- First, I know this is a day late, but I’m on vacation, give me a break!
- Second, I wasn’t at ExponentialChurch.tv on Sunday so I don’t have much to comment on other than from what I hear you had a good day.
- Missed everyone in Harrisburg…but with an off Sunday Lisa and I decided to visit our former church in Chambersburg.
- The day actually started out in WV after having spent the night at our friends, Bill and Nicole’s, house. Had a great time catching up with them.
- Still holding out hope that they will one day join Lisa, Andy, Gayle and myself here in Harrisburg.
- Any way, back to CFCOG…it was great seeing so many people and of course getting the “What are you doing here” questions.
- It’s funny how many people think that pastors never get to get away or are nervous to get away.
- First, Lisa and I make it a priority to vacation ever year and second, we have such a great staff and team that I wasn’t worried at all.
- I was actually surprised how many people got emotional seeing me there. It is nice to be missed, but I know that God has us right where He wants us and I know that things have continued well since I’ve been gone and God has even bigger things in store for CFCOG.
- Many years ago I realized that no one person is bigger than a church if it’s on mission.
- We decided to go to the early United Worship Experience (the two Experiences I led when I was there) but was disappointed that my replacement Kevin was also on vacation.
- Instead it was a recap of the VBS like activities that had happened over the previous week.
- Sounds like Kristy and her team had a tremendous week and 22 kids prayed to receive Jesus!
- I really liked this alternate way of doing VBS and if and when we’re ready to do something at ECTV, this style is something I’ll definitely recommend to Chelsea.
- As for the music and tech for the day, lots has changed.
- Some things I liked, others not so much but I’m glad they are still as passionate as ever to lead people in worship of Jesus!
- To file under Murphy’s Law, all 3 projection screens went dead for 3 of the 4 songs they did.
- However, Brian did a great job of reminding people that we didn’t come to worship technology but Jesus.
- The crowd seemed to know most of the songs because I could hear people singing…so that was cool that people still could sing along.
- I can hear an older person now going, “We never lost the lyrics in a hymnal”. :)
- The other surprise was getting to hear Chrissy Miller speak as a part of the sermon.
- For someone who doesn’t get an opportunity to do much public speaking, she did a phenomenal job…very poised and articulate.
- After a quick 15 minute break, we ended up going over to the sanctuary for the Encounter service.
- Other than music it was basically the same presentation as in United.
- Considering they were using the same people to do all 5 services, they did a great job of shuttling people back and forth and the appropriate times.
- I also got to thinking this means that Earl preached the same sermon (albeit abbreviated) 5 times in the span of about 2 1/2 hours.
- That’s hardcore…just one sermon is a taxing thing physically and emotionally but to do 5 that close together earns him an iron man award for the day.
- It was interesting as well seeing the same thing but in two different venues (multi-purpose room & sanctuary).
- Never realized how much more color “pops” in the sanctuary than it does in the MPR.
- Also, I’m going to have to get on Earl about starting to wear some make-up to cut down on the glisten when they have close-ups of him on IMAG.
- Bet that conversation is going to go over well. :) Earl + make-up= sign of the End of Times.
- The highlight of Encounter for me was seeing Karl lead worship.
- He is one of the coolest young guys you’d want to meet and has such a heart for Jesus. Add on top of that the incredible talent he has and it made for a very cool moment seeing him shine as Jesus shone through him.
- Afterward Kris and Jenny Shifler were kind enough to host a picnic for the old United team.
- It was great catching up with everyone, eating, joking, reminiscing and playing corn hole.
- After that we stopped by my sister and brother-in-laws house for yet another picnic.
- By the time we got there we were stuffed and wore out but we had a good time eating crabs, hanging out and again playing corn-hole.
- Sunday was a great way to wrap-up the first week of vacation…looking forward to 1 more week of relaxing and then it’s back to an all out assault on depopulating hell.
Inside Today’s Experience
- Really appreciative to have Chad on staff.
- We’re still in the midst of trying to get our old house in Chambersburg fixed up after our old tenants left it in bad shape.
- Lisa and I are worn out but it made it easier working so hard this weekend knowing Chad was preaching.
- It also didn’t help that I woke up at 3am this morning and had trouble falling back asleep.
- All that to say when the alarm clock went off this morning I wasn’t really motivated to get up.
- We had some new equipment arrive today to replace some stuff that had gone bad so set-up took a bit longer than normal.
- What was funny was when the band went to do their warm-up and run-through, we were not getting any sound out in the house.
- Checking…checking…checking…ummm wait nobody ever ran the cables.
- Not sure exactly how after 8 months something like that happens but it did.
- I joked with the team, “Good thing we’re working all these issues out in our preview services so that when we officially launch the church we won’t have any issues”.
- The Experience started today with our first original song called, “On the Edge”.
- Jeff wrote it in response to the iLife series.
- Awesome job by Jeff, Bill and the band working on it the last few weeks.
- It was cool watching and listening each Thursday as it took shape.
