That is a question I have been asked quite often from people in and outside of the ministry. For some reason, sometimes there is an assumption that 29eleven is only for people who are not in a relationship/engaged or they do not need 29eleven anymore because they are in a relationship....that couldn't be further from the truth because I encourage you couples to come and want you couples to come.
I then ask all of us to answer this question in return, "what is the primary purpose of 29eleven?"......If it is to be a buffet where we go to pick from the best foods available because we are hungry, or a speed dating circuit disguised under a little bit of Jesus, or like the old TV show Love Connection where I am the host of the show and I exist to pair people off (I do have some ideas btw :), then you should probably stop coming if you are in a relationship because mission accomplished..... your view of this ministry was skewed and you were here for the wrong reasons...you were seeking first your kingdom not God's Kingdom (Matthew 6) and it appears your kingdom came.
However, if you believe that 29eleven exists:
*To have fellowship with others in the same stage of life and age
*To have a great place where we can be on mission together to bring friends/coworkers and also reach those who need Jesus who show up to events or Bible study and this is a great vehicle (as a couple now) to do all that
*To provide accountability and friends that will challenge us in our walks in becoming more like our Lord and Savior as we strive for purity, unity, and God's direction
*To have people in this group observe, pray for, and help us in our relationships
*To give an avenue to grow in God's word, discernment, truth, and worship him and discuss Him together now as a couple.
If we believe 29eleven exists for those reasons and more, then I believe the question will not be "should I continue coming to 29eleven?", but rather "why would I stop coming here?" because this is about Jesus and now is the time to continue being faithful and hear from God, others who love me, and have this relationship be centered around Him not us..."
In summary everyone, if we feel we do not belong here anymore, we are wrong. If we view this ministry solely or primarily as a means to our marriage desire ends, then the answer to the title question of this blog if we are in a relationship might be NO. However if we see this ministry as a means to grow in Jesus in all areas of our life, then the answer is "of course" because this is a ministry that will help relationships grow the right way, set patterns that the world doesn't revolve around the relationship or stop now that we are in one, and will provide another great avenue to hear and discuss God's word/be on mission together thus building a spiritual climate and relationship centered on God's kingdom coming, not ours...
Sorry gang for the long overdue response to this question I get quite often...I am pro relationships and marriage in 29eleven and am praying God fulfills the natural and expected desire for marriage if you have it so if and when the relationship comes... now you know, 29eleven is for you and wants you so come one, come two, just don't come once you say I do!
Cyrus
Wednesday, April 21, 2010
Monday, March 29, 2010
whose cuisine reigned supreme?.....
Team MEN'S! Yes, knives chopped, sliced and even diced and after a gruelingly intense 1 hour and 15 minute culinary war, the men prevailed in a hard fought and almost evenly matched battle! Both teams displayed amazing ingenuity and expertise with the secret ingredient of pineapple thus serving delectable dishes that satisfied the judges palates and tummys!
Both teams should be extremely proud of their effort for the margin of victory was only 1 point!!! Had the men stuck with their original tropical drink or had the women's succulent appetizer come out on point, things might not have been that close. In the end though, it was a great time! Thank you all for making this so much fun and it was great to see two teams accomplish a difficult task by working so well together under a strenuous time constraint, so again, GREAT work everyone!!!
Until next year's battle,
Iron Chef Salehi
Both teams should be extremely proud of their effort for the margin of victory was only 1 point!!! Had the men stuck with their original tropical drink or had the women's succulent appetizer come out on point, things might not have been that close. In the end though, it was a great time! Thank you all for making this so much fun and it was great to see two teams accomplish a difficult task by working so well together under a strenuous time constraint, so again, GREAT work everyone!!!
Until next year's battle,
Iron Chef Salehi
Tuesday, February 2, 2010
Marty the Airport Angel
I originally posted this on facebook a couple of weeks ago, but it ties in nicely with the recent conversations we've had at Monday night Bible Study about the unseen spiritual world around us, so it seems apt to post it here also. Enjoy!
