Amazing! Simply Amazing!

There's no better way to put it; amazing, simply amazing! God continues to surpass our greatest expectations. For the third week in a row we have set and broken attendance records. In spite of poor weather the presence of God was rich. And once again God showed up and two more decisions were made for Christ.

On Saturday we had another "Newcomer's Breakfast" with 25 in attendance we enjoyed good food and good fellowship. I took the opportunity to share briefly the Calvary story and our newcomers responded with their own Calvary stories. I was thrilled to here a mom share a story about her son. He was sick and when his mom suggested missing church he told her, "no way, I want to go!" Another lady shared how after being out of church for a time she is now more excited about Calvary than she's been about a church in a long time.

I was watching as some last-minute arrivers walked in to an already full sanctuary and I actual grew a little concerned that we would run out of seating. That's a wonderful problem to have! I want to worry like that more often!

Keep us growing Lord... we want to worry about setting up some chairs!

Pastor Glen

He's ALIVE and Working!

Yesterday was Resurrection Sunday (Easter) and God showed up once again. Two Sundays in a row we have progessively smashed our previous attendence records. But even more importantly we crushed our "decisions for Christ" record (which was set last Sunday when we saw 6 people make decisions for Christ) this Sunday we had 8 people give their hearts to Jesus! With the 6 teens that came to Christ on Wednesday during Oneightyouth (youth group), that makes a total of 20 people coming to Christ in one week! I must bow out on this one and simply say, "totally God", to Him alone be the glory!

We annouced that we are planning a baptismal service and a "New Believers" class (Faith 101) and "if anyone is interested see me after service." Well, I have 4 people, so far signed up for the baptism and 3 signed up for Faith 101. It's awesome to see people responding to the prompting of the Holy Spirit.

We have some really exciting things that we are planning; outdoor movie-night, teen "free car-wash", baptismal, Faith 101 class, Luau fellowship diner, coffee-house, Kings-Fest (youth outing), and much more! It's gonna be a busy next few months!

Stay tuned to see what is going on at Calvary... I promise to update this blog more often. BTW - check out our podcasts at www.glenkeefer.org and enjoy!

Making a Difference!
Pastor Glen

It's Happening

What? What's happening? After almost four years of praying and dreaming and envisioning and working and pushing and getting discouraged and believing, we are seeing a healthy, growing, excited church being born. Growing a church is much like having a baby. Ok, so all the women out there are like, "you have no idea!" Ok, so I'm not a woman, but I do understand the pains of giving birth to something. I've often wondered why God has allowed us to grow at what seems like a slower pace than other churches I've read about. I've learned three reasons. First, we weren't ready for it yet. If we started growing by 20-30 people in a few weeks we would have imploded into ourselves. We didn't have the workers or structure put into place for that kind of growth; now we do. Second, slower growth is often healthier growth. Relationships take time to develop and grow and church is about relationships not how many we can pack in on a given Sunday morning. I use the example of someone who does body building (good term); those who workout and slowly grow muscle mass naturally will end up being more healthy than those who use steroids and drugs to accomplish their goals more quickly. And third, an instant-church out of the box will never learn to appreciate the struggle and pains of growing a church. We don't appreciate those things that cost us nothing. But a healthy, growing, loving church takes blood, sweat and tears to build... and it's worth every bit!

Yesterday we had an anniversary celebration. 20x4x4x1 What does that all mean? 20 years for Solid Rock (the name of the older church before our merger) 4 years for Calvary Faith Center. 4 years for me (Pastor Glen) preaching. And 1 year together as a merged church! That's a whole lot of reasons to celebrate! And we did! With a new record attendance we celebrated like never before! And the guest of honor - the Holy Spirit - showed up and everyone felt His presence. I took just a moment to pause in the middle of a packed out fellowship hall and look around at the children laughing and families eating and people just enjoying the moment and I whispered a prayer that went like this, "Thank you. Thanks for letting me be a part of what You're doing. Thank you."

Making a Difference!
Pastor Glen