Clemson Football Church Day

It seems that the ACLU is unhappy that Tommy Bowden has a voluntary team church day every August (they came to Foothills in August of 04).
You can read the article here. I must say, this is ridiculous! Don't these people have anything better to do?
Keep up the good work Coach Bowden!!

Thinking Outside The X-box

If you were to ask most Pastors, what are the most difficult sermons to preach they would probably mention Christmas or Easter. That probably sounds strange, but if you think about it, it makes sense. Typically most Christmas and Easter messages use familiar Bible stories, and therefore it's hard to find new angles to teach from. This is precisely the reason we have to be even MORE creative during these seasons.
I am very excited about the new Christmas series we are starting this Sunday, Thinking Outside the X-box! This week the message is titled, X-haustion. We're going to look at some outside the box ways of preventing the Holiday season from leaving us totally wiped out.
We are expecting to see record crowds so it's gonna be a blast!
If you attend Foothills make sure you bring your friends with you. The Christmas holiday season is a time that most people would attend church if invited.

One other thing please pray for our Creative Arts Pastor Josh Gregory. He's been having some stomach problems, and they are doing some tests to try to figure out what's up.

Barry Bonds

Some people are still not convinced that Barry Bonds took steroids.
Here is a copy of his rookie card. You decide for yourself!!
I'm not sure, but he looks a little bigger now!!!

great thanksgiving weekend

** Hope you had a great Thanksgiving. I sure did! It is one of my favorite holidays. Eating and football. What more could you ask for?

** My wife kept her streak alive. Another Black Friday marathon. She got started at 2:00am!
If shopping ever becomes an Olympic sport. She will win the gold! The best thing is that my wife refuses to buy anything that is not ridiculously marked down.

** Scott Chatfield preached yesterday for me (and did a great job!). I got to sit and watch and relax. We had a pretty good attendance for a holiday weekend.

** Got deer #5 on Friday!

** We start our Christmas series this Sunday: "Thinking outside the X-Box" Plan on attending for the entire series

what a day!

** It is absolutely beautiful outside today. High is supposed to be 78 and sunny!

** It looks like they are really moving on the new building. They have the roof all on, and they are getting ready to pour the concrete for the floors, and put up some of the exterior siding. Very exciting!

** We are going to ask all of you to help us design the music set for January 6th service. I will be giving our annual "state of the church" message, and what we are asking you to help select your favorite worship songs from 2007 and your favorite feature song. The top ones will be performed on that day. We'll be giving you a list to choose from in the next couple of weeks. (I know what I'm voting for already!)

** My computer has been driving me crazy for the last week. I thought everything was finally fixed, but now I can't get anything to play through my speakers. UGH!!

** I was at Walmart this morning. They have a lot of archery stuff on clearance, so I bought some new broadheads. The lady working at the register asked if I was 18!! ( you have to be 18 years old to buy them) I know what you're thinking; that poor lady needs to get some glasses---quick! But it sure made me feel good!!!

sunday recap

Had 4 great services today. Attendance was a little lighter at 9:45am. All the others were about normal. Somehow I think Clemson playing last night caused some people to sleep in today.
Speaking of Clemson, it was a heartbreaking loss, but hopefully they can right the ship by next weekend for the South Carolina game.

During the services today, I mentioned that I had a problem with flying squirrels getting in my attic. But I took care of the problem by trapping them and then killing them. I think the animal lovers got mad, but hey sometimes you just gotta do what you gotta do! For the record, I killed 27 last year!

The DNA of God series is definitely one of my favorites. I think we may do a Part 2 next year! Today we talked about Jesus being our Redeemer. It caused me to have a new admiration for the work that Christ did for us on the cross.

Last Thursday afternoon we went to pick up our daughter from Ridgecrest NC, where she was at a Youth With A Mission Conference. It was so cold in the mountains. Believe it or not there were snow flurries.

I am looking forward to Thanksgiving. I have so much to be thankful for!

sermon prep

These days a large portion of my week has to do with what happens on Sunday mornings. Everything from prior Sunday service evaluation meetings to upcoming creative team meetings to the actual sermon preparation time, and finally to the sermon rehearsal time.
Here's what I've discovered. The larger our church becomes, the more important it is for Sunday mornings (as well as every other area) to continue to improve. Like it or not people expect better quality everything from a larger church.

Here's what I want to tackle in this post. What do I feel the keys to quality sermons are. So here are my thoughts.

