Faith Follows - "Fall" Issue Three 2018 by Faith Follows

FAITH FOLLOWS “FALL” 2018 | ISSUE 3

ACTS PRAISE

Acts shares his musical pursuits, battles and his testimony to the seen miracles

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[CONTENTS]

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FAITH FOLLOWS “FALL” 2018 | ISSUE 3

FEATURES p.22

ACTS PRAISE

Acts dives into his musical passion and reveals his life story

p.4 Hayet

EDITORIAL

Gessese on the direction of Faith Follows

GROWING PAINS

p.6 Chris Newby shares the realities of

growth pains of life

p.14

p.28

COVERED

What it means to walk in the blessing of favor

MEENA

Meena’s testimony of finding faith in the most unlikely of places

p.34

p.42

struggling the

OVERLY OBSESSIVE?

Is it wrong to want to be the best?

THE BEST PART

Carlos & Sonia Solorzano share their fifteen year faith and love journey

CONTRIBUTERS PHOTOGRAPHY

Jared Thomas, Hayet Gessese, Jay Lemus, Matthew Lejune, Edwin Andrade & Nathan Dumlao

WRITING

Chris Newby, Acts Praise, Meena Ramesh, Carlos Solorzano & Hayet Gessese

DESIGN CONSULTANT Phyl Bautzer

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EDITORIAL This is the biggest issue in scope, size, and depth in terms of the audience we are trying to reach. I initially created this magazine as a means to let my friends and family know what was happening here in Sydney. I couldn’t have imagined that my testimony and what I have done this year would inspire people and I mean that with the sincerest heart. I was telling my story in the way I do my life, with the utmost sincerity and authenticity. I suppose that’s what people are attracted to. People want real, they want raw. It’s what we relate to as humans. For the longest time in my life I tried to pretend that things were alright. I faked my way through everything, highlighting and curating only the best aspects of my life to show people that things were great when they were really were not. Since then I’ve decided to stay true to myself and others and have used platforms like this to do so. What I love most about this magazine is the idea of a long 4

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format medium to express thoughts, emotions. Doing the second issue helped me realize telling YOU the reader about my life is just one perspective. I speak from the world perspective of a first generation American who grew up on the West Coast. It took creating the last issue to realize that this magazine is NOT about me. While it may have started that way, people need to hear more stories. I’m only one voice and I know how many other voices are out there. Stories that haven’t been told. Stories from people whose countries I never visited and perhaps you haven’t either. With this third issue, I had the pleasure of curating testimonies that will speak to multiple audiences with diverse backgrounds and voices that deserve to be heard. It’s my honor to bring to you issue three. I hope you enjoy and are inspired by what we shared. Hayet Gessese Founder & Publisher

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GROWING Seeking progress admist the tension

PAINS

Words by Chris Newby Photography by Hayet Gessese

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Chris Newby Tacoma, USA I recently decided to learn how to draw and my GOODNESS is it hard to learn. My wife is my personal teacher that I’ve decided to hire and paid in kisses and a lifetime of cooked meals. She’s taught me a lot of the basics that I need to know before grabbing me by the neck and back of my jeans and throwing me straight into the great abyss that is the “art world.” Growing up, I was into music and art and came up with fake players to create in my Madden video game, but drawing was one of those things I never had the knack for. My hand-eye coordination was like watching a baby giraffe come out of the womb with a paint brush in its mouth and letting it have a go at recreating The Starry Night by Vincent Van Gogh. Flash forward to today and like any discipline that doesn’t come quite naturally, drawing has been cumbersome and still just as hard as I found it when I was a kid. And yet that’s the whole point. Without that rigidness in life how can we learn or grow without that tension? In that place of wrestle with our insecurities and our abilities I believe we make the most headway. For a period of time I found myself sitting daily at one of my favorite cafes and drawing the shop across the street over and over again. Now it doesn’t look like much, but I’m definitely realizing more and more in all aspects of art that it’s not about the thing itself but about what it does to me as a human being. I wouldn’t get wherever “there” is without the constant clawing, scribbling, erasing, and lead snapping that comes with learning a new skill. As well as the constant denial of the small voices that tell me things like “You actually suck

