starts tomorrow, Friday (2/20) at 7 pm, First Pres. We'll be all together across the different fellowship groups for announcements and a time of music and praise. Then we'll split up into the different classes: Course 101, SK1, Church 101, the Gospels, and more. If you haven't signed up, don't worry: just come and we'll figure it out when you get there. But if you're taking Course 101 (or 101x), you have homework due tomorrow!

Oh, and before GTS, H.1 and H.8 will eat dinner together at Chang Luong at 5:30 pm. If you can make it, come join us.

After GTS, there's GLive practice! Oh my gosh, only 6 weeks to go! Anyway, we'll be introducing the different skits tomorrow, and start practice... can you believe it? There's been scores of people working on the scripts, and I know of a group of brothers who drove down from our Davis Waypoint Church to be here all week to help write GLive scripts. One difference this year is we're asking you if you'd like to participate, please sign up online for GLive. It'll help the different skit directors plan for roles and make sure you have a speaking part and get on stage.

That's pretty much it for now... and here's a video from this past weekend's Valentine's Day of Compassion visit to Hilton House, Oakland. Thought it'd be nice to see for those of you who missed it. If any of you who went with us want to comment on your experience, please do!


H.1 Valentine's Day of Compassion 2009 from kevan on Vimeo.

It's a Gracepoint tradition that on Valentine's Day, we buck the societal trend that celebrates Love with flowers, roses, and romance. We believe love is a lot more than that, and so our homegroup joined with many others to spread out across the Bay Area to spend Valentine's Day with those who could use our company, love, and presence to be with them on this day.

Snow Trip & Valentine's Day Wrap-up

Upcoming Saturday (2/21), it's AWESOME day. Yes, it's a different sort of name, I know, but just wanted to share that with you. Why is it Awesome day? It's because we're having an all-Freshman Snow Trip! Romp around in the snow, get your friends, practice your aim and see how fast (and accurate) you can throw a snowball at moving targets (AKA other freshmen). Plus the sledding and snowman building. It's Awesome day. Sign up online now! And you can start prepping by doing your work and setting aside all day Saturday, from early morning to late at night, and getting your snow gear in order. The freshmen will head up to the Sierras where it's been snowing all week and have the first (of many) fun bonding times as a class. Don't forget to sign up to reserve a spot in a car and some food!

The rest of us (meaning the sophomores and juniors) are headed for a day trip to Stinson Beach, where we'll barbecue, walk along the coastline, frisbee, football, and enjoy some time away from Berkeley. Sign up online for our Stinson Beach trip so we can plan for food and rides.

In other news, this past weekend was really great. We had a chance to celebrate Valentine's Day together as a group with the rest of our church. We decided to break the cultural norm of the Hallmark'd over-commercialized roses, teddy bears, and chocolates holiday. That's not love! Love is God's love, and we sought to express it by going to convalescent homes and shelters throughout the Bay Area on this day when "Love" is celebrated. Love isn't mere romance, it's more than that.

So homegroup 1 went to Hilton House in downtown Oakland and spent time with the 16 residents there. While there, we sang a couple songs for them (Amazing Love, Your Love is Deep, and Zephaniah 3:17). Eddie gave a message sharing what God's love is really about, and even used a couple glasses of water and red food coloring to bring his point home. We finished out our time by singing some more, and working on a gift we had prepared for each of the residents: a picture frame with the words from Zephaniah 3:17,

The LORD your God is with you,
he is mighty to save.
He will take great delight in you,
he will quiet you with his love,
he will rejoice over you with singing.

It was stirring for all of us to be there, and I think most of us would agree that we received more than we gave. It was a chance to hear their stories, spend time with them, and give them the dignity of being God's sons and daughters. There's plenty of pictures online, so make sure you check it out on the Flickr site.

After we left Hilton House, we went to Oakland Chinatown, ate some yummy dimsum, and then went to a plaza to grab boba and other sweets and pastries. Later in the evening, the girls had their Valentine's party, and the guys ate some In-N-Out and then made a ruckus at the local gym playing volleyball and basketball.

In the News....

It's the third week already! Here's a couple highlights of things that are happening!

* Dr. Craig Hazen, Professor of Comparative Religions and Apologetics from Biola, is joining us this Friday, 2/6 @ 7pm, 155 Dwinelle to discuss Christianity in a World of Religions.

* There's also an all day training session on Saturday w/ Dr. Hazen. If you're interested, you can sign up online. Cost is $10, and it'll go 10am to 4pm @ Willard Middle School Auditorium.

* This semester, there'll be Friday night Courses in lieu of big group bible study, including Course 101, Survival Kit 1, Church 101, the Gospels, and more. Sign up online by 2/8. There's also plenty of information about what classes are offered, a description of each, and a list of prerequisites and requirements. Take a look.

* GLive practices are going to start soon! Watch out.

* Gracepoint's Sunday Service schedule has changed! We start Prayer Meeting at 10:00am, and Worship Service starts at 11:15am. Dorm pickups are only available for Foothill, Stern, and Bowles from 9:20-9:40am. There'll be lunch after service each week.

* Allen's posted some good info about our Valentine's Day of Compassion activity, which is coming up soon. Check it out and sign up!

* Pictures from Winter Retreat are also online...

Valentine's Day of Compassion

A wonderful annual tradition started a few years ago when our sisters decided that they would no longer conform to the pattern of this world by buying in to the romantic views perpetuated by Valentine's Day. Instead, they turned an ordinarily lonely day into a Day of Compassion by visiting homeless shelters and convalescent homes throughout the Bay Area, spreading God's love and sharing His compassion with others in need.

