Everything They Had (Acts2’s 5&2 Ministry)
Stack Life is a faith group that was borne out of one of the shelters that our 5&2 ministry visits. (5&2 is named after Jesus’ miracle of multiplying the 5 loaves and 2 fish to feed 5000; giving what we have to serve our community). For about a year, 6–8 brothers and sisters, all volunteers from 5&2, have been visiting First Presbyterian Church of Hayward’s shelter weekly to provide & serve food, talk to residents and host activities and programs — messages, praise & prayer, even carnival games, and a lot of personal conversations. Among them were Dennis and Nancy Cheung.
I remember when Nancy came to Cal as a wide-eyed freshman, or, more like a deer caught in headlights. She was a thoughtful, if indecisive, middle child of 3 girls. Everything she did was deliberative — eating, talking, even blinking. I also remember when Dennis came to our new San Francisco ministry as a working professional. She was churched, he unchurched, and through their own journeys they both became Christian, eventually got married, and had 2 daughters. Dennis works as a Devops Engineer for IBM. Nancy did a variety of things, including getting licensed in massage therapy, but ended up working in my peer, Sophia’s, ophthalmology office.
Our church started 5&2 ministry in around 2020, looking for places where we could serve our community, and started serving shelters for the unhoused, a post-prison transition center, women’s shelters, and a program for kids in Oakland. As it’s named, our 5&2 team goes & does what they can. They’ll spend a few hours a week teaching former inmates computer skills, hold Bible studies with a small group of women, walk around encampments passing out toiletries and talking to people. They trust that God will multiply their efforts. They’ve provided encouraging stories that bring the rest of us to tears. This was one of them.
Dennis and Nancy are perfect for 5&2. They both have a calm and peaceful spirit. Though Nancy still does almost everything deliberatively, and still sort of looks like a deer caught in headlights, she’s been a bold and loving evangelist at her workplace. Pharmaceutical representatives come to the office to sell products, and Nancy befriends and shares the love of Christ with them — one person started attending online services, one woman shared her burden for her daughter who is blind and received prayers and care from Nancy. One co-worker in the office went through course 101 and Bible reading with Nancy. When she experienced a medical emergency, the person she reached out to was Nancy, who prayed for her, and asked other co-workers to pray for her; and this woman actually received Christ! This kind of heart and persistence made her also an effective minister to the unhoused.
Whenever Dennis would walk into First Pres, be brought his warmth, patience and calm. He’d go from one man to the next, talking to them, praying and reading Bible with them, bringing the comfort of God as they were going through tough times. Over the past year of serving there, he took different opportunities to share the GOSPEL acrostic he learned from Dare2Share ministries, and led a handful of men to Christ.
Some of these residents attend Stack Life on Sundays, where they have lunch, do a Faith Circle with Bible discussion and prayer time at the park. Back in June, Dennis and Nancy shared with the group that they were moving to West Lafayette to start a youth ministry. One of the unhoused brothers mentioned how they want to contribute to the new ministry. Everyone at the Faith Circle then started taking out whatever they had and collected around $67 on the spot! Another brother also shared the vision for the Cheung family to bring the youth they meet to the Bay Area for a mission trip in the future. As our 5&2 members shared this, we were reminded of the widow in Mark 12, where Jesus “called his disciples to him and said to them, ‘Truly, I say to you, this poor widow has put in more than all those who are contributing to the offering box. For they all contributed out of their abundance, but she out of her poverty has put in everything she had, all she had to live on.’” I’m sure God will bless & multiply this offering. What would this group of Bay Area men and women have anything to do with youth in West Lafayette? But they have everything to do with them, because of the love they received from Dennis & Nancy, and now they’ve joined along with us in praying for those youth. God surely does multiply our efforts.
