Things That Inspire

I felt inspired by a passion fruit this morning. We have a garden on our stone wall surrounding our house in Nairobi; passion fruit vines are growing on it. We took 124 passion fruit down to Milly today so she could include them in the lunch for our students, former street kids now in our "family" and education and skills training program at Kamulu. So I took one of them into chapel and talked to the kids about it after the first couple of songs (it's great to be back here singing with the kids -- that's inspiring in itself!).

I held up the passion fruit, and they told me what it was. I told them it is dark like them, but unlike them, it is kind of ugly, while they are beautiful. They laughed, and I shared with them that many American visitors have never seen passion fruit before, and when they look at the fruit, they doubt whether it will be any good.

I reminded them that they have had experiences like that, when nobody thought they were very good. They nodded their heads or said yes. They have had people shout at them, run them away, pour hot water on them, throw stones at them and abuse them in other ways when they were sleeping on the streets.

Then I told them the value of the passion fruit, that it makes everything else better. You mix it in with mango and strawberries and apples and oranges, and it adds a special flavor that is delightful. And I said, "You make my life better." And I told them that I believe they will make many other people better during their lives. Most of them will marry, and they will make husbands and wives into better people. They will help their employers to have a better life, and they will make fellow employees better. And they will make others in the church better.

They will do this because they love God, and because they love what is good. So I said to just keep on going the way they are going, and they are like the passion fruit, making life delightful in their own way.

God is Smart

I mentioned before about walking home from a Passover meal carrying my granddaughter, when she looked up at the constellation Orion and said, "God is really smart." I've been thinking about that truth lately. We drove through the desert in our move from California to Texas and saw its stark beauty. And here in Texas we saw a lightning storm, as great bolts hit the ground all around. I walk a great deal, partly to keep the diabetes in check and to stay relatively fit, partly to have time to think or to talk to Darlene, and I have looked at all the ways we use concrete.

There is an enormous amount of concrete all over the world. One aspect is that it means the removal of trees and the loss of farm land. But another is revelation of the enormous amounts of raw materials for concrete.

So...in the beginning...God planned for our future. He made raw materials for something people would learn to use many thousands of years after their making. And he made enough for all the creative ways we would use the materials. And then there are radio waves, which we would learn to use. And who knows what else lies in our universe that we have not even dreamed of, but will be useful to people who live long after us.

God is really smart. He not only makes what is needed for the moment -- all manner of fruits and plants for the young couple in the Garden to eat and use -- but for all the long future of mankind before He decides the time is finished. That's why the marveling Paul of Tarsus writes that in Christ all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge are hidden (Col. 2:3) and in Christ all things hold together (Col. 1:17).

And there are a lot of other things to marvel at, not to mention the people whom God has transformed into the image of his Son.

Coulston Address

We have a new address to receive mail. The family is now based in the Fort Worth/Dallas area. We are less than 20 minutes from DFW, so our flights to visit people on behalf of Made in the Streets will be easy to catch and centrally located.

Continue to donate online (see www.made-in-the-streets.org or www.madeinthestreets.blogspot.com for the online) or send to Made in the Streets, 409 Franklin Road, Brentwood, TN 37027. But for mail about the ministry, or for sponsors to send mail for us to take to students, please send to

Charles/Darlene Coulston
P. O. Box 93165
Southlake, TX 76092

We look forward to hearing from you.

I Fell Off the Truck

We are now in Texas. We have been warmly welcomed. Joel Quile, who was in the youth group in the Redwood Church when we were in the Bay Area, lives 5 minutes away and he found us kind and serving believers who came over and helped us unload at the house. And Kim brought pizza and someone else brought a cake and water bottles...it was a great welcome.

We received a wonderful goodbye from the Conejo Church in Thousand Oaks, CA. They let me preach on August 16 and gave us a reception goodbye after second worship. Then we drove the pickup and the van the 1,474 miles from Thousand Oaks to the Fort Worth/Dallas area, along with me in a rental truck. So, back to the topic...

