This is the Truth Network. Canada coffee What in the world do they have in common? Enter Jesse. He is a kingdom coffee man. In fact, that's what's on your shirt, Jesse.
What's going on with you, man, with this shirt? What in the world? Yeah, it's kingdom coffee, man. How do you want me to start? I wanna know, you're in North Carolina.
You came to our Wednesday in the word is still a little bit loud. There's Dr. Date, the word Carson, there. There's old Bower Socks. There's a bunch of guys still standing around praying.
But what brought you here? You never thought you'd end up in this room with this crazy crowd, did you? No, not at all. I don't know what kind of brought me here. It was the Lord, brother.
So, uh,. Yeah, there's a whole story behind it. How much time you have? Just jump right in. Just give us the clip, give us the clip, those we want to hear it.
Okay, yeah, so we got connected with some people in Honduras.
So last year we were praying for some coffee, and coffee prices went up like crazy. And I had a friend reach out and said, Hey, there's this co-op of pastors out of Honduras, and they have no one to buy their coffee. And we are connected with David and Megan Grevara. They run a ministry down in Honduras. It's called Blossom Creek.
And we got on a WhatsApp call with them. We met them over a phone for about 10 minutes. And then me and my wife, Steph, and our three youngest kids, we jumped on a plane, went and met David and Megan. And we were just looking for coffee. David doesn't even do coffee.
It's the pastors that do coffee.
So we thought we went all the way to Honduras kind of for nothing. And then David brought us all the way up the hill. We met these pastors, and the Holy Spirit kind of kicked in, and we knew that we were in the right place at the right time. And after that trip, it was awesome. We're like, Well, okay, we were connected with these pastors, we're gonna bring up their coffee.
David phones me when we get back home and he introduces me to a guy named Chris, who's in Patrick County, uh, who runs uh Springs of Life Bible Camp. He's like, You gotta meet Chris, tell him your story. Uh, I shared my testimony with Chris, shared our story, and I said, He's like. We're missing out on roasting. We had a guy who's roasting coffee for us.
We have the coffee, but. We don't have anyone to roast it. We have the sales.
So we're like, well, what does it look like if we just come down there and meet you? And he's like, Yeah, we got place and we got time, so let's go down here and meet you.
So we jumped on a plane. We have five kids, so me and my wife, and my son's fiancé.
So there's eight of us total. We jumped on a plane and went to DC and then drove five and a half hours to Patrick County, Virginia. Patrick County, Virginia. Is that near Air Rap, Virginia? I don't know, man.
Is that the same one? It is. It might be where my daddy was born. How about that?
So, what happened? Yeah, so we just connected with them and then we're just like, we're just talking. We're like, hey, what does it look like if we send a coffee roaster down here? And while we were doing that, my wife found out a month prior to that that she had American descendants and family from the U.S. She's only third generation Canadian.
She found out that she has 12 great-great-grandparents that fought in the American Revolution. And they're actually, her grandfather got married in Patrick County, Virginia.
So it was like the Lord kind of brought us there and connected it, and it was like it was crazy. And then we found out that Chris was the guy who couldn't buy the coffee from the people in Honduras, that we ended up buying it because they didn't have anyone to roast it, so they couldn't buy it. What is it about the kingdom and coffee? Make a connection for us because you're a guy that loves Jesus. And you love coffee.
How is that connected for everyone out there listening that are just meeting Jesse from Canada? Who's coming down to Patrick County and getting involved with Honduras coffee, which is some of the best coffee in the world? Yeah, so we got into coffee.
Well, I'm gonna go back to the beginning a little bit quick here. I grew up with parents that were addicted to heroin. My dad used to sell drugs for the club when I was a kid. My dad ended up doing two and a half years in jail for conspiracy to sell cocaine for. For that, when I was about four and a half years old, so my mom, me, and my sister, we moved away, tried to get away from my dad, but my mom was still addicted, so she just ended up with people that weren't like my dad, that were kind of exactly like my dad, you know what I mean?
That were into the same stuff, so it didn't help. Anyways, my dad got out of jail and my mom and my dad did not get along. My dad ended up, yeah. Put my mom in the hospital, and then he ended up going back to jail. And then me and my sister ended up in childcare for a few weeks, and then.
Mom went to rehab, and then we moved back in with my grandparents back into Calgary after we came back from out of town. Uh anyways, parents split up. Life was crazy. And by 12 years old, we moved near my cousin's house, and my cousins were all older than me, and they like to drink and they like to smoke and get into all kinds of drugs. I didn't have any friends growing up.
