Quick Update

Sunday morning has been a huge success. Everyone said it would be and they were right. We have visitors every week and people seem to be sticking. This week is Mother's day. It's typically the 2nd highest attended weekend of the year. We're also doing child dedications and a number of families are coming to watch their grandkid, niece, or nephew be dedicated. We're expecting standing room only.

Next week we're adding another service. We're bringing our Saturday night back in full force. We'll be meeting at 6 on Saturday nights and keeping our 10:30 on Sunday mornings. Pray for us. The extra service puts a strain on our children's workers and worship team. And for those praying for our finances, it's working. We continue to have just enough for everything we need. Thanks for your prayers!!!

How Great is Our God! ("!" not "?")

Things have been speeding up lately at Connections. Let me give you the last month or so . . .

Our first set of baptisms took place a few weeks ago. We had 4 people get baptized and share their testimonies on video. God moved.

Two weeks ago we celebrated our first year at Connections. Over the last 12 months we've given away food, free gift wrapping, coffee at a busy stop light, money on a street corner and a slew of things on a one on one basis. We've had dramas and illustrations and have edited more video footage than you could watch in a full day. We've seen marriages saved and addictions broken. Amazing how much God has used a little church with less than a hundred people and no budget. We are willing God. Let's go crazy for year two!

Last week we encouraged our people to invite their friends and family and we laid out the gospel in a crystal clear fashion. We had four people raise their hands at the end to accept Christ. Wow God!

Here's what is happening next. . . We made a call about an open facility on fairview ave. It's one of the major roads in the town we live in. We couldn't afford it, but since it was empty, we thought we'd give it a shot. We offered them what we could afford if they would let us use it 24 hours a week, from Saturday at 1 to Sunday at 1. They countered back and said we could occupy it full time and they would keep the rent at what we could afford. WHAT??? OK, I guess we can handle that. So, at the end of this month, we're moving into our first full time building. Now, honestly, it's pretty small. 2 classrooms, one restroom (ouch) and a good sized room for our service. All in all about 2500sf. We're viewing this like our first little apartment. It's a great place to grow and would allow us to have 2-3 services a week and possibly reach the 4-500 number before we need to move on. And, like I said earlier, we are in a GREAT location! This alone is a huge blessing and we'll be in by Easter! You're amazing God!!!

Here's where I need your help. We have so much stuff ready to go. Since we're a portable church, we already have a sound system and all the childrens stuff we need to get started. What we don't have is tables and chairs. We're going to need 75 chairs and 10 tables (to start). If we buy new, we're looking at 4-5k. We're also going to need an additional projector and screen. Another few thousand dollars. All in all we're going to need around 10-12k. That's minimum. They'll probably be more we need once we get started. Pray with me that we can make this happen. It seems impossible. But, so does a 2500sf facility on Fairview Ave for about what we're paying now. Show up again God! I have zero doubts!

4 baptisms. 4 Salvations. 12 months of amazing ministry. New Facility. Easter is Coming. We're no longer standing in line . . . the roller coaster has officially begun!

Baptisms!

We celebrated our first set of baptisms on Saturday night! It was incredible. We had what looked like record attendance (although we rarely count) and the energy was crazy great. We put all the videos up online (with the permission of those who were baptized). Take a few minutes and watch these. Amazing!!!

The Power of Positivity

Positivity?! I guess that's a word since the little guy inside my computer didn't underline it in red. I ran into this video today and thought I'd share it with you. It's Steve Jobs from apple introducing the iPad. Someone edited it down to about 3 minutes but kept all the positive things that were said during the presentation. Check it out.

Jeremiah 17

I read something in my daily devotions today that was really good. I thought I'd toss it your way. This comes from Jeremiah 17. 5-8 (the message).

"Cursed is the strong one
who depends on mere humans,
Who thinks he can make it on muscle alone
and sets God aside as dead weight.
He's like a tumbleweed on the prairie,
out of touch with the good earth.
He lives rootless and aimless
in a land where nothing grows.

"But blessed is the man who trusts me, God,
the woman who sticks with God.
They're like trees replanted in Eden,
putting down roots near the rivers—
Never a worry through the hottest of summers,
never dropping a leaf,
Serene and calm through droughts,

bearing fresh fruit every season.

