All things are Possible...Event 10,000 Tents in 2 days.

My Friend Shaun King put out an urgent message for partners in South Florida to help get 10,000 yep... 10,000 tents on a shipment with partnering organizations for Mission Haiti.

URGENT ...... is an understatement on how we need South Florida people to respond to what I am, along with several thousands homeless people in Haiti are about to ask:

PLEASE DONATE A TENT NOW! We need to get 10,000 Tents to Haiti in less than 48hrs, and the clock is ticking. Here's how you can help:

Click here to purchase online & shipped to: 21113 Johnson St. STE 120 Pembroke Pines, FL 33029.

Or purchase a Tent at the Local Walmart, Target or Bass Pro Shop in Miami for tents 11551 No.West 12th. Or you can call there and order @ 305.341.4200. Ask to speak to Mgr Scott Tarlow to call & buy. All sizes and costs available. Designate 4 Haiti under name Esther Ortiz

We have two drop off at are 2 confirmed drop off locations:

Broward County Location

Healing for Haiti Now

Here is the address to the drop zone: 21113 Johnson St. STE 120 Pembroke Pines, FL 33029. Click HERE for a map. Hours: 9-5, Monday- Friday. For after hours donations call us: 954-432-0321

Miami Dade Location

J-R Custom Mica Furniture

Here is the address to the drop zone: 411-H NW 132nd StreetOpa Locka, FL 33054

Click Here for a map. Hours: 10:00 - 4:00 p.m. Attn: Jesus Travieso. 305-761-4476

Please Consider helping us. I can be reached on twitter: @Bennysalas or via email: bennysalas77@gmail.com also Follow @Shaunking, @Countrycuban @kimberlybrooke @healingHaitiNow

Where I ..... BE!

So I have come to grips with the fact that Blogging daily is not going to happen for me because its too much at the time but at least I can twitter everyday so at least I feel content with that. But, much has happened that I need to just "Blah-G" about! 1st my lovely wife and I made the decision with much prayer, advice and conviction to serve at Crossway Church. A new church plant in the Davie/Plantation area that is lead by pastor Jon Elswick and his wife Melissa Elswick. We felt that this was an opportunity to learn, serve, connect and experience a church plant during the developmental stages and initial growing pains. Besides we like Jon and Melissa!


This experience would be priceless in our endeavors to prepare ourselves to launch Freedom Culture Church in the next couple of years. Of course that's my plan but God, can change that just as easily as he lead us to this ministry that has a lot of potential. Of course I'm wrapping up my classes at Trinity Int'l University and looking forward to the possibilities of going on to Seminary, we'll see what happens.


Lastly, our campaign, Healing For Haiti Now is heavy on our hearts as we seek to join our community, churches, neighbors and whomever to join in on this cause! Healing For Haiti Now is a relief efforts through West Pines Community Church, Crossway Church and other partners to bring relief Aid to Haiti! I don't think we will ever be able to wrap our minds around such devastation and pain that many are experiencing at this moment but one thing we do know is the God of comfort who allows us to rest in Him in moments of despair.

Keep this effort in your prayers, follow our Tweets, Fan Page and Blog Site.....Mostly pray for the people of Haiti, the relief workers on the ground there and other organizations trying to make a difference in these difficult times.

Refocus: Church Planting, Life, Goals, Marriage & 2010

Happy New Year!!! How many times have we read, heard, said and thought about those words lately. I would say my NEW YEAR began about 2 months ago when I had to make some tough choices and decision about the direction my wife and I were headed in. Now I’m grateful for a loving, amazing, supporting and ever tough-minded partner that has been by my side when I was a single youth pastor and now future church planter but we hit the wall in our efforts to see certain dreams and goals accomplished. Our decision in 2009 to begin moving forward with planting Freedom Culture Church was on high hopes and became the focal point of everything I was trying to do.

