My warning lights

WARNING, WARNING, WARNING Just like a warning light to any gauge in a car, my life's warning lights are going off and it's time to pull over and refuel. There are some simple but extremely practical signs that remind me that it's time to pull over and recalibrate:

1) I can always tell the order of my life by the order of my computer desktop. If my desktop is crazy, icons everywhere, some even overlapping others that's usually how my life is going. Oh I'm productive and I'm busy but too many things overlapping, and the important things easily get missed.

2) Blogging, When I'm blogging it means I'm thinking, when I'm thinking it means I'm finding rest. It's been difficult to find rest lately. I'm talking about that rest in my heart and my mind when I can easily discern the voice of God speaking to my life. If I can give you a better picture it would be like this: at this level of rest it literally feels like God is speaking constantly to you. I'm talking life defining stuff, things that you would not normally think of, things that you could not think of on your own.

3) Physically my body will start to tell me it's time to rest: I know it's not in the bible but sometimes I think God uses a cold to slow me down because sometimes that's the only way I will.

Last year at this time I was burnt and I would continue to ignore the warning lights. I'm not ignoring them, now. Matter of fact I do things a lot differently now. We all have our kryptonite, can't deny it or ignore it. Don't ignore the warning lights when they are blinking in your life. What are your warning lights? Care to share, please comment below, would love to get some feedback on this topic.

Blueprint Moment

Met with my son earlier today, it was his last day at school and he is getting ready to start a new school next month. My wife was also there so I walked both my son and her to the car. As I walked away, I looked back to say bye one more time, sitting in the back seat was my son, his eyes said everything he was feeling. "Daddy, why can't things be the same, why can't I stay here, why can't we just be normal?" Up until two weeks ago my family has lived in the same city for the last seven years. I've had the same job for the last 10 and little Isaiah has gone to the same school for the last two. As of today we have sold much of our possessions, living in one room, my son will be heading to a new school in a new city in a matter of weeks and that's just a small piece of what's really about to happen. Our normal life has changed, it's changed so dramatically that it almost seems easier to go back to being normal.

But, is normal what I really want? Is it where I'm supposed to be?

I think today I experienced one of those blueprint moments with God. I felt as if the creator of my life unfolded the schematics before my very eyes and heart. In fact a scripture that I read today say's this "and your real life is hidden with Christ in God." "Your life was never intended to be normal it was intended to be purposed." Within normality I create my own blueprint only to discover it leads to a dead end. Man is intended to live life everyday with a sense of destiny and to discover how our lives are truly supposed to count for the creator that created us.

I'm not going to lie, I'm uncomfortable, my faith is daily being stretched, but I can't live in the norm because I'll die inside. Today I put my complete trust for my life, my marriage, my family, my team in the hands of an all powerful, all knowing and ever present God. My life was not intended for normality it was intended for a purpose

June 14th 2009 @ "THE M"

Sunday Recap 06-14-09

-Seems like the night before service I was tossing and turning and praying for much of the night. Honestly at around 4am I had a lot of concern going into Sunday. A lot of change in my life taking place right now and still adjusting. But I maintained my position in prayer and wasn't going to allow anything to stop a great day.

-Got to service and I was pumped. Finalizing our message series "Moving Forward", trying some new technical elements, new band on stage, oh yeah and a bbq afterward, can it get any better? You better believe it...

- LifeGroups begin: New folks showing up to journaling class almost an hour before service starts. enerGY, enRGY, ENERY

- And the countdown begins t-30 till service starts, the lights are set, the sound is getting prepped and my heart can't wait to preach. Troy Lepisi has his RUN DMC glasses on. Amanda Mikkelsen and Big Roob are getting ready to lead the team into worship.

- The team prays in the back, we focus on one word. A word that is actually a title from Jake Hamiltons latest CD. The word is "Marked". Our prayer is that people would leave marked by God today and on their way to the mark of their God given destiny.

-Ready, set, go it's 11:17am time for service: Newest addition to CWC Milpitas and the CWC Hawaii team Rev. Julie Grimes opens service for her very first time and definitely not her last. Great job, great intensity.

-Missed a portion of worship. I walked across the way to pick up some Indian food with my buddy Sumant for our BBQ after. That's right Indian Food. Every week I get to preach, Latinos, Whites, Islanders, Asians and Indians. "All races, All Generations, Serving one God"

- My mouth drops for a minute as I walk back into service. Much bigger crowd then last week. Santz opens the sermon, recaps how far we have come the previous weeks. We open with a question via a Txt message poll. As the figures start tallying right before our eyes, people start gasping. (pretty cool). Todays message "Chase the Lion" from 2 Samuel 23:20. When your pursuing a God given destiny you will have to come up against a lion that roars fear, uncertainty, failure, past...Lock eyes with your lion, chase it and take it out.

- Great service, great response, most of all people came to know Jesus as their saviour.

