WE BROKE THE 200 IN ATTENDANCE MARK!!!! We had 213 people at church this weekend and IT WAS AWESOME!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! YIPPPPPEEEEEEEEEEEEE! I’m doing cartwheeels because every number represents such an amazing story. Stop and ask people in our foyer about their journey with Christ. It will keep you motivated for the rest of your life!

Tiffany Wisecarver lead worship for the first time (with us) today. Seriously amazing woman! Thank you, Tiffany, for helping us to connect with Jesus through your gifts. When I go to Heaven, I hope God gives me a voice like yours to sing praises to Him for the rest of eternity!

I went into the Great Adventurer’s class at 10:30 just to mess with kids…I love interrupting the class to make eye contact with some of the greatest kids on the planet! It was Pastor Kim’s birthday on Sunday, so she got lots of love and adoration!

Pete Torres said that Starting Point is having an awesome session. I think he’s got the best job at our church. He gets to lay the foundation for God, help people learn how to read the Bible, pray, and live for Jesus. If you are still trying to figure out Christianity, I suggest you think about jumping into the Starting Point class in January. It is foundational and FABULOUS!

I had a long conversation at the bar with Jace. He’s almost 4 and we had a nice chat about life.

Mark had a hard hitting message about morality…if you missed it, I highly recommend catching it online in the next few days. It’s a life-changer, if you let it be!

We have about 7 people getting baptized next weekend. You can sign up online if you are interested in doing that! We can’t wait to celebrate with people who have experienced the life saving power of Jesus.

Rachael Yonko’s brother heard about us in California from a man who was from Vancouver. He said that the coffeechurch was creating quite a buzz. Well, yes we are. How can you not create a buzz when you serve the most controversial man who ever walked the planet? Jesus is the ultimate “buzz maker!”

Have an awesome week!

As a pastor, the number one issue in our church that we have dealt with over the last four years (and many more if you count youth pastoring) is sex. Sex before marriage, sex with the wrong person during marriage, and a lack of sex within marriage. It’s a pretty consistent conversation that we have.

I was laying in bed this morning praying for some people who are dealing with some issues related to this topic. I was thinking about how much pain could be erased if everyone obeyed God in just this ONE area. If we were all obedient NOT to have sex before our wedding day, if we stayed away from pornography and affairs, and if we were devoted to our spouses to work through all of the issues within this area of our marriages. Oh, what a much better world we would live in! It’s not the solution to all things, but it would cut out a large percentage of the problems that we have created in our society.

Sexual obedience would drastically cut down on abortions, teen pregnancy (and related finanical burdens on society), sexual addictions, sexually transmitted diseases and the related issues (such as cancer and death). It would cut down our divorce rate, it would cut down our need for counseling, and it would model for our children what God intended sex to be in a healthy context. If we were obedient, sexual abuse would not be as prevelant in our society. Not to mention the social issues that we’ve now created with our young people such as sexting, sending graphic pictures, and God only knows what we’ll come up with next! Just living according to God’s standard of purity in this area would eliminate a great deal of emotional pain and give us a freedom that we can’t imagine.

And yet, time after time, I encounter Christians who minimize God’s standard and try to justify their disobedience in this area. Looking around at society, I am very clear that God nailed this principle. He knew that the gift of sex, when misapplied, was a very dangerous thing. He knew that if we took this principle lightly the ramifications would be life-altering and many times completely devasting. Yes, I know that we’ll all be tempted. I know that it’s hard, but it’s time that we, as Christians, stopped living solely on our feelings and relied on our brains to steer the ship. The rewards are worth the work and quite frankly, we know better.

So, just do it…or don’t. Whichever one applies to your situation.

We just returned from a Conference for church planters. One of the things that I enjoy most is simply seeing all of the different types of people that God uses to start and lead successful churches. It always clarifies for me that the wrong question to ask is whether or not “our” way of doing church is the “right” way. There are so many different methods and strategies of “doing” church. Some leaders are super organized, some fly by the seat of their pants. Some are topical preachers and some preach from straight passages of scripture. Some have loud worship, some have soft hymns…and yet the common denomintor in all of these styles is that people who are far from God come to these churches and are transformed by Jesus.

We’ve had various conversations with people over the years about particular methods we use. They have gotten caught up in the “right” way to do church and focused on things like why we don’t do “altar calls” for people to accept Jesus. The problem is that when we focus on the “how” too much, we forget the “why”. It causes us not to pay attention to testimony after testimony of changed lives and the vast number of baptisms that we celebrate regularily. We simply see the methodology of our preference as THE way to do something. The irony of it all is that the Bible doesn’t even give us very many specifics for church, such as a model for an “altar call” at the end of a sermon…none of that is in the Bible at all. It’s not right or wrong…it’s just one of the options out there.

All of these amazing leaders that we watch and listen to are so diverse and so unique in their DNA. That translates into vastly different churches that all have the same result…thousands of people loving Jesus. The reality is that God loves diversity and that is seen in all of these successful churches. Aside from a method that is directly sinful and against the heartbeat of God, we need to embrace other churches and be thankful that they are touching people’s lives that we never could!

It’s interesting to write highlights this week because we have a couple of families that are dealing with some crisis, which has been our main focus. We are praying for the Malone’s while there son is in the hospital. They are trying to figure out what is causing joint pain and some issues with his internal organs. Lee and Helen are on our pastoral team, so it hits us hard. We are believing God for a miraculous and quick recovery! We also have another family where the mother is going in for surgery today for thyroid cancer, so please pray for that situation as well. Sometimes, as a church, we laugh together and sometimes we cry together. It’s just part of the deal and we are honored to walk through the difficult seasons with people we love.

We started a new series this weekend where we are taking a look at our priorities. I think we want to believe that we are balanced, but when we really step back and evaluate what SIGNIFICANT things we are doing, it’s pretty minimalistic. We tend to do the urgent, not the important. The next three weeks are going to be fun!

Some of our team are leaving for a conference tomorrow. I am looking forward to the growth opportunity and to open my heart to anything God wants to show me. Conferences always seem to come when I am at my limit and I need to hear from God…and here we are again!

Every Halloween we serve coffee to the adults who are taking their kids trick or treating. It’s a nice way to say, “Here’s something warm and welcoming…just like our church!” And it’s not a bad way to spend the evening drinking coffee with everyone who walks by!

Our services this weekend were unbalanced…most of the time they are all three just about the same size lately, but this weekend was wacky. I like balance better!

I took a moment to introduce a newer couple to a brand new couple…funny thing was that when one couple turned around they all realized they were old friends! I love when God does things like that…

Lots to do and accomplish this week! Hope that you have a great one! Take some time to do something to grow yourself!