Yet, in October 2009 we realized that we needed to move in a different direction and began praying about plugging in with a fellowship of believers or church before we planted our church. Of course initially I was not having any of that when we first started this journey but God is His graceful mercy served me up a piece of HUMBLE PIE as we continued to realize how time consuming, lonely, disappointing, challenging, financially, emotionally and spiritually draining it had become! I try to not be one that complains too much (wonder what my wife thinks about that last statement) because I want to view challenges as opportunities and stepping-stones not obstacles and stumbling blocks except I got burned-out quick! Trying to finish my education at Trinity International University (B.A. in Organizational Leadership and Minor in Christian Ministry) working a 40hr job as a case manager at a Downtown Miami Homeless Shelter, trying to lead my wife of 2yrs and our home, social networking ( @bennysalas - Twitter, BennySalas - Facebook, @freedomculture - Twitter) to get our name and establish our identity was a lot to keep up with and all were not working out well!

REFOCUSING: We are currently in prayer as we speak about opportunities to connect with a church in the South Florida Area that will be launching in the next 2 weeks or with the sending church of the soon to be launched church. We felt the need to learn how to do this correctly, be part of a fellowship we can serve and grow in and connect with some partnership/relationship/friendship because church planting is hard enough without people in your corner. Secondly I’m trying to finish up these last classes I have left to graduate by May or the latest December of this year, give or take It’ll be this year. This long journey of graduating from college has been a fight like you cannot imagine (I’ll blog about my journey to finish some other time) but I’m determine finish this year …before Jesus Comes back. ……Which may be in 2012…just kidding!

So as of right now Freedom Culture Church is on hold as I finish up some important classes, plug in with my wife at a local church that we can serve and learn from and get healthier as we prepare to launch a church that will outlive us!

Lastly but most importantly the health of my marriage is key! My wife and I are on the same page, growing in our love for one another and are hearing and sensing God hand with us. I’m grateful once again for my wife, as well as people like Rubin/Janyl, Ed Arroyo, Doug Rea, Jon/Melissa Elswick and Peter Hong who all have been a part of this season where we faced many challenges and had to think through some important questions. Keep us in your prayers, as I will be making more post updates on our status as well other things I love to blog about! Take care AMIGOS!

Having an ENCOUNTER with God

Day 1 after an amazing time of teaching, worship and encouragement with the Freedom Culture Team at the Hillsong United ENCOUNTER Conference 2009 in Miami. The place was literally filled with thousands of people hungry to hear the message of Faith, Hope & Love which seemed the themes throughout the main teaching sessions. Of course any Hillsong event you can bet will be filled with Music, Creativity, Teaching and a passion to praise God. This being my third Hillsong event, I felt God so much differently in time past. I really felt that I had an ENCOUNTER with God.

To be honest, it was not like this deep revelation as you would think but I sensed several things that God wanted to do in my life that I was not allowing HIM to do because I was not having personal encounters with Him on a regular basis. I must admit I fall short in this area of deep solitude time with the Lord and have been feeling that God wants to do more with me but I'm not making time for Him to do so. I want go off the handle by just blaming the busy schedule I have but truthfully, if I can make time to Twitter, Facebook and Blog...I can make time to have FACE-TIME Encounters with my God.

As Pastor Brian Houston explained: An ENCOUNTER is a collision with the unexpected. Usually an encounter is referred to as a hostile, violent or even emotional struggle between two people in an unexpected manner. When I hear that, I cant help but to reflect on the struggle it is to have these encounters with God and how Satan (The enemy) thrives on stealing that encounter time with the Lord. Think about how many times just this week something came up that pulled you from devoting more, or someone said something to you that threw your day off, or we entertained a negative thought that could have robbed our seed of faith that we are believing God for.

Having an Encounter with God will be a struggle because the enemy knows that when we get in God FACE-BOOK (His word that reveals His face) that we will be transformed into the image His son and that spells conflict for the enemy! God desires that you and I Have Encounters so that we can expect the unexpected from our Lord! That's in your face FAITH! God wants to fuel us up with His presence so that as we live our lives in a world that doubts God He can reveal Himself as the God who is all-powerful, all-knowing, all-faithful & all-loving.

