 Right now what we're going to do is it's actually not going to be a formal study like I attempt to teach normally. What I want to do is just kind of share some things with you, prepared things that I wanted to share today being our 36th anniversary and all. And so let me read to you out of Isaiah 43 verses 18 and 19. And then I'm going to just kind of visit with you, share some things and all. Again, it's not one of the Bible studies that you perhaps are used to if you've been a member of this fellowship for a while. This is more just kind of a sharing of the history and some things related to this ministry and things like that. And so in verse 18, Isaiah 43 reading to verse 19, do not remember the former things nor consider the things of old. Behold, I will do a new thing. Now it shall spring forth, shall you not know it? I will even make a road in the wilderness and rivers in the desert. And so this month, the month of July actually marks two very special anniversaries for me ministry-wise. Obviously today we celebrate the church's birthday 36 years ago on a Sunday morning. We met for the first time as a church gathered in a home. I'll share a few things about that in just a moment. And on this upcoming Monday, the 31st, I will celebrate the 38th anniversary of my ordination into pastoral ministry. And so July represents two very significant dates in my life, one planting the church into my ordination as a pastor. Originally I began ministry in this area in 1974. I started a Bible study in the city of Ontario in September of 1974 in order to minister to my brother. I have a very ugly brother named Frank. And Frank had been going through some very difficult times. And I lived in Norwalk and Frank was living here in the city of Ontario. And he was going through difficulty and all. And he had come to visit my parents. And I was living at home at that time. And he came to visit my parents. It was a Sunday. And we took him to church. And it was August 4, 1974. And Frank gave his heart to the Lord at church that night. And so I got concerned for him that he might be discipled. And so I began to drive from Norwalk where I lived to Ontario. And I did it every Monday and began a Bible study in Ontario to minister to my brother. And when it began, it was just my brother, my sister Madeline and me. It was just a very basic, private Bible study with a brother and a sister that was born out of a concern for him to grow in his faith and understanding of the ways of the Lord. Frank worked in the area here. And he began to invite friends to attend the Bible study and all. And all of you who are part of this church know that one day a young lady walked into that room that was one of his co-workers. And she didn't know the Lord yet. And so at the end of the Bible study, she and I had a conversation. And I just knew that the Lord had just introduced me to my wife. And I still remember driving home telling my sister Madeline, I just met the woman I'm going to marry. It was one of those things, even though she wasn't saved. And no, I didn't ask her out until she was saved. And so she got saved a couple of weeks later. And we began a relationship at that time that has been, well it's been continuous since that day. And so that's how I met Marie and it did so in ministry here in the, well in the city of Ontario. During the summer of 1975, I decided to go to Europe for three months. And so a friend of mine and I backpacked through 11 countries of Europe, took three months to do that. We went through Germany and Holland. We went through Belgium and England, France, Spain, Switzerland, Austria, Italy, Greece. And we drove from Greece through Yugoslavia to Frankfurt, Germany. And so during that time, I let the Bible study go that I had been teaching at my brother's house. I actually handed it to somebody else. But when I returned, I decided that I would move the study. And we moved the study from the city of Ontario into Montclair. And while I was teaching in Montclair, I was teaching at the home of John and Annie Matta. And they had a little boy, a little girl too. They had a little boy who was a little, little monster. We knew him as John John. I think John John was around seven years of age at that time. And John John would come and I still remember he would stand at the door and he would kind of look at everybody at the door when we were seated in his parents' front room. And after a while, he got comfortable. And he would come in and he would sit next to the women and rub their legs, a little twisted pervert. And I got greatly concerned for him. But we just hired John John. John John is going to be serving with us now. And he's coming on staff in a couple of weeks. I figure, I figure, I got, I got to have him close by just to keep an eye on that twisted little guy. But John John was very special to us. And again, I had known him since 75 or so. My wife is from Chino. So in 1977, we got involved in a church in the local area. And the church was in Claremont. And we got heavily involved there. I was teaching Bible studies. I was doing alongside a Marie Children's Ministry. I played on the softball team. I was the chaplain and served on the board of the church. And in the service of the Lord there over time, I was ordained. I was ordained in 1979. I went on paid staff in February of 1980. And it was at that time that the Lord began to move in in us. And I began a Bible study in the city of Pomona that I don't remember what the date was when it began. I think it was either in April or in May of 1981. I can't remember anymore. But I do know that that's how this fellowship really came to be. We had the Bible study in the home of David and Connie's