2009: GOODBYE TO A TRUE ASSET TO THE CITY OF TRENTON

The Trenton area lost a very vibrant and active community member with the transfer of Pastor Jim Coston to Calvary Baptist Church in Waco, Texas. Herewith a cut and paste on Jim's transfer. Godspeed as you continue to labor in the Vineyards of the Lord, Jim, and thanks for including my blog as a link on your website.

Meet Jim Coston-Calvary's New Pastor, beginning in August

(This post was taken from Jim's website from Trenton, NJ--southtrenton.com)

James (Jim) Holmes Coston was born in Atlanta, GA, on Aug 30, 1970, to James Robert and Carol Holmes Coston. He lived most of his life in Columbia, TN, with parents and a younger sister, Kathy Coston. Jim graduated from Columbia Central High School in 1988 and enrolled in Wake Forest University in Winston-Salem, NC, that Fall.

In 1992, he graduated from Wake Forest University with a Bachelors of Arts in Philosophy and Greek. He graduated with a Masters of Arts from Wake Forest University in 1995 having written a thesis on the hermeneutics of Rudolf Bultmann and Paul Ricoeur (which is collecting dust on a shelf somewhere in his house at this moment).

On May 27, 1995, he married Julie Diane Davis in Wilmington, NC. A summer later they both enrolled in Princeton Theological Seminary in Princeton, NJ.

During the 1996-1998 academic years, both served as interns at the First Baptist Church of the City of Trenton. They both graduated with Masters of Divinity from PTS in May of 1998 and became Co-Pastors of the First Baptist Church of the City of Trenton in June of 1998. Jim was ordained by the West End Baptist Church, Columbia, TN, in May of 1998.

In December of 2002, an infant, Justin Wells, was placed with Jim and Julie. He was formally adopted in November of 2003. Julie resigned from First Baptist effective January 1, 2003. Jim assumed the full-time, solo pastor position.

Reverend Coston founded the South Trenton Habitat Project in 1999, a satellite of Habitat for Humanity˜Trenton Area. During the next three years, STHP built two Habitat houses in the Goat Hill section of South Trenton, raising $120,000.00 in capital. In 2001, the Jersey Street Community Association honored the Reverends Coston with its community award.

Reverend James Coston founded the Lamberton Historic District Committee [LHDC], a civic association covering the riverside of the South Ward of Trenton, in December of 2003. LHDC formed to lobby against the Trenton Housing Authority's application for a Hope VI grant in 2004 and 2005. Both applications were rejected by the Housing and Urban Development Department. LHDC also spearheaded the community fight against the Leewood Village Centre project which would have demolished six blocks of housing in the Lamberton neighborhood and displaced upwards of 500 families. After intense pressure, the City of Trenton administration scrapped the LVC plan.

In November of 2005, Reverend Coston was honored by the Trentonian as one of the top 20 community leaders under 40 years of age. In January of 2006, Reverend Coston announced his candidacy for the South Ward Council seat to be decided in May of that year. In the May 2006 municipal election, Jim was the top vote getter though did not reach the 50% plus 1 threshold to avoid a runoff. However, in June 2006, Jim Coston defeated the 3-term incumbent by better than a 2-1 margin to win election to the South Ward City Council seat. He was sworn into office on July 1, 2006.

On March 21, Chloe Sonia & Samantha Oksana, fraternal twins, were born and subsequently placed with Jim, Julie & Justin. The family happily expanded to five!

There is much to come!

Read this blog post about Coston, posted by a Trenton resident in 2007. We have found such a jewel.

Thanks be to God.

The Costons plan to move to Waco in August.