August is gone

As I sat down to work on my August Elder Report early this morning, I remembered again that the days I was giving account for are never to be lived again.  The Lord did amazing things at Crossroads, yet still it caused me to really examine my own life.

What things did I personally spend my August days doing that will count for all of eternity?

This could sound dramatic and negative, but is it?

Maybe the simple things, the everyday things are what God counts most.






I remember the day my hubby and I lit up the face of a tired waitress complimenting her and leaving her an encouraging tip.

I remember planning and cooking meals for my family and what pleasure that brings me.

I remember visiting my lonely mom numerous times and breaking up her long days.

I remember encouraging a very discouraged ministry leader outside of Crossroads.

Loving, being kind, being dependable, working with excellence, caring for your family, being generous with what God has provided, all of these are things we each can do daily that will show evidence of Jesus in our lives.

There's a new stirring in my soul causing me to be thankful for the countless little, unknown, simple ways my daily life allows me to live for eternity.  My prayer today is to not miss even one opportunity to encourage others and be an example of how God changes lives!

working on Easter

I just finished writing the video revisions to our Easter videos that are in the process of being prepared.

My ultimate goal is to have every part of our service to be God-honoring and to be used to bring understanding about who Jesus is to those who attend.  In order for that to happen, we must work as hard as possible to eliminate any mistake or lack of excellence.

As I typed out words that I needed removed from the video and images I need slowed down and speeded up, I wondered if the Lord is pleased with our work.  I wondered if the Lord needs our work?

The fact that He has chosen to use us to 'create' services to lead the lost to Him is crazy!  He could have just chosen whom He wanted leaving no part to play for any of us.

Instead, he uses us to create things like services and the details those require, with rehearsals and weeks of preparation and evaluation.  And he uses volunteers who carefully clean the church, and make the coffee and teach the children and greet and park the people.  All so they can see Him through us.  Amazing.

We are just 3 weeks away now, time is moving quickly like always.

Will you play your part in the preparations by inviting lost friends and relatives?

Will you hold every detail of things being prepared in prayer asking the Savior of the Universe to reveal Himself to many at Crossroads this year?

I cannot wait to see Him touch this place....

church = the best

I loved my church growing up, but I still felt at times that we settled for less then excellent. In leadership at times, in the quality of the furnishings, in the approach to ministry. And don't even get me started about the lack of creativity...

At times it was like we just decided to let the world have all the excellence!

I have worked recently to create connections with the local art center and the academy in Mansfield that provides lessons to many of Richland County's top musicians. I want the church to be a place where excellence and creativity abound.

This video recently circulated showing SUCH creativity in the church. Sadly they had to take down the comments because people were leaving such hateful comments. Why would people criticize a ministry for being so 'cutting edge' and current? I say - this is great! click here

Would the Lord bless us with artistic creative ability and then not want it used in church? I don't think so!

a frigid night

I never thought anyone would come out tonight for our First Wednesday communion service due to the frigid weather...but they did.

It was a warm wonderful night of worship inside!

I was overcome with thankfulness to our volunteers that so unselfishly came to worship and serve others! So amazing!

Our communion team worked their magic to decorate the tables and prepare the elements!

All these little details come together to help create an atmosphere of excellence and celebration for our congregation!

It was good to be in the house of the Lord...now, if I can just get home safely!

weekend report

I am so proud to be part of this ministry! Everyone I worked with all weekend was passionate about their responsibilities - and it showed. From the first notes on stage to the Graphic Design Group meeting following the services - excellence permeated each aspect of the weekend.

We even mounted web cams on the heads of some of our actors to try to push our data base and the need to upload their pictures and update their data!



Our setlist:

Pre-Worship: Mighty Is the Power of the Cross
Pre-Worship: Holy, Holy, Holy
Welcome -
Praise: Give Him Praise - Brewster
Praise: Everlasting God
Worship: God You Reign
Worship: Wonderful Cross
Praise: I Will Boast
Message: First teaching from I Corinthians - Tim Armstrong
Announcements: Bill Hill We pushed the sign up for our data base - "Church Community Builder" We made it easy for people to update their info or get a log on and password -by mounting web cams on ball caps and ordering laptop shoulder carriers for rovers to roam around and gather info! It was successful!

To watch our services go to www.crossroadswired.com

To see what other ministries used in their services go to www.theworshipcommunity.com

so proud of our team

We, like many other ministries around the world, did Christmas Eve services to a standing room only crowd, then turned around and did completely different services for the weekend. This is when you find out what your teams are made of!

Ours are made of determination and very, very high skill. They rocked the house tonight! Excellent worship, drama, technical execution and teaching! Such a high level of excellent preparation.

A perfect ending to a wonderful holiday weekend! More about today's service including video tomorrow! I hope you all can join us, you won't be sorry!

excellence

Excellence can be obtained if you:

- care more than others think is wise;
- risk more than others think is safe;
- dream more than others think is practical;
- expect more than others think is possible.

