Today was baptism Sunday at North Creek! We do them regularily, but I will never get bored watching baptisms! It’s my all time favorite part of church. To watch people go under water and the symbolism of being washed clean by Jesus is monumental. Congrats to John, Nicole and Kaile! You can click on the pictures below to see a few of my favorite shots!

Other than baptisms, I have to give a BIG shout out to our 9:00 am volunteers this morning. At 8:30 am, I looked around and we had all of our volunteers ready to go, coffee in hand, and smiles on their faces. It was AWESOME! And the best part was that I had 4 new volunteers who KNOCKED IT OUT OF THE PARK! I love the broad base of volunteers at our church. When everyone does their part it sure makes it fun!

We changed our Connection Card to include a box to check that says, “I’m ready to become a follower of Jesus.” We had two people check that box this morning and turn it in. Praise God! And what a great system. Now we can make sure they have the info for Starting Point to get some of their questions answered and give them some foundation to their new faith. It’s not just about the initial commitment to Christ! It’s about getting people from that first step to a strong relationship. We are committed to the whole process.

We went to a going away party for one of our college students, Larissa, on Friday. We are “losing” some great families to long-distance moves this year. We let them go with both blessing and sadness in our hearts.

Honestly, I have been discouraged this week as we have been exploring options for growth in our future. Every option seems daunting, but I am confident that God will lead us in the right direction. Sometimes it’s just aggravating to be in the middle of the story and not know how it will turn out. But, just like a book, you’ve just got to keep going and you’ll get there. So, we’ll keep going!

This was on Rhonda’s facebook, “Got into the car this afternoon and a song Josh recognized from church was playing on The Fish. He says “I didn’t know North Creek was on the radio!”‘ That’s awesome, Josh! We’ll be on the radio someday, just hang on!

All of the kids came in at the 9:00 am service to watch John be baptized. AWESOME group of kids marching in! I love each one of them! Glad that they are a part of our church and our future.

Please pray from some miracles this week for North Creek. To grow to the next level and that’s going to require some work on our part and some moves of God as well.

Blessings to you and your family!

I’m reading a great book right now by Nelson Searcy called Activate. It’s about how his church has structured Small Groups. It’s been a paradigm shifter as I looked at what we’ve been doing compared to what he’s been doing.

One of the paragraphs opens with, ‘”One hallmark of growing churches is that they are not afraid to ask, “How can we do it better?” That’s the only way you will improve.”‘ Honestly the idea and thought of change is daunting! But a good leader never lets the work be the reason that they don’t do something. Hard work is not our enemy…lack of change is! If change makes us better, then by all means, let us throw off our former way of doing things and jump in with both feet.

Our challenge as a startup church has been two fold…we have been a smaller church that is growing consistently. Both of those issues have been a small groups nightmare. Small churches have less options to plug people into where they can find a group of people that they actually want to connect with for 18 months. Also, with consistent growth that means that people are always wanting a small group, but with the length of commitment and our structure, it’s been a big step to get into a small group.

At this point my goal is to create a system where more people can connect with more people more quickly. In church life, one of the most important things is that people begin to develop friendships. They don’t have to be deep, profound, intimate relationships, just people that they look forward to seeing on Sundays and who they can have a good conversation with. Those deeper friendships can come out of that, but what I’ve found with small groups is that those type of relationships cannot be cultivated by a program.

This has been a tension for me as a small group leader. If the purpose of small groups is to have intimate friendships with the 12 people in my group, we are somewhat failing. I like everybody in my small group, but they are not necessarily the deepest relationships in my life…and that’s not bad! We connected randomly at a Grouplink event. It’s a bit much to now assume that they will be my soulmates. What we have succeeded at…I have LOVED getting to know each of them. I am so thankful for our friendship and on Sundays I look forward to saying hi and catching up on their week. If that is the goal of small groups, we knocked it out of the park!

I will continue to blog about this book for a couple of days, but that’s my first paradigm shift. I’m sure that some small groups will randomly become the best of friends for the rest of their lives, but probably most groups will just enjoy getting to know some new people and growing together in study, serving, and prayer. And that’s a win.

It was Mother’s Day at North Creek! I was scheduled to speak, but with the flu all week, I gave that task to Mark. It was nice to be able to relax a little on my special day and Mark did a great job!

I really love the moms at our church! They are some of the women I respect most in the world and I am so honored to be alongside them as I parent my own children.

