Ed Stetzer on Potential Podcast

Ed Stetzer is one of my favorite speakers/writers on the Church in America.  He and Troy Gramling have a great podcast here on the challenge of the Church to remain faithful to the Gospel while remaining flexible in our presentation of the Gospel.  Great stuff.

Way Cool Tool

I’m listening to “Rapper’s Delight” by the Sugar Hill Gang on a way cool tool called Tiny Song.  Listen to just about any song, build a playlist, etc…  I already love Pandora, the Music Genome Project.  This will compliment that site nicely.

Sunday Wrap-up

• There was no shaving for me prior to church today. I’m a clean shaven kind of guy. But, my sun burn had me give my razor a rest. My back and chest is still torn up. I should be good to go by tomorrow.
• The audio for today is here.
• Phil and Kelly (my honey) have the only other wrap-ups I’ve seen so far. Check them out.  For what it’s worth, it’s Kelly’s first Sunday Wrap-up and she needs your help naming her Sunday blog.
• We had 446 people today. Our June average was 449 people. On our biggest day of June, we had 502. That was the Sunday of the month where TheCURE (students) had their service. No doubt about it. We have more people at church when the youth have a separate service…have to work through what to do about that.
• I was really excited to see all of the leadership developing in the band. Jesse did not participate on the stage at all. Leading in his place was Reina, Julie, Phil, and Alex.
• We should always be developing and deploying new leaders. There is no success without a successor. Great stuff.
• Alex lead an incredible song called “Devotion” by Hillsong United. During the 2nd service it seemed like God was doing something special throughout the auditorium…amazing moment. Playing through this during communion made the moment seem so real.
• My favorite lines were:

When you stand the tall trees and mountains bow

When you speak the fiercest of oceans is still

And I see the sinner seek devotion

The lost become chosen, and I fall to my knees

• A few weeks ago, we moved people over to the 9 am. It freed up room in the 10:30. The 10:30 is slam packed again. We should be going to three services on August 24th (8:30, 940, and 10:50). If we have to, we’ll start our third before then…we’ll see.
• We showed our baptism video from last week…almost always pulls a tear from me.
• Today, we picked up in Philippians 2:1-11 and were talking about humility.
• I have learned that if there is anything that can drive the pride out of you, it is having kids.
• I’ve been feeling that this week in every way possible. I wouldn’t have it any other way.
• After service, we met at the offices for a Life Pointe 2.0 seminar…pretty cool. We had about 22-23 people and picked up a few more bloggers, which expands our influence, develops community, improves Life Pointe Church search engine optimization, and gives opportunities for people in at Life Pointe to “virtually advance the Gospel in reality!

Tomorrow, I teach on humility

Tomorrow, I’m teaching on humility.  Ben Franklin said that humility was the one virtue he was never able to attain.  It’s a message I’ll be listening to more than I’m teaching.

That’s one of the challenging jobs of being a pastor.  You’re called to share enourmous truths from a holy God.  Leadership requires you to take people from where they are to where they should be.  A leader cannot take someone to a place they have never been.

On days like tomorrow, I’ll be challenged to admit my shortcomings and tell everyone that we’re taking a walk together to a place that we’ve not likely visited very much.

“Man Rules,” our fall message series. THOUGHTS?

“MAN RULES” is a 3 week series we’re working on for the fall. We’ll be dealing with topics of Biblical Masculinity. This image is a rough idea to be used for a mailer, slides, etc… Do you have any thoughts on the images or creative ideas for the series?

If you click on any of the pictures, you’ll go to our Flickr account and see some of the comments already there.

Something Significant Going Down in Our City

Check out this Miami Herald article about Melvin McCormick, one of our city councilmen. Then, check your heart and see if you want to be a part of something significant in our city.  If you do, you’ll find me there.

There are two kinds of people in the world

According to C.S. Lewis, there are two kinds of people in the world:

1. Those who look to God and say, “Thy will be done.”
2. Those whom God looks to and finally assents, “Thy will be done.”

In the battle of the wills, you can beat God…if you will.

Taking Down the Curtain

We love pipe and drape.  You can use pipe and drape to hide stuff, to create walls, and to right size an auditorium.  One of the worst uses for it is to limit faith.

