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Monthly Archives: April 2016

April 24 Coffee Church Highlights

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April 28, 2016
Ministry
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What a weekend and then a week!  First I had the privilege of preaching on Sunday and then we’ve spent the last three days at our Annual Pastor’s Conference, which is why this blog is a bit late this week.  We had a great time hanging with our other pastor’s friends and telling them how wonderful you all are! 🙂

Preaching was actually fun!  I try and avoid the spotlight as much as feasibly possible in ministry, but I felt like God gave me a message that He needed to say to North Creek. I encourage you to listen to it at www.coffeechurch.com.

We got to go out with a new missionary that we started supporting this week.  She serves in a dangerous part of the world and keeps her name out of social media for her own safety.  As I listened to her talk I was captivated by the bravery and courage that must take to go, as a single woman, into an uncertain world to tell them about our God.  Would you commit to giving more money to missions every month?  What an amazing group of people!

Speaking of giving, we are a few thousand dollars short this month and need to make budget by Saturday!  If you can help us out, you can give several ways HERE.  We are in the process of looking for a new building and every month counts when we go to ask for lending options.  Also, if you hear of a building that might work for us, pass on the info!

If you’re wondering what’s going on with our trailer situation, well…we are dealing with insurance companies….do I need to say any more?  We should have all of our stuff back in order in a decade or so…#itsjuststuff

Men!  Don’t forget to sign up for Men’s Conference coming up in May.  You can register at www.coffeechurch.com today!

We have one more week of our North Creek U class on How to Read Your Bible for Understanding.  We had one lady tell us that she applied what she learned and got WAY more out of her Bible reading already.  That is AWESOME!  I encourage you to sign up for various North Creek U’s coming up in the future to further the growth in your life.

Our youth ministry turns 7 today!  Happy Birthday to the Difference!  We are so proud of you!!!

God spoke a lot of things into Mark and I’s heart this weekend at Conference and I look forward to processing it all in the future.  I’m so ready to watch our community and nation change by the power and presence of an Almighty God.  How about you?  It will never be changed by systems, programs, and processes, but rather by a move of God that is unquestionable.

And I believe that move is coming!  Here we go!

April 17 Coffee Church Highlights

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April 20, 2016
Ministry
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It was another great Sunday at North Creek!  We are still rolling right along with a bit of less stuff as we are trying to sort through the trailer fiasco we’ve been dealing with!

I had a friend from High School send money to help.  It was AWESOME to hear from someone after 20 years and have them be so encouraging.  This has been an expensive bump in the road, so we really appreciate the extra help.  Thank you so much, Kristin!

We had a phenomenal worship time on Sunday followed by a great message in our series “Dangerous Prayers”.  If you have missed any of these messages you can find them online at www.coffeechurch.com.  I’m actually preaching this week, so that will be fun!  You should come and join us because I am preaching on the MOST Dangerous Prayer.  Such a tease! 🙂

We also started North Creek U.  This first session is called Reading Your Bible for Understanding.  It was a great start to our new Sunday morning learning environments.  We will be having many of these opportunities scattered over the year on a variety of topics.  Some will be a one-week class and some will be multiple weeks to cover a bigger topic. You can jot down May 15 as a DON’T MISS Sunday.  Cheryl Bledsoe will be teaching a class on internet safety for your kids.  I am very excited to be a part of learning how to keep my kids safer in this digital age.  Feel free to invite anyone to this.  They don’t need to be a part of North Creek to register!  Sign ups will be out soon.

Apparently we were on KGW again on Monday night regarding North Creek getting the trailer back.  Also, the Battle Ground police department is doing an AMAZING job!  They think they have our thief in custody for another crime and are gathering evidence to make an arrest.  Our thieve’s quick departure to jail may be why our stuff didn’t get sold piece by piece.  We will keep you posted as our story unfolds!

We have good news to share about the Battle Ground campus on Sunday as well.  This journey of merging our two campuses has been one touch of God after the other.  He has been faithful at every turn, although our human hearts sure wanted to panic a few times!  We look forward to moving toward a permanent facility as the Lord enables and finding our home.