This year on Valentine's day (Sat., Feb. 14), we're planning to visit the Center for Elders Independence in downtown Oakland in the morning/early afternoon, and here's a chance for you to get involved! We hope to do similar things as we've done in the past, such as singing, giving a short message, doing arts and crafts, and simply spending time talking to the elderly. You never know what kind of impact young college students can have in the lives of those who may be ignored or forgotten on this day.

Here's a video of what it looked like a few years ago, and here is some sharing from people who have participated in the past.

Please sign up to let us know if you would like to participate in this year's Valentine's Day of Compassion!

News and Thanksgiving Celebration!

This week's news is super-punctuated by Thanksgiving Celebration, which is coming up really quick. But before we get there, let's have at it with this week's news:

• We were originally going to have a Koinonia in-house Thanksgiving Celebration this Friday, but no more! Instead of sending only one Koinonia act to Sunday's Thanksgiving Celebration, we're just going to send all four! That's the biggest change. What does that mean? Read on and find out.


• Koinonia's "This Is Your Life" Bible study on Friday (11/21) begins at 7:00pm @ Lipman Room on the 8th floor of Barrows Hall. Joanna (H.6 Lead) and Dan (H.4 Lead) will tell their personal stories of how they became Christian and committed to follow Jesus. Dinners will be by smallgroups beforehand so ask your smallgroup leader. Afterwards, we'll practice our Thanksgiving Celebration act and get it ready for Sunday's final performance.


• Sunday's (11/23) Gracepoint Worship Service is at 1:30pm @ Kauffman Auditorium in Alameda. Afterwards, we'll have our annual Thanksgiving Celebration right on the gargantuan stage. Each ministry group, from Element to ISM to all the different college groups (including us!), will have stage time to present their act in front of a Thanksgiving crowd of 1000+ people. How exciting!


• After the stage time where laughter and legends are born, H.1 and H.5 will dine together for our own traditional Thanksgiving dinner, complete with turkey, fixings, and everything else. Ya'll will be helping cook too so stay tuned. We're going to cook different dishes by classes.


• This part's really important: We need you to sign up online if you're coming so we can account for rides and food. After all, it'd be really sad if we ran out of food for dinner! Do it right now, just click on the link!

That's it for the news to come, but wanted to briefly talk about the news that's been happening in the last several days. Last Friday, Pastor Manny and Sunny joined us from Koinonia Austin. Pastor Manny gave us a message from the book of Jonah about God's calling for each of our lives. It was so good to see them again, and it's hard to believe that it's only been four months since the first Austin team departed Berkeley!
Saturday's Thanksgiving Retreat was really incredible, as we heard more than 30 personal stories from different brothers and sisters throughout our ministry. Moreover, we Pastor Manny gave an extended report from Austin, and we got a glimpse into what life is like over there.

Also, Prison Fellowship's yearly Christmas program, Angel Tree, is approaching. Our homegroup's been doing it together each of the past couple years. We "adopt" a family with 1-2 kids, children of a parent who's in prison. We buy them the Christmas present they wouldn't otherwise receive, meet the family, and invite them to a Christmas party at NorthLoop. It's been a wonderful experience thus far to touch people's lives, get out of ourselves just a little bit, and serve a community of people who often get lost during the bustle of the Christmas season. If you'd like more information or want to get involved, the H.1 lead on this is Allen, so send him an email.

In other news:

• DT Journals for December-January are available for order. Pre-order online, as usual, for $3. Very helpful if you like being lightweight and mobile! Highly recommended!

H.1 Convalescent Home Visit

On Sunday morning, 14 of us (plus a little half-person) went to the Crown Bay Convalescent Home to spend time with the men and women living there. Richard and Lauren's Praxis homegroup goes each week to Crown Bay convalescent home to spend time with the residents and lead a worship service. H.1 got to join them this past weekend on Sunday morning. We sang a song we had prepared, "How Great Thou Art," listened to Allen give a brief message through 1 John 4 on God's love, gave a potpourri gift to each person, and spent time talking and being with each of the men and women who live at that home. I think we were the ones who walked away most blessed. Here's some words from people who went:

• I was thankful that the people enjoyed the service. I was touched when they sang along with us. I didn't expect to have such an memorable experience. (fr, Mindy C.)


• was touched that many old people show a tremendous thankfulness and passion about life through their smile when seeing Abigail moving around with Jenny. I was also touched when they tried to remember the joys and happiness in their early lives and the peaceful way they present these stories to me. And these stories teach me how rich life can be, and how well a person can enjoy from his journey of life. (fr, David Y.)


• I was thankful God helped me get past my mind block. Going into the convalescent home I felt intimidated to start a conversation with the elderly. Graciously God lessened the age gap and gave me questions and things to talk about. Eventually, one grandma, Joy, was able to brighten up for me and I was glad she was so open to listening and responding to me. I hope to visit her again. (jr, Hannah P.)


• I was thankful for meeting a woman who served God through years of missionary work in China. Her testimony displayed the timelessness and power of the gospel throughout generations. (jr, Madelaine B.)

On Friday, H.1 guys ate at Mike's apartment (barbecue chicken) and the H.1 girls joined with H.5 at Virginia's. At Koinonia's "This Is Your Life," Pastor Ed posed the question: How can we have reliable knowledge about God? How can we know God? He talked about revelation, and how the Bible fits into this picture of God's self-revealing to humanity. It was cool stuff, and the Q&A time afterwards was packed with good questions. Seems like people really like the whole text messaging thing as a question and answer format.

After VLSB, our group went to Dana House. While we were there, we prepped for the upcoming convalescent home visit, ate some brownies and ice cream prepared by our marvelous chefs (David Y. & Kevin D.), and even played some silly Guesstures game. We loved it when Daniel S. kept on pumping his fist in the air, trying to communicate "clench" to the rest of us, and doing nothing except clenching his fist and waving it in the air.