SCBC Urbana 06

I signed up for Urbana 2006 not really knowing why I did. At the time, I was still very self-cautious about my relationship with God. I felt really distant from Him and even though it bothered me on the inside, I did nothing to show it. As a result, I signed up because many of my friends were also going. Basically, I just thought, "Why not?"

Perhaps a couple months before Urbana, I started to realize I needed to take action to fix this unfamiliarity with God. I then discovered that Urbana was the answer and that this was God giving me the perfect opportunity to draw near to Him again. I anticipated learning more about Him and understanding what He wanted for my life. However, when I got to Urbana, this was not the only thing that I got. I realized that not only did I have to draw closer to Him, but he truly wanted and NEEDED me to step out and take action for Him. After going through days of workshops, seminars, amazing sermons, it really hit me that the world needed the very few number of Christians to go out and spread the gospel. Whether it was a year-long mission, a couple months, or even a week, Christians were NEEDED around the world, to impact the world.

I clearly remember from one of the sermons, one of the speakers said, "To be a Christian, is to live a life of frustration." This whole time I had been struggling with my relationship with God, my relationship with friends, my new adjustment at university, and I was extremely frustrated; but this was what God wanted. He wanted me to realize that without first improving my relationship with Him, I could not have a whole and joyful life. He was simply shaping me for my future purpose, for He had called me, and all of us, to go out among the nations and serve Him.

After Urbana, my whole perspective of missions changed. As I come back to university, everything looks more like an opportunity to tell others about my faith. Even a simple thing, like wearing a t-shirt with a bible verse to the gym, is a way for me to evangelize. At Urbana, I made a commitment to dedicate my lifestyle, career, and monetaries to Jesus Christ, and to tell friends and relatives about my wonderful Saviour. I believe that with His strength, I can let go of everything and in turn, let God. All I know now, is that I simply want to tell the world, Jesus lives! He has proved faithful to me all these years and now I want to do the same. Praise God :)

When I first applied for Urbana, I did not have much of a purpose for going other than going for the sake of going and seeing what it would be like. By the time Urbana departure date rolled around, I realized that by going to Urbana, I wanted to renew my love for God. During my first semester at university, I did not lead the Christ-like life I had led that previous summer. My flame for the Holy Spirit was diminishing. I was hoping that Urbana would remind me of the love that I once had for Jesus. Also, the first semester of university made me unsure of the future that lay ahead of me, more so than before. Seeing as the theme for Urbana ’06 was “The Calling”, I was hoping that perhaps I’d be able to figure out my future there.

Urbana, at first, seemed a little overwhelming; so many seminars to choose from, so many people around you. But knowing that all those people around you had the same purpose for life, it was comforting. The people, the seminars and the general meetings with fantastic worship, helped me realize why I became a Christian in the first place; it was God’s love that was shown to me in November 2005 that I became devoted to loving Him.

Although my flame was growing, my doubt and insecurities for the future remained. I attended a seminar that helped me realize that my career choice didn’t matter, as long as it made God proud. God will guide me in the direction He wants me to go; He will provide me with all that I will need. But I must also look at myself, determine what my spiritual and natural gifts are, what I enjoy, and what others might think I’m good at. The future was not something to fear, but embrace.

I also happened to attend a prayer ministry/seminar regarding sexual brokenness and healing. There I had realized how I have not figured out how to forgive myself for things that occurred in the past. I knew God had forgiven me through Jesus, but I hadn’t let things go and continued to dwell on the past. I must learn to continue asking for the ability to forgive myself and others, and with time, I will. I must not give up nor lose faith if it doesn’t occur suddenly, for it can take a while.

Overall, Urbana gave rise to many life-changing events: I was able to recapture my love for God, learn to put more faith in Him for the future, and begin once again to let my wounds heal. Not only that, I’ve committed myself to attend a fellowship at university and continue attending a small group. I’ve also applied for a summer internship with an orphanage in the Dominican Republic. At Urbana, not only were my goals fulfilled, but I received much more from the experience that will be useful for future purposes.

