God and Country

It’s been a long, tiring week. Maybe more on that later.

Ridge Church had the first of a two part series today called God & Country. Thanks to John Moore for leading some amazing worship today. Here is a few pictures of the set.

What a Statement

This is a Blog post by Seth Godin who wrote the book Tribes. I love the last line. We need to be remarkable.

You’re boring

Sorry, someone had to say it.

Your products are predictable. Your insights are recycled. You don’t bring surprise with you when you enter a room.

That’s why people are ignoring you.

Which used to be fine, because you could just buy attention for your brand or your company or your sales efforts. But that half-price sale on attention is now over.

The only path left is to lean out of the edge and become interesting, noteworthy and yes, remarkable.

Bless You!

Some people have a pattern when they sneeze, Tina always sneezes in threes. Enjoy!

Do you read your Bible??

Today at Ridge we finished part two of TEXT_ a great series where Andy has one goal, to get us to read our Bible. What an amazing message today. Andy took the books of the bible and explained how they were put together, and why they are in the order they are in. For me, it was an eye opener. I have attended church most of my life and I have never had this explained in such a simple way before. PLEASE go here and listen to this message. You will not regret it.

Josh and Tasha Via lead worship today with Brett Banks on bass and Cameron Berg on Drums, I love these guys. Great heart and great spirit. Here are a couple of pics.

Mothers and Me

I have two mothers in my life. Of course my mother, who went to be with the Lord earlier this year after a long struggle with pulmonary fibrosis. She was everything you would want in a mom. She always told me you can do anything you want and to do the best you can. She took us to church and never let us stray to far.

Then there is the mother of my children… and the love of my life. I have no clue how she puts up with my crap. Unlike my mom she had a choice. She chose and continues to choose to be with me. She is an amazing mom to our three kids. She has made some hard choices over the last 14 years. She continually makes sacrifices for the sake of her family. There is no one else in this world that I would rather call my wife. She seems to never stop. She can be doing twenty things all at once. She is always doing something. I love her and I know her children do.

The Gospel is SIMPLE

At Ridge Church this week we are continuing the series SIMPLE. This is one of those messages from Andy that makes you say, YES! the message of Christianity is simple. It is not about following a bunch of man made rules but following the example of Jesus Christ. Here is a video teaser for this Sunday. Trust me if you or someone you know is on the fence about this whole Jesus thing, don’t miss this. Ridge Church 9:30 or 11:00 AM.

Easter 2009

Well it is in the books, Easter 2009. Ridge Church held it’s first Easter service and it went well. Andy Cherry lead worship with Matt Nethery on lead, Brett Banks on Bass, Tim Morrison on Drums and Kellie Robertson on Vocals. They all did a great job. The set was a little traditional mixed with a little contemporary. Here is a picture of the set under different lighting conditions (I love LED fixtures)

Chris brought a great message  “Common Threads” and smashed a real 52″ LCD Sharp 1080P TV right before our very eyes! If you don’t know, you’ll have to go here and listen to the message to find out why.

One Ridge Easter service down, God only knows how many more to come. If he lets me, I would like to do a few more.

The NEWS about churches

I saw this TED talk this morning I thought was very inspiring for those of us who program church services.

Jacek Utko was talking about newspapers, but I think we can apply this to Service Programming. He put a new face on something old. It wasn’t that the news was boring, It was the way it was presented. He updated the packaging. He made it inviting.  I really like what he says at the end of his talk. “Your can work for a small company, in a boring branch, you can have no budgets, no people, but still you can put your work to the highest possible level. Everybody can do it, we just need inspiration, vision, determination. You need to remember, to be good is not enough.”

WOW

Three words sum up this Monday, I AM TIRED. Yesterday started at 5:15 AM when the alarm went off. It ended at 9:45 PM as I picked up the banner from the side of NC-51 in Matthews. There are no pictures of the day, there may be an audio file somewhere, but I don’t even know that for sure. The day was very full. Set up at the Levine Center, CORE, 11:00 Am worship, a quick lunch at Qdoba, setup for Night of Worship, Rehearsal, Ridge’s first creative gathering, Ridge’s first night of worship, tear down and finally… sleep. I really hope this is all worth it. In the end it is not for my glory but for His. I hope God uses my meager attempts to make His name famous, to give Him an opportunity and a venue where he can snap someone out of their aimless existence, and move them in a direction with purpose and meaning.

Week 1 of He’s Still*

Week 1 of He’s Still* Got The Whole World In His Hands is done and I think it was a great start to a great series.  Andy Cherry lead us in worship and we were truly blessed. Andy Stanley really brought all of our fears and concerns front and center. I was personally encouraged to reexamine what I believe about faith in God. Can we trust that God has our best interest at heart in the good times and the bad. That God works all things together for those who love Him. I believe we can. I believe that even though circumstances change God does not. God is Faithful.