-BBQ time. Actually could smell the smoke during final prayer. I'll admit it, my mind wandered for a split second. Wow Jesse and Troy and Nelson got everything ready to go. I look out and see an awesome community being built. Can't help but smile because of the culture God is building at CWC Milpitas is incredible.

-Almost forgot to mention "I PREACHED IN CONVERSE ON A SUNDAY" Man it was comfortable, wish I could do that every week.

HUGE Momentum at CWC Milpitas right now. I have a convincing feeling, we haven't seen anything yet. BACK to BACK BIG Days coming up. New Message Series "The Blueprint" launches next week. We're also Getting ready to make some big announcements soon toward the building of our community.

Sunday Recap June 7th 2009

-Out the gate we're ready to go. One thing that I love about our church is the atmosphere is charged before things even start. The 10 minutes before service are quickly becoming some of the most important and fun minutes of the day for me. Don't get me wrong, it has not always been that way, but we have made it a point to start strong, start passionately and start with fun. You never know what your going to get, rap sessions, blast sessions, movie scenes, or just an incredible one liner from God.

- PBen and the team from San Jose jammed this weekend as Mantana is in London and our team took a breather (kind a sort of). PBen you guys brought it, thank you so much, appreciate you guys.

-We continued our series on Moving Forward and I talked about How to move forward when you hit "the wall". The wall is when you want to give in, throw in the towel and call it quits. Seems like many people have hit the wall these days even church leadership. God has called you to scale the walls, and break through them. If there is one thing I'm tired about in my life and in the lives of people are detours that could of been avoided. Stop wasting time, you have a purpose to fullfill on the other side of that wall.

-Hearing a lot of stories, beautiful stories of what God is doing in folks lives. Slow down , pay attention to the stories behind the faces. I bet you your life will be blessed.

-Journaling 101 LifeGroup and journaling in general is about take some huge leaps. BIG announcements coming soon. Great Job Jesse Contreras for leading Journaling 101 and doing life together through Journaling.

-Congratulations to my little sister, Masters Commission Graduates and CWCBI graduates. So proud of you all. Troy your a big sissy, but so am I, it's all good uce, shhh I won't tell anyone.

NEXT WEEK: Moving Forward continues, Chillin and Grilling after service and who knows what other surprises. BTW a twist to our worship team is taking place this week. Amanda and Big Roob YOU GOT THIS!

Proverbs 31:12

Our journey...has not been perfect but I would not trade the journey I'm on for another one or to experience it with anyone else but my wife.

Today I was reading out of Proverbs 31:12 which reminded me of my wife it says "She brings him good, not harm, all the days of her life." I'll be honest I've slept on the couch but never because my wife has made me. I've blown it big time but have never have been called a bum or a loser. There are promises that I've broken, things I've forgotten, times when I wasn't listening, words I've said that I wish I could of taken back, but my wife in over 10 years of marriage has never made me feel worthless, never tried to push me down, and has never threatened to leave me. Proverbs 31:12 is my wife, she seeks to bring good to me, good for me and good through me, and she has done it ever since I've known her.

Oh it get's gooder, she sacrifices like crazy for our children. She runs with me in ministry, dreams with me in life, and I know that every step of the way if there is anyone in my corner it's her. And still yet even gooder then that, she recently left the comfort of our home, is walking away from security, peace of mind, selling it all, leaving it all, risking it all on the field of life to follow her crazy husband and chase a dream of building a church to reach the islands.

My God is her God, and my people are her people. My dream has become her dream, and my vision has become her vision. I'm not forcing her, not demanding this of her, she is not a slave, our hearts share the same heartbeat, it's bigger than us, how can it work like this? Has to be God. To my wife, you have built a warrior, a champion, a person who feels like he can touch the entire world, you've made me feel like the man every single step of the way. "You've brought me good" ever since we've first met" I love you babe.

Sunday Recap

And the momentum continues...

-It was another great Sunday @ "the M"

-The ladies took the mic this weekend, way to go Carolyn, you were awesome! Can't wait to watch Amanda and Big Rue spearhead the music the next few weeks.

-More new faces, and different races.

-New member recognized Rose Bracamonte, she heard about CWC Milpitas from a crossing guard, visited us 1 day and has been here ever since!

-Awesome message PD. I'm loving the recharge series...perfect timing and a life transforming word.

-Great to see a former co-worker of mine and family at church, God is doing a beautiful thing in their lives. Equally awesome to see second time visitors coming back and some thirds.

-New addition to CWC HI team introduced. Welcome Rev. Julie Grimes. It's great having you aboard.

-Awesome culture being developed at our church. It says a lot about the culture of your church if people hang out afterwards. If folks are up and gone then something is missing. Since everyone likes to chill we figured we add a grill to that...Sunday June 14th "Chilling and Grillin" CWC Style. (hmmm maybe a lil competition?)

Can't wait till next week, we'll continue our series "Moving Forward" Have a great week everyone!