- I was excited to be able to announce our first baptism service will take place on July 31st immediately following the Experience.
- I’m hoping many will take the plunge both literally and figuratively and be obedient to Jesus command to be baptized.
- Surprised by how few father’s we have that attend.
- We still honor you anyway! :)
- Especially good to have my dad with us…guessing that’s the first time in 18 years that we’ve been able to worship together on Father’s Day.
- After last week’s weirdness in having the recording stop unexpectedly, it was a relief to get home today and see that everything worked well today.
- You can listen to Chad message here.
- He joked about not being good with kids, but he does an incredible job with his own 3…glad he can model that for others.
- Lots of good interaction afterward…love seeing how people are coming earlier and staying later to hang with one another.
- Speaking of, we’d love to be able to hang with as many of you as possible on July 15th at the Harrisburg Senator’s game.
- We bought a block of tickets…you can purchase them for only $7.50 each on our web-site. Hope you can make it!
- This is a great event to invite someone to that isn’t quite ready to come with you on a Sunday morning.
- It will help them see that followers of Jesus are normal people not some weirdo’s.
- Insert your own joke here ___________________.
- Came home and took not just 1 but 2 naps.
- Finishing up some stuff this afternoon and then start 2 weeks of vacation tomorrow!
- Please pray for us that it will be a relaxing time and that we get the housing situation wrapped up between now and then.
- I’ll be back preaching on Jul 10th with a new series on Jonah.
- Was able to get the majority of it written in the last few weeks…should be exciting and in week 3 we’ll have a very special surprise.
Inside Today’s Experience
- Weird day today for a number of reasons.
- Everything started as normal and we even got set-up quicker than normal despite a brand new stage set being put up for the first time.
- Great job by Bill who puts these together on a very limited budget.
- Part of the weirdness today was that I wasn’t preaching.
- I have my normal Sunday routine and quite a few times I found my self just wandering around going, “mmmm ok what should I do now?”
- Because I wasn’t preaching and because of a last minute cancellation, I… instead… served…in…the……………………….nursery!
- Pretty ironic since just two weeks ago in my message I stated that you wouldn’t want me serving in there.
- In any case, there is a great crew working in there so I never felt overwhelmed and I only got thrown up on 3 times.
- Chad started the new Thrive series today which is all about the Church.
- Pretty cool to start it on Pentecost Sunday which is also our denominations “Plant a Church Sunday”.
- They take one Sunday to concentrate on raising funds to help new church plants...their generosity helped us immensely 8 months ago.
- We decided though from day 1 of Exponential to give back not just 1 day per year but all year long.
- To date in just 7 months we’ve been able to give nearly $11000!
- One of our core values at Exponential is that “It takes all types of churches to reach all types of people”. So giving back to church planting is just one way to put our money where our mouth is at.
- Now to be honest being a new church and struggling financially it’s tempting to not give but I personally feel that it wouldn’t be right to ask for people to support us financially and trust God that He’ll meet their needs and then not do the same thing ourselves.
- Ok back to Chad’s message…I hear it went well and I’d love to be able to listen to it…but the next weird thing that happened was every channel on our multi-track recorder stopped about 18 minutes into today’s Experience which means we’ve lost it forever.
- I called Chad this afternoon to see if he wanted to re-record it but he felt he could do better just doing a brief re-cap next week before week 2’s message.
- For those of you used to listening or were especially excited to hear Chad’s message, I greatly apologize that we don’t have it and we’ll work hard to make sure it doesn’t happen again.
- It was great that we could give everyone a copy of Guerrilla Lovers today.
- It was written by my good friend Vince Antonucci who is super funny, super creative, as passionate about reaching the lost as I am and as passionate about “being the Church” as Chad is.
- I hope everyone enjoys it…if you didn’t get a copy (I understand we ran out), we’ll get more copies and have them ready for you next week.
- Last weird thing that happened was Chad left everyone out early and our tear down crews must have been super hungry because we left the theater a full 1/2 hour earlier than normal.
- Heck we even beat the main-line denominations to the buffet line…and that’s saying something! :)
- Got a busy week this week as we prepare for vacation coming up…hope to get it all done but yet still have time to enjoy these beautiful days God has been giving us.
Inside Today’s Experience
- Another great day!
- Weird not starting the day by meeting Mike to put out signs.
- He missed his first day today which now only leave Chad from the original group that has not yet missed a day.
- Thanks to John and Sara Fox for taking care of the signs today.
- Not sure how we did it but everything got set-up about 1 1/2 feet off center on the stage today.
- Weird since we used the same marks as usual as a guide…looked funny.
- During our team meeting Lisa and I were surprised with a cake for our birthdays & anniversary.
- Great to have the Bricker’s and Deihl’s pay a visit today from Chambersburg.
- Loved the new song the band did today called Manifesto.
- Poor Bill…the bridge part is essentially the Lord’s Prayer except you’ve got to sing it all in 1 breath…he’s been struggling with it but during warm-ups this morning he was nailing it.