I found this on a blog I was reading and I thought it was an great way to think about achieving excellence. When you lead a volunteer team, it is a very precarious tightrope you walk.

It is a constant struggle worrying about requiring too much and not requiring enough.

Early in Crossroads history I did not require enough, I have talked about the mistakes I made in earlier posts so I wont' go back into the nasty details.

But, I write this to encourage any of you who lead people - they will rise to the level of excellence your require. They seem to be waiting for the challenge.

I hold back my ask many times knowing how hard people work all week long - but the chance to participate in producing excellence with eternal purpose gives them far more personal accomplishment than some of their daytime jobs do. This is NOT to suggest that only ministry related work counts for eternity - of course I am not implying that! It just will never stop moving me to see the dedication that our volunteers bring to the challenge of serving one another within the context of church.

So, I encourage all of you aim ridiculously high. And if you are getting 'no' from people you need excellence from - then you are obviously asking the wrong person. Move on - don't compromise!

lean in close

Couldn't sleep this morning, woke up worrying about all the details that have to come together for Palm Sunday weekend and Easter. (As if worrying is going to help anything). So, after laying for a while I decided the best thing to do is make coffee, spend time in study and prayer...then make a list.

Of course God had exactly what I needed to hear waiting for me. It was the scene where John is reclining against Jesus. Can you imagine leaning close to Jesus? This put everything I have to accomplish into perspective.

In the context of our daily lives how can we lean into Jesus? We lean by surrendering.

All I have to do is read about the misconceptions the disciples had as they followed Jesus, and I ease up on my lack of 'getting it right'. They seemed to be clueless much of the time about what was going on physically right in front of their eyes. They could touch it, lean on it, physically spend time with it and still didn't fully grasp what they were experiencing. When they leaned on Him, they could feel His breath. Think of it!

I know I'm repeating what I've written about before, but I find great comfort in their humanness. Occasional forgetfulness about the scope of God's generosity and a loss of perspective on the only reason I am here on earth is to be understood. But, to carry the burden of trivial earth junk on my own back, that is a choice.

If I chase obedience and surrender to only Him allowing my earthly life to 'lean in close', keeping my eyes glued to His face, then who cares about the order of details being accomplished? Who cares about grumbling or untimely 'suggestions' from those sure there is a better way of doing it? And quite frankly, who cares if I don't get every single detail perfect?

I care only from the perspective of my disorganization hindering the simple message of Christ being clearly presented with a God ordained excellence. That's what I care about. Organizing the details so that others have the opportunity to 'lean in close', laying their very best at His feet.

preparation

The weekend preparation began tonight as it does every Thursday evening.

Steve was adjusting a couple of lights to accommodate our baptisms during worship. Dan was moving a computer out of the sound booth while Bryan was preparing to dial in the sound. Tom was in the lighting booth watching our big production piece being rehearsed for a week from now. (You won't want to miss March 15 & 16, that's all I am going to say about that!)

Musicians were preparing to practice and vocalists were busy warming up and practicing sweet harmonies. All this preparation to bring the Lord our most excellent work, it's going to be amazing!!

seen and critiqued by many

I love my job. I often wonder how I got here. I often wonder what God thinks of my work.

My work is seen by many, critiqued by many, there just isn’t really anything private about my work. It is just out there for all to see. This is difficult sometimes.

I sometimes wonder what it must be like to work privately, quietly, unnoticed. This sounds attractive sometimes!

Would I be as diligent, would I strive so hard for excellence? Or would I be lazy, move slower or ever step out of my comfort zone? Don’t know.

God sees us all the time, every minute, every second. Do I work as if He is watching, as if I believe that He sees all? What about my thoughts? I wonder how much of my day He is glorified by. I want to live as if I believe He is listening and watching me. Can you imagine if you never had to be sorry for any word spoken or any thought? No apologizes, ever.

To live fully committed, fully focused, fully engaged, fully forgiven. I would imagine this would draw the lost to the Lord in ways none of the services I have helped plan every have or ever will. To live a fully devoted life would allow all my work, all my thoughts to freely be examined without shame or apology. And would allow people to catch just a glance of the difference Christ can make in someone’s life. This is the reason for continuing to ask for forgiveness and beginning again and again.

We all get tired. We all question if we are doing what God intended us to spend our lives doing. We all think we can’t. We all want to give up sometimes. We must cling to Him daily and continue ‘a long obedience in the same direction’…we must!

Our services rocked!

The weekend services went off just as planned. Several times recently things just have not gone as we planned on Thursday. But, this weekend went great!

The worship was impacting and the drama/music combo "Let Go" was fabulous! This was a WillowCreek creation. And although it was quite old, it was very relevant and deeply impacted our congregation.

No need to recreate the wheel when products this excellent are available to purchase. You can watch the whole service at www.crossroadswired.com Enjoy!