After getting a handle on our auditorium size, we somehow had gotten hung up on making sure our pipe and drape was in exactly the appropriate place so that the auditorium always felt just right.  At the same time, we were praying for God’s Kingdom to come in Homestead.  We were praying for increase….asking God to send the people yet keeping the pipe and drape perfectly positioned to make sure our auditorium was “right sized.”

For us, taking the curtain down was a step of faith.  It may have also been a signal that we weren’t only praying for increase but that we were expecting it.  Now, I’m looking for where else we have positioned other types of pipe and drape in our church.

Sunday Wrap-up: Baptism edition

BAPTISM SLIDESHOW

Sunday was a defining day in the life of our church. A lot can be said. I’ll sum it up in five statements:

1. I didn’t get arrested.
2. The baptisms were amazing.
3. Life Pointe has guts.
4. You guys love to be with one another.
5. You represented Jesus well.

I’m very familiar and appreciative of the stories behind a few of the people being baptized.

Richie Nieves just didn’t go to church at all for decades. He’s one cool guy whose wife has loved Jesus for a long time. He made a decision to follow Jesus a few months ago and hasn’t looked back. Richie is my friend. He loves to serve. He’s totally sold out to a revolutionary Jesus. It was a privilege to baptize him…glad to call him my friend.

Cyndi Mazorous is in my life group. From the first day she walked into Life Pointe, it felt like she has always belonged. She didn’t get baptized with everyone on the beach because she said she “didn’t feel worthy to be baptized”…most powerful, deeply accurate statement of the day. She wasn’t worthy…none of us were/are.

When she got baptized, the beach had been closed because of lightning. So, we stepped into the muck, rocks, and mangroves by our picnic area. I sunk a good one foot into the gunk. People cheered for her. She went public with her faith in Jesus. Bar none, it may have been one of the most significant moments of my ministry.

I’d love to tell the stories of each person going public with their faith in Jesus. Those stories need to be heard. So, go tell them. That’s your first job as a follower of Jesus. Go and tell. It’s too bad that some people never get that part of following Christ.

SUNDAY WRAP-UP

• It was great to see Ela at Life Pointe! When I see her, I always think of this Scripture.
• Mark and Tere had their last Sunday together with us before they move to San Antonio. Mark is one of our Elders. He was/is an anchor for me as we made huge moves to move the Gospel forward in Homestead. Sending them out with a prayer in the 9 am service was special.
• I’m blown away by the level of honesty so many of you have in approaching Jesus!…It’s a thing of beauty!
• Check out the rest of the pics from yesterday here.

Blake and Me Hangin’ with the Crocodiles

Sunday was a great day that topped off a busy weekend (a quince, birthday party, baby shower, three services, a picnic, and a baptism). Chris, David, Marcela, and Bill can tell you about it. I’ll give some pics from the baptism and a bit of a wrap-up a little later.

In the meantime, check out my son, Blake and me hunting for crocodiles at the Baptism and Picnic yesterday. Yep. We were looking for some good material to make Chris Elrod a manbag out of.

Loving God and man with reckless abandon

Check out this really cool little old lady that “loves God and man with reckless abandon.” Thanks to Josh Lane for the link.

Chris Elrod is a Bitter Man

From time to time, Chris Elrod picks a cyber-fight with me.  Unfortunately, he tends to show up with enough intellectual fuel to barely power a moped half-way around a BB.

No doubt, his lovable antics are a display of his former days as a comedian…and possibly my posting of this picture of him wearing a purse.  I hope he “gets better, not bitter.”

Anyway, in response to this Twitter comment, he’s working on giving me the nickname he owns the right to, “Man bags.”  I told him I would gladly receive the name if he would stop carrying his powder and lipstick in his own man bag.

Still, I don’t think that “Man Bags” is a fair nickname for Chris Elrod to have.  So, why don’t you help me give him a good, manly nickname? Fire away.

The Great A/C Caper Helped Me Make a Memory

Our air conditioning was down for the count 3 nights this week. Our response was to move a mattress downstairs and sleep in the family room (coolest room in the house). We moved the girls into our bedroom (2nd coolest room in the house) which they loved.

We sweated to death but made some memories in the process. It reminded me of when Kelly and I had a 300 square foot apartment and nothing but a future ahead of us. Great days.

Anyway, the A/C got fixed yesterday. We decided to camp out for one more night downstairs for the heck of it. For three days we were inconvenienced. But, for the rest of our lives, we have a good memory.

Southwest Airlines and Me

This morning, I was boarding a flight on Southwest Airlines to Tampa. While standing in line, I texted this to my Twitter account. Then, about an hour ago, I boarded Southwest Airlines from Tampa to Ft. Lauderdale and said this, this, then this.

Apparently, Southwest Airlines actually gives a rip. They twittered this in response to me. Naturally, I said this and this. It’s amazing how just a little Twitter response made me feel. Imagine how much customer satisfaction I’d have if they hooked me up with a free flight!

There’s a lesson to be learned here.

Begin This Sentence

…and that’s how I ended up wearing parachute pants, suspenders, and a football helmet.

Finish This Sentence

If the Presidential election doesn’t hurry up and get over with, I think I’m going to…

Social Networking: Life Pointe Style

As our church grows larger, it has to grow smaller. That’s what Rick Warren says at least. I agree. But, maybe it’s more than just that. Maybe, growing with one another in community is simply an act of obedience to the Scriptures. Showing generous hospitality, giving and receiving, and living our lives openly with one another and the world around us are hallmarks of the Church.

What does that look like for us? It means opening our homes and lives to one another. It also means participating in community wherever people are found. This is one of the reasons we leverage social networking and blogging tools actively as a part of our church life.

So, on Sunday, June 29th @ 2 PM, we’ll be hosting a Life Pointe 2.0 seminar in our offices to talk about:

• blogging
• twitter
• flickr
• youtube
• vimeo
• myspace
• facebook

In the meantime, if you have any questions about starting a blog or some other social networking site and/or how you can use it, feel free to ask. I’m sure someone has some decent answers around here.

Sunday Wrap-up

• Happy Father’s Day! (aka Man Day)…got killed in Guitar hero out in the lobby by James.
• In addition to “Man Day: Guitar Hero edition,” we celebrated by dedicating 5 kiddos in the 9 am service.
• The 9 am service is now officially the larger service! Awesome.
• Last Summer, our crowds dropped by 25%. So far, our June attendance average is up 4% from the May average. That’s big news.
• We’d definitely be launching a third service right now if we were near the fall. If we need to add the third sooner we will.
• When we do, we’ll be adding another team, which means more volunteers and more room for leaders to step up.
• You guys are going berserk inviting your friends. I dig it!
• Today, one of our newer guys grabbed me after service and let me know that he’s never really made his family get up early on Sundays for church. They’d always drag him to church when they decided to go. He said that on Sundays he’s kicking everyone in the butt to get out the door so they can be a “hero” and attend the 9!  Love that.
• I’ve had a couple people ask for us to put on a bloggers seminar so they can pick up some skills. I think we’ll be all over it. Watch for the announcement on that this week.
• Kicking off the “Got Funk?” message on suffering, Nathan, Paul, and Alex starred in one funky video…one of my favorite we’ve ever done. It’s embedded above as well.
• Talking about suffering from Paul’s perspective is challenging. We believe God came to relieve our suffering. We also believe He came to minister to us in our suffering even if He doesn’t alleviate it.
• The Q&A is challenging…understanding that the questions come from real people, facing real challenges is an amazing inside and real time look into the lives of our people.
• After service, I jetted to my parents’ house to enjoy the day with them…great day all the way around.
• I’m so glad for how God is working in us. Keep doing what you do.

Father’s Day

Father’s Day…doesn’t evoke the fondest memory in every heart.  Some Dads are pretty lousy.  If that’s your memory, my heart hurts for you.  It shouldn’t have been that way.

