Heroes!

New Series Starting July 5th @ The Ridge!

Don’t Miss This Sunday…or any Sunday in July…@ The Ridge as we kick off this new series. We will be looking at Heroes of the Faith as well as honoring heroes in our midst. Below are the titles of the Heroes messages. The first person to leave a comment and correctly guess the hero for each week will receive a prize! (No cheating if I already talked about it with you ) Also, you’ll find the plan for the heroes we are honoring each week. If you fit into one of these categories or if you know someone who does, be there and invite them to attend with you.

• July 5th – “Unlikely Hero“  …???? … We are honoring all military, fire, police, EMT workers with a special reception and gift.
• July 12th – “Unwavering Hero“  …????…  We will be honoring all private, public and home school teachers as well as any school personnel (administrators, bus drivers, custodial workers, etc.)
• July 19th – “Unworthy Hero“  …????… We will be honoring all of our own Volunteers @ The Ridge who work so faithfully to fulfill God’s mission here! You guys rock! And you’re making an Impact!
• July 26th – “Unsung Heroes“  …???… Who are we honoring this day? That is up to YOU. Stay tuned…

If you can figure out what Hero of the Faith we are talking about each week, leave a comment. Here’s a HINT: you’ll find all of them in the Bible.   Everyone play along! See you Sunday @ The Ridge!

Looking Forward

There are several things I’m “looking forward to” right now:

• …My oldest daughter coming home from a student leadership camp tomorrow. She’s been gone 8 days. Really missed her.
• …My #2 daughter coming home from a 2-week dance camp at “Ballet Magnificat!” in Jackson, MS. She’ll be home the end of next week. Really missin her too!
• …What’s next @ The Ridge!  Some big stuff on the horizon. Some of it I don’t really know what it is yet, but God does! I can sense as I pray about it that He is about to do something significant in our community and in His church @ The Ridge.
• …Our new Creative Arts Pastor, Jerry Davison joining our team next week! Yea!! After 14+ months of prayer and countless interviews and conversations and seemingly endless searching, God has brought His man to us to join our team. I am really excited to have Jerry joining us @ The Ridge. HERE is a BIO and job description of what he’ll be doing. If you are a Ridger, check out his blog HERE and leave them a comment welcoming them to The Ridge. They are currently in route from Las Vegas, NV. I imagine they are somewhere in Arizona or New Mexico right now!
• BTW – Some might have asked why we need this position right now. Well, I’d say we didn’t need this position right now…we needed it a year ago! All you have to do is read the job description and you’ll see all the things that I and a few other staff and volunteers have been juggling for all this time. Then you’ll see how incredibly valuable this position is to God’s work here and the void that was left by Doug when he left. In addition, Jerry is bringing so much more to the table, including some new areas of ministry we’ve never been able to do! You’ll have a chance to meet he and Cheryl and their kids soon and you’ll see that God has brought us an A-player to the team. Again, looking forward to what God has planned! He’s bringing specific people for a specific purpose!
• … to our Community Makeover Weekend August 1-2 as we join with 35+ other churches in our county together to go out into the community and “BE the church.” Can’t wait for this weekend! If you want to help or if you know of someone in need that we could help in our community, e-mail Brenton Lehman , our Community Ministry Intern,  who is running point on this project at brentonl@churchattheridge.com.
• … to Family Fusion Family Camp July 26-30. This is always a highlight of the summer for our church. we have currently 23 families attending. There is room for only TWO more families. Join us by registering HERE. It is a week you WILL NOT forget! It is a week that will impact your family like nothing ever has…guaranteed!
• …to our Summit @ The Ridge on Sunday Evening, August 9th. It will be a “family” picnic and a time of connecting for all Ridgers. It will be a celebration of baptism and worship together as well as a time of vision and a “town hall” of sorts for you to hear my heart and prayers for what God is doing and what He is laying before us this year.
• …a new principle at Austin Middle School. Not that there was anything wrong with the one that was there. Mrs. Tammy Allen has been a fantastic person to work with us @ The Ridge. She took quite a chance letting this new church come into her brand new school building 3+ years ago. She has been a great support and has partnered with us in making a difference in the community. We are very blessed to have had her in leadership at AMS. We will miss her as she goes to open and lead yet another new middle school in our county. As she departs, we look forward to a new relationship with Joel Slater as the new principle. I have had the chance to meet with Mr. Slater and am very excited about this new relationship, as is he.
• …Some REALLY exciting potential opportunities coming in 2010. Something BIG that could change, revive, and renew the hearts of every person @ The Ridge is in the works. Praying for this BIG opportunity to impact the church from the insideout.
• …to some changes in our staff structure that I have been praying and thinking through for some time. Praying for God to provide the resources to make these critical, necessary additions that will make a huge impact on our community.
• …some potential new directions in the areas of student ministry and small groups.
• …possibly returning with a team of Ridgers to Burkina Faso this October.
• …to whatever God wants to do in my life and in His church!

