My Worship Revolution

Our lead pastor at CLC, Ed Tyler, kinda started a blog a few months back.  But now, we got him all set up and he’s really got his own blog!  I’m looking forward to reading as he shares what’s going on in his life, spirit, and mind as he leads our community of faith.

So swing on by and leave him a comment of encouragement!  Click here to get to the new blog.  And be sure to subscribe to his feed as well…especially you CLCers!

And while you’re at it, start your own blog!! If you’re blogging and you aren’t on my CLC blogs list, let me know.  And a My Space blog doesn’t count!

From my sister‘s blog:

That’s my boy!
And appropriate pic.  Caleb dropping back as the QB while Ryan’s on the line protecting him.
Oakland won’t stand a chance when these guys are on the team!

Filmed live at Christian Life Center…
in Stockton:

Thought it was over at 4:55, didn’t ya?

I don’t think we’ll be singing that anytime soon.
Although I wouldn’t mind worshipping with them sometime.
They be havin fun, eh?

So I’ve developed a pretty big value for high quality graphic
design.  Didn’t used to have it.  I think it came from my time at
Revolution, where everything that’s put out looks really good.  It was a
high value there.  And I think it rubbed off on me.  But I’m definitely
not an expert on it.

So I knew I was in a bit of trouble when I was gonna have to try and
come up with a flyer/mailer for our Hillbilly Harvest Festival.  So I
gave it a go.  Luckily, I have a friend down south who is a killer graphic
designer.

So I called Michelle Lasch to ask for some quick tips on designing
in Photoshop.  She told me that after I designed it I could send it to
her to take a look and have her "massage" it a little.  So I jumped on
the offer.  Like I said, I don’t feel like Graphic Design is a gift I
possess…yet.  (Workin at it!) 

So I will share what I think is my embarrassing design to show what
simple changes by someone who knows what they’re doing and has a great
eye can do.  Check out my original concept in comparison to Michelle’s
tweaked versions for me.

BEFORE

Front                                                   Back

AFTER

Front                                                   Back

Night and day difference. 
I knew some of the basics that were wrong with it, but don’t have the skills to get it there.  The 2 places I know I suck the most are having a good working knowledge of the features of Photoshop and I am horrible at knowing how to pick good fonts. 

Anyway, I’m stoked about the way it looks after she fixed it for us.  They’ve gone to print and we will be mailing it to every residence within a mile of our church.  That’s over 9000 residents!!!  Just the fact that there are that many addresses that close to us is a good reminder of how many people there are to reach.  I’m excited about this not even for the hope they’ll come to this one event, but more so that it starts to get our name out there as we seek to make ourselves more visible in our community and be seen as a positive force in our immediate area.  Another 800 or so will go in the hands of our congregation to use as invites.

So that’s what Michelle was able to do starting with my lame design and making a couple tweaks.  She does even better when she starts on her own!  Amazing.  Need to hire a graphic designer for any of your projects?  Hit her up.  You won’t regret it.

Why settle for a faux-hawk when you could have the real thing?
I thought about stopping at this point when cutting my hair this morning:

My wife vetoed that idea.

We’re recently started a new series called Generations.  We have a very multi-generational church.  Through this series we are celebrating the beauty of that.  We are taking each week to highlight a specific generation and recognizing what they bring to the table.  What specific gifts and perspectives they have.  Reminding us that everyone is part of doing this ministry.  And challenging each generation where they need to be challenged.

This week is seniors, 65+.  Each week we are also hoping to highlight the story of someone’s life here at CLC who is a part of that generation through a video testimony.  Here is the video we used this morning.

Meet Babe Sanborn.
She’s 89.  And a half.
She is amazing.
Watch this:

We are blessed to have her!
She is such a cheerleader for our team!  And by the way, she was serious.  You don’t go to her house and leave empty handed.

Did you notice the blue cat pillow 3:53 in?  Of course not.  It was black and white to you I guess.
Babe made that the night before.
That belongs to my son now.
Thanks Babe!!

Read a great post by Jonathon Herron today that explains pretty precisely why I passionately believe small groups are so important.  Whether you call em Life Groups, Community Groups, Care Groups, or something else, it’s all the same.  Please go read it here.

Our church holds 3 core values.
Intimacy with God
Community with insiders.
Influence with outsiders.
It’s all a work in progress, but that is what we value and that is the CLC mark of a maturing disciple.

Life Groups are our number one priority in helping people to experience community.  It is the number one place we want people to move to from the Sunday Morning Gatherings.