May dad is a good dad.  Some of the things he did to be a good dad when I was a young pup were:

• He called me Big T…even when I was a little guy.
• He never let me say, “I can’t.”  He’d respond with a comment like, “Can’t isn’t in the Johnson vocabulary.” OR “Things don’t come in can’ts, they come in cans.”
• He’d watch me take risks…and dare me to jump off of ridiculously high places into water.
• He’d move the keys in his pocket out of the way so I could put my head on his lap on long trips.
• In public around “important people,” he wouldn’t ignore me.
• After catching a fly ball in the eye while playing catch, he made me catch another one before we went in the house.
• He always told me he wanted me to do better than him in life.  Those are high expectations…some tall orders.  I’ll spend my life working on that one.  At the end of the day, if I’m half the man he is, I will have accomplished much.

That list could go on and on and on.  I appreciate and love my dad for that.  I look at Kourtney, McKenna, and Blake with a ton of love, a father’s love.  It all makes me so appreciate for the Father I have, in heaven and here on earth

Happy Father’s Day, Dad.

Follow-up: Guest blogger, Chris Day on “Assimilate”

Chris Day, is our Follow-up Director (and King of all Excel Lovers) at Life Pointe.  He’s been a part of our church for somewhere under 80 weeks (he’s got it on a spreadsheet somewhere).  He’s been following Christ for under two years and has a great faith story to watch.  He is what Life Pointe is about and the kind of disciple we are trying to reproduce.  He’s also my guest blogger today as we finish talking about follow-up.

To ‘assimilate’ is to utilize, absorb, and incorporate into the body. In our case that body is the living and breathing body that is our church – Life Pointe Church. In order for our church to be living and breathing it needs to be growing. We must always be fully engaged in expanding God’s Kingdom here on Earth. The devil is working overtime, and he has a firm grip on hearts and souls everywhere. But God is working hard too, and He is working through His disciples here on Earth. We are His hands and His feet – His arms and His legs. There’s strength in numbers, so the more disciples there are walking His fantastic journey here on Earth and following Him the harder it will be for the devil to do his dirty deeds on new hearts and souls.

At Life Pointe Church one of our goals is to assimilate our first-time guests into our church family as quickly yet as comfortably as possible. We never want to pull or push you into doing something that you don’t feel comfortable with. We want to welcome you with open arms and lots of love so that you know that you belong with us. From the moment that you walk in to that front door of the movie theatre on Sunday morning you are instantly with family at Life Pointe Church. We are all God’s children, and as such we are all brothers and sisters. We know that if you come back as a second-time guest, and then keep on coming back week after week then God is clearly at work in your heart and soul, the church family is expanding, and the living and breathing body that is the church is alive and healthy.

Sometimes it’s hard to realize that we do not ‘go to church’ on Sunday mornings. The movie theatre is not ‘the church’. It is merely a convenient place in the commercial center of the city where we corporately meet at and transform into a place of worship. We are the church, and we bring our church family to the movie theatre. We are the church at all times and at all places. It doesn’t matter if we are alone or with other people. It doesn’t matter if we are with fellow believers or non-believers. One should be able to see the vision and mission of Jesus Christ in each and everyone of us.

Life Pointe Church should never be ‘that church that you attend’, but rather ‘your church’. You own and operate a piece of your church. Once our regular attenders really feel that they are owners and operators of their church by letting them loose and allowing them to serve God and His children in their own unique way it seems only natural to become official members of their church by attending our bimonthly membership luncheon and then signing the membership covenant. The assimilation process never stops, for members can then be trained and given the tools necessary to become leaders of their church. We need to constantly raise up new leaders in order for the state of the church family to remain alive and healthy. God’s Kingdom can’t expand without this constant growth process – guests becoming attenders – attenders becoming members – and members becoming leaders. This growth must be bonafide, consistent, and exponential. We must do it for the expansion of God’s Kingdom here on Earth. It is always about Him. It is all about human lives being saved by Him.

Q&A from Got Funk – week 2 (loneliness)

The following questions were some questions I was unable to get to on Sunday.  They all represent excellent, heartfelt questions.  One is deeply personal.  I’m very appreciative for the great thoughts and questions.

QUESTION: How do you know when you found your partner ? How do you know it’s a gospel partnership?

RESPONSE: When you set out to find a marriage covenant partner, you need to have your mind made up about what you are looking for in a person.  If you have not established in your heart that you want the person your marry to love Jesus more than they love you, you will settle for someone who will love Jesus because of you.

