ARTICLE ABOUT THE ILC

The International Leadership Conference was spectacular!!!

It was impacting and very inspiring to hear sermons from leaders who don't only preach great, but who are showing with their lives, convictions, and ministries that God is being glorified!!!

What I heard in the conference called me to repentance. I had stopped dreaming BIG for God's kingdom. I was still dreaming, but my cowardliness, lack of faith, and low expectation for myself and for the disciples in the La Paz church had become stronger than my dreams.

In one of the classes at the conference Sam Laing said "Tell me how your relationship with God is and I'll tell who how you are." It was great to hear this and is 100% true!!! My relationship with God was not where it needed to be and I am now fighting to get it up there.

Sam also said "Sometimes you just get tired of being tired." And this is exactly how I was feeling in my heart. I do believe all of us need a push once in a while and this is what the L.A. conference did for me.

Once I got home I heard Shawn Wooten and Gordon Ferguson's class about Courageous and Motivating Preaching once again. It helped me pray, prepare my heart, and my lesson for Sunday morning. And on Sunday I not only preached God's word but right after service I decided to have a talk I had been postponing in my heart for a long time. This is one thing some of us have not been doing in La Paz for a while...disciple one another to help each other get where we need to be with God. It was great. I felt afraid, but at the same time I just knew it was time to have this talk, for God's honor and for His church!!! And right after that I set up times with different disciples to get in their lives.

I pray that this momentum in my life not only stays alive, but that it becomes stronger. Please pray for me so that God makes sure he uses my life powerfully 'til one day I can finally go home and get my rest next to Him. But meanwhile, while we're all down here, I pray we live our lives of passion and great dreams for our mighty and merciful God.

I thank God, and the very loving church in Tampa, Florida for making it possible for me to be part of this conference. I know I did not deserve to be there, but probably desperately needed it.

To God all the glory, and may He use us all to be and do in our generation what we ought to be and do so that we do our part in making sure His name is glorified FOR ALL GENERATIONS!!!

Edson Aquino.

La Paz Church of Christ.

La Paz, Bolivia.