Darlene and I are putting our belongings in storage for the time being; maybe by this time next year we'll have a place to put it all. We took the rental truck to the storage unit and started unloading. Our son-by-marriage was in the truck with me handing out a large mattress, and Darlene and our daughter were below, with the kids in the car. Darlene slightly tripped on a bed frame and I thought I'd be a good guy and get down and help them with the mattress, so I walked off the truck.

I am impressed with how efficient gravity is. Seemingly with no time in between I left the truck and landed on the asphalt. Everybody screamed, and I don't know what they did with the mattress. It was quite a shock to my system, and I lay there a bit to assess the damage. My head hit the ground but there seemed to be no pain there. After a while I isolated damage to my left knee, my right elbow and the right side of my back in the rib cage. In the last few days I have supported the Ibuprofen industry and been pampered by the family. Each day one of the granddaughters asks me how I am, and I tell her I am sore, and she says she wants God to help me feel better. That helps a lot!

I am still able to drink lattes and talk short walks around the neighborhood. And now I am back at work on the internet. And I have this short piece of advice that is useless -- it isn't wise for a medicare patient to be too helpful.

peace, charles

Ready to Move

We always try to be ready to move, whether to heaven or to another spot here.  There is so much work to moving, to remind us of the value of where we are and the joy of where we are going.  Nothing against Texas, but we would stay in California if it were up to us -- we are following granddaughters (and they have parents, of course).  The Coulston's new mailing address is P.O. Box 93165, Southlake, Texas, 76092.  Donations to Made in the Streets may be done online or sent to Made in the Streets, 409 Franklin Road, Brentwood, TN 37027.  But anything that needs our special attention please send to the Texas address.  

Tomorrow is a granddaughter's 5th birthday, and in two weeks we will have been married 45 years.  As Scripture says of the early church - "much grace was upon them all" - we have first-hand experience of that great and wondrous grace that grows out of not only the kindness of God but also the kindness of God's people.  

So...be kind!   And rejoice in grace!

A Good Book

Now and then I find a book that reaches deep down within me where my true heart resides.  That part of my life needs to be touched now and then with great ideas, because it is out of that place that my actions come.  Last year Mike Rivas of Thousand Oaks, CA, gave us several copies of John Ortberg's Everybody's Normal Till You Get to Know Them.  Two weeks ago I finally got around to reading it myself.  Chapter 3 on "the fellowship of the mat" is worth spending my own money for.  So today I introduced the book to the Team members at Made in the Streets who are dorm supervisors for the boys.  I asked them to read it at the same time and talk in pairs after each chapter.  They agreed.  I found out that a couple of the Team have already read it, and now 6 are engaged with it.  We will see what it touches in them and what it will come to mean to the street kids also.

When you find a book that reaches you, we would love for you to recommend it to our Team, or buy a few copies for us.  We can get the books over here in suitcases when we travel.  Let us know.  It's a way to powerfully impact young men and women who powerfully impact kids who have no home and no hope.  

Matatus

Matatus are fascinating.  They are mini-buses that are used for public transport in Nairobi and all over Kenya.  They have 30 seats and hold 77 people - or they did until they passed a law in 1994 saying everyone had to have a seat.  Once Darlene and I turned off 1st Avenue in Eastleigh into Juja Road and there were 4 matatus abreast coming at us (and that's on a 2-lane street).  I guess they missed us; I didn't remember anything for a few days.  Here is a picture of two matatus coming down a street in Eastleigh with lots of trash in it.  Many of them are wildly painted, with all sorts of graphics and words on them.  And they play loud music and drive as fast as they can wherever they are.  The objective is to pass one more car.  And the method is to stop anywhere and without warning to try to pick up one more customer before another matatu does.  They cause lots of traffic jams by passing anywhere, especially if there is a slowdown, blocking cars from the other direction, filling up the round-a-bouts (traffic circles) and causing all traffic to come to a standstill.  Everybody hates them, and everybody rides them.  Of course some of our kids at Made in the Streets aspire to be matatu drivers. 

  And yesterday we were in a small traffic jam on the highway, following a matatu, and we saw written on the back of it -- Max Lucado!  Now that's fame!