Urbana was definetely an eye-opening experience. It gives you a
feeling of responsibility and burden that comes along with being a
Christian. There are many horrors that are going around us in this
world today and trivial things that we deem important in our lives are
overshadowed by the magnitude of things that are going on outside of
our lives. Urbana places a calling into each and everyone of us to be
a part of God's mission.

My Experience at Urbana – Lilian Man

Through Urbana, I had a lot of the “first” experience. There’s a lot of things you read about in books, you heard from people or you watch on TV that you have the acknowledge about but never experience it first hand. Here’s a little list of my first experiences

1. Traveling 14 hours continuously on a bus with 50 people who are around my age. To top it off with a cherry, sitting beside the bathroom is definitely a first hand experience on how university students use the bathroom a lot. The bus ride was definitely something I will not forget for a long time

2. Celebrating new years with 20 000+ people. I saw on TV how people did it. But being at there made my new years memorable and different.

3. Getting to meet famous people. People that you hear who have done such an amazing job in their field of work. Those people are in front of you talking about their lives. For me, I had always imagined Rick Warren to be a tall, skinny and serious man. But instead, he’s a chubby, friendly, Texas rancher look-a-like man. These people became alive from textbooks and they can be just standing next to you because they are so much like you and me.

4. One morning, my roommates and I were walking through the lobby to get our breakfast. While I was getting my coffee, I notice this girl next to me had on a very interesting shirt. As I was paying closer attention to the shirt, I realize it had a slogan that said “Hi! I am HIV+ =)” I paused for a second. I had never encounter anyone who are HIV positive. It feels like that God is speaking to me. At that time, I realize that HIV is not only a problem at the far away land of Africa. HIV happens here right in our community.

5. Sitting in the seats that normally cost 100 dollars listening to the world best speakers talk. Also being in the presence of 20 000 people who have the same goal and vision as myself. Watching my life change before my eyes. Realizing what I do would be very limited but it would make a difference to someone.

This list can go on. But I want to thank God for providing this chance. While everyone was all excited for Urbana, I was quite emotionless. I was not super excited. I took it as part of my Christmas plans. But then I left Urbana with a goal in mind. I left with a mission to dos something that can change someone’s live.

Urbana keeps popping up in my conversations one way or another, which signifies how much impact this conference has put on me. I am constantly sharing what I learned throughout the talks and seminars in little pieces everywhere I go. I've learned and taken alot from Urbana about my calling to do mission work, which was what mainly Urbana was supposed to be about, but I came out with that and even more to my surprise. During those talks, you couldn't help but feel rejuvenated with the word of God, with powerful speakers and interesting seminars. It provided me many more ways to look at life, and to live it, as well as how to look at it from a third person perspective. I felt the need to urgently change after each one. The schedule left us to be busy all day long and lack in our sleep, so it was an action packed trip all the way through. Being busy wasn't too bad though, since I was with my fellow SCBCer's most of the time through. I got the best of both worlds, meeting new people and having someplace to fall back on. I really got to bond with them being around them so much. The worship there was foreign but welcome to me. They lead worship with almost an Afircan-American gospel church style, with a mix of songs from other cultures, which really reflected the multi-cultural nature of Urbana. Everything was well organized and engaging, though that's what's expected from 3 years of planning. I was particularly mad about having many of my seminars cancelled, but most of the time, attendees agreed to have discussions on the topic at hand, which had its own merit.

I guess I still don't feel God's calling for me to do cross-cultural missions, but I feel within my community and circle of friends, that I can spread the word. ALthough this may change, I can deifnitely affirm the positive change towards my spiritual growth it's done for me.