*********************************************
I recently spent a glorious weekend in Highland Park, NJ, for the wedding of my dear old friend Audrey. Not old because of her age (I'm older by 2 months anyway), but because we met in 6th grade and have a long history of theatre, letter writing, Bonnie Raitt songs, Trivial Pursuit, and water poker that spans almost 20 years now (criminy! Maybe we are old...)
Everything about the event was impeccably Audrey and perfect, from the eclectic assortment of plate and glassware to the music (especially the song she sang to David, her groom, accompanied by Gary, her dad, on the guitar) to the elegantly fun floor length brown gown with pink sash that she wore. It was the weekend that my soul needed - a chance to see Audrey and her family, her wonderful, dear family - the kind of weekend where you don't fully realize how much you miss someone (or a collective group of someones) until you see them again after an absence of too many years.
But I digress. This story is really about Marty, who may or may not be a real person. I'm open to either possibility, for I very much believe in the possibility of entertaining strangers who may very well be angels in disguise.
I'm late pretty much all of the time these days. I'm not really sure why this happens. Usually I have a good handle on where I'm going, how long it will take me to get there and when I need to leave to get there in time. But no matter how hard I try or how early I leave, something invariably happens along the way that makes me late. In FoCo, it's usually getting stopped at every red light between me and my destination or being stopped by a train. Sometimes it's a massive accident on I-25 that causes me to do things like miss my flight to Canada. This last month my excuse is that it's been too cold for my garage door to close and I have to wait and trick it into closing, which is about a 5 minute process. I guess all of these things could be comical, but mainly it's annoying because I hate being late.
But I digress again. Back to Marty.
I left my hotel that morning in New Jersey with plenty of time to spare. I got to the general area of the Newark Airport with plenty of time to spare as well ("plenty" being 15 minutes, which in Robin land is pretty close to excellent.) Here's where it got dicey. Despite Payless Cars' best effort to write out a paragraph of explicit directions back to the Wyndham hotel/rental car drop-off, I managed to continuously miss the exit to get me to the rental car office. Instead, I circled the airport multiple times, shouting a lot of un-Robin like words to no one in particular, except maybe whoever designed the 50,000 exits surrounding EWR.
20 minutes later, at 7:35 AM, I somehow managed to find my way into the hotel/rental car parking lot, dropped off my rental car, hoping that the shuttle would show up quickly to get me to the airport with enough time to print my boarding pass, go through security, and get to my gate in time for my 8:50 AM flight. Did I mention I was needing to do all of this in the Newark Airport? Yeah. That's right. At 7:45 AM, I was still standing in the Wyndham lobby waiting for the airport shuttle. It didn't take long for this normally smart girl from Los Alamos to figure out that this wasn't a good situation.
The still quiet voice of God kept telling me that it would be ok. The extremely loud voice of Robin kept telling me to panic. It's so much easier to listen to the loud voice...
Here's where the miracle begins. I'm in the lobby with an old guy who's on his way to the D.R. We discuss the Haiti earthquake briefly before panicky Robin makes a comment about being extremely late for my flight. There is no one else in the lobby with us except the hotel clerk and a family checking out. He looks at his watch, reminds me that it's 7:45 AM, one hour and 5 minutes before my flight, and basically says, "Good luck with that." Gee, thanks, old guy. I didn't realize I was cutting it that close until you pointed it out to me...
The shuttle shows up. I jump on and anxiously wait for the shuttle driver to get back on so I can demand that he take me to the Continental gate first. That's when Marty gets on. He sits down behind me and quietly says, "What time is your flight and what airline are you on?" He hadn't been in the lobby with us; I had no idea where he had come from, but the tone of his voice made it sound like he was fully aware of my situation somehow.
