Shower For Your Ministry

I thought I would pass along a great idea that one of our Student Ministry volunteers had. We were trying to come up with easy ways for our congregation to be able to donate items for our new youth room. It's always a little dicey to ask for donations, because you never really know what kind of stuff you will get. So the idea was to throw our youth a shower. A few of the guys went to Target and Lowes and registered our church as a wedding. They then put together a dream list of cool stuff for the room - tv's, video games, rugs, lamps, ect. People loved the idea and we now have a room full of mostly brand new stuff! How cool is that?

Online Learning

We are unveiling a really cool spiritual growth tool next weekend at Seacoast, but I thought I would give you guys a sneak peak. For the past year a team of very talented and dedicated Seacoasters have been working on a massive online project to help people grow spiritually. Next weekend (at Greenville) we're unveiling a piece of that project called the Spiritual Health Assessment. They have developed a 56 question diagnosis tool to help you see where you are in your growth based on the five values Seacoast is built on: worship, connect, serve, share and grow. After you take the assessment you are give a customized list of resources to help you grow in each area. The list of resources will be continually updated, so this is a living tool that will just continue to improve over time.

If you'd like to take it for a test drive you can click here. Please let us know what you think and I will pass it on to the team. This is a great tool that is just the beginning of what Seacoast's Online Learning is going to be about.

Small Groups Are Happenin'

After my last couple of posts, it probably seems like I need put down the knife and take a vacation. Actually, I am really stoked about where things are right now. It's just more fun to blog rants! :)

Our small groups have been going for a couple weeks now, and I just got the final reports that 80% of our adults are in groups! I always had the feeling that as we grew, our percentage of attenders in groups would go down. It has actually been the opposite. Our goal by the end of the year is 85%, and now I think we may have to bump that to 90! I don't think I could ever imagine having church without communities of people that live life together. Why would you want to try to do that?

Do We Look Like A Pageant?

OK, I have to air out a frustration here. For those of you who like to think planting a church is always wonderful, God-inspiring work - you may want to turn your head for a minute.

This has happened a few times since we started, and some of the names and places have been changed to protect the innocent: Said Christian family visits the church one Sunday and grabs me after the service to begin the game. Stop me if you've heard this before - they have been shopping around for a church for a while, and we seem to have a few things that might interest them. "Could we meet for lunch sometime this week so you can give us the full sales pitch?" I say "sure", because I'm always there for food and we set a date.

At lunch over burritos, I share my heart and they probe for why we would be more deserving of their attendance than the last 5 churches they have tried out. I'm a nice person, so at the end of the interview I pick up the check and tell them I hope to see them on Sunday.

Said Christian family shows up a couple more times to kick the tires a bit...see what other incentives we could offer them to join...could we possibly throw in a leadership position to be named later? Something obviously goes horribly wrong because suddenly they disappear for a couple of weeks.

That's all fine - I kind of understand most of that - but here's what really gets me: said Christian family decides to call me one day to let me know that they have prayed about it - a lot, and we just are not the church for them. But if the other church somehow fails to fulfill their duties as their church of the month, we might still be the winner! O glory be!!!

Sometimes, lost people just seem to be nicer than us Christians. Why is that?

Alright, I'm done. It's safe to look again... :)

Sitting In The Airport

I am right now sitting in the Greenville/Spartanburg airport waiting for my flight to Dallas. This is my first time to fly out of GSP, and so far I am impressed. For one thing, they have wifi through the entire airport. A very cool thing that Atlanta needs to add. They also have clearly marked outlets at every gate for plugging in your "gear". Nice. Here are a few thoughts heading into this week:

1. I am going to Dallas this week to work with Leadership Network on their meeting facilitation teams. It's sort of a think-tank for churches and leaders from around the nation. This one is on church planting. I am excited about being a small part of a great organization.

2. We had our biggest Sunday ever yesterday! The worship was awesome, the message was off-the-hook, and we played a Journey song! What more could you want from a service?

3. I am stoked about getting our small groups started again this week. I am looking for over 85% participation this semester. I think they are that important for the spiritual health of our people. If you are not in a small group yet, what are you waiting for?!?

4. We are in the planning stages for our Sunday morning youth ministry called Nitro. It's going to be awesome! More about that later - they are calling my flight!