at this” or “What’s the point?” or “The house you’re drawing looks like an apple.” It can be painful, demoralizing, and feel like an overall waste of time but the discipline and the growth in those moments no matter what craft you find yourself doing is the real prize. I was reading an essay by a man named Frederick Douglass. He was an abolitionist, writer and civil reformer in the 19th century who is considered one of the greatest writers in American history. He delivered a speech in 1857 titled the “West India Emancipation.” In it he talks of the struggle for freedom and justice in different societies globally and the emancipation of India from Great Britain and compared it to the pre-Civil War fight for abolishing slavery and what it meant to fight for freedom. Mid-way through his speech he wrote one of the most profound pieces of literature: “If there is no struggle, there is no progress. Those who profess to favor freedom and yet deprecate agitation are men who want crops without plowing up the ground; they want rain without thunder and lightning. They want the ocean without the awful roar of its many waters.” Now we can’t quite compare our art to a human being’s fight for freedom but we can learn a very important lesson from Douglass’ writing. We must go through the pains of drawing buildings to get to something that resembles anything. We must go through the contention of facing death when fighting against the tyranny of slavery. We must go through the callused fingers

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and peeled skin in order to play that guitar beautifully. We must stretch our bodies beyond breaking point in order to achieve great human feats of strength. We must fight against systemic laws of oppression in order to allow people the basic human right of finding a decent living in this world. All of these things take a measure of fight, a measure of questioning, a measure of struggle. Iâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;ve lived here in Sydney for the last five years of my life and nothing was more frightening than moving to a new city, let alone a new country with $200 in my pocket. I had two realities to the situation. One, it was going to be ROUGH. And two, I was going to be ok. Whether I cried myself to sleep because I felt I had no help around or whether I could only afford one meal a day, I had both truths to go back to. One truth hurt but the other truth brought me hope. Things will get hard but everything in the end will be ok. What a dumb but oh so real truth. I would find myself asking for help in those hard times in life and not find it in the family and

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friends that I was raised to believe I could count on. Once I realized that I could not lean onto the things that I had once known, I had to meet my debts face to face. A wrestling match in my heart that resembled the Rumble in the Jungle. The beating my mind and heart took as I woke up everyday, unsure of how I would survive another and feeling like I had nobody to talk to about it was one for the ages. It was a battle for my future. For my life. For my dreams. You see I went through about a year of uncertainty, losing count of the days really. A lot of days I felt like Tom Hanks in Castaway, scribbling the count of days on the wall but really finding myself in it all. I could go down a giant list of disciplines I learned from this experience but reading the words on a page could never do justice to the real headway that I had made in my life. It was difficult, it was trying, I still cry about certain moments to this day but I know and can say today that I grew up in that time and reached a newfound appreciation for life that I might not have arrived

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at had I never been through the trials in that season. Whenever I have a friend or colleague tell me they’re giving up on a project or their spouse is ending their relationship because things have gotten too hard, or they’re moving home because life here or there isn’t what they expected it to be, I always think to experiences and sometimes say to them firstly to be kind to themselves and know that everything will be ok. I’m really speaking to myself but I also believe we all need to look at ourselves in the eyes and tell ourselves that life is going to be okay. The hard parts of life are normal and it’s only when we fight through that initial instinct to run away that we really make some big steps at growing as people. I constantly see people that have spent so much time running away that they haven’t realized that they’re actually running the wrong way. I’m not saying there are not situations where you do need to step away and course correct, because there are definitely life situations where you need to get the hell out of there. I’m merely saying let’s not be so quick to run away from the normal struggles of everyday life. There are those who dream of a world where man, nature, and everything in between live in harmony amongst one another but at some point we all have to come face to face with the frustrations of this world we live in. We must meet that tension head on, grinding our way through a thought or an idea or a moment of life to end up saying anything of importance So have you found yourself in a space of tension, confusion, struggle, madness, wrestling in your craft, work, marriage, life? That’s ok. Be kind to yourself. For if you want progress in anything in life, you will need at times to struggle with it.

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When the grace of God surpasses all understanding Words by Hayet Gessese Photography by Jared Thonas

ERED

COV

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Hayet Gessese Los Angeles, USA When you think of blessing, what’s the first thing that comes to mind? I think of peace. A fuzzy kind of peace that makes you feel all kinds of warm inside. A peace that passes all understanding, that no matter what the circumstances may bring, there’s joy in your heart. I like to equate blessing with favor. When you have favor with someone, whether it be a friend, colleague, mentor, family member, they treat you in a certain way. Perhaps they treat you with respect, admiration and kindness. This year I believe I had true favor shown to me through God himself. Now I don’t know if you even believe in God and I probably lost some of you by just saying that, but hear me out. This year was perhaps the biggest leap of faith I have ever taken in my life. I left my whole life behind in Los Angeles. I left everything I had fought to build for the past seven years, and those seven years haven’t been easy. I worked minimum wage jobs after graduating college. I was homeless living in my car at one point, all the while struggling to accomplish my dream of directing films in the big leagues. Faith isn’t something new to me. I’ve made drastic changes in my life, I took non-paid internships in the middle of nowhere, I moved states and transferred schools. But moving to Sydney, Australia and selling/giving away everything I had and taking practically nothing with me was by far the the most bizarre thing I have ever done. I still find it hard to explain to people that this God in heaven was telling me to go and I don’t blame people them, I don’t. But I say all this because I have been walking in the blessing of God since I stepped foot in this country. I was born in Fresno, California, an agricultural city

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in Central California. When I was about five or six, my mother let me take my own showers and I remember distinctly singing and humming to myself Singing in the Rain. I specifically don’t recall watching this film as a child but this memory stuck with me. Years later in film school I watched Shame, among the many films I watched in my spare time studying the craft of storytelling. There was a beautiful scene where the main character stands in the rain. After struggling with addiction, the character is reborn in the rain, a physical and spiritual baptism of crossing over from his old life and on to the new life. A life lived with new purpose. If you haven’t read or heard my story previously, I was blessed with a little over $10k to attend Hillsong College here in Sydney. I budgeted that money very wisely and intended to find a job within the first two months of living here. I had no idea that four months later in May I would only have $16.80 in my bank account. I had no idea the amount of people who were willing to help me this year financially, in prayers and in support. I wasn’t ready for this kind of blessing. You see the minute I ran out of money and didn’t know where to turn to except to God, God’s blessing has been pouring over my life. The amounts of money I have received from people across the world from the United States to India, Taiwan, Norway and in Sydney has been remarkable. Thousands and thousands of dollars have come my way. And I say this not to brag, but I say this because I have never seen this kind of blessing before in my life. One of my dear friends who knew that the check I was supposed to receive this year never

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arrived, decided to pay the rest of my tuition fees which was over $2,500. If these instances and occurrences were not orchestrated by a divine being time and time again, then I would be just a lucky person. But I don’t believe in luck. God had a purpose for all of this and he intended to bless me. I never went hungry or without food. My rent has always been paid every week/month and my school expenses have been covered. In Jewish and Christian tradition, rain symbolizes the blessing of God’s favor. Whenever there was a drought or famine in the bible, God’s deliverance for his people was rain, and still is today. Without drought, people’s reality of water may differ. The need for it becomes exponentially greater because of the lack. I see that fitting and applicable today. When I ran out of money, the need of it grew exponentially. While I had money, there was a concern because I was spending money and not generating income, and the concern became greater when there wasn’t much left. I believe that when we come to the end of ourselves, when we have nowhere to turn to but God, we can count on him to show up time and time again. I can say this because I lived it. When I had just a dollar in my Australian bank account, I was blessed. And every time when I was close to being without, I was blessed by people. Now this isn’t to say I’m lazy and didn’t want to work. I actually interviewed and dropped my resume to countless businesses, all whom didn’t want to hire me for whatever reason. It wasn’t until two months ago that I was able to obtain a job and the miracle behind that job was extraordinary. I was back in California for a wedding and visited San Francisco to see

my family. Hours before my flight in the parking lot of Costco, I ran into Brenden Brown, our Hillsong San Francisco campus pastor. We had a conversation and he asked how my year at college was going and I was honest and told him everything and how I was struggling financially. He gave me someone’s number at a clothing company and told me to call him when I was back in Sydney. Two weeks later I found myself with a job all because I needed some underwear and protein powder. I don’t think that’s a coincidence. Out of the 900k people that live in San Francisco, I ran into one of my pastors in a Costco parking lot… and he got me a job! While the job is in retail, I’m still very grateful for the opportunity. Doing this whole college journey hasn’t been easy. Humbling myself and going back to school and moving to a foreign country has been an excruciating challenge. At times I felt like I was wasting my life especially when you’re 27 and you find yourself in a financial situation like mine. It was hard not to be hopeless and feel like a failure. But my value isn’t in a number in a bank account. It isn’t determined by what job I have or what I do with my life or what others think of me. Our value is determined by THE one who loves us, and God has never stopped loving you and I. I lived in Oregon for eleven years of my life. I always disliked living in Portland because of the rain and constantly compared it to the California sunshine. But these days I’m fond of the rain. I’m reborn in the ¬¬blessing of rain, my faith is stronger and I’m beginning to see the purpose that God has for my life. I’m living in God’s blessing and I couldn’t be happier. I’m singing in the rain.

