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Anywhere from Oceanside to Encinitas, Ponto is one of my more favorite waves. It really depends on who I happen to be surfing with, for a beginner I go to different waves than with someone who is a more advanced surfers.
The Encinitas chapter started in 2002 with Larry and Kelly Patt. I joined the chapter in March of 2002. I was looking for a chapter since I had connected with the guys of SonSurf S. Africa (CS South Africa) while I was over there.
Within a short time they asked me to come onto the core team and I carefully and prayerfully considered it before ultimately accepting.
In 2004 the core team started going into different ministries. My wife Carrie and I and Larry and Kelly were just trying to hold the chapter together while each of us couples had a new baby to take care of.
Keith and Jaqueline Stanton had gone to New Tribes Missions to their training school from 03’ to 07’ and came back to revive the chapter.
I once again came on leadership and at the end of a year the Stanton’s accepted a leadership position in New Tribes and I became chapter director and have been since then!
It’s funny, when I was growing up I was the only person who did both! In high school I would skate and surf one day and then hang out with golfers and golf the next day. I didn’t have one friend that did both sports. In the early 90’s golfing took off when celebrities came into it. Retired pro surfers started to pick it up and it soon spread from them to professional surfers and then throughout the surfing world.
I have found that surfing helps with golf in flexibility, balance and upper body strength. I can tell when I haven’t surfed in a while and I play golf I can’t drive the ball as far.
I’ve heard surfers say that it helps mentally but I think that relates more to a contest situation than to your average weekend surfer.
We’ve always been a chapter that tends to attract an older group of surfers, 20 something and even 30’s and 40’s. In the early days we had some friend’s of Kelly’s son that would come. That tends to limit some of the crazier stories that I have heard from other chapters!
We have meetings on the beach in the summertime and when we had our first meeting this summer, one of the guys in the chapter brought his dried out Christmas tree. There were 20 foot flames coming out of our firepit, it was pretty funny!
I think we’re unique in that our approach to the ministry is focused on ongoing relationship development. We have Bible study every Tuesday night and meet to surf every Saturday morning at 8 am. Surfers always know where to find us. One girl we hadn’t seen in three years that used to attend the chapter but moved away recently showed up at a surf! She knew where to find us because we always go to the same spot at the same time every week.
This actually happens quite often. The consistency is special to people, they connect, then sometimes leave and and when they reconnect again later we are still there.
We also have serious inductive Bible study, in depth, serious and rich teaching for 45 minutes to an hour. Everyone really eats that up, Christian and non-Christian. The current crop of leaders we have have grown up under that teaching and in those positions largely because of the rich teaching.
We used to keep it lighter and gospel focused, especially when we were meeting at the beach but we have found that non-Christians are more engaged with this kind of serious teaching and dialogue more afterward. Sometimes I don’t get home until 10 pm. or later because of the follow up conversations that the Bible opens up!
A consistent faithfulness is a key part of our chapter.
As a general rule, our Saturday surf days every Saturday morning at 8 a.m. function as our outreach events. It is a non-threatening time for people to bring their friends and introduce them to the group. We have found that being faithful to be there and at Bible study every week brings forth fruit.
Besides, with Huntington and Newport doing a lot of the planning for the large events such as the US Open, ASR and the Trestles campout we are able to piggyback on what they do and support them in those events.
We have lows of 53-55 in the winter and then in the summer it gets up to 71-72, but we had 75 degree water this summer early. But that is really unusual.
Personally October is my favorite time. The water is still warm and we start to get our first winter NW swells but the sandbars are still built up from the weak summer surf.
Santa Ana’s are blowing and the kids are back in school. The second week of October and then Thanksgiving weekend generally is really good!
The first thing that comes to mind is the fellowship, I love getting together with a group of leaders that are all surfers and passionate about the ministry. It is so nice to catch up with guys that I don’t see all year. It’s also good and encouraging to hear about what God has been doing in other chapters.
I ride any shortboard from a 6’2 to 9’0, whatever the conditions call for. A Christian shaper out of S. Africa shaped most of my boards but he has since retired and gone full time into ministry so not only are my boards good but hold sentimental value.
I also still have the board I learned on, a 6’7 Donald Takayama. I recently went out on a small day and took it out for a surf. I paddled out by my parent’s house in Encinitas right where I learned how to surf as a little kid and had a ball!
In my own experience Christian Surfers has been instrumental in my walk since I got saved in 91’. The reason is that I was going to church but wasn’t involved in the church and didn’t feel like I fit in.
CS gave me a place to be involved and a place to give back and grow as well. It gave me a place to apply what I heard on Sunday morning to outreach and personal relationships during the week. A place to disciple and be discipled. The end result was that I connected more deeply to my church and other ministries in a way that I might not have done if it had not been for CS.
Chapter Director: Fred Havens
Email: csencinitas@gmail.com