Home Run

This morning was great!

We busted tail last week to get everything moved in and set up for service in the theater today and it was all worth it. As I said, the venue change was an outward expression of what I feel is a change in the spiritual climate of Focal Point. We arrived at 8 a.m. and there were already several families waiting at the Theater to come in and help set up. You have to realize that for us this is huge. Setup has always been an issue and that's even when we've started setup at 9 a.m. in our old spaces! For people to be there at 8 made our day start off with a bang.

The new space is just what the Doctor ordered! The acoustics are terrific, the environment is exactly what we want (it's a cafe' theater). We added our own sound and lighting and the quality of our church just went up 3 notches. It also pulled more out of our people. It was as if the change made some of our people step up even higher in their passion to serve. I loved it.

The band did a great job today and we also interviewed a woman who visited our church in May who came partially because we were doing a "Desperate Households" series and that day's topic was 'Divorce'. She was looking for me (the Pastor) to give her biblical grounds. She told today how I shared about 95% of my message about the joy of marriage, the value of covenant and that the marriage bond is a vow we make to God as well as our mate. She said "Then he spoke for like 5 minutes on the grounds for divorce and even then he said just because you can doesn't mean you always should." Anyway, it was a powerful testimony because she left that day and God started working her over. She came the next two weeks and I talked about Trust and Communication. God gave her the peace and power to restore her marriage (they were living 4 hours apart- He in D.C. and She here). Well, today's topic was "Pay it Forward". My main point was : The Gospel has the power to change lives. AND You'll never fully experience that power until you GIVE IT AWAY to someone else. The cool thing about her testimony is that after they reconciled, they moved back in and restored their family unit. Well, about a month ago their son (observing what Jesus did in their family life) came into the room crying and he said "Mom, Dad... I want Jesus as my Savior too!" What a start to the new space! It was awesome!

Back to the space:
Out in the foyer they have two pool tables. We had a guy named Lyle (thanks) cut two sheets of 4x8 plywood to cover them. We laid down some industrial blankets (for moving vans) over the tables, then the wood, then some plastic and table decorations. We then had a small table also covered in the same fabric put between the two to create a horse shoe look for our welcome center. I loved it. Totally made use of the space and practically provided a 'focal point' for the foyer area.

I'm riding a high right now... I just told my wife "It sucks that church services are another week away!" She said "Wow, I don't know if I've heard you say THAT before."

Here is a picture someone took from the sound board. I'll get some higher quality shots up in the weeks to come.


Guys... if things are going good... I rejoice with you. If things are down, please let our transformation be an encouragement to you today. Church planting is difficult and it won't always be fun. In fact most days it will stink but if you hang tight and persevere... the joy comes in the mornin' :) I think that's written somewhere.