Scott had a good post today letting us know some random things that were on his mind and I liked it. So like any good pastor, I thought I would steal that idea and share with you what is on my mind today. To read Scott’s thoughts click here.

1. My message this week entitled: Growing Up
2. Lot’s of meomeries of the last year in our school
3. Nervousness about moving to the theatre (good nervous)
4. Changes I sense coming
5. What is for dinner?
6. Sex (starting a new series and I have been listening to sermons and reading a lot of books on this subject)
7. Stage design for the new series
8. What our video Ken is doing will look like
9. How I feel something big is about to happen at RSC (not sure if it is good or bad or both)
10. I truly love my job
11. I truly love my church
12. How to get the money to lease a Design Jet 800 printer
13. Are our door hangers going to make in time for our huge push Saturday morning?
14. I am very blessed
15. Who is getting kicked off Rock Star: INXS tonight

This is our last sunday at the school. That has been a little weird to me this week. Teasley Middle School is one of the oldest schools in town and it really isn’t in a great location. It is dirty most every Sunday and the bathrooms are horrible. We tripped the breakers all the time and the AC only worked when it felt like it. Yet, she has been good to us. God used her to grow us to where we are today and to see people literally have their lives changed by the power of God.

I feel as if this is a closing point for our church in some ways. After we move, I truly feel we will grow even more rapidly then we have and the intimacy of being a church our size will disappear. I am taking this week as I did last week to have a “family chat.” The larger we get, the less those will happen. That is too bad.

I am so excited about the move that I can’t stand it. But Teasley Middle School was where IT all started and for that, it will always have a soft spot to me. That is odd but it is the way I feel.

So this week we rock it out one more time in the school everyone said a church could never make it in.
That is cool.

In honor of a new baby and the big ask working, this weeks cool church plant is Focal Point Church in Chesapeake, VA.

Tally, sounds like you had a great week!

It doesn’t get much cooler then that!

Business Week Online published the top twenty most innovative companies. I thought it was interesting so if you want to check it out, click here.

Tim is in his office rocking out to himself singing from the RSC CD rough cuts. Is that odd?

We had a great day at RSC today. It was so nice to have the last three weeks and have Tadd preach on two of those weeks but, it was even nicer to be back. I often joke that I put Tadd teaching on the weeks that I know attendance will be down but he must have done something right because they were all back this week. It is so nice to know that I have someone that connects with our people and can stand on stage and not have the church miss a beat. I know a lot of planters don’t have that so I feel lucky.

Worship was off the hook today and I felt such liberty to teach. I did a little house cleaning today and will be doing a little more next week. There are the type of messages you don’t really enjoy teaching but need to be taught. Especially for us before we move. Today I taught on Unity in the church. It was actually a very straight forward message and I basically recast our vision and said if you can’t be on board with that, then we are probably not the church for you. Well tonight the first person decided it was not the church for them. I hate that. I truly do. I really appreciate this family and what they meant to us but it WAS time for them to move on and I am glad they realized that.

I have talked before about being mean about you vision. We make no bones about the fact that it will not compromise and my staff and leadership support that. That makes things a lot easier.

Tonight we went to Mountain Lake Church and it was great. They are an awesome work and God has blown the doors off there in thier short 5 years.

It was GREAT to get the big MO back especially heading into our last week at the school.

My good friend and one of our start-up guys, Scott King has been mixing some music from one of our recent services. To check out a little bit of what RSC’s style is like, click here.

Come on, you got to admit, My Glorious is off the hook. I am so proud of these guys it is amazing.

Sweet Emotion was a two minute opener. We have a huge cafe in our services so we do a two minute jam to start the service and let people get in their seats. It normally is a secular song that goes along with the message.

As a follow up to the below post, I have also been thinking of the many things we do right at RSC. It is easy to focus on the negative and not remember the positive at times.

1.) Reached Unchurched - I do very few things right but I do connect with unchurched people well. Our church is full of them.

2.) Know our area - I have talked about his a lot on here. No one knows our area better then us.

3.) Music - God has blown the doors off in this area. Tim does a GREAT job and this has been huge for us.

4.) Branding - We have done a good job creating a “look” in the community with our advertising.

5.) Advertising - We have very little money in this are yet we have stretched it to the max and see great return for it.

6.) Preschool - I sleep with the person in charge of preschool so I am bias but they do a top notch job in that area.

7.) Creativity - We place a large emphasis on this and it shows and pays off.

8.) Sundays - We are all about Sundays and 99% of the time it shows as we do a top notch service.

9.) Teaching - I am not the best teacher but, it connects with our crowd. Like it or not, people come in the early days because they connect with the pastor. It isn’t about me but that is the reality and any church planter who tells you different is wrong.

10.) Vision - Our people buy into what we are doing.

11.) Different Connections - Each of our staff has connected with different people. Meaning people that I have not truly been able to form relationships with, Tadd has. Ones Tadd hasn’t been able to connect with, Tim has, etc. That is nice to know it is not all up to you because you will only connect with certain amount of people.

Just as with the mistakes, I am sure there is more things we have done right but these come to mind at this time.

We are coming up on our one year anniversary and I have been doing a lot of thinking lately about what we have done right and what we have done wrong. So I figured I might as well post some of the thoughts here.

Today, I’ll post some things I would have done different.

1.) Assimilation - We do a AWFUL job of following up on first time guests. We have never had any system and I have no doubt this has hurt us in the area of growth. Hopefully we have corrected this problem and will see the benefits of this.

2.) Hiring - I have hit some duds in the area of staffing. I thank God for the group we have now but it has been one of the main areas God has had to teach me.

3.) Not focused on those negative people - We have had VERY few but they have gotten more of my time then those on board.

4.) Not tried to start everything at once - We are 11 months old. We are a baby and we can’t do everything “grown-up” churches can do.

5.) Not started a youth group - We started a youth group to early. We should have just focused on preschool and children. That is what we are doing.

6.) Put more emphasis on small groups - We started strong in this area but because it was one of a million things we were doing, it fell to the wayside. Those who are in small groups are are most faithful people.

7.) Been the boss - I feel I have a great relationship with my staff. I truly thank God for them every day. They all read this blog. At times I have tried and been the friend to much. It is a balance act and one area I struggle with. I am still mastering boss and buddy balance.

8.) Focused on the little things - We nail the big things. However, it is the thousand little things we drop the ball on.

9.) Focused on 52 big days a year instead of one big day here and there then following that up with a dud service.

10.) Teach on giving sooner - I never wanted to talk about money but now I feel I have no problem. It takes money to see a big vision through.

11.) Not done video - We never pull it off and yet we keep trying and keep looking foolish.

12.) Done creative team sermon planning sooner - It has changed our Sunday morning services and my relationship with our worship pastor. We are so on the same page it is insane.

13.) Not talked about doing things but actually doing it - We talk about improving things and actually come up with ways of doing it but a lot of time we don’t follow through.

I will think of more but those are huge to me right now.

So the girls wore flip-flops to the white house? Who cares. I respect the president and I even voted for him but if I had the chance to meet him in the casual type setting like these girls did then I would be me and wear flip-flops as well.

If it is good enough for the people of RSC on Sunday mornins, it is good enough for anyone.