That may describe where you currently are in your marriage.  God can certainly work in us, refining us, and conforming us to His character, and repairing or ministering to our marriages.  But, if you have not
yet entered into a Gospel Partnership in marriage, you should consider that Paul gives clear instruction in 2 Corinthians 6:14 not be partners with unbelievers.

To answer your final question, you know that you are in a Gospel Partnership when Jesus is the number one priority between you both, when Jesus is the filter that your decisions pass through, and when you both choose to honor Jesus before one another.

QUESTION: If we are born in sin, then why when a infant passes, he or she goes straight to heaven?

RESPONSE: King David said, “For I was born a sinner – yes, from the moment my mother conceived me” (Psalm 51:5).  Paul says in, Romans 3:23 says For all have sinned; all fall short of God’s glorious standard.”  Considering those verses, it is obvious we are absolutely and utterly borken and separated from God.

The fact that infants die demonstrates that all are impacted by sin.  Romans 6:23 points out that the result of sin is death. However, 1 John 2:2 says that Jesus came to take away the sins of the entire world.  Because of the just nature of God I am left to believe that the grace of Jesus is applied to the lives of people who are not at the age where they can comprehend what it means to choose Jesus as their God and to follow Him.

We see this idea in the story of David and Bathsheeba (2 Samuel 12:21-23).  David mourned because his child was going to die.  When his child died, he quit mourning and responded that while his child could not come back to him, he could go to his child.

There is nothing in the Bible that is conclusive that says there is an “Age of Accountability” where children suddenly become responsible for their sin.  But, there is an inference in the Scriptures that this is the case.

QUESTION: Why cant I fill the void of a spouse passed on with friends or other people? The loneliness always returns. It hurts all the time.

RESPONSE: First, I want to say that my heart hurts for you and that my answer cannot possibly do justice to your question.  I’ve never experienced the kind of loss that you have.  But, I can stop and be sad with you and pray, which I am doing now and invite others to join me.

You loved your husband.  The nature of love is that it is a high-risk, high-reward proposition.  The good times are really good.  The bad times are really bad.  Separation from someone you love deeply is painful.  There is simply no way around that pain.  I would recommend that you not try to replicate or replace that void.  Rather, you should recognize that the sense of loss exists because someone significant was in your life.

You can choose not to cover it up.  You can choose to leverage your loss as an opportunity for the goodness of God to go forward.  Allow people to see the grace of Jesus in your life as you experience pain from loss.  One of the most hope-filled lives is a life that can experience deep pain and still love Jesus. David said it best in Psalm 139:1-18.  No matter where you are, what you go through, what hell you find yourself in, God is there in the middle of you gladness or in the middle of your sorrow.

You’re definitely in my prayers.  I’m sorry you’re facing that.  Don’t do it alone.

Following up on guests, part 2: Numbers vs. People

Yesterday, I shared how important our guests are to us when I was writing about our Follow-up Process. Today, let’s look at our Numbers vs. People.

PEOPLE COUNT

The first person I ever heard give a good defense of counting people in a succinct, powerful way was Tommy Barnett, pastor of one of the most caring churches in the US, Phoenix 1st Assembly of God. He said, “We count people because people count.” The numbers are important because the people are important. Numbers tell us a lot. We are working hard to mine data to uncover as many trends as possible because it speaks to the consciousness of our people. It helps us plan.

Recently, having a grasp on our numbers helped us to ask people in our 10:30 service to move to attending our 9 am service. The 9 am service was stronger than ever. But, the 10:30 is our front door for our guests. As of last week, our attendance is split between the two services to within a dozen people. We adjusted our numbers. In doing so, we honored our people and created room for future growth. Managing the numbers honored the people.

DECREASE MAY PRECEDE INCREASE

With that said, we can have an unhealthy fixation on “the numbers.” When we stop seeing the hearts and hopes of people, we have failed. When we want numerical increase and do not adequately challenge people to increase spiritually, we have failed. Sometimes, in order to see spiritual increase, God brings numerical decrease. The Bible is full of those stories. It has also been my experience that God prunes the tree before new growth can come.