Urbana Reflection – Carmen Lam

Although Urbana 06 has ended and it will be another 3 years till the next Urbana Conference, the end of one thing is the start of another. It is the start of all the Urbana attendee’s making a difference for the Lord, living a life worthy of God’s calling, playing their part in God’s global missions.<

I was really stretched and challenged at Urbana. I went to the conference trying to seek God’s calling for me after graduation. I wanted to know how I could make an impact for Christ and “live a life worthy of the calling”. I came out of the conference changed, with a deeper understanding of God and how great God is.

During the course of Urbana, God showed me a glimpse of how to live a life that glorifies Him through the studying of Ephesians, quiet times, the worship sessions, the people I met, Bible studies, the different amazing speakers, and workshops that I attended. The biggest thing I learned from Urbana was the concept of unity. The idea of a universal church as a body was stressed as we were presented with issues across America and all over the world. When one part of the body hurts, the rest of the body should hurt as well, and when one part of the body rejoices, the rest rejoices as well. Often times, AIDS, inner-city problems, poverty and sickness in Third World countries seem so distant to us that we could care less about all the problems around the world. In the past, I used to think that as long as the issue doesn’t affect me directly, it doesn’t matter. However, this selfish and limited view was totally changed at Urbana as one speaker talked about one identity in the global church. As Christians, we are all worshipping one God, and thus, have only one identity- God’s children.

Having this mindset changes my perspective on how I view issues and how I treat the people around me. No longer are global issues just another war or just another natural disaster, but it is something that is affecting my brothers and sisters, which in turn, should affect me. No longer is the person that wronged me the bad person I am having conflicts with, but rather, I am learning to see them as children of God, regardless of whether or not they are Christians. Through the large theme of unity, my time at Urbana showed me what it means to love what God loves and to have my heart broken for what breaks God’s heart. I’ve learned that to “live a life worthy of the calling”, I must first change my views and view things through the lens of God. Before we can go out and “change the world”, God’s people must be come together despite our differences and diversity and still be able to be unified because of our one God.

One worship song greatly sums us what I learned at Urbana: “Unify us, purify us, so that we may change the world”.

Ken Woo

Being at Urbana gave me a glimpse of what heaven would be like. Worshipping with so many believers was truly a unique experience. At Urbana, I met so many different people. Even though I didn’t know any of them to begin with, the connection we have as Christians made it so much easier to talk to people. I tried to stay away from the group I went with simply because I knew most of them and I wanted to meet other people. Being with my brothers and sisters in Christ felt like being in a big family reunion. You have no idea that these people are in your family, but you just know that they’re family.

One thing God really showed me at Urbana was fellowship and what being in one body really meant. We’re so used to the idea of fellowship being once a week that we often forget that there’s no evidence in the Bible to support this idea. In fact the opposite is true. In Acts 2:42-47, Paul talks of about the fellowship of believers. Paul says that they met daily. The people were together every day, just like how we were always together during Urbana. I guess that’s why so many people enjoy the Urbana environment, because it was what the early Christians did! And guess what? The Lord added to their number daily those who were being saved. I guess God was trying to tell me to look at fellowship at a different way. Now, I guess the challenge would be to find other people who are also willing to spend more than one day to fellowship with each other.

I think this idea also relates to why we have these “spiritual highs”. It’s because we get to enjoy fellowship the way it is seen in the Bible. I think this is one of the reasons why we seem to lack this “passion” once we go back into our regular schedules. We miss the fellowship. I think the lesson that God has for me comes from thinking about this idea of passion. It made me realize that my passion in Christianity shouldn’t be coming from the great worship or the speakers, my passion in Christianity should be coming from Jesus. And that passion should never die out.

Karen’s Urbana 2006 Experience/Testimony

My experience at Urbana widened the scope that I had about the world, church and brought out a focus of multiculturalism for the church that I didn’t see before. It brought out the global aspect of the church body, as opposed to the municipal, or corporate church; a different perspective from so much individualism that I found as the common focus of churches in North America today.