Pete and Rachel Torres gave birth this week to Grayson Matthieu. Congrats on a beautiful little boy to add to your family! We are very excited to watch him grow up!

Pastor Kim’s projector broke on Sunday morning so she had to re-create her teaching time at the last minute. Ironically, my daughter, Delaney, told me it was one of her favorite classes! Way to go, Kim!

I got a cute little craft from both Kennedy and Delaney on Sunday morning. Nothing like some paper and glue to make a mom’s heart melt!

We had a wonderful lunch at the Olive Garden. Love that place! Then we went and took my inlaws to the train station for a trip to North Dakota.

This week is all about getting some things figured out for the future of North Creek. A lot of thinking, praying, and research is going into the next step. What’s best? How do we get there the most effeciently? Who do we need doing what to make the leap from where we are to where we need to be? Lots of questions and we’re praying that God would begin to give us some of the answers!

I have also been praying for Steve and Vikki Jensen. (They are a Christian family in our community, not associated with our church, but connected to several of our members.) They lost their son, Luke, to leukemia last week. He was a beautiful nine year old boy who loved Jesus through a very difficult trial! I only hope to instill that kind of love in my own children for their Savior. My prayer is that God would give them strength and peace that surpasses all understanding.

I hope that you are abundantly blessed this week as well! No matter what you are facing, God is our source. See you soon!

She is smart, funny, and as stubborn as they come. She can tell a story better than anyone I have ever met and can get small children interested in the most boring of topics with her funny faces.

She has a college degree in Home Economics, which is made all the more ironic by the fact that she hates to cook and clean. She’d rather spend a day outdoors in her flower garden than with a queen in her palace.

She loves politics and although she weighs about 110 pounds, when she talks about political issues, you think she’s capable of taking on the whole world.

She married a colorblind banker from Seattle who wanted to give it all up to become a sign painter in Montana. She was brave enough to let my dad live out his dreams, which taught me that it was OK to live out mine.

She never told me not to drink, smoke, do drugs, or have sex. I do remember her making it clear that I was brilliant, beautiful, and destined for greatness. Somewhere in that mix she made it obvious that I shouldn’t waste my time and sacrifice my destiny for any of the things that might slow me down. And I never did.

She said, “It doesn’t matter what they think.” at least a million times. That one sentence taught me early that other people’s perceptions were not necessarily my goal in life. I was too aim for what was RIGHT, not what was the current wisdom of my latest 13 year old friend.

She is dripping with creativity. She can take nothing and make it something valuable. She has an eye for the artistic side of life and always kept everything looking beautiful.

She knows how to celebrate. Birthdays are her specialty and one cannot go by without notice. She would move heaven and earth to make sure that you feel special on your special day.

She magically took interest in ballet, baton twirling, swimming, volleyball, basketball, softball, jazz dancing, and piano at the exact same time that I had performances, games, and recitals. She never missed one and never broke character of her profound interest in those events.

She put an “almost” well balanced meal on the table every day of my life. I say almost because over the years I clearly saw that she would rather have dessert than vegetables. I think that says a lot about her priorities.

She is not enticed by fame, prestige or power, but she could live with contentment in the presence of her laughing granddaughters for the rest of time. Where I hurry through life, she takes her time, works hard at her tasks, and enjoys the moments.

She has laugh lines from years of smiling and worn hands from years of work. Both of these things are beautiful in my eyes.

There are so many wonderful things about her, but the best part of it all…she’s my mom.

Happy Mother’s Day!

Kennedy shares everything with me…including her vicious stomach flu that she got last week. It’s been plaguing the two of us for about 10 days now. Just when you think that you feel a little better, this deep, intense pain in your stomach takes hold of you all over again. Food and sleep just don’t happen even if you REALLY want both of those two wonderful luxuries.

I learn a lot about myself when I’m sick. The biggest thing that comes to light is that I don’t slow down well. I hate not being able to do everything that I think I should be able to do. I push through as much as feasibly possible to the point of not allowing myself to rest and get better. This strategy seems to not be working for me this time.

That being said, I will not be preaching tomorrow as planned. On Thursday night when I was back to the beginning of not feeling well, I decided that I couldn’t risk it and gave Mark my Mother’s Day sermon. He’s never preached one of my messages before, but I know he’ll do a great job. It’s a good sermon, if I do say so myself!

Today I feel a bit better and have been able to get some of my stuff done, but I’m still glad that a major weight is off my plate! My husband is my hero! I look forward to Mother’s Day and enjoying the unexpected break that I will be getting!