Leaders are Learners

Leaders are Learners!
I don't know if Rick Warren actually coined that phrase, but it's one that has stuck with me. I really think one of the key attributes of a great learner is not only their capacity to learn, but their willingness to learn.
I thought what I would do for the next couple of blogs, is to mention some of the ways I learn.
There are alot of ways to learn, but one of the ways that has helped me the most has been to visit other churches and see first hand what they are doing. Seeing would include:

1. Seeing an actual service--- I try to schedule times each year where I take a Sunday or two off and intentionally go to other church services. I have the advantage of being within a couple of hours of some great churches.
When I visit, I try to observe every aspect. From the moment I pull into the driveway until I leave, I am taking mental notes. I always try to maximize my time. I will usually plan to visit two churches every time. For instance a couple of months ago I took a Sunday and visited Mountain Lake Church's early service, and then I drove to Chestnut Mountain Church for their second service. Another time I drove to Northpoint Church for their early service and on the way back I hit Crossroads Church for their second service.
Generally, my goal is to visit churches that are larger than ours. (Don't underestimate what you can learn from any church---even if they are smaller!)
While many of the things these churches are doing may not work in your context, there are transferable principles that will work anywhere.
If I am on vacation, I always make it a point to visit a church in the area that I am traveling to. I will usually go online to Willowcreek's Willownet and use their "Find a church" function to look them up.
A couple of weeks ago I got a chance to go to Palm Beach Gardens Christ Fellowship
I grew up in Palm Beach Gardens, so I am down that way a couple of times a year. This church is making a huge impact in a very unchurched area. I think they run about 10,000 in attendance, and they have recently gone multi-site. The Pastor, Tom Mullins was a football coach at my High School. He is a dynamic leader. John Maxwell is also a teaching Pastor there.
Whatever you do, you owe it to yourself (and your church) to see firsthand what others are doing.
In my next blog I will share the 2nd way that I learn.

Running out of room!

When we moved out of Seneca High School in November of 2003 and into our very own building we figured that we would be able to meet in this facility for about 5 years before needing to start on Phase 2-----WRONG!
We have been here for about 2 and a half years and space has become an issue.
I have always heard that there are three potential space obstacles--- 1) not enough children's space 2) not enough parking 3) not enough seats in the auditorium

One of the things we planned well for when we built this building was for children's space. This has not been too much of a problem for us.
The parking deal WAS a problem for us up until 2 weeks ago. But after changing our service times and allowing 30 minutes between our second and third services instead of 15 minutes---this doesn't seem to be too much of a problem.
Our problem (or should I say "Opportunity") is auditorium space. We just simply don't have enough space in the 2 prime times (9:45am, and 11:15 am)
We have just finished a very successful building campaign called "Only One Life" which will allow us to begin construction of our Phase 2 this summer (hopefully) This building should eliminate the space obstacles--at least for a couple of years!
If you are interested in seeing the video of what the building will look like you can view it here:

Easter Follow-up

The weekend after Easter can be a challenging one. Everyone is pumped up about Easter Sunday, but the next weekend is back to normal. I've always said that the real success of Easter Sunday is really the weeks following. During the weeks that follow you get a sense of how many people you actually retained after the "big weekend".
Well, yesterday was a great confirmation because we set a record attendance for a non-holiday weekend. Not too shabby!
Our team really stepped up. Josh is doing a great job leading worship, and Scott knocked it out of the park, singing Boulevard of Broken Dreams. I am so impressed with the commitment level of all of our volunteers. It truly humbles me. It sounds like a cliche', but we really couldn't do it without them.

sometimes bribery works well

As I mentioned a couple of days ago our Easter services were incredible. We had a record attendance of 1,670. Easter was only the second time we had 4 services (Christmas eve/ Christmas day was the other). The big difference was that all 4 services were on Sunday morning. The service times were: 7:15, 8:30, 9:45, 11:15am.
We were curious to see if anyone would actually attend our 7:15am sunrise service. We figured the best way to insure that people would show up that early was to bribe them. So in addition to our normal healthy, low calorie snacks (Donuts!), we decided to add another health conscious food----sausage biscuits! If you've never been in the south, let me explain something to you; sausage biscuits are a rednecks surf and turf. It is fine cuisine.
It seems to have worked. Here are the breakdowns for the times:
7:15 -- 212 in attendance
8:30 -- 297 in attendance
9:45 -- 604 in attendance
11:15 -- 557 in attendance

Someone asked me if speaking at 4 services was difficult. To tell you the truth, it was really no different than doing 3 (our normal). The only thing that is kind of wierd is when you can't remember if you said something in a service or not. They all sort of blend together in your mind.

world famous

While driving back from my trip down to Florida, I couldn't help but notice all of the billboards along the highway advertising almost anything you could imagine. There were a couple in particular that really made me think. 2 different restaurants used a similar phrase. They said something like, "Come and dine at the World Famous _______ restaurant." The only problem was, that I had never heard of either of those restaurants. It's highly unlikely that anyone had heard of either of the restaurants. So the question is, what does it mean to be world famous?
My guess would be that to be world famous, the entire world would know of you. (hence, World Famous)
As Christ-followers our job is to make God, world famous. To spread God's fame everwhere we go.
Essentially we need to be living, breathing, walking billboards advertising the good news of Christ.

Easter Reflections

Not only was Sunday Easter, but it was also Foothills Community Church's 8th birthday.
Our first service 8 years ago we had 70 people in attendance. Yesterday we had 1670 people!
God is truly amazing. I don't know what the next 8 years hold, but if they are anything like the first 8, it will be VERY interesting, to say the least.

You can't always get what you want

The Rolling Stones said it well; "You can't always get what you want"
Before I left for my vacation I had plans, big plans. I was going to catch up on all of the fishing I haven't been doing. Unfortunately the weather never cooperated. Windy conditions made it impossible to fish. Here I was in South Florida, the fishing capital of the U.S.A., and I can't fish--Bummer!
I had a decision to make, was I going to let that ruin my vacation or have a great time in spite of it? I chose to make the best of it and just relax. I must say, I didn't realize just how badly I needed to relax--just kick back and do nothing. It was great.
It's surprising how many hidden blessings are available to us when our best laid plans don't pan out the way we thought they should.
How do you respond when your plans change because of things out of your control?
The Bible is full of stories of men and women that were greatly used of God when they were able to yield their plans, dreams, goals and aspirations to God.

Thank God for my wife!

This past Friday evening thru Saturday afternoon my wife and I attended our church's annual Marriage Retreat in the mountains of N.C. along with about 30 other couples.
We had a great time of reflecting about what's really important in life.
I love my job. I get the privilege of being the lead Pastor in a great church, and get to do all sorts of cool things in ministry, but when it all boils down, my first alliegance is to my Lord, and then my wife and then my kids, and somewhere a little farther down the line, my ministry.
Even though I know that, sometimes it's good to be reminded of that.
How are you doing with your priorities?