Last month we started 5 Life Groups, 3 brand new and 2 that were formerly in existence.  This has taken us from 12-15 people in Life Groups to 52 people in Life Groups just a few weeks ago.  At the end of this month we start 3 more life groups.  Hopefully that will bump that number up to 80-100 people by the end of the year.  I guess I should celebrate that as success, and i do.  but at the same time, I want to see even more people having the opportunity to experience the relationships that come with a Life Group.

Rachel and I are stoked to be starting our own Life Group at the end of this month.  We’ve made some friends, but even as a pastor here we don’t feel super connected.  We long for those deep relationships that can only be developed through spending time together weekly.  If that’s how we feel as leadership involved in our community, it makes me wonder how much more that is felt by guests.

Are you in a Life Group?  If not, jump in!  I can’t wait to get goin again.

It’s funny cause it’s true!

For you "stat hos" out there: the two routes to becoming a famous blogger:

Names come to mind for both of these situations.

Are you a "famous blogger?"  Which route did you take?  Which route are you trying to take?  Or do you even care to be famous? 

HT: Monday Morning Insight

Haven’t blogged for a while.  I’ve had plenty of thoughts bouncing around my hollow dome that I’ve wanted to throw out here, but it’s been a busy week, I’ve been trying to spend the time I have with my fam, and although the thoughts have been there, I haven’t been very motivated to blog.  It’s also been a bit of a taxing week relationally.  Seems like I’ve had one run in after another.  They haven’t all ended up bad or unresolved, but either way, the distractions take something out of you, ya know?  Hopefully it’s just a season…a very short one (not like baseball season).  It’s part of doing this thing called life and engaging with others on the journey.

On a lighter side, I’m way stoked about our guest speaker this coming Sunday!  If you’re a CLC attender, be sure you are there.  You don’t want to miss out!  I became familiar with Earl Creps’ writings about a year or so ago.  I’ve read a number of his posts over at Monday Morning Insight and made it through some of his book, Off Road Disciplines.  He recently left his position at Assembly of God Theological Seminary in Springfield so that he and his wife can embark on a new journey of planting a church in Berkeley, CA.  You can see a post I wrote about that a while back here.  As I said then, I’m still looking forward to seeing where that goes.  Those of you who have been around here long enough know it gets me excited to hear stories of church multiplication, especially from competent and relevant people.

This afternoon I had the opportunity to sit down with him and his wife along with our team to prepare for our gathering on Sunday.  He and his wife are great peeps!  For a well established guy, I am struck my his humility and down to earth nature.  Like I said, lookin forward to Sunday.  Knock one out of the park this week Earl!

So, several weeks ago, I was apparently tagged by Rich Kirkpatrick to share my favorite passage of scripture.  And I never really got around to it.  in fact, I saw the post, but didn’t realize it was a tag thang until someone else he tagged responded.

I had been intending then to share a single verse that has been my favorite for many years now.
Galatians 2:20.
I love it.  But I’ll let you check it out on your own.  Instead, I’m gonna go a slightly different direction with this post.

I’ve had a pretty discouraging day today.  Been pretty frustrated to tell you the truth.  Great way to feel the day before I get the privilege of leading others into God’s presence.  (Note sarcasm…it’s my spiritual gift sometimes.)  But I received an e-mail today from someone at our church looking for information to get plugged into a Life Group.  At the bottom of her e-mail were 2 scriptures.  To be honest, I typically don’t really notice scriptures tagged to a signature in an e-mail.  But I happened to notice and read and it was what I needed to hear.  So I thought for this "tag" I’d go ahead and share those with you.  Maybe someone else needs to hear it, too.

Phillipians 4:4
Rejoice in the LORD always.  I will say it again again: REJOICE!

Numbers 6:24-26
The LORD bless you and keep you.
The LORD make His face shine upon you, and be gracious to you.
The LORD lift up His countenance upon you, and give you peace.

Sidenote: the rest of that Phillipians 4 passage is well worth reading too.  Through verse 9.  I needed to read it all today!
…Ahhh, what the heck, here it is:

Rejoice in the Lord always. I will say it again: Rejoice! Let your gentleness be evident to all. The Lord is near. Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.

Finally,
brothers, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right,
whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable—if anything
is excellent or praiseworthy—think about such things. Whatever
you have learned or received or heard from me, or seen in me—put it
into practice. And the God of peace will be with you.

Anyway, there you have it.
Your turn:  Rachel, Tim, Jenny, Steve