This passage seems pretty clear at first. Who are you depending on? Do you trust in your friends, family and other people? Maybe you trust in yourself, "muscle alone." Or, do you trust in God. Is He your source. Now we all say we trust in God. We say that because we're suppose to say that. Plus it sounds pretty arrogant to say we trust in ourselves. And maybe some of us do trust in God, but trusting in God is pretty easy when YOU have everything in control.

My middle child Drae likes to play around with gadgety stuff (where'd he get that?). If it's expensive and has a remote control, he want to open it, close it, turn it off, on, switch the channel, you name it. I will actually hand him the controls sometimes and let him play with it. I'm good with this as long as I'm standing right behind him. It's like I trust him, as long as I am really in control. Is that really trust? Maybe a little but it's not complete trust.

I think the same is true with God. When the bills are getting paid and kids are healthy and I have a good handle on my life, without a doubt I trust him. But, do we trust him when the chips are down or do we jump in and fix it our own way. I know what I do and it's usually something like, "OK God, how should I handle this? Well, I'm going to do it this way, stop me if you don't like it." I'm kinda half trusting and half in control. And what good is that? When you got two Chef's in the kitchen you end up with sushi and fritos. Not a good combination (at least it sounds gross, anyone want to do an experiment?).

What's the solution? Here's the part that is hidden in there a bit. I don't think the solution is just giving God what you already control, I mean, we should do that, but it's not that difficult. The true test of faith is doing something so big that only God could do it. Then and only then will you find yourself trusting Him. I mean, you'll have to, you can't do it on your own!

So what kind of God sized goals do you have in life? Missions work? Adopting kids? Writing a book. Starting a church? Whatever, just dive in. Start today. If God's behind it, He'll honor it, He'll help you through it. So find something worth doing with your life and bite off just a little more than you can chew. Then chew it!

Hey Team,

I trust everyone had a great Thanksgiving Day! Tam and I had a great time entertaining some family and some fellow Connectors. Toss in some pecan pie (my favorite) and it as a great day!

Two quick things I wanted to toss your way. First of all, things at Connections have been really good. We had four people raise their hands to ask Jesus in their lives this last Saturday. To be honest (which means not being deceptive) I know at least one of them well enough to know that they have had a relationship with Jesus in the past, but I'm stoked their getting their life right. God is good and He is still moving. We have such a great team at Connections, our band is INCREDIBLE, our children's ministry is awesome (thanks to a 5-1 teacher ratio, one of the great advantages of a new church plant), we have two other established, successful pastors that attend and speak and almost every person at Connections has a small group they attend at least monthly. Amazing! Still, there's more to do. Here's what we could use prayer for:

1. MORE PEOPLE! I have this visual image of Connections being a small house built on a huge foundation. We've got everything in order to build a big house, now it's just inviting and loving people. Pray that our people have the courage to invite and that the invites are accepted. 2. Pray for our finances. We've had some unexpected support checks lately that have come right on time. God continues to be faithful. Another note of praise, I sold a house this week (I have a real estate license here) and it allowed the Taylor's to get caught up on some bills. He's always right on time!!!

The second thing I wanted to tell you about is a new promotion we're doing called, "I'm Not A Number." This is some of the stories from people who've gotten involved with Connections. We opened the door to anyone who wanted to share their stories. We're hoping to take over CraigsList with written testimonies and links to a bunch more on youtube and our own website. The goal is for more people to notice and check out Connections. We're launching this later this week or early next week. It's going to be a huge win. I'm including one of the stories. It's from the Emerson's. They are my neighbors from down the street and joined us when we were still meeting in our home. They've been a huge asset to Connections. They volunteer for just about everything. I can say without hesitation, CX wouldn't be the same without them!

Thanks for your prayers and support. I truly believe the cement is drying on this massive foundation and we're ready for the next level! To God be the glory.

Full Confidence . . .

