Gilbert Thurston

• What an interesting day.
• Much busier Sunday than usual.
• After getting things set-up this morning, Andy and I shot some video for next week.
• It meant changing clothes for consistency.
• Once we got back, I noticed the hazer wasn’t putting out enough haze so we had to get that going again.
• The crowd today was about what I expected…lots of people off visiting families out of town, while at the same time we had people from all over the country in with us…Seattle wins the award for the day for people who travelled the furthest to be with us.
• I loved the We Shine video we played behind the song.
• One of our debates was whether to do it as a special or not.  It was hard to follow along with if you didn’t already know the song, but yet it was too energetic for people just to sit there, so we decided to go with the former.
• I think our team was so jazzed up to do that…technically it was very difficult…that once it was done they relaxed and we had quite a few technical mistakes from there on out.
• I hate that.
• It’s sort of like how more climbers die coming down a mountain than they do going up.  The problem is you relax because you’ve already met your goal….however, it’s about finishing, not about making it half-way through.
• Oh well, we’ll learn from it and do better the next time.
• Even I was having problems today…I was all over the place in my message, but I was able to tie it together so that you probably didn’t even realize it. 
• In other words it still flowed alright, just not in the order I thought it was going to…in cases like that though I trust God led me to remember things in the order He wanted me to.
• I HATE ANNOUNCEMENTS!!!
• However, this week so much was going on I had cover it all.
• For those who missed it, let me quickly recap two big ones.
  • June 8th Vote:  Immediately following the Experience all members need to come to a brief meeting in the sanctuary to vote on hiring a Pastor of Creative Arts.  To read more, click here.
  • Also we announced that United Worship Experience t-shirts are now available in a limited quantity.  Click here to purchase one or click the t-shirt link to the left.
• It was great having Mike Schooley in town.  He along with a few other people got United started a few years back. 
• We took some time to sit down for a video interview after the Experience which we’ll show in the future so you can hear the full story of when United was in its infancy.
• I’m watching the INDY 500, getting ready to eat and then of course my Sunday afternoon nap won’t be far behind….can’t wait for CAYA tongiht…the new series is going to be awesome.

Well the picture makes this one pretty obvious doesn’t it? From day 1 I’ve been begging Lisa to design us some cool t-shirts. Finally I earned enough brownie points that she did and they are awesome!

You can get yours by clicking here or by clicking the T-shirts link to the left.  This is a great way to invite someone to the Experience when they ask you what your t-shirt is all about.  So get your orders in quick because I have a feeling they will be really popular. 

Now for full disclosure let me explain how this is working.  The expense for this was huge and so Lisa and I decided to pay for it out of our pocket instead of burdening the church.  So when you pay either by Credit Card or PayPal, the transaction will show up on your account as WEBS, which is Lisa’s business.  We’re basically passing these along at cost and are hoping to recoup our money.  If everything sells, there will be a minor profit which we’ll donate entirely to the church.

• We had a great time yesterday down in VA at the Whiteboard Sessions Conference.
• As you can see from the picture, our seats were on the front row.
• The guy in the picture is Perry Noble, pastor of NewSpring Church.  Perry will be one of United’s guest speakers this summer for the One Prayer series.
• One of the impressive things about Perry is that even though his church is running 8000+, he was sitting a few seats over from me taking notes just like everyone else.  Just goes to show that leaders are learners and that when you stop learning, you stop leading.
• There were probably close to 1000 people at this conference but it was by far the one with the fewest females in attendance that I’ve ever seen.
• A woman stopped Lisa during one of the breaks and asked her is she was offended that none of the speakers was a woman.  Lisa’s response…”No.” Guess you had to be there.
• The format of the conference was unusual.  Each of the 8 speakers was given 30 minutes to speak on whatever topic they wanted.  It was an interesting to see what each choose.
• Here is one quote from each speaker that jumped out at me…not only for me, but for you to consider as well.
  • Mark Batterson:  Your best thought on your best day is 13 billion light years short of God’s.
  • Vince Antonucci:  When was the last time you had a non-Christian over to your home for dinner?
  • Tim Stevens:  Most churches in America aren’t making an impact…in fact, they are actually hindering the furthering of the Kingdom.
  • Darrin Patrick:  Darrin was the only one of the speakers that I either didn’t know or was at least familiar with.  His talk though to me was one of the best.  Here’s his quote…   The motivation behind every sin is either the need for power, comfort, approval or control.
  • Mark Dever:  Mark is by far the person on the panel that would be most opposite of me (lucky for him).  He is living proof that church is not so much about a particular method, but knowing who you can reach best in your local community and then offering an Experience that is done with excellence…OK that was all just code to say they are very traditional but yet they do their ministry with excellence and they are growing like crazy.  Here’s Mark’s quote… God could have chosen anything, but he chose to put Himself on display through the local church.
  • John Burke:  God, and nothing or no one else, must be enough in your life.
  • Perry Noble:  Stop walking in fear and start walking in the authority that Jesus has given you.   BONUS QUOTE:  God is not green but Kermit the Frog is.  If we save the planet but people die and go to hell, what have we really accomplished?
  • Ed Stetzer:  Many people are willing to believe but few are willing to follow.
• We ate lunch with Vince Antonucci and 6 other guys.  Didn’t get to talk with Vince much but I did get to talk with his Executive Pastor Dan throughout the lunch.  They have a great church and our conversation just further cemented our decision to visit them while on vacation this summer.
• During lunch I order 2 huge soft taco’s…it also came with a fruit cup.  The waiter asked if I wanted extra cheese and sour cream to which I replied yes.  When it came out the tacos were on one plate.  The fruit cup was in a bowl by itself, then there was a cup of sour cream and then an extra plate which was piled up with the extra cheese and sour cream.  I grabbed some extra cheese and then spooned out from the cup of sour cream a nice size blob to give my tacos a little better flavor.  As I’m about to take my first bite, Lisa says, “Why did you put the fruit dip on your taco?”  Yep dummy me thought it was sour cream…wasn’t bad though…at least that’s what I’m saying.
• We rushed back afterwards so I could catch the end of our worship teams practice.  I know they have something special planned for this week and I wanted to see how it was coming.
• Let’s just say you need to make sure you’re in your seat right on time this weekend.
• Speaking of the weekend…don’t forget to come our tonight to Heavenly Grounds Coffeehouse in downtown Chambersburg for the event we are sponsoring there.  It starts at 8PM.
• Also…we’re working out some last minute details, but keep checking back today and tomorrow for the 3rd big announcement of the week.

The picture above is from the private dining room we ate in tonight overlooking the Inner harbor in Baltimore.  My cousin graduated from college today and this is where her parents had her party.  Dinner consisted of a lobster appetizer, caesar salad, seared chicken, with fried tomatoes, asparagus and mashed potatoes…I’m stuffed…oh yeah graduation cake topped it off.

From there we left and just checked into a hotel room in Reston, Va, just outside of DC.  Tomorrow we will attend a conference called the Whiteboard Sessions where 8 of the top names in Christianity have each been given 30 minutes to talk on whatever topic they want to…well within some limits.  I’m really looking forward to hearing them and catching up with some old friends…well not literally old, but you know what I mean.