tēva sirds

we are having a youth conference in rīga on march 1st-2nd and dave patty, the president of josiah venture, is our guest speaker! the teaching will focus on God's heart for His children. He is a perfect Heavenly Father!

if you're in the area you should come! for more info, check out www.tevasirds.lv

covenant love

on saturday i will have the opportunity to share a few thoughts about sex with my friend's youth group. (pray for me!) im certainly no expert on the topic, but as i have been thinking about it over the past week the word "covenant" kept coming to mind. sex, and Jesus later expanded that any sexual activity, was originally designed to be enjoyed and experienced in a covenant relationship between a man and woman. the word "marriage" has gotten a bad name in todays culture, but the Bible clearly shows us that God is about covenant love. He desires a people who faithfully commit themselves to loving and following Him. in this grandiose "marriage" between God and His people, we see that God always fills the role of a loving and faithful "husband" (best displayed in Jesus) and mankind consistently plays the role of an unfaithful "wife."

as followers of Jesus, our marriages are supposed to "say" something about our God. our marriage covenant should display a Godly love to the watching world. we choose to love our spouse because we have a Savior who loved us first. we choose to humble ourselves and serve because Jesus did it best. we forgive because we have been forgiven through Christ... etc. when our marriages function this way we can create small and beautiful pictures of God's covenant with His Bride, His people. rarely does this type of love comes easily in human relationships and most of the time it requires lots of work. it takes sacrifice. and that is when the covenant is most crucial! this is the type of relationship where God intended sex to be experienced. despite what the culture says about sex and marriage, sex is best experienced in a covenant relationship! it is no mistake that this is also the type of loving environment where babies (the result of the sex act) grow into healthy adults.

i saw this video this morning and thought it fit the topic well. listen to these three spiritual jedis share some of their marital wisdom...

The RĪGA Internship

the thought behind the internship is that a group of laypeople who live or work in rīga would come together weekly over a period of time to study the life and ministry of Jesus in a tight community... with the idea in mind that they will focus their time and energy on making disciples where God has placed them. my hope is that discipleship will begin happening more consistently in the churches of rīga and that more people will respond to Jesus' call. to read more about the internship you can click here.

now id like to introduce you to the group...

from left to right: kurts, krišjānis, krista, liene, beāte, baiba & džo

please pray for us over the next six months!

february update

if youre interested in reading our latest update, you can do that here!

jv 2012 annual report

josiah venture recently put out an annual report on what God is doing all across central and eastern europe. hope it is an encouragement to you! click here to read.

JV Annual Report 2012

youtube of the month: february

so good!