Sunday, October 28, 2007

Celebration!

Isn't it amazing? In our culture, it's acceptable to celebrate something as menial and trivial as the Red Sox taking a commanding three games to zero lead in the World Series (I mean, in the scheme of things, how important is it, really?). But to celebrate what God has done among us is somehow strange and excessive. It's ok to be a sports nut, but to pour that kind of emotion into a spiritual celebration makes you a religious nut, and that's definitely not ok, according to the world around us.


Well, around here we like to turn conventional thinking on its head. We think that God is a lot more important than baseball, much more worthy of being celebrated, and infinitely more deserving of our time, attention, devotion, and enthusiasm!


Here's some of the great things to celebrate over these last 40 days:

  • Over 85% of our church in small groups
  • More than double the kids in Awana compared to last year
  • A new Awana Commander, Larry Burman, who comes with a passion for God and a love for kids
  • Increase in adult leaders for Awana
  • Lots of new faces in Youth Group, as the kids have been reaching out together to invite their friends
  • Double the number of adult leaders for Youth Group
  • All kinds of Small Group Service Projects ministering to people and meeting tangible needs in all sorts of different ways--distributing food, clothing kids for winter, providing childcare for single moms, helping maintain property at a camp for at-risk kids, and more!
  • Some of these groups are going to be involved in on-going ministry beyond the 40 Days of Community Campaign
  • Advancement in our Vision--in January 2008, I'll be contacting pastors of other churches to invite them to partner with us to plant churches in Jackson County. We want to ignite a spiritual movement--a saturation church-planting movement in Jackson County to reach the 100,000 people here with no church family.

God is so good! He deserves shouts of Hallelujah! and Hosanna! Let's get excited about what God is up to in our midst! Let's thank him and praise him! Let's use these 40 days as motivation to continue striving toward being the kind of church he calls us to be. Let's devote ourselves to intense prayer, as we know that Satan wants to oppose anyone who would actually undertake a real effort to advance the kingdom of God. Let's celebrate!

This evening, Pastor Brent said, "This is a good time to be a part of this church." I couldn't agree more! God is doing stuff--he's changing hearts and calling us to greater devotion, greater obedience, and greater blessing.

The 40 Days is over, but this is certainly not the end!

No comments: