Changing Our Mission

Surrendered to God we will change the world through the lives of young adults.

I thought that was our mission statement. Our team had word-smithed it, and thought long and hard about the perfect vision we wanted to see happen. But God had other plans...

There was this guy, Simon, who lived in Sweden. Simon had never been inside a church. He did not know who Jesus is. in 2012, Simon wanted to illegally use a trial-version software with a "watermark" on it, preventing longterm use. He had a problem. He just needed to get the watermark off the software, so he asked Google how to do so. Google gave him a YouTube video from The Porch at “Watermark.” Simon watched it, and God started working on his heart. He watched more Porch videos, and started live-streaming Watermark's Sunday services. Simon trusted Christ. He joined a church in Sweden. He started a young adult ministry there (they watch The Porch). In 2013 Simon went on to be a missionary in the Philippines, telling everyone he could about the Jesus that changed his life.

Then, there was this girl named Aizada. I met her in the Watermark lobby in May, but that was weird because she lives in Kyrgyzstan (don’t worry, I didn’t know where it was either). On a visit to Afghanistan, looking for love and finding significance in men, someone from Dallas told her about The Porch. While in Afghanistan, Aizada found true love in a Man named Jesus. She got on a plane and flew to Dallas for over a month! She didn’t know where she would stay and she had no plan. She just wanted to see the place that talked about Jesus.

In Haiti there was a man named Villerson. Villerson knew Jesus. Villerson went door to door in his own town telling everyone about Jesus. Someone asked me why I didn’t go door to door in Dallas telling everyone about Jesus. Ouch.

So, that’s what some of our Haiti volunteers did when we got back to Dallas. They were unashamed of the gospel. That effort grew to include about 500 Dallas young adults worshiping one evening in Klyde Warren Park. That got the attention of a security guard at the park, who was also involved with a gang. He had been abandoned by his mother at age 10, and was dealing drugs at 13. He didn’t like God. To quote him, “I don’t need anyone to die for me.” One of our volunteers invited him to The Porch, and he politely declined, saying that he had to work every Tuesday evening. The next day the security guard's boss gave him Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday off. He caught the last Ecclesiastes message and surrendered to Christ. He then started coming on Sundays, and attending re:generation on Mondays, and went through Connecting Point to become a church member. He will be the next Villerson in Dallas.

Perhaps you see the problem. As my friend Sheetal pointed out, we can’t quite say "we will" do something in the future that God is already doing through us now.

Surrendered to God we are _ _changing the world through the lives of Young Adults.

Will you join us?

- JP