I tell my sister that she and I seem to carry this aura of vulnerability with us wherever we go. In reality, we are quite strong and can handle quite a bit, but we apparently give off a vibe that makes people want to take care of us (or worry about us.) No matter how old I get or how much I live, this quality doesn't seem to diminish for me, nor does it for her.
I don't know if that's what Marty sensed the minute he saw me or if it's just because he was one of God's invisible army members making himself visible and he knew exactly the situation I was in. But in that split second, I chose to trust him. I told him I was on Continental and my flight was leaving in an hour. He, too, looked at his watch and said, "I work for Continental, I'll get you there the short way."
Seriously? Where did this guy come from? And, God, remind me to trust you more than I do.
After the longest 5 minute shuttle ride of my life, we get to the Newark. I let Marty off first because I'm still not convinced he's for real. He gets off and waits for me and offers to carry my bags. I don't let my trust go that far...
As we walk inside, I ask him what he does. He says he's a captain but today he's not flying, just doing something else in the airport (he was wearing jeans and a jacket and looked nothing like a captain.) He starts telling me about his wife and how he always worries about her when she travels alone in EWR because she runs late and security lines are always long. Sounds like someone I know...
He guides me to a kiosk where there are no people, helps me print my boarding pass and then takes me through the employee only line at security. The normal security line was already a long one - it would have taken me 30 minutes to get through it if I had been on my own. By now it was 8:06 AM. There's no way I would have made it on my flight without Marty. He walked up to the front of the line, showed his badge, and said, "This is my friend, Robin. She's traveling with me today." The TSA lady let me right on through and we had priority going through the security screening area. Marty pointed me in the direction of my gate and promptly disappeared completely in between me putting my shoes back on and taking my bags off of the conveyor belt. This is why I suspect that he wasn't really a human, but probably an angel. Who knows, though.
I walked the length of my gate (which took 10 minutes since it was the furthest gate from security) smiling the whole way, amazed yet again at how God can pull my life out of the tank for no reason other than that He loves me. I got to my gate at 8:17, just as it started boarding. There's no way that would have happened without Marty.
Really, Marty is a picture of Christ, and a reminder of why I need a savior. When it comes to God's holiness, we're all running late. He's a busy airport where the security lines are too long and the gate is too far away from security to get there on time by ourselves no matter how hard we try and no matter how good our intentions are. That's why we need Jesus, the one who comes from behind, guides us to where we need to be and says to the One in charge, "She's with me. Let her through." And the One in charge listens and let's us pass.
Thank you, God, for that wonderful NJ weekend, the timeliness of needing to be away to work through some things in my heart, and for giving me Marty to remind me of who you are and that you came here to save me, not because I asked you to, but because you chose to.
~RAC
*********************************************
I recently spent a glorious weekend in Highland Park, NJ, for the wedding of my dear old friend Audrey. Not old because of her age (I'm older by 2 months anyway), but because we met in 6th grade and have a long history of theatre, letter writing, Bonnie Raitt songs, Trivial Pursuit, and water poker that spans almost 20 years now (criminy! Maybe we are old...)
Everything about the event was impeccably Audrey and perfect, from the eclectic assortment of plate and glassware to the music (especially the song she sang to David, her groom, accompanied by Gary, her dad, on the guitar) to the elegantly fun floor length brown gown with pink sash that she wore. It was the weekend that my soul needed - a chance to see Audrey and her family, her wonderful, dear family - the kind of weekend where you don't fully realize how much you miss someone (or a collective group of someones) until you see them again after an absence of too many years.
But I digress. This story is really about Marty, who may or may not be a real person. I'm open to either possibility, for I very much believe in the possibility of entertaining strangers who may very well be angels in disguise.