signs. And David and Connie had come to meet me on their own. I was in my office when I was the assistant pastor in Calvary Chapel of Claremont. And they had come in and wanted to speak to somebody and ask some questions. And as they walked into my office there, I still remember meeting David and Connie for the first time. And Connie was rough, man. She is a rough woman. And she grilled me about all kinds of things. And about the church and everything. She had come out of Rawls ministry. And so she was mean like her pastor. And I still remember, I guess I passed the test because she and Dave walked out. And then 20 seconds or less later she comes back and they hand me a check. They said we're going to come to this church and we're going to tithe. And that's how I met David and Connie. And so we wanted to have a home Bible study. And Dave and Connie opened their home. And I started teaching a Bible study there. And I have to say this. I have to say that that that home Bible studies, if the worship is good and the teaching is good, it requires something else. It requires a hospitable home. Hospitable place to meet. Because you might have good teaching and good worship. But if the host and hostess are not hospitable, then nobody wants to come back. And so Dave and Connie were the worst people I've ever been around. No, Dave and Connie were the most hospitable. I remember that they had invited us over when we first started getting to know them. And they had invited us over for dinner. And we came over and Connie's quite a cook. She's a very, very good cook. And we were seated there at their table and they were feeding us beautifully. But I really was captivated by her beans. I have to be honest with you. I mean, if the beans are good, everything else is fine. You know, we've got to have good beans. And so I just kept on raving. I said, you know, I can't, I can't, you know, she put so many hours into the meat and the potatoes, whatever it was. But there I am just raving over the beans. I said, I have to be honest with you. I love them. And I'll never forget her looking at me, the red face. And those are canned beans. I mean, canned. So you can open a mean can of beans, Connie. You know, I'm going to, I'm going to say something. I'm going to be emotional. Forgive me. I know you've never seen emotion come from me. Connie's not well. Connie's very sick. And unless Jesus does a miracle, she'll be going home soon. My mom taught me something. She said, son, give me flowers when I'm alive so I can smell them. What good are they to me when I'm dead? So let me give you some flowers, Connie. I love you very much. I thank God for you. The apostle Paul was speaking to the Philippian church, and he had said that they're giving to the Lord in their ministry to him was actually something that was added to their account. I was sharing with Connie and Dave just the other day how that their, their love, their loyalty, their faithfulness, their service to God, their sacrifice, their prayers for us, their support. I said to her, Connie, you need to know that there's a large portion of whatever reward I receive that's going right to you, right to you because of all the love and care and prayer that has gone on from her heart to us. This church, this church is here right now because Dave and Connie signs love Jesus and love the word of God and because they loved us. So I thank you. I love you very, very much, and I'm praying that God will do a miracle. I'll leave it there. I'll leave it there. In July of 1981, I resigned my position as the assisting pastor and we began a Sunday morning study. And the first Sunday morning study, the worship team was in the den of the house that we met in. And I still remember walking into the room. It was the den and there were three people, Doug and Mike and Stacey, who are our first three worship leaders. And when I walked in, they said, we need to pray for the service, July 26th. And they knelt on the carpet and put their faces on the carpet. And all of us, all four of us, in that small den, they're in the city of Ontario, July 26th, laid before the Lord and we said, God in Jesus' name, do a work. Use us for your glory. Use us somehow. And you can't imagine, I mean, the first Bible study we had as the Sunday morning, 25, 30 people. We had 15 children. The service was held in a front room. The children's ministry was in the den. Dan Renshaw and Randy Walls were two of my original board members. And they began the ministry with us. Dan Renshaw is now pastor of Calvary Chapel in Clalem, Washington. And Randy is pastor of Calvary Chapel in Upland. And they were my first two assistants. My children at that time were very small. My daughter Corinne was four years old. My David was two. My Joseph was three months old. We had two infants in the nursery. And Joseph was one of them. Within a couple of years, the Lord gave to us our daughter Anna. When we began our ministry, God gave to me two specific scriptures. The first portion of scripture he gave to me was when I just read to you right now out of Isaiah 43, 18 and 19. And as I read that passage and taught my very first Sunday morning here in this church, I really got a lot out of that because my experience in pastoral ministry had broken me. I was in a meeting and there were several board members in the meeting. And the senior pastor said to me, you're not a pastor. You're a counselor. We're removing ordination from you and encouraging you to go back to school to complete your degree. I was a psychology major. I did a lot of counseling in the church. And he said, I want you to complete your degree. We'll give you 50% of your salary, but you're not a pastor. And I remember