“When I had just a dollar in my Australian bank account, I was blessed”

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A C Words by Acts Praise

Photography by Hayet Gessese

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My name is Acts Praise. Yes, this really is my name. To be more exact, it is Kijjakarn Praise but “Kijjakarn” means Acts in Thai. I’m a music producer and I’ve been living in Sydney for the past two years studying songwriting at Hillsong College. Being at Hillsong has been the biggest adventure of my life. I come from a family of five with four other siblings. We grew up in a Christian family and my whole life has revolved around church. Even though Christians in Thailand make up to around 0.3 percent of the population, I felt like God chose us. My parents came to know God through the miracle that has happened to my older brother James. At two months, they discovered that he had a disease called biliary atresia. It’s a childhood disease in the liver in which one or more bile ducts are abnormally narrow, blocked, or absent. This means that the liver cannot function properly and there was a high chance that he would die. James was in and out of the hospital for four years as a kid. During that time, my parents tried everything they could to find a glimpse of 24

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hope for him. Eventually, God called my uncle to reach out to my parents and they became Christians. With the whole church praying unceasingly, God healed James and he has outlived every expectancy from the doctors and was able to live a normal life again. I’ve always known that God was real because I’ve seen Him work miracles in our family’s life. I had asthma when I was younger and God completely healed me from that. My younger brother had a hole in his heart but God closed it right before the surgery. Regardless of all of this though, I still grew up with just “going with the flow.” I knew that God was real but I never really had a personal relationship with Him. When I was fifteen, we had a tough financial situation and I had to drop out of a private international high school which massively affected me. In the midst of that, God revealed Himself to me in a way that I’ve never experienced before and taught me to trust him. I finally started to know God as my God and not just what my parents believed. Around that time, I was inspired by one of Hillsong

Acts Praise Bangkok, Thailand

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United’s videos about what God was doing in the youth ministry in Sydney. Excited about how God used songs to connect people with Him and bring revival to many lives, I was inspired to do the same in my church. Songwriting has been a way for me to connect my heart to God and draw closer to Him. Before this, the idea of songwriting never crossed my mind. I realized how songs speak to what the heart yearns to say in words. Music lifted my heart to see things from a different perspective. When we sing the truth, it has power to fight against fears and any lies that often cloud our minds. My heart’s desire is to write songs that would lift people’s spirit and point them towards Christ. If one person could be encouraged to draw closer to God through what I write, then that’s a win for me. When I was seventeen, I wanted to come to Hillsong College to pursue songwriting. However, fear clouded my perception and caused me to go for a career path that seemed more “secure” and before I knew it, I was in pre-med and on my way to become a doctor. Weeks 26

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before enrollment, I realized that I didn’t submit the papers to postpone my military service on time. Because of that, I had two choices: I could’ve either taken a lucky draw with a chance of serving for two years and go for free as a reserve or I could’ve volunteered and served for a year. Frustrated at life, I choose the latter and enlisted in the Royal Thai Airforce for a year. I had no idea what I had gotten myself into. Being in an environment that was full of pressure both mentally and physically broke me to the core. In the midst of that, God revealed to me that I was pursuing things with the wrong motives. Deep down, I didn’t want to trust God. I wanted to have control over my future and find security in something that wasn’t going to last. I realized that God alone was my security and at the end of the day it meant nothing if I won the world but lost my soul (Matthew 6:26). After I served my country I decided to finally pursue songwriting and chose God first, regardless of what came. I chose to come to Hillsong College and surrender my fears to God. I

have this wild passion for music and I’m pursuing that wholeheartedly. Even though that’s my career path, I’ve realized that God never calls us just to a career but he has called us to love Him and to love others just as He loved us. He has called be to BE His love and to share it to a lost and broken world. The bible says in Matthew 6:33 to “Seek the Kingdom of God above all else, and live righteously, and he will give you everything you need.” I truly believe that if you seek Him first, God will provide everything else that you need. I’ve seen time and time again that God is ALWAYS faithful in every situation and when you do your part, God will do His. Life is not easy but God is greater than any trial that may come your way. I’ve worked three jobs at one point to be able to stay here in Sydney and God has been faithful every time when I was out of reach and didn’t have much. When I got here, I had just enough money to live here without working for two months. All I could do was to depend on God. I did my part and handed out around 40 resumes to no avail. I prayed and many

prayed for me. After a month God came through and I had two jobs that gave me a consistent income. More than this, out of nowhere my aunt (who was a devout Buddhist) called me and said that she wanted to pay for my next semester’s tuition. This was just one of the things that God has provided for me while I have been here. I believe God can do the same for you if you seek Him with all your heart and choose to seek Him first. God is always faithful no matter what. My hope for you is to read this and be encouraged that God will never forsake you in your sickness, in your pain, when you fail and when you succeed. He will always be there and His love never changes. God is greater than anything that you can face. Take courage, because He’s got your back. Even when life seems to crumble before you, there is always hope. Not only because what our hope is but WHO our hope is in. I believe as we surrender and submit everything to God, we can have victory over anything. It is a paradox, to surrender to win. But it is one that I’m holding on to and I’ve never felt more free. FAITH FOLLOWS

