When a Christian Comes to JCF from a Different City

JCF exists to save the lost and make them disciples of Jesus Christ per Jesus’ great commission. I think about 10% of SLO people are involved in churches, but 90% do not. Most churches are focused on that 10%, but JCF focuses on those 90% who are not Christians and who are not attending any church. Most important people in our church are VIPs (people who are not Christians).

It is very difficult to evangelize these days and many churches grow by transfer growth where Christians from other churches join a particular church. I don’t think Jesus had transfer growth in mind when He told us to go make disciples of all nations. We do not invite Christians who are attending other churches to our church.

We are committed to reach out to the VIPs in our city (those 90% who are not Christians). We want to love them and help them to hear the gospel and experience the gospel through the House Church Ministry. When a Christian comes our church (they may have moved to SLO or they are not involved in any church), I want to have a meeting with them. This is where I explain House Church Ministry and how we would like to grow. I ask them to email me their spiritual journey. This is where I want to see a humble and sweet spirit. Another way to test for a humble and sweet spirit is their willingness to obey the following 3 things.

1. Join a house church right away and faithfully attend the house church.

2. They are to take the membership class and become a JCF member within first year.

3. They are to take the Living Life Bible study within the first 3 years as we offer this class once every year.

After the person is presented with these policies, if they say they would love to do all three, then we will accept them. They may take more time to fulfill the requirements due to their work schedule, but that will be fine if they are sincerely making their progress towards completing them. If they refuse to do all three, then we will respectfully ask them to look for another church.

Please remember this policy and uphold them. We want to grow by helping non-Christians to become Christians and helping to become a disciple making disciples. We want this to be our DNA. We have not done this well and we need to grow in this area. This is something new for us to implement and I thank you for your understanding and cooperation. It is not easy to build a church, but Jesus told us that He will build His church and it is well worth it. In the future, when we look back, you will be glad that you were a part of JCF as God is working in our midst to accomplish the great commission.

Your pastor,

pastor young su (PYS)

Spirit of God

As I have been a Christian for more than 30 years, the subject of “Spirit of God” has brought many confusions and misunderstanding for me and our people. As I have been learning and teaching about the Spirit of God as I preach through a book of the Bible, this subject does get addressed.

From the beginning, the Spirit of God was highly active as the Spirit of God was hovering over the waters (Genesis 1:2). At Jesus’ baptism the Holy Spirit descended upon Jesus in a bodily form as a dove signifying that Jesus was going to be sacrifice like a dove as Holy Spirit points us to Jesus Christ not Himself.

We must read and re-read John 14 through 16 to correctly understand the function of the Holy Spirit. Jesus taught us what the Holy Spirit will do. This is not whatever the Spirit wants to do, but Jesus taught us very clearly what the Spirit will do. Scripture must give us the understanding of the Holy Spirit. Yes there are different theologies (e.g. cessationism vs. continuationism), but we must be grounded in the Scripture and not deviate from it.

Spirit of God is so crucial for Christians. In fact, if you don’t have the Spirit of Christ, you don’t belong to Christ (Romans 8:9). Per Acts 1:8, Spirit gives us the power to be Jesus’ witness in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth. We operate by the Spirit empowering us to do God’s will being Jesus’ witnesses all over the world. He overcomes all of our short comings to accomplish His will and bear the fruit of the Spirit so that we can be more like Jesus Christ.

Spirit of God is God the Spirit. He is the third person in Trinity. We are living in the age of the Spirit where He dwells in every born-again Christians to accomplish the great commission. He helps us focus on Jesus, reminds us of Jesus, teaches us about Jesus, reminds us sin to repent, and draw near to God to receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need.

We need the Spirit of God. We thank God for the Spirit living inside of us. We rely on the Spirit to guide us to all truth (Jesus). We desire for Jesus’ work to be done in us and through us. We want God to receive maximum glory from us as the Spirit of God works in us.

pastor young su (PYS)

House Church Ministry

Jesus said in Matthew 16 that He will build His church and the gates of hades will not overcome it and we see the church forming in the books of Acts as Holy Spirit came down on Pentecost. We see the glimpse of various aspects of church in the letters (New Testament letters). We see the description of the church and we can learn so much from the description. We must go back to the New Testament and learn how we must do church.

House Church ministry attempts to restore the New Testament church and there are many in South Korea and North America who are in our network that are doing House Church ministry. We have regular gatherings (monthly zoom) and pastors get together every 6 months to learn, share, and get encouraged.

JCF have been doing House Church ministry since 2014 and we have had a wonderful opportunity to go to Fresno and share what we know with a church there. It was part of their revival weekend, and their leaders and members were challenged and encouraged as we have prayed for.

One emphasis of House Church ministry is to make disciples of all nation. We want non-Christians to become Christians and be a disciple making disciple of Jesus Christ. We want the entire church to engage in this and do this. Most churches the staff (paid staff) do this, but most lay people are not engaged, but we want 100% of Christians to be involved in disciple making ministry (i.e. saving the lost and developing them to be disciple making disciples). Each of the house churches are led by a lay-leader and they are not helping the pastor, but they own this ministry (this is their ministry)

JCF has helped several other churches in California and Lord willing, we will continue to function as a resource church for those who are doing House Church ministry. There are many challenges and difficulties, but as Jesus has promised us that He will build His church and gates of hades will not overcome it, we trust and follow Him to do exact thing He has said for His power, honor, and glory.

JCF will obey the great commission through the church (house churches)!