The Early Bird Might Not Always Get The Worm

Allow me to rant. I have been reading several guys lately who love to talk about how early they get up in the morning and get to work. 5am is nothing to these guys. I have something to admit: I do not like the morning. Wait, that wasn't strong enough...I HATE mornings! My family knows not to ask me anything important before 10am. It will either be answered with a grunt, or by something that will be retracted immediately when I have found my senses.

I have tried to like the morning. I have tried to make peace with early people. I once heard a speaker that I respect - say that he does 90% of his creative thinking before 8am; so I resolved to start my work days by at least 7. That lasted 2 days. I ended up staring at my computer screen for 3 hours and wishing I was dead. The only creative thing that I did was to stop showing up at 7!

Don't get me wrong - I'm not lazy. In fact, I have a very difficult time with people who do not work hard. I think that was instilled in me by my dad. (God is working on my patience. :)) I just do it a different time than most people.

I am a musician. I really think that we are wired differently. I am most creative from about 9 - 12 at night. Maybe it's from so many late gigs and rehearsals through the years...I don't know. I just know that it's time to own it.

Am I wrong? Am I the only one? I can't be...speak up night people!!!

Books

Seems like everyone is listing their favorite books from the last year, so - not to be left behind, here are my top 10 of '05:

1. Blue Like Jazz by Donald Miller
Great book that really flipped my thinking. Books like this are dangerous, they make you reconsider things you always believed. Which leads to my next book:

2. Velvet Elvis by Rob Bell
After all of the hype, I had to read it. Man, I'm glad I did! Challenged me on almost every page.

3. 7 Practices Of Effective Ministry by the Northpoint guys
A great play-by-play of how and why they do the things they do. They do them well and with purpose.

4. Tipping Point by Malcolm Gladwell
Should be a must read for every pastor and staff in America. Extremely applicable to the church.

5. Seizing Your Devine Moment by Erwin McManus
I actually read this in 'o4, but I have reread it several times since. I noticed that it has been re-released as "Chasing Daylight". A GREAT book that changed my life. (also read "Barbarian Way")

6. God Is Closer Than You Think by John Ortberg
Maybe my favorite writer. Totally challenged my view of prayer.

7. A Life You've Always Wanted by John Ortberg
A Biblically based manual for living a God focused life.

8. The Secret: What Great Leaders Know--And Do by Ken Blanchard & Mark Miller
Good business book that teaches you how lead a team.

9. The Best Question Ever by Andy Stanley
Really easy read that makes total sense. A must read for anyone who counsels people.

10. Traveling Mercies : Some Thoughts on Faith by Ann Lamott Another one of those "challenge your thinking" kind of books. A very effective, entertaining writer.

Books I'm currently reading or about to read:
Bird By Bird - Ann Lamott; Searching For God Knows What - Donald Miller; Now, Discover Your Strengths - Marcus Buckingham; Five Dysfunctions Of A Team - Patrick M. Lencioni

Anything you would suggest for me in '06?

Oh yeah - HOOK 'EM HORNS!!!

Blog Additions

As a part of the usual changes I make at this time of the year, I decided to shake up the "People I Read" section of my blog. I added a few and sadly had to see one go. Here they are:

Added:

Dave Ferguson
Dave is the Lead Pastor/Cultural Architect/Spiritual Entrepreneur/whatever he comes up with next, of Community Christian Church in Chicago. We co-hosted a multi-site conference at their place a few months ago. Very cool church and great blog. Check it out.

Multi-Site Church Revolution
Great blog about everything that is multi-site right now. The authors are my brother Geoff and a couple of the guys at Leadership Network.

Perry Noble
I have been reading Perry for quite awhile, but it was time to add him to the list.

Dropped:

Mac Lake
Mac - I hope this is a wake-up call for you buddy. Best blog on the net, and you walked away from it. Please come back Mac!

Christmas Eve Service

We had an absolutely AWESOME Christmas Eve service tonight! Everything went really well and we didn't set off the smoke alarms! I posted a few pictures over at the Greenville Page. I am going to assemble Christmas presents now - yeah!!!

Christmas At Seacoast

I posted a few pictures of our stage set and decroations this Christmas at the Greenville page. I can't believe it's almost over! :(

God Showed Up

Have you ever had one of those amazing days that you did not expect at all? We had one today. If you've been following this blog, you knew that this has not been a great week for the Upstate of South Carolina. We were absolutely wiped out by an ice storm that hit late Wednesday night. Half of Greenville still does not have power and they are not guaranteeing it until later this week. It looks like a hurricane blew through this town and took half of the trees with it. Accumulation of ice is an amazing thing.

