on my way home!

hello everyone
i am writing to you from San Fransisco where I just found out that I will be getting on my plane to head back home to Germany! praise the Lord for that! I am completely wiped and hopefully will be able to rest, especially since my wife just told me that I will hit the ground running!
It was great seeing all of my family this past week and also some friends! It was a blessing to be able to have the opportunity to do my grandmothers funeral and proclaim the gospel of Jesus Christ to everyone who was there!
May the Holy Spirit continue to work in the hearts of all of those who heard the Word!
Thank you all for your prayers throughout this trip!

TODAY IS THE DAY!

Hello Everyone
Today is the day! Today is the day that my family and I will be celebrating the life of my grandmother. Today is the day that we will come together and look at pictures, hear different testimonies about her life, watch some videos about her life, and so much more! But I would say that one of the most important things about this day is the fact that the Lord has given me the opportunity to openly proclaim the gospel of Jesus Christ to all of my family and relatives!

I was recently given these verses that I thought I would share with you as well...

Colossians 4:2-6 "Continue earnestly in prayer, being vigilant in it ​with thanksgiving; ​meanwhile praying also for us, that God would ​​open to us a door for the word, to speak ​the ​​mystery of Christ, ​for which I am also in chains, that I may make it manifest, as I ought to speak. Walk in ​wisdom toward those who are outside, ​redeeming the time. Let your speech always be ​with grace, ​seasoned with salt, ​​that you may know how you ought to answer each one."

I ask you all once more to be praying for the memorial service today that will take place at 13:00 at Calvary Chapel Chino Hills. Please be praying for the salvation of my family! Please be praying for the leading of the Holy Spirit in all that is to be said!

MAY JESUS BE PROCLAIMED TODAY!
MAY JESUS BE GLORIFIED TODAY!

Here in CA!

Hello Everyone
Just wanted to let you all know that I (Joey) arrived here safely in CA last night at around 8:00pm! A dear friend of mine, Dennis, picked me up from the LAX airport and the first thing that we did was head over to IN-N-OUT for some dinner! We briefly stopped by my parents house to say a quick hello and then headed over to my sister Erica's house so that I could simply go to sleep!
I want to thank all of you who were praying for my flights as I was able to get on both of them! Praise the Lord for that!

Will keep you updated!

Moving, Flying, and Praying

Hello Everyone,
I just want to give you a little update with what is going on with the Roper family

MOVING
Yesterday we started the process in renovating our new apartment. Today the Lord blessed us with many helpers who came by and helped us paint, put up new wallpaper, and prepare for the wall that must be put up next week. I know that it has only been a few days that we have had the keys to our new apartment, but each time we go into this apartment, we are completely amazed on how much the Lord has blessed us with this place. When we are done, we will make a little video or something. Please do continue to pray for all the work that must continue to go into the renovating and then the final moving. We do praise the Lord already for so much help!

FLYING
On Monday, I (Joey) will be flying to California for one week to do my grandmother's funeral. A friend of ours is helping me with a STAND BY ticket. The reason why we are doing it this way is because of the cost that she can offer us. It is way less and so a little more affordable. Right now, being that it is summer time, the ticket prices are ridiculously high, and so we are moving forward with this.
So please do be praying that I can get on the 14:00 (2pm) flight from Frankfurt to San Fransisco and also on the flight from San Fransisco to LAX.

PRAYING
As the date gets closer to my grandmother's funeral, we are praying more and more. We are asking you to once again join us in prayer for this date, Friday, August 20th. Please be praying for my family and relatives as well as for the Holy Spirit to be working in the hearts of all of those there at the funeral!

Continuing through Hosea

Tomorrow night we will continue through the book of Hosea! If you are interested in reading ahead and allowing God's Word to begin to minister to you, go ahead and read through Hosea chapters 6&7. As we continue to go through this book of Hosea, I do believe that the Lord is directly speaking to us even as He did to His people Israel so long ago. I want to encourage you once again to come with an expectancy of connecting with the Lord. He desires to speak to us! May we come with hungry hearts!
God Bless you all!

Present with the Lord

This morning at 1:09am, California time, my grandmother, Francellene Roper "Laguna Grandma" entered into the presence of Jesus! Shortly after my parents found out, they gave me a call to let me know. They were actually quite shocked that she did pass away since these past two days she seemed to be doing so much better. But as I said before, the Lord has fashioned our days and so I KNOW that she is in eternity seeing Jesus face to face right now! How amazing is that!

Here is some information for you to know and to be praying for:

• The funeral will be taking place on Friday, August 20th at 1:00pm
• I (Joey) will be flying back to CA and will be doing the funeral
• Please be praying for my family and relatives during this time
• Salvation
• Provision and Safety in travel

God Bless you all

Love the Roper Family

HILARIOUS!

We had to share this picture with you! If you specifically look at Aliyah's clothing. She dressed herself! This little girl is amazing! Noah wanted to be in the picture too!

God Has Fashioned our Days!

One of my favorite verses in the Bible comes out of Psalm 139 (my favorite psalm):

Psalm 139:16 "Your eyes saw my substance, being yet unformed. And in Your book they all were written, The days fashioned for me, when as yet there were none of them."

Isn't that amazing! God know exactly how many days He has given us! Too many times, especially when you are a younger person, we think that we have so much time and because of that we put so many things off. But here in this verse we see that God has clearly fashioned our days. In fact, He knew how many of them there would be before we even had our first day! Our God is absolutely amazing!

WHY DO I SHARE THIS?

Because I just got off the phone with my mom and sister and they gave me an update in regards to my grandma. Today she is doing a lot better. She has been talking a lot more (not a lot of words, but a few), wanting to drink and eat some food, etc. They were saying how it is completely opposite of how she was yesterday.
Well, all that I could think of what the fact that God has fashioned her days and He knows exactly what He is doing with her. We do praise God that she is doing better today, although there are still many things going on with her internally that are not too good.

I am so thankful that we serve such an amazing God who is truly with us each and every day! Whether it is a good one or a bad one, He is there!
Rejoice in that!

I love my grandma very much and am continuing to pray for her. Please continue to pray for her and the rest of my family for all that is and will continue to go on through all of this!

Update on Joey's Grandmother

Hello Everyone
I just want to give you all an update with my grandmother. These past couple of days I have been on the phone many times with my family to get a constant update. Unfortunately they have been moving her back and forth in many different rooms, which is never comfortable for her. My mom is currently with her and many other visitors have been coming by.
I personally have had the opportunity to talk with her a couple of times and let her know how much I love her and am so thankful for her. My grandma has truly been a blessing to me throughout my life. Last night, when I was putting one of my daughters to sleep, I began to tell her many stories of when I was a kid and how my grandma demonstrated her love towards my family!

I am not going to go into all of the details, but it seems as though she is in her last stages here on earth. Although I am bummed that I cannot be there at this moment with her, my hope and trust is in what the Word of God declares...

2 Corinthians 5:8 "We are confident, yes, well pleased rather to be absent from the body and to be present with the Lord."

Psalm 116:15 "Precious in the sight of the LORD Is the death of His saints."

In this I do rejoice! My grandma will shortly be in the presence of her Lord and King, Jesus Christ!

Please do be praying for my family during this time! Please be led as you pray! As you pray, I do ask you to please pray for provision for us to be able to get back to CA for the funeral, whenever that will take place. We will continue to keep you updated!

Hosea picks up Again!

Tomorrow night we will be picking up once again in the book of Hosea. Last week we took a break since we were at the church retreat and so once again I want to encourage you to join us this Wednesday night as we continue to go through the book of Hosea. Once again, come with expectant hearts! Come ready to connect with your Lord!