I challenge you today to have a God ENCOUNTER!

Having a Nehemiah Experience

If you have never read the book of Nehemiah, then I advise you to immediately once your done reading this blog-posts to spend some time reading the story of how God used a simple cup bearer name Nehemiah to rebuild the walls of Jerusalem and write one of the most powerful leadership books today.


Nehemiah's heart was broken from the news brought to him about the City of God "Jerusalem", and the condition and destruction that served to reflect the reproach and shame upon the citizens. Nehemiah had an experience in his life in which God placed a burden on his to respond to the ruined city and rebuild it. Is it possible that God chooses a man or woman who seems to be the unlikely candidate to bring a revolution & rebuilding to their city?

The answer is YES! God uses this man, which by the way his name "Nehemiah" means (Yahweh Comforts) to bring hope, justice and peace to a City that had been desolate for over 100+ years. I must admit that I am challenged by this story to become a stronger person of prayer to find the essence of what really burdens my heart for my city? What will I do in my actions to reflect the burden place upon me, as well as other leaders whom I network with? How will I handle the criticism, as Nehemiah did, and continue to build in the midst of opposition? How will encourage, empower and lead a revolution in South Florida to build something through Freedom Culture that will please God!

Yes I had a Nehemiah experience, how about you?

Becoming a Partner with Freedom Culture

Hello Freedom Culture: Today I made my first genuine attempt to ask friends, partners and followers to join me in our efforts to begin raising support for our Freedom Culture Plant/Launch for the 2010. I can't begin to tell you how exciting it is to envision what Freedom Culture seeks to be in South Florida. As we are building relationships with people, we are inviting people to join our launch team and dream with us what God has laid on our hearts for this community. Maybe that's YOU!

There is so much need that one message will not cover all that it will take to make this dream become a reality. From Sound equipment, a trailer, resources, staffing, rental expenditures, funding to help with cost expenditure.......The list goes on and on.

The Good news is this! Along with the regular giving of my wife and I to this mission, as well as commitments from a partnering church planting organization (Northwood), we had our 1st commitment today from someone who is seeking to offer support for the next year. We need your prayers & generous partnership support to raise the funds needed to reach our community and successfully plant Freedom Culture. We are also in process of funding from our ECC partnership and partnering churches that also believe in this vision.

Please prayerfully and generously consider partnering with Freedom Culture? That means maybe you can make a commitment for the next year of $50-$100 a month ($25 a week) or a one time donation...Either or every dollar counts and goes toward helping us dream out this vision.

If your interested in becoming a partner, email me at: benny@freedomculture.org or

Freedom Culture Inc.
P.O. BOX 170806
Hialeah, FL 33017

Thank You so much for taking the time to connect with this vision!

Freedom Culture Coffee House Hangout

South Florida, were are so excited about our 1st Coffee House Gathering this Sunday at "It's a Grind" Coffee House In Miramar, FL ( 12703 Miramar Pkwy Click for directions). The event kicks-off This Sunday around 6pm till about 8pm with awesome group of people from around the Miami Dade/Broward County area's coming to hang out, enjoy some coffee, socialize with new people, connect with Freedom Culture and support the cause of Community Partnership for Homeless.

You can expect some live DJ music by DJ. Mr.E & spoken word poetry by Yannick of Soul Movement Crew, Maeve of Arts of Color, Live comedy by funny-man Monte Benjamin and a brief intro by Benny Salas on the Vision of Freedom Culture.

We are also asking for your support in raising a donation of school supplies for the children of Community Partnership for Homeless. With the upcoming school year, many children who are residents at the 2 emergency shelter locations (Downtown Miami & Homestead) need your help

and support. We will be collecting: Book bags, pencils, pens, markers, erasers, notebook, folders, paper, pencil boxes and other school necessities. If you would like to make a financial donation to CPH, click here.