ME 28

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ENA Words by Meena Ramesh

Photography by Hayet Gessese

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Meena Ramesh Calicut, India I never believed in destiny. I thought it was a cooked up recipe for romance orchestrated by Hollywood. Little did I know that in 2016 when I decided to leave India, my life would take a whole 180 degree turn. After independently gaining my Masters degree in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Liverpool, I had an education Loan of $48k to be paid off. Indian salary was not enough to cover this and I decided to move to Australia when I received a working visa. Though I had relatives in Perth and close friends in Melbourne, I ended up in Sydney where I knew absolutely no one.

from materialistic possessions (even family) to attain complete enlightenment. Hence there are so many young men and women who live as monks in their temples. Growing up I certainly did think about choosing this path once, until I later realized that I couldn’t leave my family as I have a responsibility to look after them. It just didn’t make sense that God would create us, give us a family and then would ask us to abandon our family to be a monk to serve him at a temple. I just couldn’t see how that would end the injustice in the world and redeem it. I wanted to change the world and make it better.

What you should know about me is that I come from a very strong Hindu family. My grandfather built a huge temple for Krishna (Hindu God) when my father was young. They worshipped Krishna day and night. Since my childhood, my dad would tell me stories about the Hindu gods and how they appeared to people and that Krishna was the supreme personality of Godhead. So I grew up going to temples every Friday while in Oman. There my family joined a Hindu association called the ISKCON movement (International Society for Krishna Consciousness), which solely dedicates all praise and prayer to Krishna alone. We got more involved in the traditional Hindu rituals like fasting, chanting mantras, reading Bhagvat Gita (The Holy Scripture: Krishna’s teachings), doing pujas and offerings. We lived a life dedicated for Krishna’s glorification.

Immersed into all this at an early stage, I grew very fond of Krishna because he was different from other Hindu Gods. He seemed more personal with people and well put together compared to the other Hindu Gods. So I started talking to him, not just while praying, but with everything. I slowly grew more intuitive and there was a voice inside me, always guiding me. Whatever this voice said, when I followed it everything came in order and if not, vice versa. It would warn me of certain decisions and paths that I took or would take. I thought it was my 6th sense awakening as I got more spiritually enlightened like Buddha. So I learned to listen to this guiding intuition at all times. So when deciding to come here, this voice kept telling me to go to Sydney. Trusting it, I decided to take on the adventure and go where I knew no one. My parents said I could go if there was someone to help me there. So I asked all my close friends for help and one of them knew a guy, Sibi, who was here. Sibi turned out to be the most generous person I had ever known. He helped me with my accommodation and even picked me up at the airport. We instantly became best friends. He was studying Pastoral Leadership at

My father grew more passionate as he still believes that this is the answer that the world needs. He started disciplining himself with food, habits, thoughts, actions and even relationships. The ISKCON movement believes in attaining complete detachment

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Hillsong College and introduced me to all his friends at the Hills campus and even took me to church in December 2016. When I walked into the Hills campus, I felt like I was attending a rock concert. I was certain God’s presence was there and everyone was so nice to me. This was very different compared to the other churches that I had visited in the past with friends for Christmas, Easter, etc. But I still decided not to comeback knowing my strong Hindu family would never approve of this. You see, my parents didn’t mind me attending churches, but always warned me to stay away from Christians who would try to convert me.

didn’t as I didn’t want Sibi to think I was being influenced. Even the messages started to relate to my life and the answers I was seeking. One particular Sunday Sibi had to go to another church and that meant I could’ve slept in. But I was prompted again to go, so I went alone to the Alexandria campus. This time no one knew that I wasn’t a Christian, so I raised my hands and worshipped all I wanted. Bob Goff preached on surrendering to God and in his alter call he said “you might not be raising your hand because of your family…” I instantly cried and raised my hand, got a bible and walked home happy. But when I got home, reality hit me. I was a “Chrindu” (Hindu on the surface but

