by Josh Liu

Since LKC has been taking a break for the summer, it’s allowed a blessed time of reflection and planning. I have been incredibly encouraged and challenged while leading this ministry.

Looking back on 2010-2011…

From a ministry coordinator’s perspective, I was immensely challenged in how to minister to children, to parents, and to my staff.

Being the youngest child of three boys in my family, single with no children, and minimal experience with children, I was surprised – to say the least – when asked to serve in the Children’s Ministry as LKC’s ministry coordinator. I was humbled that the leaders of the church would trust me with such a seemingly (and true) high calling of ministering to the next generation. Beyond learning how to prepare for a message and to teach it, I had to learn how to do so for children, many of who have yet to learn how to read. I was challenged to begin thinking like a parent – which is much more complicated than how it sounds. I wrestled with how to serve and encourage the parents of the children. I struggled to learn how to take care of and lead my staff.

Yet God continues to be mightily good. The staff, parents, and even the children have all been so gracious and patient. I was blessed by the general knowledge and conduct of the children. I was humbled by the seeds already planted by their parents. And I was incredibly encouraged to see the staff ministering to and sharing the gospel with the children.

It was an awesome time of challenge, encouragement, and study of the attributes of God.

Looking ahead toward 2011-2012…

I intend to take all that I was challenged by and lessons that I learned from with me to the next year. I am very excited for the new term, and the changes that I plan to make. I am blessed and humbled to continue serving alongside some returning staff. And I am honored with another opportunity to partner with parents in the discipleship of their children.

This year’s theme centers on peacemaking, taken from The Young Peacemaker. We will walk the children through understanding conflict, and how to respond to conflict in a God-honoring manner. The gospel continues to be central. Our vertical offense against and reconciliation with God confronts our horizontal conflicts with each other.

While we are not aiming for mere behavior modification, confronting these behaviors and actions grant opportunities to confronting heart issues of conflict. Imagine for a moment that you have an open wound that refuses to heal. You go see a doctor who takes a quick look at you and concludes that you just need a good band-aid. In reality, you have a flesh-eating infection that will continue to spread unless properly treated. Similarly, actions, words, and thoughts are manifestations of the true problem, rather than the source. If the source is not treated, there is no hope for true change. From Scripture, we know that the source of our problems, our sin, is the heart (Mark 7:20-23). In fact, this is our condition: we have an ill heart, bent against God (Jeremiah 17:9-10). More than that, we are spiritually dead beings who refuse to worship God, yet God acts and saves sinners (Ephesians 2:1; Romans 5:8). God grants those who repent from their sins and believe in Christ a new heart (Ezekiel 36:26). This new heart evidences true believers, true citizens of the kingdom of God (Matthew 5:8). Only then can we live a life that pleases God. Mere good and obedient behavior does not save us; solely Christ’s death and resurrection makes us right and pleasing before God (Ephesians 2:8-9; Philippians 3:4-11).

So then, in our endeavor to make disciples of Christ, to serve the parents in discipling their children in the way of the Lord, we plan to confront the heart through peacemaking this coming year.

by Josh Liu

Lighthouse Kids Club (LKC) is a midweek ministry of Lighthouse Bible Church that serves preschool and elementary school aged children of families both within and outside of LBC. The goal of LKC is to provide a fun, safe environment in which children are taught the truth of God’s Word, and to direct their need for the gospel.

LKC meets almost every Wednesday (exceptions include Flocks weeks, Thanksgiving week, two weeks during the Christmas holiday, and other special occasions) from 6:30pm-8:00pm at the church. Children enjoy a time of worship, Scripture-based & God-centered lesson, snacks, small groups, and games. Depending on the number of children, preschool and elementary school aged children are divided to better minister to and meet the needs of the different age groups. There is a nominal registration fee per child that covers T-shirt, snacks, and teaching/activity supplies costs.

For the 2010-2011 academic school year:

• Our theme is “The Greatness of God” – Join us as we walk through the attributes of God. The ’10/’11 term runs from October 6th to May 25th, meeting at church from 6:30pm-8:00pm. The cost is $30 per child, and $20 per subsequent child of the same family.
• For more information, or to register, contact Josh Liu (liu.joshuac@gmail.com)

by Stephen Rodgers

If you’re looking for a current list of ministry opportunities, please use the PDF linked here.

Editor’s Note: One balancing act with a resource like the Beacon is trying to preserve content historically while keeping it current and relevant at the same time. Sometimes this is fairly straightforward; sometimes it is not.

It’s now been more than 5 years since we originally did our series on ministries here at LBC. Ministries have come and gone; people have come and gone.

Some folks might be interested in what the ministries looked like back in 2010 and 2011. If that’s you, you can find them here.

by Stephen Rodgers

For the last Beacon profile, I explained what the purpose of the Beacon is and what Scripture governs that purpose. I also highlighted the fact that we are fortunate enough to have quite a few visitors from all over the world.

