Sunday Unwind

I am spent. Physically, emotionally, spiritually, completely spent, yet I am also mostly content. I say mostly because I do still have a preaching headache.

Let me start from the beginning.

• Woke up at 5 am with pain in my back and in my gut (not swine flu though, don't panic: leave that to the media. :-P). Anyway, I could not go back to sleep so I got up. Really felt like it was spiritual more than anything physical happening. Spent some time praying and just trying to get in tune as much as I could with what was really going on. Mostly, just trusted God and sought Him for what He wanted to do and say today.
• Got to the office about normal time and just went over the sermon one last time and checked on the tech elements. There was a weight about the day in every step. It wasn't a struggle to do or get through, just a sense of something significant.
• We changed the preservice schedule and routine of our worship band today. I like what we are doing now, but it will take some time for them to find this new preparation groove. Giving them more time to focus and get in tune spiritually.
• The twitterverse was teaming this morning with some great quotes and encouragement. The weight of the day wasn't just at CapCity, it seemed to be many places. God is setting His Church up for soemthing amazing. May each of us be ready for it when it comes.
• Coming out of prayer with the team, I saw some friends from our neighborhood walk in. What a treat to have them in service today!
• Love taking communion as part of the worship set! Again, there was a weight in the room during that time as the Spirit was just doing His thing.
• Took a few minutes to launch a fundraising campaign to complete our café area. This is not a normal effort. Someone stepped forward recently and offered $10,000 in matching money for this project. After presenting it and giving some instruction on timing and response, CapCity once again stepped up to the plate and knocked it out of the park! I haven't seen the full numbers yet, but nearly a third has already been pledged or given. That is just preliminary of what I know from direct contact!
• I settled right in "the groove" today during the message. We wrapped up the series, "What's In Your Bag?" Today I took a lesser known parable out of Matthew 21 of the two sons and talked about follow-thru. In golf, as in many sports, the follow thru motion is at least as important if not more important than anything else. In life, we have to follow thru. It's not enough to start well if we don't finish. Jesus said, "Well done..." not "well started..."
• I broke off for a few minutes and talked about forgiveness, that wasn't planned but really felt compelled of the Spirit to do so.
• I did say that teh church does NOT have a follow up problem at all. We do not NEED another discipleship program or curriculum. There is nothign wrong with soemone writing one, it is just not needed for us to move forward, we have plenty. No our problem in the church is not a problem with follow up, our problem is follow through. We don't finish. We don't walk the journey with people over the long term. We want them to finish a course and get a certificate and think it is done. Acts 2:42 tells us that those who had just been added to the believers "devoted themselves" to the teaching and to prayer. We do not do a good job of helping people to devote themselves. We try to do it all for them.
• There are some who have been saying "No" to God, but are ready to change and say "Yes." There are also some who have said "Yes" but have yet to actually follow thru and obey.
• Had another salvation today! That is ALWAYS awesome. I don't have the exact numbers in front of me but it takes us to around 20 on the year! We have a wasy to go, but I will NEVER complain in any way about any number of people givign their hearts to God!
• We're working on a few things that we are tweaking in our follow through as a church. You'll see these come in to play in various ways.
• Let me tell you, God is setting us up for a move that is far beyond anything we have ever experienced!
• Got together with another family and cooked out lunch today. Love brats and burgers on the grill!
• Played golf this evening. 9 holes with a couple of guys and then 9 on my own. Normally, I try to rest on Sundays, just didn't happen today, might pay for it tomorrow. But I very much enjoyed being out on the course. Took my own advice from the service this morning and worked on my follow through and was hitting the ball much better. Enough about that.
• Like I said, I'm spent. Until...