“I never believed in destiny. I thought it was a cooked up recipe for romance orchestrated by Hollywood” No one in my family has dared to change their faith or even marry someone of another faith or even another Hindu caste. If they did so, they would be stripped of our family name and abandoned to maintain their social reputation and status. Being from a reputed Hindu family in that part of India, my relatives care about such things more than my parents do, as these things are frowned upon in our largely Hindubased community. My father is now the Hindu leader/preacher of ISKCON Movement in Kochi, India. Even though Sibi invited me back to church, I kept giving excuses to not make it. He stopped asking but continued to be a great friend to me. Six months went by and in May 2017, his pastoral heart stirred up and thought, “If I can’t minister to my best friend, then how can I be a pastor?” So he came to the city from Baulkham Hills and started asking me questions about life and my beliefs. He listened patiently and asked few questions, but I had no answers. He presented answers and scriptures for the same questions when I questioned him back. He then invited me again to church to know more. This time I was curious and decided to go again. I went for 3 weeks straight, every Sunday and every time I went I felt like worshipping, but

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with Christian influence). Yet God wasn’t done with me yet. Three days later, I woke up early in the morning from a dream where I was in a big dark hall, with a huge ice-filled swimming pool in between and at the other end people were worshipping just like in Church. I had to reach the other end for some reason, but in reallife, I can’t swim. A voice inside me said “You’re gonna kill yourself.” I replied “I need to do this” and I quickly dove in and reached the other end somehow. Suddenly, two people dressed in black held me and a pastor came and put his hand on my head with a bible in his other hand and prayed for me. I was trembling with fear but as soon as he started praying, I closed my eyes and suddenly I was calm and silent. I heard a voice saying “I’m here, I’m here.” I then got plunged into the water and I instantly gasped for air and woke up from my dream. Do you know how when you see a dream but you forget it when you wake up? This was so real that I still felt the dream. I instantly pulled out my bible app and instead of going back to Genesis, I went to 2 Corinthians 13:1 where it says: “This will be my third visit to you. Every matter must be established by the testimony of two or three witnesses.” I connected the dots and knew this

“Jesus has given me a new family and purpose through him here”

was Jesus and there was no looking back then. Though totally out of context, these words came alive as there were three witnesses who led me to God: Sibi, Bob Goff’s prayer and the Holy Spirit who was always guiding me even as a child. All this while the Holy Spirit was leading me to this very moment. Ten days later I got baptized and began to learn who Jesus really was. I wanted to know more about Jesus in whatever ways I could: connect groups, alpha courses, evening college. I was spiritually hungry for the word of God and it was as if I had to make up for the twenty-four years of my life that I had lost not knowing him. But the beauty in God’s plan for me was

that he knew when I was ready to receive him as my savior, so he waited for me. I have now dedicated my life’s mission to save as many souls as possible for him. Today I’m in my first year of bible college at Hillsong College. My parents still don’t know that I’m a Christian and that I am studying at Hillsong College as I never managed to return to India. I didn’t want to reveal this truth over the phone. I can confidently say that God’s been molding me at Hillsong to be ready for this moment and in January I’ll be revealing this to them when they visit me. Even if they abandon me, Jesus has given me a new family and purpose through him here in Sydney and I would never trade him for anything in my life, ever!

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OVERLY B SE I SS V E Words by Hayet Gessese

Photography by Jared Thomas

The fine line between seeking greatness and Godâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s glory

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I remember my mother tucked me into bed one night in 1995. I asked her if I was the most important person in the world. She laughed and asked why I thought that and told me that there are billions of people in this world and that I couldnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t be the most important person on planet Earth. It was that moment over twenty years ago that defined a majority of my life. I have been, or I should say was on a quest to seek this importance by any means. My family and I would always watch movies and cartoons together. Whether it was with my cousins or siblings, we loved cinematic entertainment. When my mother was injured in a car accident, we would visit her frequently in the hospital and I setup shop in the lobby waiting room with my GameCube and video games. I spent a majority of my time in the lobby room watching the Disney Channel and during that time, I knew I wanted to become a child actor. I didnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t love acting for the sake of the art, I just wanted to be famous, to feel important. I was on a quest to seek importance and value and I thought that was possible from acting. My dream later transferred over to film, and in film school I was on a quest to become the next big African-American writer-director. I was completely obsessed with the idea of becoming successful in Hollywood. On walks back to my apartment, I often rehearsed in my head my Academy Award speech for Best Director. I often deliberated between saying nothing and receiving the award and giving a tear felt speech where I would use part of my speech to point to Jesus and a charitable cause that needed attention. So for the next six years of my life, I pounded the streets of Los Angeles. I interned at production companies, made short films, music videos and spec commercials all in the hopes of getting signed to a name production company to be able to direct commercials for big time brands and music videos for major label artists. There was nothing wrong with this passion and dream of mine to become a great director, but the way I went about trying to accomplish this allusive dream was terribly flawed. I was doing this for me and only me. I wanted the glory, I wanted the fame and most of all, I wanted the feeling of impor36