How can you help get us to where we need to go?  Easy answer!  Consistent monthly giving.  As we approach the possibility of buying a new building, our lending agency will look at our monthly capacity to pay our bills.  The more capacity, the better the step we can take.  I am happy to say that we have made budget so far this year, while also giving substantially more to missions, as well as nearly $7000 to Charity Water.  That being said, our budget is down to it’s bare bones, so getting our giving up will speak volumes to our future.  See www.coffeechurch.com for easy, online giving.

So, onward we go!  So much to dream about, so much to do!  Thanks for going on this journey with us!

 

 

 

The Lost Shall Be Found!

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April 15, 2016
Ministry
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2016-04-14 10.48.28Our mobile trailer was FOUND yesterday!!!  It was parked nicely in a neighborhood in Salmon Creek in plain site from a main roadway.

The good news is that nearly all of our stuff was in it or recovered at the initial scene.  The bad news is that something clearly happened to the trailer and lots of our sound equipment.

We can’t really figure out what exactly took place in this whole story, but here’s the details we do have:

Our hitch lock was demolished, while our back door locks are still on it…they got in by destroying the door with a crow bar, so you can imagine how lovely that looks!

The trailer has front end damage, damage to the wheel well and a metal brace in the front is cracked  Our guess is that the trailer hit something pretty hard.  We had to put it on a truck to get it safely home as towing it isn’t a good plan.  The adjuster comes on Monday and we expect they will total the trailer at this point.

2016-04-14 12.23.26Inside of the box we had five massive rolling storage boxes that contained all of our stuff.  The thieves unloaded two boxes in Battle Ground, emptied the contents back into the trailer and left the boxes.  Unfortunately it was the sound box and the foyer box.  Our sound equipment and a large flat panel television was thrown into the trailer, while the cords and snake were sliced to remove them from the box.  Not only that, but the pile was directly under a part of the roof that was leaking, so it was wet or damp when we found it.  It also looked like it may have taken another hit when the trailer was in an accident and jossled everything around again.  We will need to talk to the insurance about the next step for our equipment.

The KidCity box seems like it was untouched through the whole ordeal.  It was wedged in pretty tight and difficult to get to.

The Tiny Town box clearly toppled over.  It is a very heavy box with a TV mounted inside.  The TV took a hard blow on the way down, and while it still works, I think it audibly moaned at me when I booted it up. 🙂  The box is strong as an ox, but it looks like it fought a tough battle!

Another sound box was partially dissembled as well.  It looks like they were planning on dismantling and selling our stuff, but gave up in the middle.  We aren’t sure why, but we do serve a convicting God who is on our side!  Not to mention that unloading our trailer appropriately takes precise knowledge and three men, so if they didn’t know what they were doing, they had a disaster on their hands!

The thieves also left two fishing poles…

For this Sunday, we will be without our stuff again.  We have rented sound equipment, so we are OK.  We are grateful to have so much left to rebuild from and will be back to “normal” very soon!

2016-04-14 13.52.48Also, KATU, KGW, and FOX news really did all stop by the Battle Ground building on Wednesday…all within an hour of each other.  Chris got to very unexpectedly give 3 interviews.  From now on, we’ll all be storing a nice shirt in our cars with us! 😉  He did a great job and the best part was that they did not cut out the message of Jesus in those interviews.  We appreciate those news stations for telling our story of Jesus because the trailer is just a byline!

We have very much appreciated the Battle Ground police department, Vancouver police department, and the fire department in this situation.  What an impressive group of people who have been on top of this and very helpful!

I also want to take a moment and do a shout out for our pastoral team.  They are unwaivering, faith-filled, talented, and unstoppable people.  I can’t even begin to tell you about the strength it has taken them to lead through the last year of transition and tragedy, but they haven’t flinched in the face of challenge.  Mark and I are honored and humbled to lead this group of people who are full of integrity and loyal to the cause of Christ.  North Creek is built first on the love of Jesus and second on the backs of the toughest people I know.

And now to close out this story…God is good!  He was good when the trailer was gone and He is good when the trailer came home.  The story was always about His goodness.  Our mission is to lead people into a growing relationship with Jesus.  And we go forward to do just that!