I moved every six months because of my dad being in jail and my parents and their issues.
So I just tried to earn street credit by doing whatever these guys were telling me to do. Whether it be fighting someone or doing drugs or whatever, just trying to earn favor within these individuals. But it ended me up in a lot of trouble with the law. uh and just you know I was fighting people and stealing stuff and just being stupid. I met my wife in high school and uh got her into that stuff too and then I got her pregnant at eighteen.
And uh and then we had our first child and uh she was 18 and I was twenty. And here I am trying to raise the son, and I don't even have any idea how to be a dad myself. Like, I have no thing.
So, I ended up getting three in paireds, drinking and driving.
Well, actually, four total because I had one previous there to that. But I had three impaireds back to back to back without going to court.
So I got an impaired, got out in bail, got an impaired, got out in bail, got an impaired. And they're like, you're going to kill someone. And they were right. Like, I was out of control. Like, I didn't know what to do.
So, when I got into jail, they denied me bail. I had to stay in there 45 days. They're like. And I remember sharing this jail sale with this guy who just got caught for doing some crazy stuff. And he's like, if you're going to be in here, just do something, just be solid for your family.
And I didn't know what that meant. But I knew that I just had. I just wanted to know Jesus in some capacity. Because when my mom used to get beat up by my dad, she would be like, let's just pray things get better. That was the prayer.
That was the only Christ I grew up with. As a kid, it's just let's pray things get better. And, you know, I was in there and I'm like, I just want to know Christ, but I don't know how. And I started reading the Bible and I'm like in Genesis and then I'm in Deuteronomy and I'm like, man, I'm pulling my hair out and I'm in Leviticus because it's so dragging and long. I don't know what it is, but I just had this.
Yearning to know Christ. I got out and uh I started going to church with my grandfather, and he was going to an alliance church. And then he gave me, there was a picture of Jesus on his fireplace, and it said, Families are forever, call for a free book of Mormon. Oh. And he's like, you should call him.
He was mixed up in where he was at, but we called him, and we never heard the gospel at all.
So the Mormons share the gospel. No, I'm not Mormon, but this is a part of the story. And uh. And when we started going there, they just showed away a family that I've never seen. They have.
Good morals that I've never seen, right? They're singing around a piano. We used to eat like dinner in front of the TV watching Nightcourt as a kid, right? Like, we never ate dinner as a family around a table. It was always chaotic.
And they were singing around a piano, they were eating together, and they're praying together. And we had joined the church, and we had had our other son, he was born. But they kept me sober for four and a half years. But their religion was all based off of like Joseph, and I could never swallow it. And then it was always like work space, too.
Like you had to be married to be baptized, and you had to be baptized in the temple to go to heaven. Anyways, and I was trying and I was working this work stuff. And uh When we went to go get married, I invited all my old friends back into my life that I hadn't had. And uh After four and a half years of sobriety on my bachelor party, I relapsed. And I realized that everything I believed it was built on sand.
And then I just started questioning what I believed in and what I was at and where I was. And then as I got married, my dad came back into my life too. And my dad came back, and I had to bail him out of jail. He drove from Ontario. He got caught with a bunch of drugs in Manitoba, driving to Calgary for our wedding.
And he came back 100 pounds, soaking wet, addicted to heroin still, and I wanted to kill him. But he couldn't even fight him because he was Lee looked dead already. And we let him move into our house, and life was rough. I was drinking, he was using drugs. We had had two more kids after we got married, two little girls.
And then finally, we caught my dad using heroin in the house. We had to kick him out. And then finally got to a point where My wife had to kick me out. She And and I'm like I got all drunk and I came back home. She locked me out.
So I tried to smash out the window.
Well, I did smash out the window, get in my house. She called the cops and put a production order against me. She wanted nothing to do with me.
Social worker called me, they're like Hey, you know what? You're not allowed at the house. You're not allowed this. I'm like, I don't care. I just want a divorce.
Blah, blah, blah. I just want to see my kids. And she's like, Well, I went to the school. Talk to your kids. They don't want to talk to you, they're afraid of you.
And it broke my heart. I'm like, I'm my dad and I didn't want to be. And so I came to a point where I'm like, man, I want to. I want to die, man.
So I took my truck. I didn't even have a driver's license. I was just driving around without a license, but drove my truck out to the field and I put a garden hose in my exhaust other end of my window, and I was just punching and screaming, hitting that steering wheel. And then I felt something grab me and say, hang on. And the first time in my life, I felt loved.
