- Had a good day today!
- Ok any day where 6 people come into a relationship with Christ qualifies as not just a good day, but a great day!
- What a fun series as we look back at the 70’s, 80’s and 90’s.
- Again the band did a fantastic job of putting a medley together.
- That I got to help by rapping, Parent’s Just Don’t Understand was not only fun, but nerve-wracking.
- I didn’t have in-ear monitors, so I had to go off the sound from the house,
but you guys were cheering so loud that I couldn’t hear the beat…got off a
few times, but all in all it was fun to participate. - I’m thinking Andrea was born to do covers of other bands…she again
killed her parts! - Had two new people on the team today and for the first time out, we
threw a lot of stuff at them and they came through…thanks Dan and
Cressa! - I again think that the medley wound people up and by the worship set
you guys were raring to go. - I loved that during the 9:45, there was one point where all our vocalists
dropped out and for about 1 minute it was nothing but the sound of your
voices…and LOUD! - I thought Brian did an awesome job with the song, Everybody Hurts. What a great intro into the message.
- I know today’s message wasn’t all touchy-feely, but it was something we all need to be reminded of from time to time.
- If Jesus brand was “love” and “compassion”, what makes us think ours should be anything different?
- I’m really excited about the new You Matter ministry.
- If you want to practically apply today’s message by getting involved helping the hurting in our community, You Matter is definitely the ministry for you to get involved with.
- Big props to Scott McCurley for dressing in his best 1980’s costume…wow that was impressive. Don’t forget you can dress the part each week as well.
- Next week we’ll again look at the 80’s, this time with the song, Don’t Stop Believing.
- Almost hard to believe, but today marks the 1-year anniversary since we expanded to 2 Experiences.
- What’s amazing is that one year ago we were blown away by the attendance. In fact we set a record that day.
- Today even though we had higher attendance than 1 year ago, it felt like a let down because people are still in full vacation mode.
- I’m excited about this series, but can’t wait for the next one when everyone is back and in inviting mode and we see dozens come to Christ each week, not just 1/2 dozen.
- You say. “Gilbert can’t you just be content with what we’ve got”?
- And the answer is a big fat NO. As long as there are people in our community that don’t yet know Jesus, our mission is not complete.
- Join me in making a difference…you won’t regret it!
- Invite someone to church with you next week.
- Help “You Matter” to feed children in the Boys and Girls Club this week.
- Wear your “You Matter” wristband all week and use it to share the good news with others.
- YOU MATTER and you can make a difference!
Inside Today’s Experiences
- What a great day!
- I promised an unforgettable opener to the Experience and I don’t think the team disappointed.
- The 9:45 crowd was about to explode our of their seats…the energy was incredible.
- If you missed it, you definitely missed something special.
- One of our core values is that…”Excellence honors God and inspires people”.
- Even the midst of the band covering 70’s music, I couldn’t help but get a little choked up as I saw the team giving their all to God in the hopes that something like that would prepare hearts for what was yet to come.
- The band worked incredibly hard and the video plus medley was the perfect start to the series.
- Great job by Brian in coming up with the arrangement and I thought Andrea knocked her parts out of the park.
- Brian and the stage team did an awesome job creating a new set…definitely one of my favorites.
- I think the new times periods worked out great.
- I felt so goofy in my 70’s garb and wig, but I was pleased that the fu-manchu grew in.
- Gayle as well did a great job in covering “Imagine”…such a beautiful song, too bad as we saw in the message that the lyrics are so unrealistic.
- Thankfully though Jesus has a better way…”Love your enemies and pray for those the persecute you”.
- I’m also still amazed at how seriously Jesus takes the whole forgiveness thing…in essence…if you don’t forgive others, God will not forgive you.
- The energy at 11:15 was completely different…however still a good day!
- Right before the first Experience I was in my office and the phone rang. I answered and it was a man (not from the church) asking if he could meet with me ASAP.
- I told him I could meet at 12:30 and he said that was fine.
- When I met with him you could tell he was broken and struggling.
- To make a long story short, after a few hours and many tears, he prayed to ask Jesus for His forgiveness and to be the leader of his life.
- I’m not going to mention the man’s name or his struggles, but if you could generically pray for him and his family this week, God knows who it is you’re praying for.
- I told you this story because again there is nothing else in life like helping people discover Jesus.
- Yes we had 2 great Experiences and yes I got to be up front doing my thing…but sitting with someone in my office and leading them into a relationship with Christ was by far the highlight of my day!
- So who are you inviting next week…again we’ll be doing something special as we look at the 1980’s and I’ll be preaching a message based off the song, “Everybody Hurts”.
Inside Today’s Experiences
- Sitting in my office getting ready for our staff picnic.
- Had a great day!
- Couple of minor glitches in the set-up portion and the keyboard died in the 10:45 (RIP), but other than that we couldn’t have asked for a smoother day.
- First, any day when people come into a relationship with Christ, it’s awesome…4 more today…God is so good!
- I’m really loving the new song “Yours Forever” that the team has done the past few weeks…great stuff!
- I also liked the new song today called “Ready Now”. It was cool to intro it at the beginning of the Experience and then use it as a response song to the message.
- I love doing vision messages. Nothing gets me fired up more than reminding people why we’re doing what we’re doing.
- The response so far to the message has been incredible…the real test will be in actually applying it…hope for a lot of new faces next week!
- The bumper video that Aaron put together was awesome. What’s funny though is it took he, Brian and I almost 2 hours to record the voice overs. For some reason we couldn’t get the equipment to record it right…so we did it again…and again…and on a different machine…and again…and on a different machine…and…
- It’s a shame some of them didn’t come out…Brian and I were having a lot of fun coming up with different things to say.
- The two videos I used today I thought were powerful as well. Here are the links. Pauline Jacobi getting robbed. Penn Gets a Bible.
- I love that line…”How much do you have to hate someone to believe that there is a heaven and hell yet not tell someone how to escape it”. (paraphrase)
- Again it amazes me that an atheist understands that better than many people in churches.
- So one more time…Do whatever you can to invite people next week as we begin the REWIND series, by looking at the decade of the 70’s and specifically John Lennon’s, “Imagine”.
- Also be sure to check out the new web-site and join the United Worship Experience fan page on facebook.
Inside Today’s Experiences
- Great to be back preaching again!
- After 5 weeks off I had some butterflies this morning.
- Thought there was a great energy today and that the team did an awesome job with the music.
- Also, Brian and the stage team did an incredible job with the stage set…really love the huge TXT reflective panels.
- Pretty good morning from a set-up standpoint so I was relaxed as we got started.
- At the conclusion of the 9:15, I remembered I had forgotten part of the message…then I realized oops I forgot about 10 minutes worth.
- Can you say rusty?
- In any case, for you 9:15’ers I posted the 10:45 Experience so if you want to hear the entire message you can.
- I’m super excited about this series…I love God’s Word and hope others will fall in live with it as well.
- As a reminder…this week we’re all reading the book of James and answering two questions each day in our notebooks.
- If I had to summarize the chapter I just read in a sentence or two, what would it be.
- Question two is what is one thing I can do today as a result of what I just read.
- After that we’ll all be posting online our answers.
- You can come back to my blog tomorrow for mine and comment there or you can also find it on my Facebook profile.
- Even though attendance was down, there was just somethingspecial about today and I think God is about to break loose big-time.
- Time for a nap then off to freind’s house for dinner.
- “See you” tomorrow online with your answers for James chapter 1.
Inside Today’s Experiences
