Competitive

My family likes to play games. Backgammon, Monopoly, Texas Hold-em, Rummy, Uno.... You name it, we probaly have the game. I have a confession to make. I don't like to lose. Actually, I Hate to lose! ( I want to clarify--I am not a sore loser. I just don't like to lose. If you beat me---I'll shake your hand. And then challenge you to play again!)
I have always been super-competitive. I can make a competition out of anything. I even compete against myself. Can I mow the lawn faster this week, than I did last week? Can I catch more fish today, than ever before? Stuff like that.
If I ever play a team type sport, I will be the guy that ALWAYS knows the score.
If I am playing some team sport, and I have teammates that aren't giving their all----or even worse, don't care if we win or lose, I can't handle that.
You probably are thinking that I should get therapy. (I probably should) But I have tried to take my competitive nature and leverage it for the good.
I have found after talking to tons of church planters, that a competitive nature may be one of the #1 qualities for success. And it is by far the least talked about. The people who are competitive will rarely quit. They will hang in there and keep swinging long after everyone else has given up and gone home. This may not sound super-spritual, but competitiveness can be a curse OR a Blessing! God can use everything about us. He created us the way we are. Don't apologize for it. Anyone up for a game of Rummy?

It's a small world after all

Had a great time with Jay Hardwick at lunch today. It seems that me and Jay have traveled in some similar circles at different times. As it turns out, Jay spent some time with our Pastor of First Impressions, Brian Marshall 10 years ago! I am really excited about how the Lord is using Jay and his team at Catalyst Church.
Jay shared something that someone told him once, he said we can either leave an Impression on someone or have an Impact on someone. I like that. Why settle for an impression when we can have impact!

Had a great time this weekend meeting Steve Stewart who pastors Church in the Farms, in Jupiter Florida. Steve came to a couple of our services on Sunday (while he was here we asked him to be our secret shopper, and he made lots of notes) Then he stuck around on Monday and came to our staff meetings and our creative meetings.
Church in the Farms is very near and dear to my heart, because it began in my living room in 1994. Steve has been there 2 years and is doing a great job. It was my first time meeting him, and we really enjoyed having him.
I love spending time with fellow pastors. There is kind of a band of brothers type feeling. You just understand each other.
I'm looking forward to having lunch with another Pastor, Jay Hardwick from Catalyst Church, this Thursday. They are getting it done in Greenville, SC.

2 Big Questions

This past Sunday I challenged people to ask themselves 2 critical questions every day of their lives. Question 1: Will I make time for God to use my life today? Question 2: Who will be in control of my life today?
The whole premise of the message was, that if we will be available, and allow Christ to have control of our lives, He will give us divine opportunities to touch people's lives.
My wife was talking to a friend and she was so excited, because she had an incredible divine appointment on Sunday after church. She said that she normally would have missed it, but she was paying attention spiritually. She was riding down the road and she saw an elderly woman in her 80's walking down the sidewalk. As she drove past, she sensed that she needed to turn around and offer her a ride. The lady was walking to the grocery store, so she drove her there, and then she gave the woman her phone number and told her that if she needed a ride sometime to give her a call.
God used her life because she was available---- are you?
There is nothing more fun than being in a situation where you know without a doubt, that God has soveriegnly arranged it.
Have you been asking yourself those 2 questions this week?

Men's retreat

I got a chance to go to our Spring Training Men's Retreat this Friday and Saturday. We had a great turnout. Our Men's ministry leader, Bobby King and his team did an incredible job! We had all kinds of guy stuff to do---Skeet shooting, paintball, ATV riding, Horseback riding, a Texas Hold-em tournament and plenty of food. It was nice to spend some time with my youngest (14 years old) son, Cole. They grow up way too fast.
Also, a big thank you to Clemson Tigers Head Coach Tommy Bowden for coming out on Saturday evening, and bringing a couple of players, Willy Korn and Xavier Dye. Then on Saturday, 3 more guys from the team came and hung out with us.

Finally!

Well he's finally gone. If you have tuned into American Idol this year, you know that this has been a big joke. I'm not sure which was worse, his hair-do's or his voice. Anyway, he's off the show! All I can say is goodbya Sanjaya!