And I didn't want to die. And uh And I was staying at my mom's house, and I applied to be a truck driver on my mom's phone. Uh And I'd never even had a license, and I was applying for a driver job with a CDL, like a class one. And I've never even had a CDL, but they hired me for some design work I did in the past. and I got the job and the guy I shared an office with shared the gospel with me.
And he shared Christ with me. And I came to work one day, broke down. And I was crying and his pastor came picked me up. And he brought me to his house, and I was telling him my story, telling him my struggle. And he's like, Do you think your wife would come talk to me?
I'm like, no, man. She hates you. She hates religion. She hates everything. I brought her through all this Mormon stuff and it was nuts, right?
We had left the church, obviously, because it was crazy, that Mormon stuff. And. And he's like We'll call her, see if she'll meet us. I phoned her and said, Steph, you want to meet us at a mall? And she's like, Sure.
So, me and Steph met him at a mall.
Well, we all met at the mall together, and then we started grilling him. We're like, How do you feel about tattoos and piercings and homosexuals? Like, he's there to help us, and we're grilling him about what he was there to tell us. Like, you know what I mean? And he's like, I'm not trying to do any of that.
And he shows us a scripture in John. He's like, as you're in him, he is in you. And if you give your life to Christ, the Holy Spirit comes and lives inside of you and guides and leads you. And I felt the same way I did in my truck. And I just started breaking down at the table and I was crying.
And I gave my life to Jesus at that table in 2011, and so did my wife. But my wife wouldn't come to church with me. And she wouldn't let the kids come to church for me. And I just kept going for months. And I was writing notes and notes in my journal and journal.
And she was reading them. And I said, Why don't you come? Why don't you let the kids come? She's like, I don't believe in that crap. I never have.
You need a crutch. You always have. Like, look where you came from. And I'm like, well, I feel loved. And out of this love, I can love you properly.
So I'm going to keep going. Because what I have to give you out of my love is just abusive. It's garbage. It's crap. I want to keep loving you the way that I feel loved in this way.
And then one day I came home and she's crying on the stairs. And I said, What's wrong? She's like, I just felt like I was going to die. She's like, I thought I was going to live or die, and I felt like this for a while. I was trying to drink all these juices and trying to do all these health things, and she just knew that if she didn't have Christ, that she was going to die eternally.
And she started coming to church from that. And nothing was perfect. Everything was very chaotic for a while. And it's not even perfect now. But God is there, right?
And we got. We got a a call from my dad about three months later. Three to five months later, and I'm like, where are you? And he's like, I'm at the Calgary Dream Center. I'm like, what's that place?
He's like, it's a. It's a faith-based rehab center. And I'm like, it's like, I gave my life to Jesus. And I just started crying. I'm like, Dad, we gave our lives to Jesus too.
And uh You know, my dad stayed there for a year. And then he got out and he got a degree in theology at a Bible school in Saskatchewan. And he became assistant pastor of a church in Calgary, Calgary West Full Gospel. And then my dad was earning some money to go back to the graduation the year after. And he he died working a uh on a roof.
He died in a workplace accident.
So me and my wife, we just started giving away free coffee worthies These, uh, oh, sorry, I didn't even tell you where he they found him.
So, four pastors found my dad living outside of a homeless shelter. to bring him to this Calgary Dream Center. They were pretending they were homeless. They walked them down. And uh and that's where he gave his life to Christ.
And uh And so when he passed away, me and my wife just went where those pastors found him on the street. And we just started giving away free coffee. We're giving away Starbucks coffee. And we're going through $300 a week in Starbucks, and we had $15,000. Pause one second.
We're going to get back to the coffee to the homeless. What a remarkable journey. Jesse and his family found Jesus. Your dad found Jesus. ended up in heaven not too long after.
We'll come back and talk about The coffee venture, and now, how you have a whole ministry called Kingdom Coffee from Canada. to North Carolina to Patrick County, Virginia. We're going to trace the line and give you a chance to challenge people out there that are listening on their technology. Kingdom mission from God as well. Hang on, don't touch that dial.
We'll be back with this broadcast podcast on Truth Talk. I'm Stu Everson. What a story. Go back and listen to it. Share it with someone.
Jesus Christ said That The Son of Man has come to seek and save the lost. If you're not lost, you can't be saved. If you're not broken, you can't be fixed. If you're not sick, you can't be healed. And that's what happened to Jesse.
If you're a believer, that's what happened to you. What a remarkable story of your journey to Christ, your family. a lot of dysfunction, a lot of drugs, a lot of abuse, a lot of challenges in your own home growing up. Your dad was rough, your mom in the hospital, all these things happening. You shared about how you came to Christ, your wife came to Christ, some pastors loved you.