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tance. Passions are a beautiful desire created by God and innately in itself isn’t harmful. But when a passion becomes an obsession that consumes you, it’s unhealthy. I was beyond determined to succeed. I had so much self confidence that I knew I was going to make it, I just didn’t know when... and the waiting killed me. I was so determined that I made a word document with my twenty-year plan. I was quite methodical with my approach and every five years I had these lofty goals. Signed to a production company by 25. My first feature film directed by the age of 27. Married by 30. Ten feature films made by 40. I laugh now when I think about what I deemed was so important at the time. When I didn’t see myself accomplishing these goals, little by little my life began to unravel. I became self-destructive in my romantic relationship. I dreaded my full time job because I thought it got in the way of accomplishing my dream. Whilst I had everything any young man could possibly want, I was completely unhappy. My dream of being a director did not materialize and that took precedence over everything, including church, my relationship and my friendships. I was seeking my own glory and failed miserably at it. I recently read through John’s gospel and was wrecked by what Jesus said in John 7:18: “Whoever speaks on their own does so to gain personal glory, but he who seeks the glory of the one who sent him is a man of truth; there is nothing false about him.” A friend recently shared with me an interview that Brook Ligertwood did with Rich Wilkerson Jr. at Vous Conference 2018. She explained that despite her success and even Grammy award, she doesn’t dare feel entitled or bask in success. She equated this with a Lord of the Rings metaphor. The character Gollum was corrupted by this powerful ring and it ultimately turned him from a healthy hobbit into a monstrous, frail impish villain whose one sole obsession on Middle Earth was obtaining the ring. It corrupted him and made him evil because the ring was too mighty to contain. Brooke then went on to say that we weren’t meant to “put on” the glory of God and that in doing so, will make us like Gollum internally. “We

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“We were meant to give glory, not take it… And only you know when that’s happening, that’s an internal stewardship thing… give all it back, otherwise it will destroy you.”

were meant to give glory, not take it… And only you know when that’s happening, that’s an internal stewardship thing… give all it back, otherwise it will destroy you.” And I was destroyed. But it wasn’t until 2017 that my life shifted. I began to see that there was more to life than this dream that I held so dearly to my heart. I began to see that this dream didn’t mean anything if this wasn’t what God desired for my life. When I left Los Angeles this year, I was content about giving up this dream and didn’t care if I ever became a successful director. This life means nothing if we gain the world yet lose our soul. Today I don’t find myself obsessed with success or fame because it’s not important. I’m more concerned with doing what God puts on my heart and fulfilling his calling for my life, not the other way around. I believe in dreaming. I believe in passion and pursuit of callings but we must be weary of crossing the line between seeking our own glory and seeking God’s glory. FAITH FOLLOWS

THE BES

Words by Ca Photography 42

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ST PART

arlos Solorzano y by Jay Lemus FAITH FOLLOWS

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Carlos Solorzano Los Angeles, USA Fifteen years later we finally said ‘I do.’ It was surreal during the moment because we were just kids when we first met. I didn’t know God would intertwine our stories together again. But I guess that’s what made it the best part of our story. In 2002, Sonia was fourteen years old when we met our freshman year at Hoover High School in the small city of Glendale (Greater Los Angeles area). I was fifteen at the time and like any normal teenager, I was trying to figure out how to survive high school without embarrassing myself. Sonia and I had the closest of friendships and we would always copy each other’s homework and give each other relationship advice. Our friendship grew and we officially dated on 03/03/03, which we always thought was a pretty cool date. So many memories were made during our high school years, but at an early age our relationship was put to a test. Sonia had moved to Orange County after our sophomore year. Luckily, I had started driving and was able to visit see her on the weekends. It was a strange feeling being alone in high school for our third year. We had to learn how to be apart and communicate better with each other. Our relationship wasn’t perfect, but we tried our best to make it work. Sonia had promised that she would be back at Hoover for our senior year so we could graduate together, and she made good on her promise. We went on to college, but our goals and beliefs started to set us apart. I was baptized during high school and something changed within me. I wanted to be more involved with church and God but Sonia didn’t really understand. After our first year of college in 2008, we decided it would be best to break up and go our separate ways. The high school sweethearts that everybody knew us by