This time, I just wanted to briefly shine the spotlight on a few changes and new features that you may not be aware of.

• First of all, as anyone who visits the site can tell, we recently received a bit of a facelift due to the awesome work of Dan Baker. Up at the top you can see our new logo, which will start appearing on various places around the web. Dan also made a few tweaks to the site, mostly to help make reading the articles a more enjoyable experience.
• Also, you may have noticed that the social media code at the bottom of each post has been replaced. Since Twitter, Facebook, and the rest have made it so easy to post a link, I didn’t see any reason to keep it around. Instead, we have a new “Probably Related Posts” section that tries to find the top five related articles and display them for you. Since we are now over 600 articles strong, I wanted to do something to help you explore, navigate, and benefit from the library. If it’s not working, or if you have any other ideas for what we could do, please feel free to let me know.
• Also, we realize that not everyone is able to consistantly read all the articles. Not everyone at the church has internet access. So we have posted a rather large bulletin board in the foyer in the church that will hold recent articles. Right now the board holds approximately the last two weeks, and the collected editions stored next to it are for entire months. So if you find yourself at church in need of reading material…we’ve got you covered. If you have any suggestions for improvements there, please speak with Stephanie Yu.
• Last but not least, our staff writers continue to churn out quality articles. I especially wanted to highlight the extended series that Garrett’s been doing on Living Theology and Richard did on Communion, and now on Baptism (in progress). And as always, a big thanks goes out to our pastor and elders as well.

In the coming months, we’ve got a couple more surprises in store, but you’ll have to wait and see.

We hope you enjoy it!

Pro Rege

by Kyle Grindley

The web team is working on a few tweaks to the web site. You may have already noticed that we added pictures to the member directory. We have a few other surprises in store over the next few months. We are considering an event bulletin board so members can share activities with each other. We are going to give the main site a face lift, making it easier for visitors and members to find relevant information about the church. We will make it a little more dynamic so it can highlight new sermons, events etc. We are also working on a new media section that will make it easier to access older content. There may be a few other surprises, but they are a little farther away.

If your ministry has specific web needs let us know (web@lighthousebc.com), that’s what we are here for. If you would like to post events, lessons or memory verse songs we would be happy to help, we are even getting better at helping the more we do it. We are also open to suggestions for any features you think would be useful. If web team is something you think you would be interested in let us know. It is a fairly flexible ministry where you take on projects as you have time.

by Suzie Park

My name is Suzie Park, wife to Hwa Park and mother to Kasey, Ethan and a baby to be born in Jan 11′. I’ve been part of the refreshment ministry for 10+ years and I love being in this ministry because food is one of my passions in life. I started serving in the refreshments ministry after I met Hwa in college. I remember the first time that I visited LBC while a freshmen in college the first person that stood out to me was Hwa. At the time, I didn’t know who he was, but he stood out to me because he was serving refreshments at the end of the service and not to mention, but he was wearing the most hideous shirt! I thought it was interesting that a guy was doing refreshments for the church…usually you would think it would be a gal. The refreshments spread was a HUGE platter of Cluck U Chicken and some sides…it looked great! I was thoroughly impressed!

After getting to know Hwa for a while, we ended up dating and while we were dating I started helping out with refreshments. Needless to say I fell in love with BOTH! If there’s one thing you need to know about me, it’s that, I love to eat, I love to cook, and most of all I love to feed people. It’s always a blessing serving the church at various church functions. I love seeing people with happy faces and full bellies! We have a wonderful group of people that LOVE to serve the church and none of it could be done without them. Over the years the refreshments at our church has evolved and changed so much and it’s been amazing to see how God has grown this ministry. This has been a ministry that we have been serving together, with Hwa as the head and we hope for many more years to come.

More recently, with both me and Hwa having a pssion for food we’ve been trying to grow our own food and raise our own chickens for the purpose of eggs and even meat. Everytime Hwa goes out to collect chicken eggs from the chicken coop he says its “mana from heaven”. Its been a challenge to grow vegetables in dry San Diego but we’re learning some things as we go. Its been a blessing sharing what we grow with our Church family and hopefully we can continue this for many years to come. A prayer request will be for the refreshments ministry to serve sacrificially and excellently with the goal of pleasing our Lord Jesus Christ.

If you are interested in joining the team we are always looking for more helpers. Please contact me at suzie4jc@yahoo.com or Hwa at hwapark@yahoo.com if you are interested. Thanks! =)

Chicken Coop

Fresh Eggs

Homegrown Veggies

by Chris Cho

Since the launching of the Photography Ministry, there have been constant pictures of the events documented and updated on SmugMug. Officially launching the ministry enabled more professional task handling, which in turn resulted in vast improvements of the event coverage and the photo quality. Thankfully, new members have joined the team: Andrew Lin and Christina Chon who help out eagerly on many events. Because of the departure of the San Jose team, the Photography Ministry decreased in number; however, it won’t be affecting the quality of the photos due to the improvement of the photo-taking skills of the team.