as I was seated in that room that night, I had told my wife previously for several weeks I had been saying to Marie, God is moving me. God is moving me. It's time for me to move. I need to move on. God is moving me. And I was coming home from weekly meetings. It was on Monday nights, and I would come home from the weekly board meetings. And I was usually maligned or just mistreated at those meetings. And I told Marie, I said, I know the Lord is moving me out of here. And Marie didn't want to go. All her friends were there. And she felt at that time that perhaps I was running from something that I should have stood up as a man and dealt with. And I finally started coming home and weeping. I was saying, listen, it's killing me. You need to understand. You don't know what's going on and how they're treating me. It's time to go. And finally one day, Marie, after seeing me in such a broken mess, she finally said, if the Spirit is telling you to move, you need to move. And then the next week is when the senior pastor said, you're not a pastor. We're removing an ordination from you and things of that nature. And I had the liberty and the Lord and Marie's blessing. And I said to the senior pastor, as well as to the Lord, I said, there's only one thing that I know. And the one thing that I know I'm sure of is that God has called me to be a pastor. He just hasn't called me to pastor here. So I'm resigning my position effective immediately. I'm giving you my two weeks notice and I'll be leaving this fellowship. And Dan Rancho was part of that board, my friend Dan. And I still remember stepping out of that small apartment there in the city of Montclair. And after the board voted on receiving my resignation, Dan was one member of the board, the only member of the board who said, I will not receive your resignation. You're called man and I will not receive it. You're called by God. And I said, well, I appreciate your encouragement, Dan, but it doesn't matter whether you receive it or not. I'm leaving. And I remember getting up at the end and a broken man and I stepped out of the door and and I was 30 years old and Dan was 27. Give it some perspective. And I broke down in his arms. He held me like I was a child and I wept on his shoulder. And I said, I don't know what I'm going to do. But I know whatever it is, it's what I'm supposed to do. So I sit here today saying it was what I was supposed to do. I was supposed to come and do this ministry here. When I looked at that scripture, the scripture in Isaiah, it says, I will do a new thing. He said, I will make a road in the wilderness and rivers in the desert. So I took comfort in the promises of the Lord that he would do a new thing and that he would make rivers in the dryness of our lives. The second portion he gave to me, a second scripture was found in Exodus 23, 29 and 30 where where he said, I will not drive them out from before you in one year, lest the land become desolate and the beast of the field become too numerous for you. Little by little, I will drive them out from before you until you have increased and inherit the land. And I took that as as an encouragement that the Lord was going to do a work that it wasn't going to explode. It would grow gradually. And that's what we saw over the years, a slow but steady growth. You see, I never began this work to see great numbers. In this ministry's history, 36 years, we've grown and receded many times. But the reason I wanted to do this work is because I wanted people to love the Lord. I wanted them to mature. I wanted them to serve the Lord. I wanted them to be consistent. And so when we began this ministry, we had a foundation. The foundation was Jesus Christ. Jesus is the chief cornerstone that the entire work is to be built on. Isaiah 28, 16 says, Thus says the Lord God, Behold, I lay in Zion for a foundation, a stone, a tried stone, a precious cornerstone, a sure foundation. In 1 Corinthians 3, 11, no other foundation can anyone lay than that which is laid, which is Jesus Christ. And so that's the origin of the teaching style that I have. I try to keep things at a practical level and I attempt to lay a foundation, a solid foundation in people's hearts. Eventually what happens is people will outgrow my teaching and they move on and God uses them. But the foundation that we have is Jesus Christ and our love for Him and our service for Him. That's where we got the name of our radio program, a sure foundation. Now we went on radio in 1983, first in a local station in the city of Pomona. Then over time the Lord began to open doors for our radio ministry. Today we have radio studies in Arizona, in Arkansas, in California, Colorado, in Connecticut, Florida, Georgia, in Hawaii, Idaho, Indiana, Kansas, Maine, Missouri, North Carolina, North Dakota, New Jersey, New York, Nevada, New Mexico, Ohio, Oregon, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Washington, and Wisconsin. We're also on internet ministry. And we've seen the Lord do some tremendous things through the radio ministry. Just a few weeks ago I was in Indiana and spoke to a young man who is a transplant, has planted a church in Indiana and he said that he would take his lunch at 1130 to listen to our radio program here when he lived in Orange County. And he said in many ways that I was his pastor and mentor in ministry for a long time before he moved out there. We were in Chicago and I'll never forget we had a radio program going at that time in Chicago and somebody approached me after the study and said that, because we did what is called a radio rally, I did a study and then spoke to the people who listened to us out there. And a lady approached me and she said I wanted