Welcome to Shepherds Church Blog–just a sneak peek into life in our church. Enjoy!
Recently in group Bible study, we came across a major translation difference between the new NIV and the old NIV in Matthew 11:12. It was a tough and confusing question for us to tackle - how on earth do you reconcile these two vastly different versions of the same verse? NIV 2011: From the days...
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A pavlova is a meringue based dessert that is refreshing and delightfully moreish. The outer crust has the texture of a thin wafer, and the inside is similar to marshmallow. It’s topped with whipping cream and usually fresh fruit and berries. It was named “Pavlova” after a Russian ballerina because it is “light as a...
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Monday is usually my "Sabbath" day. After uploading the question sheet online for the next Numbers Bible study one week, I was relaxing at home. Then Missionary Grace and I wanted to go eat Jjajangmyun in Los Angeles - all Korean people's soul food. Jjajangmyun is also called "black bean noodles." Since Sarah was at...
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This week's passage in Numbers jogged my memory of an article I came across in 2018. I was so amazed when I read it that I immediately sent it to my dad, who replied, "Very cool, thanks for sharing!" after which I promptly forgot about it. But I think I should probably share it here,...
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Around 2010-2011, I lived in Leo’s Common Life. At one point, I was struggling with some personal sins. I can sense that my spirit was not so good and Missionary John noticed it. So, after sharing my testimony in the group with other brothers, he suggested that I should serve my brothers at the Common...
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This has been one of my favorite songs to play and groove to within the year 2022. (And still today.) IMRSQD is a really cool new Christian artist from South Africa. One day I drove home from a real good bible study and this song started playing on my playlist. It reminded me of how...
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In Downey UBF, I used to serve the Wednesday worship service message every week. The most powerful message I remember delivering was based on Acts 7, Stephen's martyrdom. Usually I would finish the message on Monday, and then spend Tuesday and Wednesday practicing and praying to digest the passage properly. I served this particular message...
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Did you know that tucked within the huge campus of CSULB is a secret Garden of Eden? Well, it’s not so secret, since it’s open to the public. However, not many people know of its existence. I’m talking about the Earl Burns Miller Japanese Garden. It’s been on the campus since 1981, and it’s...
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Hey my fellow shepherds, I wanted to share what happened recently in the tech world: ChatGPT. What is ChatGPT? It is a chatbot launched by OpenAI in November 2022. It is built on top of OpenAI's GPT-3 family of large language models, and is fine-tuned with both supervised and reinforcement learning techniques. To put it in...
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The mother plant I was eating breakfast this morning and I saw something peculiar. We used to have a kitchen appliance in front of the window and I had placed some small succulent plants on the window sill behind it. In order to water them, I would have to streeeetch past the appliance or contort...
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Hello Church Family! On Friday I made a soup that Sarah Flores used to make in the Sister’s Common Life and we ALL loved it! How happy and blessed I was in the Common Life! This time it was made by me and Hannah Boos. Since several people at church asked for the recipe, and...
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Excerpt from testimony Nehemiah 9:1-10:39 (Shared Oct 29, 2021) In the previous passage Israel people were desperate for God. They were fasting, confessing their sins, and spent many hours in Bible study, praise and worship. Overall it was a very serious time when they did whatever they could in their desperation for God. And...
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I saw this recipe recently online and decided to give it a try. It seemed easy enough for my nonexistent cooking skills, so I thought, "Why not?" I usually rely on takeout or my mom's cooking to survive, but this time I wanted to just make something on my own. Boy am I glad I...
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As you all know, vegetables can be quite bland. To me, they are the manna of the food world, especially black beans and lentils. As in the case of manna, you have to put in work and creativity to transform vegetables into something delicious. I have made black bean patties and zucchini patties in the...
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After I had Bible study on Isaiah 49:1-7 with the fellow senior brothers, I was reminded of a poem I read a while ago titled "When God Wants to Drill A Man" written by an unknown author. This poem complimented what I learned from Isaiah 49, because it describes how God fashions me to be...
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When quarantine went from 2 weeks to several months, I decided to start gardening. To be honest, I’ve never been good at gardening. I usually kill all my plants. I even killed a cactus, which I thought was impossible. But, I thought I would try to garden with a “shepherd’s perspective.” So, here’s my experience...
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Once my parents were going to a conference, so they had us stay at our piano teacher's house and go to a Vacation Bible School with a nearby church. The songs were amazing and I never forgot some of these, like the peaceful tune of "You have been so good to me." To this day...
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King Nebuchadnezzar tried to appeal to them with mercy by giving them one more chance to bow down at the next musical cue… and threatened again to throw them in. He taunted them saying, "When you are thrown in, then what god will be able to rescue you from my hand?" When I read that...
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Ahh! A dangerous creature that will bite!! The teeth are so sharp, look at the evil in its eyes! And don't forget the naked rat tail, yuck! That's what we thought when we got a good look at the object of our dogs' barking one night in our yard. We shone a flashlight around and...
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“Look up at the heavens and count the stars - if indeed you can count them.” These words were a promise given to Abraham. All he wanted in life was to have just one son. For the sake of one son, he left everything and followed God. He went through thick and thin. In times...
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“Therefore encourage one another and build each other up, just as in fact you are doing.” 1 Thessalonians 5:11