Joey's Grandmother

I am writing to you to inform you about what is going on with my grandmother. I just got off the phone with her about 45 minutes ago. She is currently in the hospital (Pomona Valley) and is not doing too great. We are asking all of you to please be praying for her. Her name is Francellene Roper. Right now at this point, we are not sure if she will make it through the night, but only God knows. Rebecca and I had the chance to talk with her and pray with her on the phone. In fact, something that was cool, was that when I finished praying with her on the phone, she said, "AMEN." She has not said a word in quite a while and usually can only nod or groan. So the fact that she said AMEN was pretty cool. I then went on to read to her from the Bible. I read John chapter 14, Psalm 145, and Psalm 139. And then I just began to share with her different thoughts and memories. We let her know that we love her so much and are praying for her! So we ask all of you to please be praying.
We do rejoice that she knows Jesus as her Lord and Savior. In fact, a few years ago I had the opportunity to baptize her down at her favorite spot, at her favorite beach!

We do know that our God is the God of miracles and is able to completely heal her if He desires, so we will be praying for that! Please join in with us during this time!

CCH Church Retreat!

So we arrived home last night safely back from our time in Austria. I am not exactly sure where to start with everything! The Lord really did a great work of His Spirit at this year's church retreat.
We started off by leaving Friday evening to head to Spittal, Austria where a friend of ours would host us until the church retreat started on Sunday afternoon. We arrived on Saturday morning, around 4 a.m. and we were completely wiped out! Later on in the day we went to a restaurant that has an amazing view of the Austrian Alps. We went to this restaurant last year and really wanted to take the Fox's (Rhonda, Lauren, & Katelyn) to it again this year. We had a great time and the Lord really blessed our fellowship that day! Thank you again Daniel Ornelas for hosting us once more!

here is a view from the restaurant

As you have already read, this year's theme was "Spiritual Warfare." This was a theme laid on Pastor Edmund's heart, since it was really something that we as a church have been dealing with and so we decided to spend this whole week really dealing with this topic. All throughout the week the Lord was really aligning each of the messages from Pastor Brent Harrell (CC Rome), Pastor Edmund, and I. In fact, in the middle of the week Edmund and I were talking about how it was amazing how the Lord was doing this. I loved what Edmund said. He said, "It is like we are passing the baton to each other, and as one ends, the other one picks up and keeps going." I can honestly say that this was a praise report, as this is what I was asking the Lord to do through the teachings.

Noah enjoying the day in front of the castle

Many of the people were commenting on how blessed they were with the teachings and some even shared how this would be something for all of the church back home to hear. For some of them, it was their first time ever hearing teachings on Spiritual Warfare
At the end of the week, Pastor Edmund opened up the microphone for people to come forward and to share how the Lord impacted them throughout that week! What a blessing it was to hear from many different people in the church and to hear how the Lord really spoke to them with their current situations!

view from the dock, down below the castle

Aliyah & Katie enjoying the time with daddy down at the lake

Some of the other blessings that took place during the week was the fact that we had a few different visitors with us for this year's retreat. Not only were we blessed to have Pastor Brent and his family join us for the week, but we were also blessed to have Patricia (a sister in the Lord from Brazil) join us as well. This was her first time ever to Europe and she absolutely loved it! She also joined in with the worship team throughout the week and led some of the worship, both for the adults and the children's ministry. We were also blessed to have Rhonda, Lauren, and Katelyn Fox join us from CC Chino Hills to come and do the Children's Ministry throughout the week. They did a great job and the kids really had a great time! Last but not least, we had the Schneider family join us from another local Calvary Chapel here in Germany join us for their vacation. The Lord directed them this year to get a hold of us and to see if it would be possible for them to join us as well. They shared at the end of the week on how extremely blessed they were and how much the people from the church just loved on them as well!

Rebecca, Patricia, and I

We do praise the Lord for all that He did this past week and we look forward to what He wants to do from this point forward. We truly know and have been reminded that we are in a Spiritual Battle and we have got to fight this battle in the Spirit! We do ask all of you to please continue to be praying for all of those who were at the retreat to continue to "Be strong in the Lord and in the power of His might." Eph.6:10