If you don’t have a church, would you consider visiting us this Sunday?  Perhaps all of this happened so that you might hear about an unstoppable church in Vancouver, Washington that wants you to be a part.  www.coffeechurch.com

 

 

April 10 MIRACLE SUNDAY Highlights

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April 11, 2016
Ministry
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YOUR NAME, YOUR NAME IS VICTORY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

As I stood in a field on Friday night looking at what little was left of our church after someone had stolen our mobile trailer with all of our sound, kid’s church, deaf church, coffee supplies and signage, something happened in my heart.  But rather than discouragement, sadness, or frustration, it was resolve.  A resolve to rise up, brush off, and quite frankly kick the hell out of what Satan was trying to do to our lives.

Our strength comes from Jesus.  He’s our source, He’s our provider, and He has every intention of storming the gates of sin and destruction using our feet.  So our feet will push on.

Within literally minutes of getting the phone call that it was all gone, we had a borrowed sound system, video, screens, and computers on the way.  (Thank you, Roy Fisher!!!!)  We spent a whopping $400 on miscellaneous supplies to buy new rugs and a coffee pot…and that was it.  Our people brought nursery toys, grabbed what they could out of storage, offered copious amounts of help in every way, and we had church without missing a beat.

Not a beat.  Not a tear.  Not a moment of despair.  Because we don’t despair over stuff.  We despair over broken lives.  People.  I guarantee you that I grieve greater over one family leaving our church than I will ever grieve over a trailer full of possessions.  Because we didn’t start a church to have nice stuff.  We started a church to birth in the hearts and lives of people that God will break the things in their lives that they think are unbreakable.  He will set them free.  He will use them in power.  He will change their futures and their families.

It’s time that we started caring less about what might happen to us and walk in the anointing of what might happen through us!

So, we press on.  We have a crazy amount of stuff to do in order to have our systems back in place and we’ll let you know how you can help as we figure out what to do next.  In the meantime, pray, shout in victory, walk in boldness, and don’t back down.

And if you have been watching this story over the weekend and don’t have a church…come and join us.  Our resurrecting God wants to resurrect what has been stolen in your life as well!

 

 

April 3 Coffee Church Highlights

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April 6, 2016
Ministry
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Happy Spring Break to all of our students out there!  The weather has been so incredible I think all of us have been on a bit of a spring break!  I dropped all my work one day and just went outside to enjoy the sunshine.  The work will get done by itself, right?

I just love the people of North Creek!  I was so encouraged on Sunday by so many of the steps that people are taking in their walk with God…myself included!  I sense Him moving in so many hearts and lives and I am so grateful to be a part of it!  We have exceptionally amazing people in our midst!

We have no youth group this week for Spring Break.  Some of our students are headed to help with the homeless at Bridgetown on Thursday night instead.  Way to make a difference in this world!

Also, if you’d like to hire a student to earn money for summer camp, you can contact Kris Gray at kris@coffeechurch.com.  She will set you up with however many students you need to do whatever project you have!  Think about it…that pile of rocks you need to move?  Those weeds?  That pressure washing job that will take FOREVER?  Yes, you can not only send a kid to camp, but you can get them to do some labor in return.  We love to help our kids understand Jesus and work ethic!

Our Deaf Church has a group in Mexico this week for a missions trip, so please be praying that God uses their lives in remarkable ways.  Did you know that Mexican sign language is quite different than ASL?  Our deaf church has to learn a new language as well!

On a negative note, but also a positive note at the same time…our Battle Ground deal for sale fell through with the apartments, BUT two great organizations are currently looking at it for the second and third times this week.  We trust Jesus to not only give us the sale we want to move on, but also have His will done on who He wants there in order to fulfill the mission that He has for Battle Ground.  It is exciting to be on this adventure and watch Jesus orchestrate it all.

If you’d like a short term ministry, we need people to stop by the Battle Ground campus and weed the beds once a week.  If a few people did about 15 minutes of weeding a week, it would stay looking good!

How’s your Bible reading?  How about your prayer life?  If you need some help and accountability, jump into a growth group.  It helps to be in community with people who have the heart to grow!  Plus, growth groups are awesome.

I hope you have a truly God-ordained week, full of His divine appointments, miracles, and opportunities.  He has a plan for you!!!

Be blessed!