was over. Fun fact, we broke up at Kanye West’s Glow in the Dark Tour which till this day was the best concert we had ever attended. The next three years for me were confusing while I attended Glendale Community College and tried to find some sort of direction. I was volunteering at my local church and loved my time there, but outside of church I was living a totally different life. I kept up with the crowd and parties and was jumping from relationship to relationship. I would ditch my classes because I had no interest. I tried so hard for people to forget our relationship and it kind of worked, but in the unhealthiest way. In 2011 we began to text again but it was only “hellos” and “how’s life?” type of texts. At first they were short answered responses, but soon after we began a friendship again. This friendship was kind of odd because we actually didn’t want people to know that we were friends again. We wanted to avoid everybody saying that we would end up together again or question why are we even talking in the first place. We didn’t want to get into a relationship and we respected each other as friends but it did not go past that. However in 2013, our friendship evolved and there was a mutual trust that was being established. We would share our feelings about the people we dated, helped each other out with what to say and even gave fashion advice on what to wear on dates. Text advice turned into coffee hangs and our conversations got deeper, and God started taking the center of our conversations. At the time I had already left Glendale Community College and was attending Azusa Pacific University. My life became more full and I was beginning to have a deeper revelation of who God was. While I was still making mistakes, God lead me on a journey to become closer

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to him through all my relationship failures and attitudes that needed to change. I developed a better understanding of what the church should be and look like, and I think Sonia saw that in me. We started understanding each other on a deeper level and coffee hangs became coffee dates. Another fun fact, I never liked coffee nor drank it, but I knew she did. So here we were again, five years later and something that started off as a friendship again turned into something much deeper than just friends. Best of all, God started to be at the center of our conversations and ultimately our relationship. Sonia was looking for more purpose in her life because she didn’t want a routine relationship with God and wanted to experience God at His fullest. After a few coffee dates in 2013, we both wanted and had an understanding that we needed to attend a new church and grow our relationship with God together. But that was only the beginning of our “fairytale” love story. See many people think that it was easy, that we were made for each other the whole time, that we had to just give in, but that couldn’t be further from the truth. God led us to Hillsong LA in 2014 and the next four years were probably the most challenging for us individually and together as a couple. Not only did we have to navigate the forty-mile distance from Glendale to Orange County, we also had to learn how to deal with a lot of the unsaid flaws within ourselves to make our relationship work holistically. We pushed each other to be more selfless and love unconditionally, and the more we served at church individually on different teams, the more it helped our relationship see

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that we need to love the people we did life with wholeheartedly, including each other as well. We helped pioneer church when it was first planted and being involved in the early stages of Hillsong LA was sacrificial. We had early call times, late night pack downs and were at church mostly all day. It was hard work helping build the church and I found it similar to building my relationship with Sonia because throughout this sacrificial love of building the church and my relationship with Sonia, God was always at the center. That same year in 2014, Sonia was baptized at church and the purpose she was seeking all that time was being fulfilled. Our friends, pastors and family poured into our lives these past four years with biblical wisdom and advice and helped strengthen our relationship when it was at its weakest. The more we sought God, the more we saw His hand over every aspect of our lives and relationship. Every time we hit a rough patch, all we had to do was remind ourselves how God had guided us back to where we were because it was undeniable that He orchestrated everything. We had completely fallen in love with each other once again, and it was all because God showed us how to love one another and our church. Now I’m on the other side of this story, newly married and full of faith that God had put us together for something much greater than just our love story. We were unified for His glory, His kingdom and His people to show others what true love can do when we put God at the center of our lives. Fifteen years in the making and the best part of our relationship was God.

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WHATâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;S What to expect in the coming weeks and months

NEXT?

Photography by Matthew Lejune & Edwin Andrade

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Please pray for... Rain in California Political peace in the United States Migrant Caravan in Mexico End of drought in Africa (Mozambique, Somaliland) Syrian refugee settlement

The next issue of Faith Follows will be our biggest yet. Every issue has been bigger than the last and I’m excited for our fourth one. We’re doing an artist take over issue and will feature artists from art disciplines like dance and photography to songwriting and filmmaking. We’re collecting over ten unique stories from world class professionals and asking them to share their stories and passion for their art. You definitely don’t want to miss that! Here in Sydney we’re winding down

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the year and will be heading into summer. While this year has been full of highs and lows, I’m expectant that God is going to do big things as the year ends and will continue to do so in 2019. I’m thankful for all the people who have shaped this year to make it so impactful, monumental and groundbreaking. Without the help of YOU, I wouldn’t be where I am. So thank you and thank you for reading Faith Follows and supporting this journey!

KEEP IN TOUCH Thank you for reading this magazine and being a part of the journey. If you would like us to send you a postcard or would like to make a financial based contribution, send us a message. Thank you! 221/3 Bindon Place, Zetland, NSW 2017 Australia INSTAGRAM

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