In the past year, we had three growth surges (from 175-285, from 280-375, and from 375-465). Immediately before two of those surges, we lost significant groups of some really wonderful people that were an integral part of the church.

NUMBERS OF GUESTS

I’ve seen quite a few statistics concerning how many 1st time guests you need to have per week to grow. It varies from place to place. In 2005, Miami was incredibly transient. Even though our populations was growing like crazy, people were cashing out on homes and moving to Atlanta to pay cash for homes there. We were constantly adding people and only grew modestly. Obviously our guest rate had to be extremely high compared to the midwest where housing markets were more stable.

Unfortunately in 2008, the housing market has dropped plummeted and our population is stabilizing. We need fewer guests per week to grow. Nelson Searcy says that in order to grow, you need 5 new people per week per 100 attenders and keep 20% of those. I think that’s probably a good marker to work from. Ultimately, you need to find your own number that is in line with your demographic.

THE HOPE BEHIND THE NUMBERS

Our hope…our goal is “to make it hard to go to hell from Homestead.” With that hope in hand, no number will ever satisfy until “all have heard.” Jesus should be obvious, compelling, and unavoidable. Other churches, like my friends at Christ Fellowship become our Gospel partners who are on the same team…not opponents. The hope behind the numbers should cause us to fixate on throwing the doors wide open, sharing our lives generously, and helping people to fit into containers of service and containers of care.

Next, we’ll go through what our PURPOSE is in following up and what the phases look like.

Haircut Day: Buzz Cut, Mullet, Trim, Vanilla Ice?

I’m getting my haircut today.  It’s going down in the office.  You decide. Make your case for how I should have my mop carved up.  I’ll post the results tomorrow.

Following-up on guests, part 1: PROCESS

We value our guests as one of our top priorities in our church. This priority is embodied in our singular combined mission/vision statement: “Loving God and man with reckless abandon.”

Over the past couple months, we have nearly exclusively focused on the follow-up process during staff meetings. Chris Day, our director of this ministry sits next to me in staff meeting and we drive this ministry home. It is so much of who we are. Our process looks like this:

PROCESS

1. Collect guest cards and connection cards. We collect information from around 14 individuals/families per week add connection cards from our regular attenders and members weekly.
2. Act on the cards immediately. After service, people are at the office processing information, writing cards, building our list in Google Docs. A phone call is made on Monday. A first time handwritten note is mailed out by me. Kids Life sends out a stamped bag of unpopped popcorn. TheCure (students) sends out a Saturn Project CD. A 2nd time letter is sent out to adult guests. asking people to serve. Service is a high value. The expectation is set at the outset. People rally to serve. It is a part of our DNA. This past Sunday, about 16% of our connection cards received had prayer requests attached. Each request is prayed for in staff meeting and in our prayer group. Our care network follows-up with each request.
3. Close Open Loops. Our data is collected in a Google Docs spreadsheet listing assignments with an “X.” As each assignment is completed, the X is turned into a “C,” meaning closed. An item is closed when a 1st or 2nd time guest is mailed to. In the case of info request, a sign-up, or a prayer request, a loop is closed after a conversation has been had yielding a “yes,” no,” or a “not now.” The information received is gathered and placed in the comment box in the spreadsheet.
4. One month call back. We place a call 4 weeks after the initial guest visit to make sure our guests have received information they’ve requested. This call has successfully helped people to make the next step into service, membership, and group attendance. This occasionally re-activates someone who visited once and hadn’t come back after their first visit. This call also serves to ensure that our process is working and that there are no holes. This is the end of our formal process. I believe an end point is important to our processes. It provides a basis of measurement and a distinct edge to know that the job is completed and the task is cleared.

Follow-up is incredibly important. God will not send people if we are not prepared to care for people. If you cannot articulate your process, it is likely because your process is undefined. You definitely have a process. It’s just muddy and probably doesn’t work. I’ll pick up next with part 2, “Numbers vs. People.”

Thoughts?