I think if you want to find out what the ingredients are to a great sermon we need to look at the best communicator ever, Jesus. Jesus delivered His messages different than others. In Mark 1:22 it says that when Jesus taught, the people were amazed because He taught with authority. If you study Jesus communication style, you will see that Jesus was a storyteller, he used creativity, props, illustrations, and whatever else was necessary to drive home a truth.
He also was a big believer in life application, so His teaching consisted of about 30% Information, and 70% Application.

Whenever I am preparing a message I ask myself 2 important questions; What do I want them to KNOW?,and What do i want them to DO?
Alot of Pastors are good at the first part---What do I want them to KNOW? Some Pastors are just disseminators of a lot of information. They can tell you what something means in the original Greek, but they can't help you figure out how to apply that information so that it impacts your life on Monday.
People don't want to get out of bed on Sunday morning and come to church to gain more information. If they wanted to do that, they could stay home and read the newspaper!
People come to church because they want God to touch their life. Which means that a sermon must include information, but it also should include a heavy dose of application. James reminds us to not just be hearers of the word only, but be doers.

Here's what I believe sermons would look like if they were mathematical equations:

Information + Application = TRANSFORMATION

Really the desired outcome of a message should be transformation.

So here's the takeaway. Let's learn to communicate the message of truth, like our model, Jesus Christ!

beautiful Wednesday

** Had a great creative team meeting yesterday. There are going to be some incredible series in the next 6 months!

** Everyone is still mourning the loss of the 3 West Oak High School students who died in the auto accident Monday. What a tragedy. Please pray for the families.

** Why do I always feel like I'm playing catch-up? Can you relate?

** It's hard to believe that Thanksgiving is next week , and Christmas is only 6 weeks away!

** It's supposed to be 76 degrees today!! I love it.

** This Sunday's message is stretching me.

** I don't know why, but I am on everyone's spam list. I have people trying to sell me everything under the sun. From replica watches to computer software to Cialis to other things I won't mention. It's crazy!

monday thoughts

** Our staff finally finished the book The Starbucks Experience. We covered the last chapter today. In my opinion the last chapter was the worst. Found it a little boring. Starbucks wants to leave their mark by being known as an environmentally friendly company. That's cool. I'm all for protecting our environment, but I'm having a very hard time jumping on the save the planet bandwagon! Is it just me or have you noticed that it is the politically correct "in" thing these days is to be GREEN?

** Services were incredible yesterday! God was moving big time!

** Clemson looked very good Saturday. Now if we can thump Boston College like we did Wake Forest, maybe we can get revenge against Va. Tech in Jacksonville (that is IF they can beat Virginia)

** They just about have finished putting the roof on the new building. It's looking good.

** We're having some traffic back-ups on Sunday mornings because of the large crowds. Please bear with us we are looking for a solution (maybe a police officer helping direct traffic back onto Bountyland Rd.)

** Supposed to be up to 70 degrees today! I can hardly wait for summer!

** Had a lady catch me after one of the services and tell me she just moved here from out of state and absolutely loves Foothills. Since her mother and sister are still in the other state, she calls them on her cell phone and lets them listen to our services live from her cell phone! That's a first!

great Sunday so far

Well 3 services are in the books and I'm just doing a little relaxing before service #4 at 6:00pm.
In all 3 services I sensed God's presence in a very tangible way. We are talking about God revealing Himself to us as the God of comfort.
The video testimony and feature song really capped things off. It was definitely a God moment for me.
Attendance has been extremely strong the last couple of weeks. The good thing is that it appears to have increased across the board so there is still a little room in the 9:45am and 11:15am services (and the 8:30 am and 6:00pm have plenty of room)

One more thing. I just got off of the phone with my Aunt, who is facing heart valve replacement surgery in a week. She is an amazing person who loves Jesus. If you think about it, please offer up a prayer on her behalf.

working ahead

Ask any Pastor about the most stressful part of his job and he would probably say, that it is the intensity of preparing messages week after week after week. It doesn't let up. It's like standing on the shore of the ocean. The waves keep on coming. Our Worship Pastor Eric Peters refers to this as the relentless onslaught of the Sabbath.
Whatever you call it, it is hard work. One of the ways to relieve some of that pressure is by working as far in advance as possible. For me, having general message series ideas and topics 6 months out feels about right.
Yesterday I (sort of) completed January through June of 2008. Next Tuesday our creative team will meet all day trying to fine tune the creative elements. This is by no means an exact science, because things can (and sometimes, should) change.
If you are a Speaking Pastor or anyone on a creative team and have never had the luxury of being out ahead, why not start by putting your 2008 calendar together now? Start with the Big Idea, (the topic or message series) you want to cover in 2008. You don't need full outlines or anything real in-depth at this point, just where you are wanting to go with the message in general, and then start filling in the details as you get together. For instance, I am going to do a 3 week message series called "Obey". The 3 things I will be talking about will be, Obeying God even when it doesn't make sense (The story of Abraham offering Isaac as a sacrififce). The next week is obeying God even when you don't really want to (The story of Jonah), and the last week will be obeying God even when it costs you something (Jesus willingness to go to the cross).