I'm late pretty much all of the time these days. I'm not really sure why this happens. Usually I have a good handle on where I'm going, how long it will take me to get there and when I need to leave to get there in time. But no matter how hard I try or how early I leave, something invariably happens along the way that makes me late. In FoCo, it's usually getting stopped at every red light between me and my destination or being stopped by a train. Sometimes it's a massive accident on I-25 that causes me to do things like miss my flight to Canada. This last month my excuse is that it's been too cold for my garage door to close and I have to wait and trick it into closing, which is about a 5 minute process. I guess all of these things could be comical, but mainly it's annoying because I hate being late.
But I digress again. Back to Marty.
I left my hotel that morning in New Jersey with plenty of time to spare. I got to the general area of the Newark Airport with plenty of time to spare as well ("plenty" being 15 minutes, which in Robin land is pretty close to excellent.) Here's where it got dicey. Despite Payless Cars' best effort to write out a paragraph of explicit directions back to the Wyndham hotel/rental car drop-off, I managed to continuously miss the exit to get me to the rental car office. Instead, I circled the airport multiple times, shouting a lot of un-Robin like words to no one in particular, except maybe whoever designed the 50,000 exits surrounding EWR.
20 minutes later, at 7:35 AM, I somehow managed to find my way into the hotel/rental car parking lot, dropped off my rental car, hoping that the shuttle would show up quickly to get me to the airport with enough time to print my boarding pass, go through security, and get to my gate in time for my 8:50 AM flight. Did I mention I was needing to do all of this in the Newark Airport? Yeah. That's right. At 7:45 AM, I was still standing in the Wyndham lobby waiting for the airport shuttle. It didn't take long for this normally smart girl from Los Alamos to figure out that this wasn't a good situation.
The still quiet voice of God kept telling me that it would be ok. The extremely loud voice of Robin kept telling me to panic. It's so much easier to listen to the loud voice...
Here's where the miracle begins. I'm in the lobby with an old guy who's on his way to the D.R. We discuss the Haiti earthquake briefly before panicky Robin makes a comment about being extremely late for my flight. There is no one else in the lobby with us except the hotel clerk and a family checking out. He looks at his watch, reminds me that it's 7:45 AM, one hour and 5 minutes before my flight, and basically says, "Good luck with that." Gee, thanks, old guy. I didn't realize I was cutting it that close until you pointed it out to me...
The shuttle shows up. I jump on and anxiously wait for the shuttle driver to get back on so I can demand that he take me to the Continental gate first. That's when Marty gets on. He sits down behind me and quietly says, "What time is your flight and what airline are you on?" He hadn't been in the lobby with us; I had no idea where he had come from, but the tone of his voice made it sound like he was fully aware of my situation somehow.
I tell my sister that she and I seem to carry this aura of vulnerability with us wherever we go. In reality, we are quite strong and can handle quite a bit, but we apparently give off a vibe that makes people want to take care of us (or worry about us.) No matter how old I get or how much I live, this quality doesn't seem to diminish for me, nor does it for her.
I don't know if that's what Marty sensed the minute he saw me or if it's just because he was one of God's invisible army members making himself visible and he knew exactly the situation I was in. But in that split second, I chose to trust him. I told him I was on Continental and my flight was leaving in an hour. He, too, looked at his watch and said, "I work for Continental, I'll get you there the short way."
Seriously? Where did this guy come from? And, God, remind me to trust you more than I do.
After the longest 5 minute shuttle ride of my life, we get to the Newark. I let Marty off first because I'm still not convinced he's for real. He gets off and waits for me and offers to carry my bags. I don't let my trust go that far...
As we walk inside, I ask him what he does. He says he's a captain but today he's not flying, just doing something else in the airport (he was wearing jeans and a jacket and looked nothing like a captain.) He starts telling me about his wife and how he always worries about her when she travels alone in EWR because she runs late and security lines are always long. Sounds like someone I know...