I found Urbana particularly unique through the particular emphasis on the church as a global body of Christ. This perspective shifted my attention on the potential of the church to reach the poor or struggling countries when we all are united as a body in Christ. Doing something of this scope is so beyond our control, requiring not only communication and massive coordination - it is a movement with God’s orchestration of which we are a part. I had not considered the complexity something of this magnitude of this matter before coming to Urbana. It motivated me to shift my attention to viewing the church in a global perspective.

We also live in an age where the world is divided and has changed in many ways. Being at Urbana opened my eyes to desire to know more about the trends that are emerging globally. The global church is now more centered in the majority of the world as opposed to in North America. This means that increasingly more missionaries are desired here by other countries because of our need; this is a valuable consideration for us when we go out to do missions in other countries. It is amazing to see these changes and view how the church can influence the future of the world through this perspective.

One of the workshops I attended focused on an emergent style of evangelism. I was greatly impressed upon learning how we can become more relevant to the lives of others to more effectively evangelize to them. This is one valuable step to understand the shifting of our times and our culture.

In addition to becoming inspired to learn more about our times, I was intrigued particularly by one large-group session – where the 22 000 Urbana attendees gathered to worship – with an AIDS/HIV-focused program. This epidemic has no doubt been a problem for a long time, and the stories of individuals with AIDS were often very tragic. I am looking to find out more about this area, not only because it is one of great importance, but also because it is a phenomenon that is so easily written off and misunderstood.

During the sessions, I can’t forget the experience of singing as one voice. Singing in many languages was really touching for me, some of them being Mandarin, Korean, Spanish, French and African languages. This multi-cultural aspect of the worship not only encouraged closeness with my brothers and sisters in Christ across the world, but I felt it developed in me a new avenue of worship to God. To sing in another language drew from other areas of myself as a worship to God and was an enriching experience.

The meals, accommodations and travel to and from Urbana were admirably well orchestrated. I was amazed at the smoothness of coordination, especially with meals. It is a great testimony to see that volume of volunteers for the event. There was no shortage of helpers to direct (human) traffic for meals and guide them to their accommodations. Even in distributing the elements for communion, it demonstrated how awesome it is to have the body of Christ work together as one unit.

Throughout this experience, I think God has been speaking to me in many ways – through the seminars and large-group sessions and through the people I met and interacted with at Urbana. I am just amazed at what our church is emerging into and I am looking forward to finding out more of what we can do globally as a church for God’s kingdom, and to actively strive towards becoming united in Christ so that we can reach our full potential in Christ.

lillian leung

Reflections

Urbana, a place to find your calling. A life changing experience. As most have attested, Urbana was not simply a good experience, but a steep learning curve. Perhaps, we wonder if we managed to come away with all that we could. There were many inspirational messages, God stories, and stories that spoke to your heart, but yet you question if you were able to absorb it all in. Have I changed at all from Urbana?

Entering Urbana, I sought to understand further what it meant to minister to the Shalom of the city through inner-city missions. Coming from such a privileged society, I truly wanted my eyes and my heart to be open to what the Lord desired to show me. I desperately wanted to live a life worthy of His calling. Most of all, I wanted to know how my job as a Speech-Language Pathologist (SLP) would fit into missions. So, I attended several workshops on Inner-city missions and on calling and the workplace. Although those experiences opened my eyes to what I could do in the city, I still felt slightly unsure. I needed to know more. At Global Connections, I went around to the hundreds of booth searching for a hint, searching for something that would potentially pair my God given desire to be an (SLP) with his mission field. After an hour or so I felt frustrated, asking God why there seemed to be so few opportunities for an SLP. And then, I met Winfer at the Interserve booth. It was such an amazing experience to meet this woman, as God brought her to me at just the right time. A person that was willing to talk to me about how my job as an SLP could be used in the mission field. She used examples from her own life, working as a physiotherapist (now placed in Afghanistan) and how God used her. Although we spoke only briefly, she was deeply encouraging. I may not be sure where I will end up in the future, be it in inner-city missions or overseas, but I know that I am not going to just settle. I yearn to live a life that is not constantly filled with regrets, but a life worthy of His name and renown.