to tell you something but I'd prefer my husband doing that. And so he approaches me this quiet man and he says I want you to know that I am literally alive today because of your ministry here in Chicago. And I said what do you mean? And he says he said to me I was about to commit, I was going to commit suicide. He said and a friend of mine had given to me a tape and had asked me to listen to it. He said and I actually had, I put water in the bathtub. He said I climbed in the tub. I was bathing and then I was going to kill myself after I finished my bath. But I remembered that I had unfinished business. He said I had told him I would listen to this tape and he said so I went and I got the teaching, I put it on, I began to listen. He said as I was there in the bathtub fully intending to kill myself when I finished bathing he said but I listened to the study. You were teaching out of revelation at the end of the study. He said I gave my heart to Jesus Christ. He said and I am literally alive today because of your radio ministry. We've seen God do tremendous things over the years including through that radio ministry. When we began in the city of Ontario there were already about 80 churches. There were many churches but no Calvary Chapel. So we believe that Calvary Chapel ministry had something that the city needed and so we met for the first time in my sister-in-law's rented home in the city of Ontario. I sat on a recliner and I taught barefooted and I did so for several weeks until my mom told me I'm tired of looking at your bare feet, put shoes on. We didn't receive an offering. We didn't receive offerings for the first 12 or 13 years of this ministry. People were taught and people responded. The second week that we began recording messages, the second week we began recording messages but I didn't even know why but and that day I gave what we have since called our four pillars and I'm going to kind of share a little bit with you about that, these origins. This ministry has been built on what we call our sure foundation who is Jesus Christ and we believe that we must always depend on the Lord to produce His fruit to His own glory and so we have four pillars. The word, worship, worship, withness, we made up a word fellowship and witness. So first we want to have the word so I made a decision to attempt to learn to teach God's word. Jesus is a foundation of the work. We're going to center our attention on Him. In His commission He ordered His disciples to teach everything He had commanded and we've attempted to do that over the years and over the years I finally completed teaching through the entire Bible. I'll only do it once in a lifetime. It took 35 years to do that. My style of teaching is expositional, verse by verse teaching. I'm getting to the point in my ministry where I'm having people ask if we're going to make commentaries and so we have plans to do that, to begin taking my sermons, editing them and put them in book form. I have a friend of mine who is a Spanish language pastor, Persona Nandes, and he wants to translate our studies, our English studies into the Spanish language so we can create commentaries for Hispanic pastors. He said there is no Calvary Chapel pastors that are ministering to the Spanish language population and we're looking to do that. The Lord is doing some tremendous things and over the years what began with just a Sunday morning and a Wednesday grew into the small groups in the midweek study and the various ministries like the Lion Tamers or the High School or the Junior High, the Children's Ministry. We emphasize teaching our men to men ministries, our breakfast, brunches, dinners, the retreats, our men's conferences, our women's conferences, our Spanish language conference, couple's conference in the various seminars that we have. It's all built on the word of God. A second thing we do is we want to emphasize worship. I believe that God is worthy of our praise and when I first got saved I was introduced to something that was simply called Jesus Music or Jesus People Music or Jesus Movement Music. There were very few worship songs on the air and I loved and learned to worship through Calvary Chapel ministries. Over the years we just had a sampling of some of the songs we sang over the years. Over the years we have seen worship in itself change but it's still all about Jesus Christ and one of the things that I believe very strongly is that worshiping God in song is not simply a prelude to the word but it is a time of intimacy with our God. Psalm 3211 says be glad in the Lord and rejoice you righteous. Shout for joy for all you who are upright in heart. In Psalm 1501 and 2 it says praise the Lord, praise God in his sanctuary, praise him in the mighty heavens, praise him for his acts of power, praise him for his surpassing greatness and so we want to worship the Lord. We want to be a group of people who gather to sing and celebrate Jesus Christ. Withness is very important. You know originally when our church began it was easy to get to know some and all you needed to do is show up. Our first breakfast were actually whole church breakfast because we had 30 people so we'd say you guys want to go to breakfast and say yeah I say you're going to buy and so everybody went you know things have changed a bit over the years but we knew each other. It does require some effort on your part to make friends. That's one of the reasons why you ought to come as often as as possible. One of the things I believe strongly is what the Bible teaches about community because Christianity is a life intended by God to be lived out not alone but with others. In the New Testament the words one another are used over 50 times