When we get together as a team next Tuesday we will try to nail down creative elements (series logo ideas, staging design ideas,video needs, faith stories, etc) Each of these things has a timeline and a deadline. Once the decisions are finalized everyone has their assignment, and(in a perfect world) it comes together just like it's supposed to!

The bottom line is that all of this is hard work, but when lives are changing, it's all worth it! One last thing that is the key that we can never forget: No matter how slick or creative our services are---if the Holy Spirirt doesn't show up, it's just entertainment! He is the one who changes lives, so leave room for Him to guide the entire process.

God's protection

My youngest son Cole recently got his learners permit driver's license. After I picked him up from wrestling practice the other day, he wanted to drive so I went to the passenger side and he took the wheel.
In his brief time of driving I have tried to express the importance of defensive driving. I have told him to expect the unexpected when you are operating a car, because people will often do what they're not supposed to. Well, as we were leaving his school a little ways ahead I noticed a car in front of us was making a right hand turn so I said "slow down a little". It was a good thing he did because the driver of the other car did a u-turn right in front of us and never bothered to look our way until we were right on top of her. He slammed on the brakes and we stopped just a foot or two from her driver's side door. A close call for sure, and a lesson learned for him.
What would have happened if I would not have been in the car with him? What would have happened if he didn't listen to my warning to slow down? Who knows? But it probably wouldn't have been pretty.
One of the greatest things about having the Lord in your life is that He is always right beside us, instructing us and keeping us from harm if we will listen to Him and obey his commands. Life throws out a lot of unexpected things our way, we need God.

Sunday recap

We continued our DNA of God series, with a message about God being our Rock. All of the services were amazing.

Attendance was very strong. Having an extra hour of sleep had people energized for sure!

Yesterday's services were all recorded so we could create a new DVD for our Newcomer's packets. Eric and his team brought their A game. We are also going to use the new DVD as an invite tool for our Christmas services.

The feature song was very different but very cool yesterday!

You don't want to miss this weekend's services, as we talk about God being our Comforter. We are going to show a very powerful video of someone from Foothills who walked through an extremely difficult time in her life, and felt the comfort of the Lord throughout that ordeal. If someone you know is currently going through a difficult time, make sure you get them here on Sunday.

one word

If you had to describe your church in one word, what would it be? Friendly, warm, relevant, fun, boring, exciting, celebrative, liturgical, worshipful, high-energy(I guess that's 2 words), ritualistic, welcoming, obsolete, sameness, dynamic, ingrown, accepting, family, safe, big, small, wonderful....

Now ask yourself this question. If a guest showed up for the first time, what word would he/she use to describe your church?

Every church is known in the community for something. When people mention the name of your church is it in a positive light? If not, how come?
I believe that it is our responsibility to honestly examine ourselves and if our overall one word assessment of our church is not positive---then we need to make some tough decisions and set out to change the perception.
Unfortunately this process is difficult so most churches won't deal with it. For instance if you were to ask some church Members to describe their church, they may say, "Friendly", but if you were to ask a first-time guest how they would describe it, they may say "unfriendly" because the reality is that the church is friendly to their members, but not friendly to "outsiders"

When we moved to this area we were invited to many churches. Some were good experiences, some were not. One particular church we were attending seemed to be a possible choice for us to join, but we had some apprehension because it seemed like we just didn't fit in. Now keep in mind we were actually trying to fit in. We didn't sit near the exit and bolt for the doors as soon as the service was over. We attended a couples Sunday School class, we engaged people in converstaion, and yet it just wasn't clicking.
The thing that finally convinced us that this church wasn't for us was when we attended a church-wide party at a local park. My wife went to try to connect with some other ladies, and I went to try to connect with some guys. Neither of us were successful. When we came back together we both commented that we were not accepted into their established cliques.
We decided to move on because the word that we came up for our experience at that church was "unfriendly." Maybe that's not a fair assessment, but it was our assessment.

One of the things that thrills me is when someone says, "I came to Foothills because I kept hearing what a great church it is, and now that I've visited, I see why they said that!"

So what is the word for your church?