He guides me to a kiosk where there are no people, helps me print my boarding pass and then takes me through the employee only line at security. The normal security line was already a long one - it would have taken me 30 minutes to get through it if I had been on my own. By now it was 8:06 AM. There's no way I would have made it on my flight without Marty. He walked up to the front of the line, showed his badge, and said, "This is my friend, Robin. She's traveling with me today." The TSA lady let me right on through and we had priority going through the security screening area. Marty pointed me in the direction of my gate and promptly disappeared completely in between me putting my shoes back on and taking my bags off of the conveyor belt. This is why I suspect that he wasn't really a human, but probably an angel. Who knows, though.
I walked the length of my gate (which took 10 minutes since it was the furthest gate from security) smiling the whole way, amazed yet again at how God can pull my life out of the tank for no reason other than that He loves me. I got to my gate at 8:17, just as it started boarding. There's no way that would have happened without Marty.
Really, Marty is a picture of Christ, and a reminder of why I need a savior. When it comes to God's holiness, we're all running late. He's a busy airport where the security lines are too long and the gate is too far away from security to get there on time by ourselves no matter how hard we try and no matter how good our intentions are. That's why we need Jesus, the one who comes from behind, guides us to where we need to be and says to the One in charge, "She's with me. Let her through." And the One in charge listens and let's us pass.
Thank you, God, for that wonderful NJ weekend, the timeliness of needing to be away to work through some things in my heart, and for giving me Marty to remind me of who you are and that you came here to save me, not because I asked you to, but because you chose to.
~RAC
Monday, January 25, 2010
Preparing for Battle!
I remember the scene in the beginning of Rambo (yes Rambo people...do not knock American iconic movies of the 80's) when the one man annihilation machine, John Rambo, was getting ready to be inserted into the jungles of Vietnam to rescue fellow P.O.W's and they show good ole J.R. putting face paint on, getting decked out in his fatigues, strapping on his 4 foot survival knife, grabbing his assault rifles, grenades, and anything else he could get his rugged hands on that would go boom....it was a great scene that was to portray to us that a war was coming and our hero Rambo was gearing up for up.
Too many of us Christians, in my opinion, fail to see our lives like John Rambo did. He had a purpose and mission and that mission was to go to war with the enemy so he could save lives. He knew bullets would fly and opposition would be consistent and fierce so he prepared for it because lives were at stake. We, those who are followers/soldiers of Christ, need to understand we are in a battle every day and it isn't of flesh and blood but as we learned at Bible study, a battle of a spiritual nature against Satan, demons, and wicked forces that are looking to devour, derail, and defeat us daily!
It is our responsibility as servants of Christ to put on the full armor of God so we can stand firm in the faith and withstand the devil as Paul states in Ephesians 6. I want to implore all of us to realize that souls are lost in Fort Collins and we have a job to do as ambassadors of Christ armed with a message of hope and reconciliation to fight the good fight and take this message into every sphere of influence we have!
Come join us Monday nights as we discuss spiritual warfare, Satan and his schemes, demons and their powers, and how to put on this armor of God to fight the good fight....
Cyrus
Too many of us Christians, in my opinion, fail to see our lives like John Rambo did. He had a purpose and mission and that mission was to go to war with the enemy so he could save lives. He knew bullets would fly and opposition would be consistent and fierce so he prepared for it because lives were at stake. We, those who are followers/soldiers of Christ, need to understand we are in a battle every day and it isn't of flesh and blood but as we learned at Bible study, a battle of a spiritual nature against Satan, demons, and wicked forces that are looking to devour, derail, and defeat us daily!
It is our responsibility as servants of Christ to put on the full armor of God so we can stand firm in the faith and withstand the devil as Paul states in Ephesians 6. I want to implore all of us to realize that souls are lost in Fort Collins and we have a job to do as ambassadors of Christ armed with a message of hope and reconciliation to fight the good fight and take this message into every sphere of influence we have!
Come join us Monday nights as we discuss spiritual warfare, Satan and his schemes, demons and their powers, and how to put on this armor of God to fight the good fight....
Cyrus
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