2017 Casey Family Update
This time last year, God called me to join the staff of Redeemer Fellowship Church. This has been a big transition for our family. Pastoral leadership has been stretching me in significant ways. I am enjoying the staff that I lead at our Church. God is transforming lives in our city every week. It is an infectious ministry to be a part of.
Stephanie has taken the initiative to help the wives of our Church’s elders to connect spiritually. She partnered with her friend Katie and led the other nine elder’s wives in an evening of connecting with God’s word through an art night with local artist, Kelly Kruse. Stephanie also helped facilitate the same event for all of the women on our Church staff. Since I became the chaplain with the Kansas City Chiefs this year, Stephanie has been playing a role in the lives of some of the player’s wives. She attends a weekly Bible study with them and prays for them often. Having the flexibility to lead the Kansas City Chief’s coaches and players has been a joy for me. I lead two Bible Studies on Friday mornings. One for the coaches and one for the players. On Saturday nights before home games I go to the team’s hotel to lead a chapel service for the players and coaches together. This opportunity has been a breath of fresh air. It reminds me of the ministry that God first called me to as a chaplain at Northwest Missouri State and through FCA at University of Illinois.
Salem is enjoying the 4th grade. She has read all of the Harry Potter books. Stephanie worked really hard to provide a Harry Potter themed birthday party dinner for Salem and her friends. Salem also received Jesus in her heart this summer. We are so thankful for her salvation. Cora is in the 2nd grade. She is so sweet. She is full of humility and she is always helping her younger siblings. She has worked hard to become a good reader and she is always reading books that are above her grade level. Stephanie took her to get her ears pierced and she barely cried. Vivienne is hilarious. She is always saying sassy things and she brings a lot of life to our family. She loves to play “attackling” with daddy. “Attackling” is when we wrestle on the floor. It is her way of combining the words attack and tackling. Ralphie also love to play attackling. He also loves everything that has to do with the Kansas City Chiefs. We got him his first jersey. He’s a sweet boy. Everything about him is big. His hands, his head, his feet. He has a soft heart though. He loves to dress up as batman and his mother is trying to squeeze all of the cuddles that she can get out of her last baby.
We had dinner with one our members in September. His name is Reda Ibrahim. He is from Egypt and he and his wife Kalina have one son named Youssef. Reda is passionate about sharing the Gospel of Jesus Christ. He led a young Muslim man to faith in Jesus this summer and he brings him to Church every Sunday and whispers the entire service in Arabic to him. Our Church gave a significant financial gift to Reda’s church in Egypt after his pastor was brutally murdered and the other pastors were faced with heavy persecution. Please pray for Reda. He is a hardworking roofer and sends a lot of his own finances back to Egypt to support his brothers in the faith. He also has a deep passion for sharing Jesus with more Arabic Speaking people in Kansas City.
Stephanie and I have a great friendship with Jackson and Riley Swain. This has been one of the many friendships that was deepened when I came on staff with our Church this year. Rylie works full-time at the Church in our communications department and Jackson works as a video editor at an advertising firm. Our kids love Rylie. She is always generous with her time and she loves our kids back. Stephanie and I were honored to lead Jackson and Rylie in their marriage counseling and I officiated their wedding ceremony. We are blown away by how God has used Jackson and Riley to bring joy to our family.
Stephanie and I went to the Frequency Conference in Philadelphia, PA, with the minority pastoral residents from our Church. The trip was led by Brian Key, our pastor of spiritual formation. We went with the same thing in mind. We worshipped with hundreds of other black pastors and we were trained to endure in the fight for racial reconciliation. We were there to deepen our relational connection with each other, experience the movement of God with others who are distant geographically yet close theologically and racially; and to feel God's heart for racial reconciliation and healing in our country.
The fellowship, worship, and preaching was amazing. Walking through an amazing city with friends filled my heart. We have a lot of work to do by way of racial reconciliation in our country. But I'm glad to do it with our team.
Some extra highlights from that trip were that Stephanie and I ran up the “Rocky Steps” that Sylvester Stallone ran in the filming of the movie Rocky. We also took an Uber over to the Olympic Regional Training Center for Wrestlers on the campus of University of Pennsylvania. One of the wrestlers, BJ Futrell, who I discipled at University of Illinois is training there. We walked around the campus with him, met his girlfriend, and prayed for him.
I love boxing. The training is intense and the possibility of being punched in the face has added a different level of thrill to my workouts. Boxing has given me the opportunity to build friendships with young men in the inner city. One of the boxers that I was training actually received Jesus as his savior after he spent time with one of the pastors at our Church. We spent a lot of time with him and I gave him some good gospel-centered books before he moved back to Seattle this Fall. We get groups of people from the Church to support these guys on their fight nights and encourage them. Another boxer that I have spent time with has started his own personal training business. I helped him think through how much he charged and I have connected with people that want to get in shape and learn from him. This is big step up from working as janitor at night time, especially since he just had his first baby.
Stephanie and I had a fun time in Breckenridge Colorado last Spring. We hiked in the mountains and enjoyed some extended time focused on prayer and reading chunks of Scripture together. We are now looking forward to taking our entire family to Asheville, North Carolina for a time of extended rest.
Yours in Christ,
Marcellus Casey
Director of Ministry Leadership
Redeemer Fellowship