A man at work shared the gospel with you. Your dad came to the Lord, he passed away. But through The journey of him to getting to Christ, you discovered there is a need. And that homeless people, they need a good Hot cup of joe, is that right, sir, Jesse? Yeah, yeah, so yeah, after my dad died in December of 2015.
And me, I couldn't, I had a hard time sleeping. I'm like someone else's dad or brother or mom's down there. And it was cold, and I'm like, I gotta go. And my wife's like, you're crazy. But she's like, okay, let's go.
So we're like, it was the dead of winter. It was January in Canada.
So we're like, let's get him some Starbucks.
So we just started buying Starbucks, but we ended up going through $300 in Starbucks a week. And we had $15,000 and my dad passed away through his accident. And we're using that money, but we were burning through it. And then I'm like, I was praying and I'm like. I asked Steph, I said, I'm thinking about buying a coffee roaster.
She's like, Yeah, you should. I asked my father-in-law, because usually I do stupid things, and he was the one that usually, you know what I mean? He was like my rule of measure a little bit, right? Because he told me, anyways, yeah, so he's like, I think it's a great idea.
So we spent the rest of our money on a roaster. We bought this roaster and I had no idea how to roast coffee, and I was burning it, and I was under roasting it, it tasted awful. And then I'm just like... I was praying and I'm just like, I felt God, like, you know, it's just like, be still and know that I'm Lord. You know, I have a plan, right?
And I just, I just like, if all this roaster is, is just a roast coffee to be prayed over to give to people in need so they can know the love of God and love of Christ Jesus, then that's all it's for. And so that's what we did. We just kept roasting and getting better. And then, you know, it turned into this every week, then we're feeding these homeless, and then we're feeding two to three hundred people a week. Uh, and then obviously, we got better at roasting coffee, but we've been serving the homeless every Every Saturday for the last 10 years almost, since January of 2016.
And we only missed a couple of months during COVID because of kind of lockdown stuff. But other than that, we've been there. And now we have a big hot dog cart.
So we feed them a hot meal and give them a free cup of coffee along with this hot meal and just share Christ with them. What is it about your journey to Christ where People like this fellow at work and others, pastors, reached out to you. When you felt like no one else loved you or cared for you. What is it about that that's Put in your heart to love these homeless people that no one cares about. They were rejected.
They're the offscour of society. They're they're they're worthless. They stink. No one cares. What is it about your heart and heart for Christ for them?
Well, I didn't feel loved growing up either. Like, I was a part of social systems, the food bank. And whatnot, too. Like, I felt dirty, I felt stained, but Christ cleaned me up. He wiped me up, you know, he made me new.
So, why couldn't he do the same for them? Like, if you met my dad before Christ and after Christ, like, we used to threaten our children and be like, Hey, if you don't behave, Grandpa Jim's gonna watch you, and they'd run away screaming. But then, after he was saved, the kids ran to him and they're like, They just ran and hugged him as he walked in the door because he carried the love of Christ.
So, we were just like, if one person, if one dad, one brother, one mom, one sister can come to know Christ and affect their whole family, then it's worth it for us. Like, we just want to keep being there and being available. We want to go to where you are now first. I got to bring someone else in here on this panel. I'm Stu Everson.
This is Truth Talk. We're at Dario.
Now it got a little quieter, but we still have guys praying together from Wednesday in the Word.
So good to have a Canadian in our midst. We gave you some cool door prizes. Bauer Sox. Bring a little uh Color commentary in here.
Now, how did you meet this guy? What is it about his story that the most hits your heart? You know, you're ministering to pastors a lot with energized ministries. I've noticed pastors kind of like coffee too. Pastors do love coffee.
I love coffee. It's a good fit for my current profession in it, caring for pastors.
So, Stuart, it's Kingdom Connections, right? Like the name of Jesse's company is called Kingdom Coffee. We had a mutual friend who's a pastor up in Virginia that said, Hey, you guys should connect.
So, we did. A couple months ago, we met for lunch, and I just take a liking to this guy right here.
So, I love to see the life of Christ come to life in other people. Obviously, you've heard a good bit of his story, even more than I got to hear it along the way. But anyway, he's He's a spirit-led guy. You know our ministry. We're very much spirit-led.
The Lord brought us together, so we're trying to help him get established down here.
Well, tell us where the Lord's leading your ministry next, how we can be praying for you, real quick. Yeah, so we weren't sure where the ministry was going to lead us. We wanted obviously an opportunity if we're coming down here to do some ministry work like we do with the homeless in Calgary. As we're going to keep that going as well, that's going to keep operating. Kingdom Coffee is going to keep operating there.