There have been concerns about the selection of the photos uploaded on the website. It is inevitable that the photos might not be the most pleasing to the one whose photos are taken. If anyone is offended by the photos on SmugMug, it is crucial to let the team know as soon as possible; it is likely for others to feel the same way about certain photos. There is a strict self-examination among the team members before uploading the photos online. We first focus on what glorifies God the most through these photos while protecting the reputation of the church and members, especially our elders. But it can be difficult to define something being “fun” from something being “offensive”. The last thing the team wants is stumbling the church members due to the photos taken from the events. Communication between the photographers and members are very important. We as a team want you to feel comfortable when the photos are taken. So please talk to us and “smile” when there is a camera pointing at you.

I thought this would be a great time to introduce some of the team members as photographers, and I would like to highlight some of the distinctive styles of the team members. First, I like to introduce the most active yet former member of the team, James Lim. As a professional part-time wedding photographer, James has encouraged the members of the team to take the ministry more seriously. He challenged many of the team members to seek the ways to improve the photo quality while not losing focus on why we are serving in the ministry. He is the most influential member at criticizing the photos and make suggestions to improve the quality. His strong point as a photographer is that he can frame the photos that convey a unique perspective not found from other team members. His distinctive style enables viewers to distinguish his photos from the rest of the members’. He mainly serves in the video ministry these days but he always helps the photography ministry members by giving advice.

Courtney Chow, who is a member of San Jose church plant team, has left the team; however, her unique style is worthy of being mentioned. Her style as a photographer is very different from the rest of the members due to her use of bright natural light to highlight the object (in photography jargon, over-exposed). Her photos, therefore, convey the style popularly used in wedding photography. Her photos are also easy for the viewers to distinguish from the rest of the members.

Last but not least, Chris Cho, myself (hopefully you may not feel uncomfortable referring myself in third person), is a photographer who fell in love with heavy photo processing that shows neither blemishes nor imperfections in the photos. However, this can be skipped occasionally when he is busy with other stuff while the deadline for uploading photos has passed. Then the most natural and almost non-post-processed photos can be seen on SmugMug. He is not very photogenic, which results in him avoiding cameras while asking people to smile in front of his camera. His photos can be easily identified because of his use of vintage style filters on pretty much all of his photos uploaded on SmugMug.

There are many more members who are not mentioned in this update faithfully serve in the ministry to glorify God. They are precious gifts from God. They serve the body and carry out the Great Commission. On the next update, the styles of the others members will be mentioned.

Our goal as a team is to serve the body of Christ faithfully while using our passion for photography to benefit the church. Our focus is on Christ and carrying out the MVP of our church. One request from the photography ministry to the church members is to get to know the photographers in the church. It is natural for photographers to take pictures of people whom they are comfortable with. This results in absence of many members in the event photos despite their participation. So please talk to the photographers and they will appreciate it very much.

Editor’s Note: In case you missed it earlier in the article, you can check out all the LBC photos on the SmugMug page.

by Lillian To

Fireflies is always changing! Every week our staff is rotating, the infants and toddlers are increasing in number; they grow in height and weight and at the end of each month before we switch out our Sunday school lesson the toddlers have developed a further understanding of God’s character.

This week, Fireflies, wanted to take some time to specifically highlight a few more of those significant changes in the life of the Fireflies ministry.

Nursery 1 (0-18 months)

We have been noticing the growing population on this side of Fireflies. And we can only anticipate even more growth as God continues to multiply the families in our church. To help accommodate some of those needs, Fireflies has purchased two new pack and plays with bassinets. This is for our infants so they can sleep while they are in Fireflies.

Nursery 2 (18-36 months)

During the month of June, we saw three of our Fireflies promoted into Sparklers (preschool ministry). This is always a significant time in the life of the child as he or she matures both physically and spiritually. We hope and pray that the seeds sown during Fireflies have fallen on good soil and that we will see these young ones come to know Christ as Lord and Savior!

Curriculum

For the summer months, the truth lessons and memory verses that have and will be covered are:

A project that we wanted to share with you is our MEMORY VERSE project. We’ve found that integrating music has been helpful in bible verse memorization. While we teach the reason for why we memorize scripture – I have stored up your word in my heart, that I might not sin against you (Psalm 119:11) – and explain and illustrate each verse, we’ve also taught them the verse by singing it.

The Fireflies staff recently began work on making recordings of these verses and placed them online. Currently we have two of the verses online. This project is still in the works and we wanted to share that progress with you (Fireflies Media). We hope you enjoy it and can memorize God’s word with us too!