- Mmm not so much during the Experience but he pulled it together and it still was a powerful moment.
- Great to also bring back the song Beautiful Things which was a major part of our Easter Experience.
- I wrapped up the iLife series today by talking about how to get moral margin in your life regardless of whether you’re a teen, single or married.
- I had no idea the impact the message was going to have.
- Person after person came up afterward saying it was one of the best messages they had heard.
- That’s a very humbling thing to hear but I’m glad it immediately resonated with people…now I hope they apply it.
- This will be hard to describe but I hear all the time, “Gilbert I love how real you are”.
- Honestly I can’t imagine preaching any other way.
- We also had 2 more people make a decision to become a follower of Jesus today!
- That’s now 93 since we launched 7 months ago!
- Can’t wait for the Thrive series to start next week…it’s going to be awesome and everyone attending will be given a special gift that will help you apply what Chad’s going to be talking about.
- Big thanks to my niece, Taylor Duda and to Kiara Pornel for all their help serving each Sunday. These two young ladies will be going off for the summer and today was their last day for awhile. Thanks again ladies…serve Jesus as you travel!
- Folks God is doing some amazing stuff in and through us…keep it up and I promise you one thing…The Best is Yet to Come!
Inside Today’s Experience
- I give up!
- What I mean by that is…I give up trying to figure out attendance patterns.
- Today being Memorial Day weekend, most churches see a dip in attendance.
- This week I personally knew of 18 people that said they wouldn’t be with us…who knows how many I didn’t know about.
- So my expectation was a really low attendance day…
- So of course we end up with our 2nd highest attendance ever…God amazes me.
- Best of all we had 5 more people pray today for Jesus forgiveness and leadership!
- Funny thing is I didn’t plan on offering a call for commitment today, but I felt the Holy Spirit nudging me at the end to do it any way.
- Glad I listened!
- As for the rest of the day, we couldn’t have asked for it to be much smoother.
- In fact, the band got set-up, had their warm-up and run through and still had so much time that they were actually able to do some Thursday night practice kind of stuff.
- Big thanks to Kristie Frownfelter for stepping up and leading the Children’s Ministry today while Chelsea was away on vacation.
- I peeked in and it looked like you were doing an awesome job.
- Speaking of an awesome job, the pic for this post (sorry it’s so dark) is of our tech team. Andy, Mike, and Cris have 3 computers to run with the assorted programs we use plus then the sound board.
- They consistently accomplish the best thing a tech team can do…not be noticed.
- If the technology itself or the operators through error draw attention, that means the attention is off of Jesus. So thankful to have a team that knows what they are doing and do it with excellence.
- Mike though did do a funny thing this morning when he and I went out to set up signs. We got to an intersection that we put a sign out at. The plan is for me to jump out, reach in the back to get the sign, then Mike takes off and turns around while I’m putting the sign in the appropriate place. This is all done at a busy intersection and it’s best if the light is red when we get there. Today though it was green and so imagine my surprise when I jump out and Mike starts to take off before I’ve been able to get the sign out of the back. Not sure if this is making sense, but it was funny.
- This was the 5th part to our iLife series and I’m not sure why but on Thursday I started to get really excited about today’s topic which was gaining professional margin.
- Was also nervous a bit though because the one visual illustration I wanted to do involved me juggling. Now I have juggled for years but in order for the illustration to really work it was vital that I not drop any. You’ll have to listen to the message to understand why. Whew…was able to do it!
- Always great to be able to look out and seeing a visiting pastor. Today we were excited to have Charlie Hostetter and his wife Linda with us from the Mechanicsburg First Church of God.
- Charlie said they wanted to come check us out because they’ve heard so much.
- Never really sure how to take that since as much negative is said about us as positive.
- They seemed to like it though and we were able to provide Linda with a pair of complimentary ear plugs in case the music got too loud for her.
- I know it seems silly but it’s the little things like this (and the mints and hand lotion we provide in the restrooms) that really help create wow experiences for people.
- Noticed afterward a lot more people hanging out in the lobby. That’s great that people are getting connected with one another. Technically we need to get out of the theater ASAP, but as long as were not in the way, then I’d love to see these interactions continuing.
- Had lunch with my mom and dad today and then Lisa and I went swimming. Our pool is already at a very comfy 82 degrees…tomorrow should help even more.
- On a personal note, today marked the one year anniversary since my last day on staff at the Chambersburg First Church of God.
- Wow do I miss them tremendously. At the same time though I’m so grateful for the new relationships we’ve made here in Harrisburg as we’re getting ExponentialChurch.tv launched.
- I have no doubt we’re exactly where God wants us but it still doesn’t make it easy to be away from so many great friends. Thanks United and CFCOG for 3 awesome years together.
- Next week at Exponential we’ll wrap-up the iLife series by discovering how to get moral margin in your life.
- I want to talk to 3 groups of people…teens, singles and married couples about how to make sure when it comes to purity (especially sexual purity) you have the margin that God desires.