Good News travels fast

We are hearing so many cool stories about what happened at Foothills Community Church this past Sunday! (110 people baptized) One person told me that he had 6 people leave messages on his phone Sunday after the morning services telling him he better make sure he gets to the 6:00pm service --because God was doing something incredible.
There have been emails of people celebrating a loved one's salvation (that they have been praying for years about) and then their obedience to follow in baptism.
I have heard stories of the buzz in the community of conversations around the water cooler that were about what was going on at Foothills.
The list goes on and on, so what we are going to be doing (hopefully by the end of the week) is having a link on our website (www.foothillscc.org) to a place where you can leave your story about your experience last Sunday.
All honor to God!!

Pray

By now I'm sure everyone has heard about the tragedy at Virginia Tech. A gunman kills 32 people, then himself. Another 15 people injured. They say it's the worst mass killing in our history.
Senseless. That's the only way to describe these type of things.
My neice is a student at Va. Tech. Fortunately she was not one of the victims. But there are a lot of people that are grieving big-time today. Parents, brothers, sisters, cousins, aunts, uncles, grandparents, and friends.
I have two thoughts about this tragedy. First, PRAY. Pray for all of the people that will have to deal with this tragedy first-hand. God is still on the throne. This did not take Him by surprise. And although God did not cause this tragedy, He can and will be there bringing comfort and peace. Psalm 34:18 says: The Lord is close to the brokenhearted; He rescues them those who are crushed in Spirit.
Second, Tell your kids that you love them today!

Unbelievable!

There are no words to describe what we experienced at all 4 of our services today. The only way to describe it would be to say that God showed up and did what only He could do----touch people's hearts.
We have been telling everyone to be prepared, because we were going to be doing something we have never done at Foothills. What was the great mystery? A spontaneous Baptism service!
When the dust settled we baptized 110 people!!! Let that sink in for a minute. 110 people publicly declaring their faith in Christ.
I have never been in a service that was more moving. And the cool thing was, that God moved in every one of the services. I have never seen so many people in tears as they watched person after person going under the baptism waters. I am in awe of God.
We also set another non-Easter attendance record. I believe we had 1,623 people show up today!
Probably the coolest thing was at the 8:30 am service (which by far is our most conservative service), I hadn't even given the invitation when a man ran down the aisle and literally cannonballed into the pool. He couldn't wait. Everyone thought that he was a plant--but he wasn't!
Foothills family, all I can say is, hang on!!

Excitement in the air

We are putting the final touches on the service for this weekend. I have been telling everyone to put on their seatbelts because we are going to be doing something at Foothills that we've never done before. There is something very exhilirating about doing something that if God doesn't show up, we're in big trouble.
It's been really funny watching people trying to figure out what it is that we are going to do.
Anyway, mark your calendars for April 15th. You Do Not Want To Miss It!

Easter Update

So here are the official numbers from Easter. Attendance--2,000 on the button! More importantly we had the biggest spiritual response we have ever had, we had 18 people receive Christ, and we had 106 people make recommitments! That is amazing. 124 significant spiritual decisions. Now comes the hard work---follow-up.

Whew!

What a day we had yesterday! We're still tallying up everything. but it looks like we had 2,000 people yesterday at our services. It was really amazing.
I can't say enough about our staff and volunteers. There were probably a couple of hundred people serving. Some actually volunteered at all 5 services.
It's hard to believe that yesterday was also our 9th birthday as a church. What an amazing journey we are on. On our first Sunday 9 years ago we had 70 people show up. Yesterday, 2,000!!--ONLY GOD!!
Our new building is going to be so helpful for us to be able to keep reaching people as space is becoming an issue.

This is hilarious!

Over the years there has been alot of mis-information about Foothills Community Church. Things like, "they don't teach from the Bible", or "they don't talk about sin or Hell", you know, just the normal stuff that people make up because they are a little insecure or jealous.
But I heard about a rumor that someone heard about Foothills Community Church. This person heard that if you join Foothills, you have to take a vow to never drink any Pepsi products again!!!!!
Are you kidding me?? Someone actually believes this?? Just for the record---I drink 2 diet cherry Pepsi's everyday.
Can you imagine the membership covenant: I willl protect the unity of my church, I will participate in the ministry of my church, I will only drink Coca-Cola products!!
Where do people come up with this stuff?? Hilarious!!

The steel has started to arrive!

We just had 3 semi truckloads of steel delivered for our new facility. I have no clue how many more truckloads they are going to bring. The only problem is that they haven't started the grading and earthwork yet. Oh well, at least we won't have to wait for the steel to be delivered.
This is starting to get really exciting!