Staff

Lastly, our staff has been going through a lot of changes. This past year, the staff had been the biggest it has ever been at a little more than 35. However, in the months of May, June and July, we saw many of these ladies transition out as they moved home, started grad school, family transitions, or went on the church plant. Yet through it all we can only testify of God’s faithfulness as he continued to provide more staff to serve in Fireflies. We are excited for our newest staff and welcome them!!!

Although we are sad to see our former staff members leave, we can only anticipate how God will use each of them whether it is in a different region of California, Hawaii, across the country or on the church plant team; we know that God is with them wherever they go. Perhaps something we’ll hear in the coming months will be the start of another Fireflies ministry at LBCSJ!

With all the changes going on here in Fireflies, our personal lives, and in the life of our church, let us be reminded there is one thing that remains the same: Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever. (Hebrews 13:8). Let’s find refuge in that truth! Praise God!

by Min Kim

One of the duties of the Ushering Ministry is collecting white slips. It’s the little white slip of paper found in your program (or maybe you dropped it on the way into the sanctuary). The ushers collect the white slips and then I gather them and email the information out to the elders. Anyone may use the white slips to inform the church of changes in address, email, or contact information. On the front of the white slips, you can also indicate what affinity group you belong to, whether you’d like to be added to the weekly email list, want to apply for membership, or if you received Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior today. There is also a question you can answer (every week if you wanted to), “If you were to die today, do you know for certain that you would go to heaven?” Y/N. The white slips have changed a little over the years. There is now box for Youth! Maybe one day we’ll have one for Sonlight? Sparklers? I do remember years ago when there was another box, “Would you like a pastoral call?” I used that one from time to time. But that was when the Church was a lot smaller and the pastor was able to visit every home in a week’s time.

On the back of the white slips, you can write down your prayer requests or comments. If it is of a more sensitive and personal nature, then there is a box for you to check off Leadership Staff Only. This means that only the elders and I will see the white slips. If the box is not checked off, then that means that the faithful prayer warriors will pray for you Sunday mornings before Church service begins. The elders will pray for you and I will pray for you as well. Lately, I’ve had the prayer list open on my computer and pray over them through out the week.

One may think that this is an easy and simple job and even an encouraging one at that. But there have been times when it has been difficult. You may wonder how just relaying information can be difficult. I have been collecting, reading, and emailing white slips to the elders for over ten years now. And let me tell you, I have been immensely encouraged by the questions and comments, but there have been times when I have been discouraged by them as well. There have been some strange ones too. I will not say more here because of the sensitive and personal nature of the questions and prayer requests.

I do have a request however. Please write legibly. There have been many times when I could not for the life of me read what it says. So if you have not been getting weekly emails or have not been contacted by the Church, then there might be a reason: I cannot read your writing. Sorry. And lastly, please use them. The leaders of our Church truly appreciate it when you communicate with them, and they welcome your questions and comments.

And finally, if you would like to be an usher or help out with communion setup/cleanup and are a member of Lighthouse Bible Church, please let me know.

by Joyce Kang

The PB Homeless Ministry was the first ministry I joined when I became a member of Lighthouse. Four years later, it still remains a ministry that is very near and dear to my heart for a number of reasons. I am often asked why I serve in this ministry, and quite frankly, my response can be summed up in our church’s passion statement: love for God and people. Christ’s death on the cross has given every believer a new life and purpose. As I continue to grow in my understanding and love for Christ, I desire to share this great gift with others.

We live in a world full of lost people, and it is the responsibility of every Christian to follow Christ’s command to evangelize and make disciples (Matthew 28:19-20) As Christians, our aim in this life is to make disciples of Christ because it is through the salvation of lost sinners that our Father is glorified. At Lighthouse, we are truly blessed to have solid teaching, praise, and fellowship on a regular basis; however, they are not the end goal of the church. The purpose of the church is to make worshipers of Christ by seeking and saving the lost.

The harvest is indeed plentiful, but the workers are few. The Great Commission tells us to GO and make disciples; therefore, we must be obedient and heed that command. If we truly desire to imitate our Savior and reflect His love for us, we must fervently labor to win men and women to Christ. The need for missions exists everywhere, so a good place to start is in our local community.

It has been a humbling and joyful experience to witness God’s faithfulness to this ministry over the years. Although the fruits of our labor are not always evident, there is great joy in knowing that we are faithful to Christ’s command. The PB Ministry has been a tremendous source of encouragement to me and I would like to challenge the members of Lighthouse to consider serving in this ministry. I would also like to encourage you to partner with us by praying for the following:

1. The Gospel to remain at the forefront of our minds as we labor.
2. God’s word would go forth convicting and changing lives for His glory.
3. Ample opportunities to build relationships with the homeless and boldness in sharing the Gospel.