and you see how the early church would would have community in John 13 34 a new commandment I give to you love one another Romans 15 7 receive one another 2nd Corinthians 13 12 greet one another Galatians 5 13 by love serve one another Ephesians 4 32 be kind to one another 1st Thessalonians 5 11 comfort yourselves together edify one another Hebrews 10 24 consider one another to provoke into loving good works the Bible speaks concerning the need for community and we need to take advantage of the opportunities that God gives to us worship and then we have witness there's a saying I received from my pastor healthy sheep beget sheep the Jesus movement was and remains an evangelistic movement I got saved and I went home and I told my mom and I told my dad and I told my sisters eventually I told my brother my brother didn't want to believe that I was saved because he knew I was crazy and so he said you're just you're just in another one of your fads David how long is this going to last my mom and my dad just watched to see what would happen in my life I started taking my sisters with me to church I would take them to Calvary Chapel Costa Mason and and Madeleine gave her heart to Christ the day I got saved Becky began to hang around with us when we'd go to fellowship and all and for me it has always been the most important thing is to make sure that you that you share your faith with other people and so that's how ministry here began to to reach out to communities like I mentioned our radio ministry our morning our Saturday morning door-to-door evangelism our Friday night sweet street witnessing teams our missions to Mexicali we we have high school ministry that's traveled to various countries Costa Rica the Philippines Guatemala Mexico Israel we have food box ministries dinner ministries hospital home visitation teams condolence at home ministry a new believers ministry and Thanksgiving and Christmas we provide food for families and as well as gifts our Easter services and men's conferences Christmas services have served to reach thousands of people throughout our community we have a skate ministry skater ministry that reaches out to kids many of them receive in the kingdom for the first time we've planted churches in in Mexicali in the Philippines in Fontana upland Ontario in south LA and in Montclair and why rica and ohi and great falls montana and corpus christians and Antonio and clay alum and lake have a suit in madison wisconsin you know when i got saved i never could have imagined the amazing trip that god had in store for me you see me if you come to this church you see emotion come out of me quite often many of you don't know why that's true some don't understand and to be honest with you i've even had pastors yet upset and say things because i'm emotional they think i was teaching at a pastors conference years ago where pastors i teared up over something and they said what's he got to cry about and that made me cry um i have a very deep passionate commitment to Jesus christ he is my life and he has given meaning to my life he has blessed me with a wife that i i can't help but mention with my children my grandchildren friends a church and when i'm teaching there was a movie i'll put it like this called chariots of fire it's an old movie some of you weren't even born when it came out but this runner felt the glory of god when he ran and there's this very poignant moment in the movie when this runner is running his race and you see him portraying a moment of experiencing the joy of god as he ran because he said i run for the glory of god i understand that passion and because when i open my heart to you i can't help but cry sometimes he's been so good to me i break down he's been so good to me how can i not weep with joy and thankfulness for his goodness to me and that's what you see i'm not depressed i'm overwhelmed i'm overwhelmed i really am i open to you and and and you see the heart i was just a doper a punk kid in norwalk getting high getting drunk stealing hurting people breaking my parents heart and he reached down and he pulled me out of the myri clay and he put my feet on a solid rock how can i not thank him for what he's done how can i not the adventure has been amazing i i don't talk a lot about things with you sometimes i i i feel like it would sound like i was boasting and so i don't say things to the church but some of you have heard me mention things smuggling bibles into china teaching in india the philippines thailand japan england austria germany scotland mexico chile colombia peru jordan gone israel 25 times i've been to presidential briefings i was part of a council that held the very first hispanic prayer breakfast in the history of the united states i was given the great privilege of speaking at the prayer breakfast in norwalk and i have to be honest with you i told him i said listen i've been in presidential briefings and other things that people consider honors but standing here in the city of norwalk talking to you it's the greatest honor i've ever had a son coming home to the city saying this is what jesus christ can do and that to me has been some of the things the lord has taught me if you would have told me what an amazing 36 years were in front of me i wouldn't have believed it but the thing that i love about it is this god has done so much in our past but i look forward to what he's planning to do in the future he's not through with us yet this isn't my this is not my resignation message like my pastor said one day he said i take my hat off for the past but i take my jacket off for the future there is still work to be done i know that god has much more to do and i invite you to be part of that