We did not have power at the church until late Friday, and I was not sure if anyone would want to come to church after all of that - and I really knew that people would not want to come early to volunteer. When we gathered early for prayer for before the first service, I looked around the circle and there were at least 30 people standing there with smiles - ready to serve! Some of them had not had power at their house for 3 days and were living with relatives or out of hotels. What an incredible team!

And then God showed up in a BIG way. Greg's message was anointed and the best I have heard him. Anyone who ever thinks that Seacoast may not preach the Word, needs to listen to this message. After that, we had an incredible time of worship and prayer where people literally pinned their sins/requests/fears - to the cross. Amazing.

God always seems that much more powerful after a storm, and we experienced that today.

Let There Be Light

At somewhere around 8pm tonight, we called our home from WalMart (we were there with around 10,000 of our closest friends) and heard the beautiful sound of our answering machine picking up. It meant that after 2 1/2 days...56 hours and 10 minutes, we had power at our house again! We started jumping around the store like we had hit the Education lottery and triple coupon day at the same time. The people around us probably thought we had gotten the Holy Ghost or something - we didn't care. We had heat!

I will never again take for granted little things like: expecting the heat to come on when it gets cold outside; or how beautiful our tree looks with all of the Christmas lights lit up. God has blessed us so much and we have so much to be thankful for. Maybe sometimes stuff happens in life to help us put things back in perspective. What do you have in your life to be thankful for right now?

Frozen Tundra

I am posting this with my Treo 650, because my office and my house have been without power all day. We do not have power because Greenville is frozen. One large piece of ice. I am sitting here watching large trees in my backyard snap like twigs. It's a little disconcerting to watch tall trees now almost touching the ground from the weight of the ice. We ventured out for lunch and had to drive off of the road a few times to avoid fallen branches and power lines. Oh well, at least I don't have to worry about hurricanes anymore!

Catching Up

Ok, I haven't blogged in awhile - so I have several things to get out into the blogosphere. Here goes in no particular order:

I bought a Windows PC for the house at the 5am Black Friday after Thanksgiving. I am a musician, so I wasn't really aware that there were two 5:00's in a day, but apparently there is. There aren't very many nice people out at that first 5:00 - but that's beside the point. I bought a PC. I wrestled with the desicion for several weeks. We haven't had a working computer in our house for a few months, and I thought that getting a pc would be the best thing for the whole family - because of my daughter's games, ect. Man - am I regretting that decision! Maybe I've been Mac too long, but I have already experienced all of the "joys" of Windows. Crashes, virus software for the virus software...it goes on and on. Please take me back Steve!!!

Last night, I checked out one of our worship leaders, Chris Sligh and his band Half Past Forever, at a concert in downtown Greenville. Those guys seriously rocked!!! Chris had eaten some bad Mexican food the night before, so he looked a little putrude all night (it may have been the green light on him as well), but they still put on a great set. Chris has an amazing voice and writes great songs. You can buy one of Chris' cds at our bookstore next Sunday.

We decorated our auditorium for Christmas a couple of weeks ago and it looks very cool! The best part was - I had very little to none participation in the design. We have some very talented people in our church who know how to do that kind of thing. I just showed up with a ladder and put things where they told me! That was the best thing for all. I will try to post some pictures here or at the Greenville blog.

40 Days of Community was a very cool thing for us. We ended up with over 80% of our adults in small groups! I can't wait for the next small group semester to get kicked off in January. We have some great new groups that are going to be starting up. Also, I'm very excited about our new online learning experience. More about that later!

The uproar about churches not having Christmas services on Christmas Day is getting almost ridiculously funny. My brother Greg has a great post on it here.

Am I the only one who thinks it's weird that the spell check on my blog does not recognize the word "blog"?

I spoke 3 times this week - twice this morning + a child dedication. That's about all I have in me...

Not So Good

I've always fancied myself a pretty decent keyboard player. I have done it for a living for most of my working life, and have gotten by pretty well.

I sat down with my 7 year old daughter tonight to play with a little Christmas keyboard book that she has. You know - it's one of those miniature pianos with different colors on each key. The sheet music tells you which note to play by the colors. It doesn't give you a key, time signature, or note values. Just colors. I couldn't play it. I finally had to give up and let my 7 year old take over. She breezed through it with no problem, and then looked at me with the look we usually give our children - as if to say "it's ok daddy, you'll get it one day." I'm learning how to play the flute now.