- Kicked off the new “God at the Box Office” series today.
- The day got off to a rough start when one of my contacts ripped on the way to the theater this morning.
- So I had to turn around and go back home…not a big deal but it did put me a bit behind.
- Set-up today went fairly smooth considering a new set needed to be assembled for the first time.
- Bill did an awesome job creating a film strip look that covered the entirety of the stage.
- Andy did a great job lighting it all up and creating some new effects we’ve never had before.
- I guess one of the limitations of being in a portable situation is the not being able to see if things will work until you actually get there.
- In my previous church when a series was finished, the set got torn down that Sunday afternoon and the framework of the new set was erected.
- That gave all week to work on getting it just right before Thursday night’s practice where the final bugs would be worked out in preparation for Sunday morning.
- Here there’s a lot more hoping and praying! :)
- All thing considered though the team does an awesome job with the limited amount of time we’ve got.
- Bill Hybels once said that “Excellence is doing the best you can with what you’ve got”.
- I think we’re doing that.
- Big thank to the Regal for donating popcorn for all 4 weeks of the series to us.
- Nothing like doing a movie series and being able to give away free movie popcorn!
- Attendance was way down today.
- I knew this going in because I had 12 of our adults who normally serve on a Sunday morning let me know they wouldn’t be there.
- Add in all their children and right there you’re missing 25-30 people even before you start.
- Most frustrating though was the lack of first time guests for the new series.
- We did heavy video promotion and provided everyone with a minimum of 5 invite cards.
- Hopefully it will pick up in future weeks.
- The band did a good job despite the lack of energy in the room.
- Here’s the video of their cover of “Iridescent” by Linkin Park which is the main song from the Transformers movie we talked about today.
- The video will also give you a chance to see what Bill created for the set.
- I was a bit windy today but it’s something every Christian should listen to and take seriously.
- Hoping people take the 5X5X5 challenge seriously.
- We recognized the 13 who got baptized last week with their custom made baptism certificates…everyone loved them and were telling me where they were going to put it.
- Hope the visual reminder impacts them for the rest of their lives.
- Love hanging out in the lobby afterward talking with people…we’ve got a great group of people that are building the foundation of what we’ll be for years to come.
- Got a really busy week including a conference that 8 of us from ECTV will be going to…hope we’re inspired to go to new levels for God personally and corporately.
Inside Today’s Experience
- What an awesome day!
- Had another profession of faith and then afterward we had 13 baptisms!
- The challenge as a portable church is how to do things like communion and baptism in an environment that’s not really conducive for things like that.
- For baptism it meant setting up a swimming pool out back.
- Chad, his boys and Andre set it up last night at 10:30pm and began the long process of filling it up.
- The fire department was supposed to do it but they stopped after someone complained their water made them sick. :)
- We were concerned whether the pool was going to collapse but it held up fine.
- As for the day itself set-up went well, nothing out of the ordinary.
- During run-through time I gave everyone instructions on how , who and when we’d start tearing down so we could get out to the baptism and have the theater ready for movies to begin.
- Glad we did that because when it came time later in the morning, everything ran like clockwork.
- For some reason energy was down today in the Experience but the band as usual did a great job leading.
- Today was the last in the Jonah series…you can listen to what I consider the shocking conclusion here.
- Amazing how we so often want forgiveness for ourselves but judgment for others.
- The plan was for the band to come forward during the prayer time and get ready to start tearing down once I started doing announcements.
- Instead they started during the prayer itself…
- Wow was that hard…
- I’m trying to lead a very Holy moment and dodging people left and right who are literally taking the floor out right from under me.
- Still God is amazing and despite everything, we still had a young lady come into a relationship with Jesus!
- By the time I was done with announcements, the only thing left to tear down was sound and projection…amazing how quickly they did everything.
- I dismissed everyone to exit out the back door and I ran off to get changed and put the closing touches on things I needed to do before exiting the theater.
- Here’s a link to photos from the baptism.