We are launching Coffee House events every 1st Sunday as social gathering for the community, share the vision of Freedom Culture. We look forward to meeting you at one of our event gatherings or come-unity group gatherings. Please connect with Benny Salas or Freedom Culture on Twitter, Facebook or for more info email us: info@freedomculture.com

Social "Not-Working"

It's not often will you hear a post a like this, or at least I've not heard of one that will address the issues of balancing your social networking time along with the other million-and-1 tasks you have to do in a day! Go back to the days of MYSPACE.... Remember that? Yeah, I still haven't deleted my account yet, not sure why I haven't but nonetheless that's my goal for this week.

Anyways, when MYSPACE came out I recall spending so much time trying to get my profile page to look "HOT" as I scrolled through all my friends’ pages reading comments and so forth. Of course that got played out real quick and then FACEBOOK came along. I sat on it for a while but then it took off and I got HOOKED.... Again! Then to join the craze of bloggers I had to up it up-1 and begin blogging to share my thoughts on issues and topics I felt were relevant, personal and close to my convictions. Now we have Twitter! (WHEW).......(UUGGHHHH).....Does it ever end or will it ever end?

It's called Social Networking and thousands upon thousands; maybe millions of people are social networking everyday. Why else would Twitter and Facebook crash and freeze up! Think of the amount of time, energy, focus and concentration the Social Networking-Sphere has and will cost you in the long run. I along with the many social-networkers have a good reason for being addicted to posting a thought, Tweet or Blog to develop our organizations or get our name out there. Let's be honest for a just a moment and rate yourself on how much do you social network on a regular basis?

(1 2 3 4 5)

1-not so much

2-few times a day

3-Just enough

4-More than enough

5-all day

I must confess that I am a 5 and if I'm not balancing my time correctly I could very well be off the Charts! A conversation I had with my wife about these issues took place a few months back when I was basically living like a zombie. Every time my phone alerted me that I got a message, email, text or Tweet I had to answer it no matter where I was! It flat out pissed my wife off and for very good reason I might add. My attention to details, conversation, small things, personal time and family time and most importantly God time was sucked by the need to know what everybody else is doing and for everybody to know what I was doing.

This is Blog-fessional (Confessional Blog) where the conversation came up again after having spent quality time with my wife she asked me to engage in more conversation with her family and my opportunity to show her that I’m a changed man (Work in Progress still), didnt turn out good for me as I blew it! To busy trying to be excited about the (ADVERTISEMENT COMING) The Aug. 2nd Coffee House Gathering at It's a Grind Coffee House @ 6pm in Miramar, Fl.

My attempt to justify why I was messaging details only revealed to me that I was being selfish with my time and not honoring relational time with my family. It raised a Red Flag as I just had a conversation this past week with a good friend whose marriage is suffering and in restoration and healing due to the Social Networking disease. Is social networking bad? No! Yet when it’s where you find validation, acceptance, friends and identity then it can become unhealthy. I mean we are in a time where we can reach the world at the touch of a click or push button…..Amazing! Not so cool when it’s becomes your mistress or is the only time your intimacy happens for you.

Here are changes I hope to implement in my social networking sphere:

• Don’t compromise my relational time (My God, My wife, My Church, My Friends).
• Shut my phone/laptop off for meal times, devotional times, reflecting times and rest times.
• Don’t set everything to alert! May have to disable a few of them, actually already did. Easier said than done, because supposedly everything is important…NOT TRUE!
• Create a specific time to answer important things and specific time for non-important things.
• Work, Ministry, Education & Study time must come first! Am I offering the bulk of time building my future or my social networks??? (Big Challenge)
• Be cautious to not get arrogant and prideful with followers.....Keep my integrity in Check!

I’m sure there are more ideas you and I can come up so feel free to add. I want to stress that I’m not saying that you don’t social network, I’m just challenging you to think about this issue in your personal life and what this may look like! Maybe you think I’m too extreme or not extreme enough, but I just want to be healthy in my life that’s all. If you have to Google your name to see how many time you pop up, it's a sign you have social networking disease.