We're trying to open up Redemptive Coffee down here and get roasting with it. But we're praying for opportunities. Lord, where do you want us to minister to? We met a couple in Danville that helped minister to less fortunate people, the kids and families, and they're in need. Like we were there on Sunday and their van wasn't working.
And I rented a big bus because we have a lot of kids. And we rolled up and they had a bunch of kids coming out of all these apartment buildings and they had no shoes on and they were so excited to get to know Christ. And we picked up two van loads of kids and there wasn't even enough seats for all the kids. And they just wanted to be fed and they wanted to be, they just wanted to come to know people that knew Christ. And the parents didn't even know me.
They're just sending the kids out. And I'm like, wow, this is, it reminded me of me as a kid because I grew up in a lot of apartment complexes and we were just allowed to have the free run of the range in there. And it's like, man, these kids have a hunger to, they actually have a hunger because they're hungry and they're getting fed after, but actually a hunger to know people that have like life in order. And I grew up with such chaos that I hungered and thirsted for order and some sort of just direction and because it was all over the place. And we're feeling that the Lord's maybe planted us to help these people into Anvil as well.
So yeah.
So kind of where the Lord's leading. Jesse, Kingdom Coffee, quickly, your challenge to the rest of us out there, including me, we're comfortable. A lot of times we're spoiled, I think, in the Western churches. You know, we've got so much. But what's your challenge to everyone out there listening using whatever their gift is, whether it's coffee, sports, coaching, teaching?
Whether they're just, they're in a, they're maybe in a tough spot, like you were in growing up. What would you say, everyone? as your as a takeaway from this conversation.
Well, for me, I had to be broken completely. I had to be without nothing, and then I had to be built up, and I had to come to know. Uh, the one that loves me, and the one that that died for me, and and that's Jesus Christ, right?
So, there is hope in the name, there's just hope in his spirit, and then that hope I just have to stay connected to and grounded with to keep going, and and you know. Just be open to the Holy Spirit, be open to what He's saying to you, be open to where He's moving you and what He's doing. Like, for us to come from Calgary to try to intempor to come down here to the south is extremely crazy. And I had a friend who just sent me a scripture, and it was just talking about. You know, like after Moses died, and you got these guys trying to cross the river, and they don't know what to do, and they had no lifeline, and they didn't know what they were doing.
I'm kind of paraphrasing, and I'm butchering it, but. They just went. You know, they just said, be courageous, right? Just be courageous and go.
So we're kind of in that season right now where we're just stepping out in faith and being courageous. We don't know what next day is going to give us. And we're kind of leaving an established thing to maybe start something new. And that's incredibly tough and crazy to do. But if the Lord's in it, He's going to guide and lead it, right?
And I'm 43 and I'm about to be 44 and I have five kids and the Lord's called me to be responsible to them and to raise them and to take care of them. And I feel like, you know, it's very stretching, but the Lord is bigger than what I am.
So I'm going to just keep following that and just keep hearing them. Amen. You were there in your car. You had the Tailpipe rigged so you could kill yourself basically, take commit suicide in a field. And suddenly you felt the love of God.
What would you say to someone who's literally at the end of their rope? They literally are done. They're just, they feel no love, no hope. Life has come at them hard and they just are out there. What would you say to them right now?
Just give a call to someone who's lonely, broken, stuck as we get out of here. Yeah, there's a God that loves you more than you can ever think of. More than your mom, more than your dad, more than your brother, sister. There's someone who knows every hair on your head and every freckle on your face and knows you by name and calls you his own. And he just has a place for you and a comfort for you like none other.
So run into your father's arms. He's there for you. He'll never abandon you. He'll never forsake you. And and he He'll never turn his back on you, and it's just something that's unbelievable that I've come to learn because I felt abandoned, I felt left.
I felt like I didn't mean anything and I wasn't worthy of anything. And I was told that a lot of my life, but Jesus didn't say that. He had a better plan for me and a better future for me and he loves me. And I'm his, so. Amen.
How would people get a hold of you or find out more information about Kingdom Coffee? Maybe this has resonated. They want to learn more or connect or support you. What's the best way to reach you? or on F Facebook or internet or what's the website or what whatnot.
Kingdom Coffee.ca. Kingdom Coffee.ca. Or Kingdom Coffee YYC. That's our airport code.
So Kingdom Coffee YYC Calgary. Yep. To the colour. This is the Truth Network. Yeah.