- Huge thanks to my brother-in-law Brian for traveling in from out of town to take these…also to my nephew Jordan for shooting some video…can’t wait to see what he puts together.
- Check other people’s walls on Facebook for more photos…I’ve seen them starting to be posted.
- Got to admit I got choked up a number of times during the baptisms…one of my favorite things to do in ministry.
- What an honor to be a part of such a special moment in each of these people’s lives.
- Special mention for Dylan Krull…I remember him being born and dedicated and so many other milestones in his young life…now to get to baptize him is so awesome.
- Big thanks to Bill & Meghan Butler for building changing rooms in the trailer so people didn’t have to go home wet.
- Although I was amazed how warm the water was so I didn’t mind staying wet.
- As the guys started collapsing the pool they let too much go at first and it ran down the sidewalk and right into another theater!!!
- Luckily nothing was going on in that one yet and we were able to go in and clean it up…oops.
- Other than that it was a tremendously successful day.
- Best part was I ended up leaving the theater basically at the same time I normally do!
- Next week we begin the “God at the Box Office” series by looking at the spiritual lessons from the newest Transformers movie.
- Please share our commercial for the series with as many people as possible and keep handing out the tickets.
- The commercial can be found here on YouTube or here on Facebook.
- Can’t wait…I love doing series like these!
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.
Random Tuesday Thoughts
- Finally got confirmation that the number baptized two Sunday’s ago was 42!
- This past weekend was hectic but great.
- Friday night I was at church for the rehearsal of the wedding I was doing on Saturday.
- At one point one of the organ petals got stuck.
- Remember in “Dumb and Dumber” when they did the most annoying noise in the world…ummm yeah, I’m just saying.
- Had to call Earl so he could line up a repairman while I continued with practice.
- After practice I put the final touches on getting ready for the class I taught on Saturday morning.
- Had 45 people show up for the “Get Connected with God” class.
- I tried to cram it all into 2 hours, but ended up going 2 1/2.
- As I’ve been getting e-mails in response, the #1 complaint has been that the class wasn’t long enough.
- I said it before and I’ll say it again…this class is awesome!
- Here are some excerpts of just a few of the e-mails I’ve gotten…
- “I would recommended that EVERYONE take this class if you ever offer it again”.
- “I wish I would have had this class much earlier in my Christian life…I hate to admit it, but I still feel like a baby in the Word- but now that I have the tools, that is going to change”.
- “This class has given me a game plan”.
- “This class…will take us (husband and I) into a higher level of knowing our God and understanding our purpose”.
- “I guarantee you that everyone who took the Get Connected To God class today came out with a better understanding of what it takes to develop the habits we need to grow to spiritual maturity and how to bring that about”.
- The wedding went very well then in the afternoon.
- Congratulations to Ronnie and Kristy Yarnell!
- At the reception, we sat with the organist who was asking questions about United.
- Our table was about in tears with laughter watching this guys expressions as we kept sharing and you could just see the shock on his face.
- He kept asking, “Wait a second, you did that in church”?
- He said he wants to come visit…he’ll be easy to recognize…he’ll be the one with his mouth gaping open the whole time. :)
- Sunday I’ve already blogged about, but I’ve heard some really good stuff in the meantime about how people felt convicted and challenged by the Experience.
- The new web-site is also getting a lot of good feedback and a lot of traffic.
- One person I forgot to mention in my excitement of announcing it last Friday was Ashleigh Schwindt. Many of the pictures on the site she shot and I’m glad we have someone with her skills in the church.
- Ashleigh has her own photography business and I’m in love with one of her models!
- We are hosting Micah Brickner this week at the church to help him in his internship with our region of the denomination. Micah wants to plant a church in the next few years so he’s spending the week with us learning the good, the bad and the ugly (insert whatever staff person’s face you want with each:)).
- Please pray for Micah and my good friend, Chuck Frank as the region attempts to plant as many churches as possible in the next 5-10 years.
- If you’re interested in something like this, go here.