Elevation Church

Spent 24 hours in Charlotte, NC. Met with a staffer from elevationchurch.com last night and attended both of their campuses this morning. Few comments:
1. Their church seeks to 'seek and save the lost' and strategize church to that end.
2. Their guest service team: tearing it up! By far the most warm welcome I've ever received walking into a church!
3. Setup team: On location by 5am. 5AM!!! Earliest I've ever heard a church begin setup. And there are about 50 on site at that time! Not one person stood around wasting time. These guys and gals took their volunteer positions serious!
4. The staff is very intentional about casting vision. Every meeting is 50% vision/50% tactical. When a volunteer understands the connection of their role to the vision and you multiply that by 280 you get elevationchurch.org!
5. They keep it SIMPLE. 1. Worship experience. 2. Small Groups. That's all!
6. Two years old and about 4,000 attendees.
7. No youth ministry. 50% of the Sunday morning volunteers were youth. What's that saying?
8. Every volunteer is required to refer to Stephen Furtick as 'Pastor', 'Pastor Stephen' or 'Pastor Stephen Furtick'. Seriously, it's required! You'll hear things like, "Pastor said this..." or "Pastor does that..." That kind of weird's me out. I'm not saying it's wrong... it's just different. Every staff and volunteer I connected with is normal. They don't worship Stephen and I didn't sense any weird (sinful!) stuff like that at all but they want to follow the vision God has put on their leaders heart and follow it well. I respect that. I didn't meet Stephen, he was speaking at another church. ButI met his vision and passion for the unbeliever when I met his staff and volunteers.

Bed time! I'm running on a couple hours of sleep and vertigo is setting in...

Atlanta

I'm watching the celtics-lakers game. It's tied at 90 with 4 minutes to go in the fourth quarter. I hope the Celtics win. Yea, even though I'm from California I'm not a very big lakers fan. I'd be surprised if the Lakers win. The Celtics are a stronger and more consistent team.

So I'm currently living in Alpharetta, GA. I've been here over a week and have about three weeks to go until we head back to the left coast. I've got a nice new apartment over looking a great pool. We've been in the pool almost every day cause it's so stinking hot and humid here! I'm enjoying the heat and will miss it when I leave. The one bummer out here is that west coast sports games run soooo late! It's almost midnight here and this game still has three minutes to go!!! (Lakers are up by 2 now :()

Today I went up to Chatanooga, TN to Rock Point Church. Heath and his team did a great job and we learned a lot. I'm looking forward to this week full of meetings at North Point Community Church. I appreciate the intentionality and excellence put forth by the staff at this church. It's truly a breath of fresh air. 

Happy Fathers Day!

Mark Driscoll Interview

Something new I'm using

Two very cool cutting edge web applications:

Remember the Milk

Jott

2019

My son will be 12 in the year 2019. Dang that sounds like a long time from today! Yet, my son will only be 12 then. That is so far in the future!!! 

Anyway, I wrote my son a letter today. He is not to open it until his 12th birthday in 2019. So what do you tell your son today who will read your words 12 years from now? I basically told him he is very loved and brings joy to our family. I told him to follow God despite the church and despite his family. I told him to laugh at himself. I told him to give himself to others. I told him to read a few books. I told him to respect and care for the ladies in his life and to not date until he's old enough (or almost old enough) to get married as dating leaves one with two choices: break-up or get married... so why not wait? I told him that he'll mess up in life yet God will always accept him back. 

So I realize that I'm writing him a bunch of random pieces of advice I'd like to pass to him and that maybe Solomon did the same thing at the birth of his children and we now read it as the book of Proverbs. I know he did write it for his kids, but I wonder if he did it years in advance... just a random thought flying around the cranium today.

Randy Pausch

You've probably seen this... if you haven't you should. I've placed this here more for me (sorry, I'm selfish) to help me keep a better perspective on life.

Advice Worth a Million Bucks!

"Don't tell people how to live their lives, just tell them stories."
-Randy Pausch

"The LORD had said to Abram, "Leave your country, your people and your father's household and go to the land I will show you. I will make you into a great nation and I will bless you; I will make your name great, and you will be a blessing.""
-Genesis 12:1,2