Archives for August 2008

Inside Today’s Experiences

August 31, 2008 by Gilbert Leave a Comment

What a day of contrasts.

The 9:15 Experience had no energy…10:45 was completely different.

The last few weeks I’ve had to debate with myself which message to post online…today there was no question that 10:45 was better.

Before I forget, here’s the link to the “Aren’t All Religions the Same” message I referenced today.

The band performing U2’s “I Still Haven’t Found What I’m Looking For” was a real highlight…they are awesome and I can’t wait to take our awesomeness to a new level when Aaron comes on staff.

I had someone tell me that they’ll never be able to hear that song the same way again.

That’s our hope…take the secular and make it sacred. Take the things our culture feeds us and redeem it for Jesus!

From a technical standpoint, everything went pretty smoothly today with the exception of some minor glitches at the 9:15 Experience.

All in all not a bad day…second highest attendance ever and 1 more person who is now a follower of Christ!

Everyone I’ve talked to really enjoyed this series, so we’ll probably try to do something similar next year.

Going to be different next week without the popcorn and prizes, but I’m really excited…I think REAL U will be one of the most life-changing series ever!

Hope everyone has a safe holiday…pray for those that will be affected by Gustav.

Thursday Thoughts

August 28, 2008 by Gilbert Leave a Comment

Over 200 middle and high schoolers and a total of almost 300 people showed up last night for the Edge party.
Our youth pastor, Gene Reinemen and his team did an incredible job of making this an awesome event for the kids right before they went back to school.
The Safety of Routine and the Ryan Payne Bandprovided the music, while Brad Mowry inspired the kids to make a difference this school year.
Of course there was plenty of food, treats, prizes and games.
The entire staff took turns in the dunking booth.
I love how much Earl gets into these things…he was all dressed like a dunking booth jester and had plenty of one-liners to heckle them with.
Somehow I drew the short straw and was in last.
Got dunked about 20 times and got colder and colder as the night progressed.
I had plenty of one-liners all prepared but for some reason most of the people throwing at me were in the 6-10 age range.
Sort of hard to tell a 6 year old that he throws like a girl when it might cause him to cry, give up sports all together or have a negative self image for the rest of his life.
I’m going to speak at the prison tonight…maybe I’ll try a few of the lines there…ummm on second thought…maybe not.
In any case, it was a great event!
Today Earl challenged Heidi Pisle to a 3 balls each challenge in the dunk tank.
Earl went in first but Heidi missed.
Earl didn’t…Heidi was soaked.
Just finished up staff meeting…
We have a lot of fun with one another…but we still get things done!
Got a few meetings yet, then some programming for the weekend, followed by speaking at the jail and then catch the end of the worship team practice.

What Do You Care About?

August 26, 2008 by Gilbert Leave a Comment

I once heard Billy Graham say that if you knew the cure for cancer, he found it highly unlikely that you would keep that info to yourself. But yet as Christians we know the cure for sin but are often afraid to share it with others.

How crazy is that! I read something this morning along the same lines and want to share it with you…

If you REALLY believe in the saving power of Jesus Christ then why in the world would you show up at church every single Sunday without a carload of people who need Him?

Does Jesus save? ABSOLUTELY!!!

Does He change lives? ABSOLUTELY!!!

Has He called us to REACH OUT…or be obsessed with other things?

Jesus said in Luke 19:10 that He came to seek & save that which is “lost!”

If that was the heart of Jesus…and Jesus lives in our hearts…then that HAS TO BE IN OUR HEARTS AS WELL!!

We CANNOT claim to be followers of Jesus and NOT CARE ABOUT WHAT HE CARES ABOUT!!!

Remember one of our core values…lost people matter to God and therefore they must matter to me.

This Sunday as we wrap-up the God at the Box Office series, I’ll be sharing insights from The Dark Knight. From start to finish I’ll be sharing the good news that Jesus loves us and came to die for us.

So the question is…are you going to keep this good news to yourself? Or are you going to invite a carload of people to come with you this weekend? Your answer says a lot about your faith and your priorities.

Other Weekend Thoughts

August 25, 2008 by Gilbert Leave a Comment

Had a great dinner with the Dell’Aqua’s on Friday night in their new home just up the street from the church.

Lisa and I are not really big on cooking so we eat out a lot. It was nice having a homemade meal.

Saturday we saw the Broadway touring show of the Lion King down at the Kennedy Center in DC.

OH MY GOODNESS!

The story of course was familiar and the singing and acting while excellent wasn’t earth shattering either…

It was the costuming and special effects that just still has me shaking my head.

Click here to get a brief glimpse of some of what I’m talking about.

I kept leaning over and saying to Lisa, “Can we get that for United?” Just one awesome effect after another…amazing!

Went back to my uncle’s house then for dinner with about 20 other relatives…it’s fun catching up with everyone as we celebrated Christmas in August.

Yesterday at church I had at least a half dozen people tease me about falling and spraining my ankle…everything from time to pick out a nursing home to maybe I’d better get one of those medical alert thingies to wear around my neck.

“I’ve fallen and I can’t get up.”

I’m really enjoying the 9:15 Experience…

Really liked that during the special I could hear people getting into the music that was selected…there was laughter, some “ah-ha” I know that one’s and clapping along.

10:45 just sat there…hmmm wonder what the difference was?

Last night we had dinner with some friends whose little girl starts Kindergarten this week. Seems just like yesterday that we were holding her just moments after she was born.

And don’t even get me started on my niece whose 9th birthday was yesterday….my goodness maybe I am getting old.

I did recently get an AARP card in the mail by accident…maybe I should start using it. :)

Inside Today’s Experiences

August 24, 2008 by Gilbert Leave a Comment

Because of being out of town yesterday I had to get to the church early this morning…

Really early…6:30 early…uhh watched the sun rising early.

I hate early.

Everything went smoothly with set-up and the band had a good practice after Thursday night’s debacle.

About 2 minutes before we were to start the 9:15 Experience, Dirk taps me on the shoulder and says, “Uh Andy needs to see you.”

Go back to the tech area to find Andy in a bit of a panic.

What’s wrong? “We’ve lost all of our files for this morning.”

Somehow when they went to start the countdown, the computer crashed and when the program was re-opened all the files were missing.

I ran around to let the worship team know we’d be in a bit of a delay.

That didn’t feel good on a sore ankle.

Ran back to the tech area and watched as Andy started trying to get things working.

Not sure anyone really knew we were in a delay but we were 7 minutes late in getting started.

Never did get all the files back, but we made due.

Miraculously we were able to make up the time…although I felt like I was flying through the message.

During the 1/2 hour break in between Experiences Andy was able to get some more things back so the 10:45 went off without a hitch.

Attendance was down today, but I had expected that after looking at last years numbers the week before school started.

On a positive note, I thought Jack’s movie medley that he put together was excellent.

I also thought that the band really pulled the whole thing together. We had substitutes in 3 areas but yet they blended well.

I was able to avoid last week’s mistake and keep my adrenaline pumping the whole time and so I felt much better about the 10:45 message.

Next week is going to be intense…the Dark Knight is an incredible movie and the buzz created by it makes for an easy invite.

As I said…I will be giving a clear presentation of the Gospel….do whatever you need to do to make sure you have people with you.

It was great to be able to finally announce our new Creative Arts Pastor hire. Aaron Schwindt is talented in many ways that we need, but more importantly is a great man of God.

I’ll give more details about him later in the week.

For now, it’s nap time then dinner with friends tonight.