Praise Report - Secular Hobby Shop # 2 & Birth of Int'l Play Group?

[Deck Metrics]

Good day to you all,

Peace to you and your families. I'm Jonathan from South Florida. I'm just reporting God's Faithfulness and Favor! Glory to God! I've spent the last month in prayer for the Lord to add onto our playgroup which was made up of about 4 core players. I also asked the Lord to open a doorway of ministry through Redemption. About 3 weeks ago one of our core guys left for Coast Guard Bootcamp bringing us down to 3 guys.

About a week after he left I was reconnecting with a friend of mine at a near by church who I gave a starter deck to. My brother & I taught him how to play, but he didn't really seem too interested since he never came out to play cards. Anyways, as I was talking to him about Redemption he suggested I show another guy the game, he referred me to someone else who immediately got excited about the game.

We exchanged numbers and I gave him the web address to our site, www.southfloridaredemption.webs.com and kept in touch. In less than a week following that night we linked up and I gave him a starter deck. That was a Tuesday night. That guy showed up the following Friday night with another friend of his to learn how to play. So we grew to 5 guys. Both showed up to our local tournament the next day, Saturday.

God is so good! Yesterday we meet up at a different hobby shop than our usual hang out shop, GXE Games; a secular hobby shop. We just showed up to play cards. The store was hosting a Pokemon tournament there were a few casual D & D players. One of the store owners quickly caught interest in Redemption which he had never heard of. We briefly gave him a rundown of the game and how it works and the object of the game.

One lady saw us playing and began asking questions to whom we replied and gave out our site's web address. Another younger lady who was playing pokemon wanted to learn how to play. We were ready with a starter deck to sow into her. At first she was reluctant to receive our gift, but finally she took it and we also gave her our site's url.

One of the store owner's, the one in charge of gaming, best friend was a priest and he wanted to introduce the game to him and wanted to help us promote the game and even witness to people! He liked the game and what it's intentions are and its message. They want us to host tournaments there and start a club and they plan on carrying Redemption product to which we gave a list of suggested items to carry.

On a disappointing note, one of the new comers is moving to Puerto Rico to be an associate Pastor at his father's church. We all had dinner and fellowshipped at an Italian pizza house down the street afterwards. On the other hand this could be the beginning of the birth of another international play group off the coast of Florida. Praise God!



Jonathan from SoFL Redemption

Jesus is Lord!

Over & Out

[Red]

Can you move to AL? All humor aside I'm glad for you to expeince such growtnh in your group!

[Deck Metrics]

Can you move to AL? All humor aside I'm glad for you to expeince such growtnh in your group!

Haha, thanks. I appreciate the encouragement. We're expecting more grow too. I handed out three starters to people over the weekend. Another friend of mine who likes Redemption is moving to Canada. My brother & I have given her a starter deck and some cards. Hopefully that becomes another international play group too!

[SomeKittens]

Praise God!  Any tips on how to be so amazing?

[Deck Metrics]

Praise God!  Any tips on how to be so amazing?

Yes, the Glory is God's! I'd just point to the Bible. Sow or give into people. I've spent between $100-$200 in just giving out starter decks this year alone. And patience since time is part of God's spiritual Law of Seed, Time and Harvest. I'm sure you've done this stuff too. We go out to hobby shops and just hang out and play against eachother and it sparks interest in people.

Over the weekend I was playing with my brother in a hobby shop. A stranger walks over and starts watching us play. First he's just watching and we break the ice to open up conversation. Turns out he plays MTG. I ask him if he wants to learn, at first he just wanted to watch. After our game I ask him again and this time he was open to learning. Here's another key I've learned.. be ready! I already had two starter decks to give out so I asked him and then I gave him a starter  as a gift. I also hold onto extra cards, ones I have enough of and give those away too as newbies continue to show interest. I try to give people an incentive to play, I give'em stuff, cards, food, drinks, etc. I'm building a bridge through relationship.

Now a lot don't stick at first that's why it's important to be patient. I have given out a lot of starters, but our newest guy is so excited! He's spent at least $100 on cards in about 3 weeks and he's bringing people to show the game to, two people in two weeks and there's a 3rd person he's going to show either this week or the next.

[Deck Metrics]

Oh yeah, PRAYER! haha, I've been praying for about a month habitually for growth, but also to be worthy of such responsibility.

[disciple_drew]

Yeah praise God, God is so good. We've also invited people to our outings. Whenever we host a tournament we invite people who we'd suspect may be interested.

If you have friends who formerly played games like MTG, yugioh, pokemon, etc... show them the game. One reason we find out why a lot of them quit was because it was too expensive to play. We usually share the benefits to the game with them such as how cost effective it is to collect, compete, and so on.

The Bible has Jesus say that you shall know His disciples by their love. So we just love on folks. Appreciate them, appreciate where they're at. If they're not that interested.. don't condem them or pressure them; just keep loving on them. Some of the love thats demonstrated when we're at tournaments is we take a lot of pictures, videos, I've also created a cool website, a podcast, etc. Just to get the message across... we care, Jesus cares. So, we're invovled in their life or at least when we're playing together. The tournament play is interactive, it's not just a dry experience. We'll put those videos & pictures on an internet webzine and so on. We demonstrate love and people are drawn to that, people want to be invovled in that. A lot of people think it's cool but over all it's touched people.

[Warrior_Monk]

Puerto Rico is still kinda US...

but that's awesome!

[Deck Metrics]

Puerto Rico is still kinda US...

but that's awesome!

haha, yeah I guess so, but hey, I can't wait to see how God is going to move.

[YourMathTeacher]

Congratulations as always. God is doing great things through you two.

BTW, money is very tight for me, so I have not signed up for any tournaments as yet. I've been teaching during the day and working Disney at night, so I have had no time to plan ahead. Let me know if there are any particular days you guys had in mind for tournaments and I will see what I can do.

[disciple_drew]

Congratulations as always. God is doing great things through you two.

BTW, money is very tight for me, so I have not signed up for any tournaments as yet. I've been teaching during the day and working Disney at night, so I have had no time to plan ahead. Let me know if there are any particular days you guys had in mind for tournaments and I will see what I can do.

Hey Tim,

I sent you a message regarding that. Remember we're 2 single guys with no kids so we don't have all the things that can tie a married family man does. We just really want to see your family & playgroup again. Not to mention ours is growing; of which I'm sure you guys would be eager to meet.

[YourMathTeacher]

Just FYI, my van died on Saturday, so now our transportation is limited, too. I'm still trying to figure out how to pay my electric bill, so I have not made any plans yet. If you have dates in mind, just send me that in a PM. I will really be on and off the boards quickly from now until I get caught up.

I apologize again for the inconvenience.