Aarons Hands

May 2010: Discipleship is about Relationship

This year being the Director of our village discipleship, LaunchPad has been challenging and rewarding.  I have an amazing team of staff and interns that make LaunchPad happen each week and am overwhelmed by what God is doing.  The focus of LaunchPad has been on developing real relationships with our students and listening to the leading of the Holy Spirit in our weekly classes. We want to see God be big in and through us with our students.

Jace, one of the staff teachers, had this testimony one week in May,

” Teaching last week during LaunchPad God took me beyond my comfort zones in my class. As I started to teach my class of students I knew that God was going to be doing something different today. With the beginning of class talking about baggage that we carry in our lives I started to view my students with different eyes. I felt the pain, struggles & baggage that all of my students were carrying in their own personal lives. God kept pushing me to go out of my comfort zone to ask my students to come up for prayer. I wasn’t comfortable in asking them to come up so that I could pray for them; to pour my heart out to them. Finally after listening to God’s spirit I put my book down & started to pour my heart out to my students. Explaining to them that even though we carry all this baggage in our lives we have forgiveness; we are able to be set free. Looking around my classroom I could sense the urgency of wanting to feel God’s love pour all around them. I finally asked for a show of hands of who would like to get prayer & asked them to come forward. As I started to see the show of hands I saw all of my students hands raised. My interpreter, Sly, that was standing next to me in the classroom looked at me in confusion. I knew that this step in praying with students was a big step out of his comfort zone as well. As both Sly & I started praying over all of the students we felt God’s presence there. I felt that my students were encountering God for the very time in their lives ever. My students were feeling what it was like to be loved for the first time, to be set free & six of my students received salvation that day. God trusted in me & I trusted in him that day at class by going completely out of my comfort zone.”