New Blog Added "Live-Out Loud"

I just added a new Blog called: "Live-Out Loud." The Purpose of this blog is to address the social issues in our culture that cause for voice to speak up on. I along with others will be posting on this blog along with links to other blogs that deal with issues and concerns of interest. All matters will not be addressed, yet this will be a culmination of a variety of issues that deal with Social Justice, Compassion, Morality, Ethics. Politics, Faith, Life, Music, Arts & Culture. Please be Patient as the site is under Construction.

Not sure if that will be the pic for the Blog yet. This is just a Test Page. May switch to WORDPRESS.

Popularity Screws Over Morality!

I debated about writing this blog but than I came across a great posts on FACEBOOK by April R. Silvers thoughts on this matter and I felt that anger rise within me to say something about how that made me feel. Besides it’s my blog anyways….lol.

Last Sunday night I tuned into the 09' BET Awards after coming home late from a speaking engagement that I had to be at and so I caught the last 30 mins of the show, expecting to hear or see a final tribute to Michael Jackson. What I got was anything but a tribute to Michael Jackson but a reality check of how trashy mainstream media will go to keep their popularity alive.

Here’s what my Tweets from twitter page looked like as I was watching this garbage and conversing with some friend about what was on the screen:

@LaSportsanista why do u want 2 cancel
BET is str8 up GHETTO!10:13 PM Jun 28th from twidroid

MAXWELL is singing mine & @sharonsalas song.10:15 PM Jun 28th from twidroid

@LaSportsanista yeah I know. BET awards needs major facelift. Unfortunately the stereotypes seem to fit.10:21 PM Jun 28th from twidroid

@LaSportsanista Another perverted lil'wayne song! I don't hate him, just his message, hope some guy doesn't treat his daughter that way10:30 PM Jun 28th from twidroid

BET awards should be ashamed of themselves for that last performance..Lil'wayne trash music10:32 PM Jun 28th from twidroid

Lil'wayne just trashed women then brings his kids on stage for a song....Wow! Pray God spares HIM! God heart just broke over that stupidity!10:36 PM Jun 28th from twidroid

@waynesutton I agree!10:37 PM Jun 28th from twidroid

@mileycyrus sorry the world had to hear lil'wayne song disrespect you. Keep be'n a positive role model becuz lil'wayne isnt .10:49 PM Jun 28th from twidroid

If you didn’t have the discomfort of watching Lil’ Wayne performance then I’d advise you to search it and see why everybody is buzzing about his performance for all the wrong reason. The song “Every Girl” flat out degraded women as he rhymes (which In my opinion he sucks at) about basically having sex with almost every girl he can have sex with. You could barely hear the song because almost every other word was “Bleeped” out! Sounded more like someone trying to tune a radio and not being able to pick up a signal…It was that bad!

Worse than the bleeping, worse the performance, worse than anything was him bringing little girls, even his own daughter on stage while he was performing the song! WHAT! Are you kidding me! Yes, he’s basically pimping and treating his own flesh and blood child as one of his many HOOCHIE girls he rapping about. I decided to not post the full Lyrics because I don’t want that nonsense on my web page but here are a few bars from his song:

“for free suites I’d give Paris Hilton all-nighters,
in about 3 years holla at me Miley Cyrus”

I could only imagine what his daughter’s thought as their Idol Hannah Montana is be sexually assaulted by their father on live TV. I do apologize for the long post but I make no apologizes about the stupidity and filth people would display to demoralize women in the name of Lust! Let’s be honest, lil’ Wayne has not been the 1st to do this and will not be the last either.

The moral fabric of family values, purity, integrity, respect and Godliness has been on the decline for decades and with each foothold the enemy can influence a person to desire after their flesh will only put us in jeopardy of what’s to come. Of course it never seizes to amaze me when these artist are esteemed and honored by society they never forget to thank God for it, yet they have just wounded the heart of God!