Hey Blog fans.  I know its been a little while but we wanted to catch you up on what's been going on with us out here in California.  For the past couple months we have been making California more our home.  We have had a lot of visitors from back home to help us out during big weekends for the church.  We even had a visit from Bekah's parents last month which was great.  The church has been going really well.  This past weekend for easter we hosted an easter egg hunt for our community and had 2000 people attend!!  It was incredible!  We had some mission teams come in and help us stuff 6000 plastic eggs by hand with candy.  We even did a few Willy Wonka style golden tickets that kids could turn in for really cool prizes.  Things like tickets to a Giants game, build a bear gift cards and various other fun toys.  It was a blast to be able to show our community the love of Christ and ask nothing in return.  We had all walks of people there- Hindu's, Muslims, all receiving a touch of kindness from Christ.  We had planned this for months but it worked out to be good timing because the week prior that same community experienced a major blow. 5 people, including 2 children had been shot in this community of million+ dollar homes.  Things like this just don''t happen here.  So it was nice to get people back out of their homes to laugh and enjoy the sun and of course, get some candy. :) Here are some pics: 


Our church is now about 10 weeks old and we have been running about 130-170 every sunday.  We have been so blessed by all the volunteers and people willing to give of their time to make South Bay Church happen.  We held 2 Easter services this past sunday and had 285 people!  We had 9 first time decisions for Christ, and 35 first time guests!  It was an incredible weekend for us as a team!  

Coming up this next week, our pastoral team will be heading to LA for the first time since we've been here to attend a Christian Leadership Conference called Catalyst http://www.catalystwestcoast.com/  We are really excited to get out of town for a bit and get inspired and renewed.  I will try to post some pics from my phone this week, it should be pretty incredible.  

On a personal level, Bekah is still enjoying her job and traveling around to homes to work with kids birth to 3yrs old.  It takes a special person to do what she does.  I joke with her that I'm going to have to live in her mansion in heaven (because she's such a good person).  Right now she has a new OT shadowing her as she's driving around and will soon be in a new office space during the week.  I have been continuing to take guitar lesson from a friend and improving my skills.  I have been playing more lead guitar on Sunday mornings which has been a goal of mine, instead of playing acoustic.  Also, we needed to buy a car because Bekah uses ours for work and I have been borrowing a car from our Pastor, Andy since Sept.  We recently got church offices and I now have a need for my own transportation since we are no longer working out of our homes.  We have been saving since Sept to buy a second car in cash.  So this past week I found a car that I have always wanted and it was at a great price and since I only drive around town... I got it.  A 67 Ford Mustang.  I've only had it a few days but already have met many people who want to talk about the car.  Rebekah and I were praying yesterday and we were saying that Jesus wants to use anything we will give Him to reach people, including a Mustang.  Already it has been a great in-roads to build relationships with people.  

Thanks so much for all your prayers.  We are excited about what God is doing here among us.  We are seeing many people come to Christ and lives being radically changed for His sake.  We are so thankful to be giving our lives to His calling.