Do you have full confidence in God? I mean, do you believe with every fiber of your being that he's going to do what he promises? A couple of days ago in Bible time I read the, "Do not worry" passage in Matthew. As I was reading it, I asked myself if I really believed it. Do I believe whole heartedly that God is going to take care of me and my family the same way he takes care of the flowers in the field. And my answer . . . YES!!!

I do believe it. I believe it for two reasons. The first one is He said he would. That should be enough, but there's more. The second reason I believe it is because of God's history. Not His global history, but His history in the Taylor Family and in my life. God has always showed up, always right on time. I want to tell you about how faithful God has been over the summer. I think you'll be amazed!

For those of you not familiar with Connections, let me give you a couple of quick facts. We're a new church, less than a year old, reaching prechristians and young families. We're still under 100 people (but growing). I have a couple of side jobs that I do now and then when I can get the work, but mostly I put all my time in making Connections go. Financially things have been a challenge, as they are with any non-profit in this economy. But the fact that most of our people are college aged or unsaved makes it even a bit more challenging. Still God has been faithful. Here are the last few months and what God has done to save the day.

At the beginning of the summer, we needed money to pay all our bills at the beginning of the month. We prayed and God showed up in the mail. We got a 600 dollar check from our escrow account. We're still not sure if they miscalculated something (we bought this house when we moved here about a year ago), or if it has to do with a change on our mortgage insurance, but either way, we needed it.

Fast forward 30 days, same situation, just a little worse. Tammi came in and sat down with me to talk finances. "Here are our options. We can take a partial paycheck and pay the mortgage or we can take no paycheck and pay the rent for the church. What do you want to do? Oh and we need to pay our worship leader and children's worker too." As a man, that's tough, I mean, that's my main gig, providing for my family. Even more than starting a church and loving on people, I'm commanded to take care of the Taylor clan. Tam and I prayed together and the next day, in the mail box we got a support check for 1200 bucks. How amazing is that!!! We didn't ask for it, we didn't even make the need known, it just showed up.

Thirty days later, same song, third verse. This time it was a check for 1000 dollars for some work I hadn't even done yet. The original agreement was that I'd get paid after all the editing was finished. We were still a month out from even doing the shooting, much less all the editing, but I was holding in my hand a 1000 dollar check. The guy who sent it had no idea he answered our prayers.

Number 4. Probably my favorite story (that's happened so far). I'm sitting in a parking lot waiting for a lady 4 spaces up to back out so I could park as close as possible to the front door. While I was waiting, I noticed the car directly to my left was also backing out towards me. "Surely she'll see me!" I thought. I tapped on the horn a couple of times then laid on the horn as hard as I could (as if that would make it louder). I actually broke the plastic piece that activates the horn. My horn didn't stop her, but my driver side door did. She apologized and admitted it was completely her fault. My car left an imprint in her plastic bumper, "Reatta" (only backwards of course). Lucky for her it was a loaner car, hers was being fixed. The Reatta took a good sized dent up by the front wheel well. When the insurance company called me to talk about a fix they said I could just keep the money if I wanted or I could have it fixed, either way it was up to me. I still have the dent, and my house. Another mortgage miracle. I love my car (it turns 20 in January), I'm bummed it's got a dent in it, but I'm thinking about keeping it just as a great story of God's faithfulness. He always shows up.

Last month I felt God calling me to sell some things to make things go and I was faithful to that. I understand completely that God calls us to do our part too. We have to be men and woman willing to give it all up for him. We can't just stand there with our hands out all the time.

All in all the last 4-5 months have been amazing. To me it's just more proof that God is behind the ministry we're doing here. And I know he'll continue to be faithful because he has always been faithful, he has always provided.

Let me close with another verse I ran into recently. It's in the book of 1 John, chapter 3 starting in verse 21, "Dear friends, if our hearts do not condemn us, we have confidence before God and receive from him anything we ask, because we obey his commands and do what pleases him." IF our hearts do not condemn us . . . in other words, if we are clean before God, no unconfessed sin, no baggage that we're carrying around, then we have full confidence in God! He will do what we ask, He will help us accomplish His will on this earth, He will help grow Connections and continue to provide for the Taylor family. I believe this with every fiber of my being! I have FULL CONFIDENCE!!!!