Thousands of Sand Dollars

I spent a few days in Baja, Mexico last week. It was awesome. One afternoon we decided to drive into a neighboring town to check out the beach and visit the local pastor. Santa Marie is a small town of 500 people. It is off the main highway and did on a beautiful stretch of coast. The coastline consist of sand dunes, sand dollars, and miles of beach breaks with no one around except for the people in town. First we visited our pastor friend. He built his church 20 years ago in this little farming village and has been the pastor since. Over the years he built a nice house and raised his children in this same town. The church looked to be around 50 people with a good size youth group as well. It was cool to see this guys life work and get to share in it with him for a few minutes. After visiting for a bit we headed a few blocks west to the coast. I stumbled over the sand dunes and onto the beach. As I walked to get a closer look of the waves, my friend began to shout in Spanish. I looked over and he was holding something in his hand and waving me over. He had a sand dollar. I was sad I did not find one myself. Then he pointed to the ground. As far as you could see there were sand dollars scattered across the beach. Maybe even for miles. It was amazing, and I had overlooked them. It hit me that just as these sand dollars had been overlooked so had this local pastor, who was so glad to have visitors for the afternoon. If this one pastor in Santa Marie was overlooked then I imagine that thousands of people in ministry in my own community and around the world are serving God everyday without ever receiving a note of encouragement, starbucks gift card, or even a simple friendly visit from a friend. Stop in and say hello to a pastor in your community today.

Accept,
John

Highly Political Blog

From a distance this may look like your normal 'claw'. Stuffed animals and so forth. Flashing sign. Today something caught my eye inside the machine so I went in for a closer look. Barack Obama and John McCain?
Sure enough... Thank you for reading my most political blog ever. Make sure to Vote November 4th!

Transitions Website: Saturday Night Church!

It's not that big of a secret, we have a Saturday night church service at 6:30pm. Now we have a new website. Check it out www.transitionscommunity.com!

Go Danielle!

I know all of you voted for 'Extreme Dance FX' last night on NBC's hit show America's Got Talent. If you didn't make sure to watch and vote for them next week because they made it through to the top 20!!! We are so proud of Danielle and her dance team!

My week.

It is looking like this:

-Hanging out with cousins from Ohio
-Eat better?
-Start training for second triathlon September 13th
-Get some much needed rest after a fun summer of events
-Catch up with Caleb

Video Blog: 8.22.08

Mexico Fishing Fun

A friend from church has a fishing charter business in San Quintin, Baja, Mexico. For the last few years he has been generously letting us go down and fish his boats with skipper Jaime Garcia. My dad and I always have a ton of fun and catch a ton of fish... literally. After our trips we stop by Siempre and drop off our catch for the kids at the orphanage. Having fun for a good cause.

Accept,
John

Picutred: Alejondro and I holding up a few of the sand bass we caught, and Jamime and me with a big yellow tail I caught.

Fishing.

I am going fishing with my dad today. I will be back Tuesday. Check back soon for pictures from our trip. Peace.

John

(Don't Forget paintball is Wednesday, information on www.acceptym.com)

Triathlon Pictures....

Get Your Quarters Ready (The Soda Machine is Back!)

It is a big day in our churches youth group history. The soda machine has be neglected for months sense one of our hard working church leaders moved away for a new job. Yes we have missed Jon. Today I spent some time with the soda machine and brought it back to life in fashion. We will now have Cactus Cooler and Mountain Dew added to our already outstanding lineup of sodas. At Central Community $0.50 still gets you pretty far, and a dollar gets a soda for you and a friend! I was thinking about big things the soda machine could lead too. One of them being a large boom in youth group attendance... "Hey friend come with me to church, I will buy you a Cactus Cooler!". The soda machine also means a new found revenue stream for our youth ministries. Boasting a $60 a month profit (very cool). Kids start looking under your couch cushions before you come to church!

Accept,
John Denton

Magic Mountain.

Another Wednesday of fun.

Finished: My First triathlon was awesome!

I placed 278th (out of 700) and ranked 23rd (out of 40) in my age group. My total time was one hour and thirty nine minutes. I was very pleased with how I did in my first triathlon and have already started to think about areas I could have pushed a little more and trained a little harder. My goal was to start and finish with a smile on my face, and I did that! So I am feeling rather good this evening. I will post more pictures as soon as I get them.

Wetsuit: Check

Packing for the big race tomorrow...

Flat Tire (Surf trip fun)

I helped, I promise... Mid-day at the beach we got word the van had a flat. Caleb and I tried to fix it fast but struggled so we brought in the 'AAA.' Oh yeah the surf trip was awesome.

Dairy Queen. Buy a Blizzard August 7th.

Buy a blizzard at Dairy Queen August 7th and help out kid's at Children's Hospital. The Los Angele's Angels are getting involved as well! Reggie Wilits will be At the Garden Grove DQ and Jose Aredondo will be at the Murieta DQ. They will be signing autographs from 11:30am to 1:30pm. So Thursday I will be eating Blizzards in Murieta with Aredondo my favorite Angels reliever.

Brick Workouts and Triathlon Fun (Say What?)

Ok Ok. Prepare yourself for a months worth of triathlon related blogs after this weekends big race. In case you forgot I have been training for a triathlon for the last two years, the first year and six months I was verbally training but I eventually kind of sort of got serious about it when I paid $60 to enter a race. That race, the Camp Pendleton Sprint Triathlon, is this Saturday at 8am. The race consist of a 500m swim, a 30k bike ride, and a 5k run. Today I did my second 'brick', a brick is a bike slash run that you do back to back to simulate the race day scenario and to get those muscles groups working together. I have learned over the last few days that these workouts are not so fun. After a brick workout last week I was pretty sure my legs would never be the same, today was much better and I feel a little bit more prepared for my race saturday. Thats what was going on this morning in my head. Triathlon stuff.

John

Saturday Monring.

Well. We were going to do a 1.5k (a mile?) open water swim in Oceanside today but realized we would rather eat than swim. After a good breakfast and some beach time we stopped by a local triathlon store then headed back toward home. One thing about triathlons is you spend lots of money in the process. To run a race all you need is shoes. To race a triathlon all you need is a wetsuit, goggles, bike, helmet, bike shoes, running shoes, and race clothes not to mention a mind numbing number of random accessories and race entry fees. Lucky for me I love accessorizing.

My afternoons look like this...