That’s just a few of the things I’m looking forward to right now. Praying for His wisdom and the leadership of the Holy Spirit. Hang on Ridgers…pray hard…keep your fork…God’s up to something BIG! You kow how I know? His word tells me and the enemy is working. Sure sign that God’s about to do something HUGE! Don’t miss it!

Sunday Recap 6-28-09

Good day @ The Ridge as we wrapped up the OnePrayer series today. We heard a very timely message from Andy Stanley called “God Is…Certain.” When life is uncertain, God is not. I was very encouraged as many people were today.

Here are some more highlights:

• Attendance was better today, but still typical June. This has always been our lowest month of the year. Giving definitely has been reflective of that this month. Will be having to make some tough financial decisions soon.
• We saw FOUR adults baptized this morning! That’s what it’s all about! Never gets old.
• Last Thursday we had FOUR kids baptized too at the end of our Impact Week. Two more adults scheduled to be baptized in a couple of weeks! Praise God for changed lives.
• Interviewed a couple who are volunteers @ The Ridge. They were first exposed to The Ridge at our community outreach event last summer at the Paulding Co. Fireworks Show. As a result of us handing out water and glo-sticks to people, this family came to The Ridge last summer. Right before Christmas, both the husband and wife put their faith in Christ and in February were baptized! They’ve come full circle as they are now coodinating volunteers for THIS year’s fireworks show outreach. THAT’S what its all about! THAT’S why we do community outreach events! Love watching how God changes lives!
• Tonight, I hosted a small group study of 6 men in my basement. We are studying “Raising A Modern Day Knight” together. This was our first full session and it was a great time! Really lovin this group.
• My oldest two are away at two different camps and my number 3 child is spending the night at a friend’s house tonight.  What do we do with only 5 kids for the night?
• Can’t wait to actually be back teaching next Sunday as we strart off a new series: HEROES. We’ll be honoring heroes in our community all month as we look at heroes of the Faith in Scripture. Next Sunday, July 5th, we’ll be honoring active and former military personnel along with community heroes who serve in the police, EMT and fire departments. If you are one of these, come in uniform and allow us to honor you as we celebrate our country’s freedom and look at “An Unlikely Hero” in the Bible.

New Series Starting July 5th @ The Ridge!

Impact Week

What a great time we had @ The Ridge this past week! It was IMPACT Sports and Arts Camp Week and it was awesome! We had camps for soccer, wrestling, baseball, sewing, and hip-hop dance. Each night the kids spent an hour in skills, drills and instruction. Then the second hour was spent in what we called “jam session” where there was music and a skit which tied together the theme of the week: Faith. Following that, was small group sessions where we had a chance to look at scripture and reinforce and apply the teaching. Then we had another hour of skill development. Thursday night we ended the week all together for FamJam, our Family Worship Extravaganza!  Overall it was a great week! 59 kids participated and on Thursday 204 parents and kids participated in FamJam. We also had 4 kids baptized Thursday night! Dozens of volunteers from the Ridge were joined by a group of about 20 high school youth from Gray United Methodist Church in Gray, GA. These kids came a ministered in  our community all week and did an awesome job! Thanks to Jason Wade and his team for an outstanding job! Thanks to all you Ridgers who gave of your time this week to make and IMPACT on families in our community! Also, thanks and big props toWendell and to Brenton Lehman, our summer intern, for running point on this event. He came in the last week of May and hit the ground running on IMPACT Week and made it happen. Great job! Big Impact!