Sunday Wrap-up

• Luci is a new addition to the bloggers that give a Sunday recap. Chris, Phil, Ritz, and Jesse should have some thoughts up soon too. On to my thoughts…
• Here is the audio from today.
• Woke up at 4 to get ready like I’ve been doing the past few months.
• That tradition may have to change. I’m not the iron man that I used to be. I need my beauty rest. Some would say I need it badly.
• HUGE news flash! The 9 am and 10:30 am are evenly distributed in attendance! We have room for a total of 150 more people before we absolutely must add a third service.
• The guys and gals that made the move are monster heroes!!!
• I really enjoyed teaching today. God is at work changing people. I can see it…visibly.
• Our attendance is up 260% from the same Sunday last year.
• Every Sunday people are making decisions to put their faith in Jesus!
• One of our volunteer staff members is one of those people. Chris has been following Jesus for 72 weeks.
• Before that, he hadn’t set foot in a church for 30 years.
• He’s directing our Follow-up process and mining data…he’s an MVP.
• Because of the hard work done by Chris and Paul, we had 63 people at our membership luncheon (including staff). 47 prospective members. 34 have signed membership covenants so far. Awesome. (third time I’ve edited this).
• At the membership luncheon, Jesse was taking scandalous pictures of me. He’s threatened to post them on his blog. I’m gonna get you sucka!
• Some bad news? Today was Kim’s (Kim is on the right) last day at Life Pointe. He’s an exchange student that has been living with one of our families. He’s going back to South Korea…hate that.
• I didn’t have time to get to the text message questions today. There were three intensely on target and deeply personal questions that were absolutely awesome. I’ll answer them tomorrow. You’ll be able to find them here.
• One last thing, as you can see from the pictures above, I need a haircut badly! Alex is not only our youth pastor, but he’s also the dude that skins my head! Pray folks, pray!

Service Capacity

Right now at Life Pointe, we are working to reduce the number of people in our 10:30 service. We’ve passed the 70% capacity ceiling and are very close to 80% which we believe is a ceiling that will deter people from coming back. I think that the only people that like 100% capacity meetings are pastors and politicians. Think about what happens when you walk into a movie and it is beyond 70-80% full:

• You may have to sit at the very front of the movie and look up at a 45 degree angle to see the screen. Of course, a lot of us love sitting in the front. New people typically don’t.
• You may have to separate from your family or party to find seats.
• You probably will have sit right next to someone, body-to-body. That may be a positive experience (if you’re a close talker). It may not be such a great experience.
• You’ll likely have to climb over someone to take a middle seat.

Currently, our 9 am service is at 50% capacity.  We’ve been asking people to make the move to the 9 am service for the following reasons:

• Since the vast majority of our first time guests attend the 10:30 service, we need to consider them first as an act of worship to God and an act of generous hospitality to our guests.
• By attending the 9 am service, our people are free to serve in the 10:30, the service that has the most traffic…though it is rapidly evening out.
• We demonstrate growing spiritual maturity when we subordinate our needs to other people’s needs.
• We are good stewards of our resources. By not having to get a larger venue, we are able to turn our seats more and make our space less expensive.
• We are able to position ourselves for a third service in the fall. If we are able to evenly distribute our crowds, when we add our third service, we will be able to more evenly distribute our people into a third service.

There is no doubt in my mind that we can actually kill Kingdom growth by not effectively stewarding basic resources like meeting space. I would hate to think that a church would put a damper on changed lives over a space issue. Tackling the work of maximizing our space is evangelistic work. When we bring our church family into a basic effort like this, we are extending the influence of Jesus in our city.

Clear Communication: a Case Study

Props to Todd for the link.

Quick Hits – near and far

• Our Flickr page has some great new pictures.
• Michael Lukaszewski writes about what it means for a church to dominate a city.
• I’m really bummed because some really good friends that have been a HUGE part of Life Pointe are moving to San Antonio. Mark and Tere, Kelly and I are going to miss you guys more than you know.
• Craig Groeschel talks about breaking barriers. Great, great stuff for each of us.
• My friend, Chris Elrod talks about the 14 days that he was a dad. It made me love him more.
• Pete Wilson is looking to hire two staff pastors. Pete is a blog friend…I need to meet him in real life and verify that he is indeed as nice as he appears to be in the blogosphere.
• Chris Day will be a lifelong friend. He’s the real deal. I’m humbled to have him as a friend and as a ministry partner. He has insight. But, he’s also clueless. His prayers touch the heart of God and minister to me.
• Ritz posted his Sunday Goosfaba 24 hours after Sunday. Does that make it a Monday about Sunday Goosfaba?!
• Jason Curlee is talking about summer slumps here and here. Good stuff. Fact or fiction?!
• Alex got his braces off. Now, he looks like Matt Drudge.
• Bill, another Life Pointe guy blogs!
• Jesse is a metrosexual according to Prodigal Jon at Stuff Christians Like. He scored a 54. The white belt and Castro hat comment sent me over the edge.

