As we announced Sunday, Grace Community Church has purchased 58 acres of land just a couple miles from our current meeting location. We are excited about the future. To answer some of the questions we did not have time to share Sunday, I wanted to share some details about this process.
For years, I resisted a call to ministry, partly because of this advice. The simple fact was that I could do some things besides ministry. I had some success in business. In fact, at one point I was extremely successful in my field. In my own strength, I found I could do many things.
I enjoyed meeting some of the people that I admire online this week at Cultivate Conference in Chicago. Names that appear bigger than life to me, because I enjoy their blogs and work so much, were up close and personal. I shook the hands of people like, Jon Acuff, Kem Meyer, Scott McClellan, Kent Shaffer, Tony Steward and Rhett Smith.
Cheryl and I are on vacation in the Southwest. First stop was Albuquerque, NM for the annual balloon festival. We spent Saturday looking at hundreds of beautiful hot air balloons and returned this morning for another look. We left in time to catch the middle service of a great church, Sagebrush Community Church. Pastor Todd Cook was ending a series called “Heart” and shared a message that encouraged us to be encouragers. It was exactly what I needed to hear.
Operation Serve! What an experience! I am so thankful to be a part of Grace Community Church and for all that serve! Let’s not allow this to be a once a year experience. Find ways to continue to take Christ’s love to the streets of our community!
As a church planter concerned about spreading the Gospel of Jesus Christ, but consistently meeting people who have no interest in what they believe Christianity to be, this appears to be an important movie. My friend Michael Hyatt was the first to recommend this movie, which would be enough to encourage me to watch it. After watching the trailer, there is no question I will put this movie on my “must see” list.
Grace Community Church was four years old yesterday. Happy Birthday! We will celebrate it tomorrow by asking our people to sacrifice more and serve the city of Clarksville by offering a third service for the first time. If you do not have a church home join us at 8:30, 10:00 or 11:30 AM at Rossview High School. You can find directions HERE.
One of the toughest jobs in the church must be the role of pastor or minister’s spouse. Recently Cheryl (my spouse) completed a Bible study on her own that she felt was very helpful to her. She believes it will be helpful for other ministry spouses. If her schedule will ever allow it she would love to lead a group of area wives through this study. I decided since it was valuable enough for my wife that I would like to interview one of the authors.
A few weeks ago, in preparing a message for Grace Community Church in which I celebrated the victories we have seen in the last year at Grace, God convicted me for my line of thinking. I was preparing to remind people of the strategy of the church, as we do at the beginning of each new fall season, to encourage them to continue giving their time and resources to further the vision. I believe God gently reminded me that apart from Him, we would have no vision and we would certainly have no success.
As our staff and church has grown, my role is changing. I spend much more of my day interacting with staff members about their particular area of focus. Lately it seems I am saying a lot of, “Let me connect you with _________”, as I refer people to another person on our team.
