Saturday, June 23, 2007

God's Story


I was asked to speak at NorthEast Christian Church in Bakersfield last Sunday just to tell "our story" and our vision for Kaleo.
I had planned on just winging it as I know my story pretty well and I've been eating and breathing Kaleos vision for about two years now. However, my wife reminded me that I tend to be a bit long winded when talking about myself or Kaleo and that maybe an outline would keep me on track. SoI started walking through chronologically the turning points which lead us to this point in time and the decision to plant a church. It was a very powerful experience! I could see God's hand in so many critical moments guiding, loving, redirecting, disciplining and delivering large portions of His Grace. I am so blessed, so many people have played crucial roles in my development, I am grateful to so many people. I know I've barely begun to scratch the surface of God's moving in my life but I'm determined to identify more and more and let this drive me to gratefulness and worship.

Where can you see God's fingerprints in your story?

Friday, June 15, 2007

A Home for Kaleo


If you’ve been reading our prayer emails or our newsletters you’ve heard me say that God’s fingerprints are all over this adventure. Well this time His print is in the form of a meeting facility. We passed by this place the first time we were in Bakersfield and David Limiero the pastor of Life Journey Church in Bakersfield mentioned that it might be worth looking into as a place to meet. Then we passed by it again with our realtor, an elder at NorthEast Christian Church, and he said he knew the owners because they attended his church as kids. Then when we hit town we were visiting Christ Church of the Valley and noticed they were having an event there, Becky asked Amberly Neese, the lead pastors wife, about it and she said the owners attended and were active at CCV. So about this time (I’m apparently a little slow on the uptake) I decide maybe God’s doing something and call the owners Mike and Shari to see if I can come and see the facility and talk about the possibility of renting it. After touring the place with Mike and realizing we couldn’t possibly hope for a better place. Mike tells me they would love to have us in the facility and they wouldn’t charge us anything to use it. After picking my jaw up off the floor, Mike explained to me that he couldn’t charge me rent because he didn’t own the building. After pausing just long enough for me to start wondering about sub-leasing problems, He tells me that the owner is God and he’s pretty sure He won’t mind. : )
You can see more pictures of the inside of the facility at http://web.mac.com/sbcole just click on A Home for Kaleo.