You can only grow to your lowest leaky hole

I’ve been fascinated with Twitter over the past month.  I finally have 100 loyal followers on the popular new social networking site.  I’m ready to take over the world.

But, just when I began to love the 140 character blogging tool, they became overwhelmed by their own success and everyone started bogging down in the virtual morass.  It is frustrating.  And, it happened because they were successful.

I can’t be too critical (of course I can…that’s what arm chair quarterbacks do).  I’ve seen that happen with Life Pointe.  We started out with a handful of people and it wasn’t long before we were bumping into the same thing.  At 150-200 people, we got stucker than stuck.  I found out quick that we could only grow to our lowest leaky hole.

In the meantime, while I was trying to learn, we were losing people who were leaking out our low holes in the bucket.  We have new holes now…trying to patch them before the water level reaches them.  While this isn’t a perfect analogy (I don’t see the church as a bucket to neatly contain people), I do imagine we will be in a constant battle to repair our bucket so we can be faithful with the kingdom growth God sends.

As far as the original story goes, Twitter’s response is to be open about their problems and to work to fix it.  That’s a good thing.  The first step you take to fixing big holes in the bucket is to be honest that there is a hole in the bucket.  The second thing you do is engage your people and yourself to fix it ASAP.  If you don’t do it fast, you may miss a big wave of momentum and cause people to think twice about you, your product, or even Christ.

Sunday Wrap-up

• Chris has the scoop on today. The rest of the gang is MIA so far.
• Me? I woke up at 4 am to hit the office this morning because I would be fielding questions on the fly via text message and I was a bit anxious.
• While I was sitting in my office for a few hours, I tweaked my message and added some images that were dropped in on Media at the last second.
• They handled it like champs and we were off to the races.
• The 9 AM crowd was awesome…larger than our church was one year ago.
• A lot of people made the move to the 9 last week. More people made a commitment to move this week too!
• During the music set/communion, I sat down and felt overwhelmed by the sacrifice Jesus made. It felt very real today.
• Jesse is having too much fun leading worship.
• He’s also going through guitar strings like they’re water.
• If he keeps it up, we might have to refer to him as “Edwards Scissor Hands.”
• I kicked off “Got Funk? Religion for People with Junk in the Trunk.” We’re studying the Book of Philippians. I loved it.
• I wanted to read Acts 16 which is the story of the founding of the Church at Philippi with everyone. We just didn’t have the time.
• Read it now. It will help you out for next Sunday.
• During the 10:30, in an off-the-cuff moment, I said, “I’d rather have a bottle in front of me than a frontal lobotomy.”
• That led to the first text messaged question, “What’s a frontal lobotomy?” Deeply spiritual, I know.
• Relieved I didn’t have to field a questions about flying monkeys, I answered it.
• The rest of the questions were really great…felt like we interacted and people opened up.
• Some of the questions came out of a desire to know more. Some came out of a real need they were experiencing.
• I can see this is going to develop my prayer life.
• After service, I met a ton of people, including some old friends from college, Nathan and Stephanie Bradfield. That was really great. They should live here.
• I was also blown away by how many people I was ferrying to meet Alex about The Cure student ministry.
• I love how The Cure is developing…proud of Alex.
• After church and lunch, I hit the office to write some notes to our guests. I haven’t written this many notes since Easter…not bad for the first day of summer.
• It makes sense though. Our crowd was bigger today than it has been on any other day besides Easter following our massive roughly 9,000 person Egg Hunt when we had over 700 people.
• People are inviting their friends like mad.
• Lives are being changed. People are choosing to follow Christ!
• That’s what its all about.