Monday, March 30, 2009

Is Evil Real?

For those that were at CX Saturday night, we talked about the reality of hell. I challenged us to see our world with that in mind. Do you weep for your neighbors and friends? Do you pray for those in your family who are lost? I hope this is a life changing week for you.

I promised you a link to the debate on whether Satan exists. You can watch it here. http://abcnews.go.com/Nightline/faceoff It is very interesting.

Also, start inviting for Easter! Here are the details, one more time. 5:30 is an Easter Egg hunt for all kids. At 6 we kick of our service which we're calling, "The Bridge," and then afterwards we'll have snacks and coffee like normal. Easter is a huge opportunity to invite others. Make the ask! We'll be meeting at Reflections church. It's on the southwest corner of Ustick and Meridian. You can't miss it!!!

Wednesday, March 18, 2009

This is what's new.

Sunday night we held our behind the scenes look at Connections called, "The Tour." We invited all our new families to join us. We fed everyone dinner and spent a couple of hours talking about what makes Connections tick. It was a fun to see all the new people getting involved. We had over 20 people at our house, including the kids. Also from that meeting, we started two more Connection Groups. This doubles our small groups to four. What I'm most excited about is not the number of small groups, but the percentage of our people who are connected to one. After these two launch, we'll be in the 90% range for people being in a small groups. That's incredible. Kudo's to Jeremy who oversees our small groups. He is doing a great job!!!
Another great thing is finally happening. We've launched a new section of our website we call CXbration. It is where you can find our sermons and videos. Right now we have all the sermons since launch and a video of launch service. You can see it here. This is a great place for people who are considering checking out Connections to actually see it in person before they visit.
This weekend we're doing a big drama that will take up a big chunk of the service. I'm really excited about doing more things like this in the future. I say this often, but I think dramas and videos hit people harder than preaching does and it lingers in the brain longer too. I'm excited to have some people around me who can write, direct and act in our dramas. We're recording with two cameras this week and hoping to get a video on the website or on this blog early next week.
Lastly, don't forget that tomorrow is a big day. The beginning of March Madness! At my last church we all took our powerbooks to the back room and worked while we watched the games. I'll miss that this year.
Thanks for keeping up with us. Pray for our Easter celebration. We've hit a couple of snags on our facility for that Saturday night, but I believe it's an opportunity to do something great! I can't wait to see what God has planned. He's always up to something!

Wednesday, March 4, 2009

What He Opens . . .

Saturday night we talked about the verse in Revelation, "What He opens, no one can shut and what he shuts, no one can open." We talked briefly about what happens when God closes a door and we go busting through it anyways and then we showed this video. Brandi and Amy did an AWESOME job acting in this video. My challenge was putting in the special effects. Let's just say spielburg won't be hiring me for the long awaited ET sequel! We ended up with a 70's sci fi show but I think the point still comes across!