Here are a few pics of the week:

Soccer

wrestling

sewing

baseball

Hip-Hop at Final Performance

"Jam Session" Skit

small group time

Awesome Volunteers!

Southern Baptist Convention

Ed Stetzer had a great summary and wrap up report on the SBC. As always, Ed has good insight, details and data. Check it out HERE.

Jon and Kate, Not So Great

Last night I watched the end of Jon & Kate’s marriage on national TV. What a mess! It was sad to watch two people who, by all appearances, totally can’t see the forest for the trees. I was amazed that they can’t seem to get a grasp on what some of the roots of their problems have been. I am no expert counselor, but as my wife and I talked about it, we were both saddened at the lack of perspective they had. Has anyone been counseling these people about anything other than money and ratings? I don’t know. I don’t condemn them and I would never put myself above them, but I think there are some lessons for all of us in this saga. I hurt for this family who claim to be brothers and sisters in Christ.  Here are a couple of thoughts and observations we had:

• Repeatedly they both said, “I don’t really know what happened.” Really? You’re kidding, right? Kate said that she didn’t think the TV show had anything to do with their break-up. Really?! The $$ and the fame and the invasion into their lives had nothing to do with it?
• Jon said that he had become passive and let her rule the roost. Perfect observation, just a little too late. They let their personality strengths become their weaknesses. This can be true in any relationship. It can be true in family, ministry, leadership, work relationships. Those unique personality traits that God built into us by His design, when not understood by oneself and one’s spouse and other relationships, can become a great weakness. We can easily fall into our natural default and the negative aspects of that trait will rule. Key to that in a marriage is communication, understanding, and SELFLESSNESS. We can let pride rule our lives and consequently our relationships or we can let Christ rule. Pride is most easily identified in the strong personality as arrogance or doing things in our own strength, but it is really anything that focuses on me. Shyness and passivity can be manifestations of Pride, because they are self-focused. Anything that is self-focused is pride and is sin. It’s a constant battle for me. Both Jon and Kate appear to have been struggling with pride. It just looks different in each of them.
• The seeming antithesis of this however, is in the statements that they both made repeatedly saying that “It’s all about the kids. I love my kids. Everything is for them. This show is for them. This new house and this land is for them. Everything we’ve done is for them. We love them more than anything.” That sounds like a pretty selfless attitude right? Well, that is a problem in most marriages and its a cultural phenomenon that has had a negative impact on more families and, I believe, on our culture…and even the church. It’s a philosophy that says, “Put the kids first. Its all about them. They are our future.“  Sounds logical. The problem is it isn’t biblical and it isn’t healthy for families and marriages. The first relationship God established was between Adam and Eve. At that point, they were a family. (Genesis 1:27-28; 2:22-25) The problem we have that I believe the Enemy has used for too long is that of what some call “child-centered parenting.” What this looks like is the children become the center of everything in the family.

• Imagine this picture: a husband and wife holding hands forming a small circle, a family. Then the first child comes along. A child centered philosophy places the child in the center of this circle. Sounds fine and for the first couple of months with only on child, it might work out okay. But as the child begins to understand (or even demand) being in the center of the circle, he/she realizes that they are the driving force. Self-centeredness (which we all are naturally bent toward) begins to take hold. The expectations rise. Everything becomes about them and their happiness. This is what seems to have happened to Jon & Kate. We call it spoiled, but it isn’t really something that is intentional most of the time. What happens as the child grows and more children come into the marriage is the most potentially devastating part of the picture in a marriage.
• Imagine the picture again of the mom and dad holding hands now with several kids in the middle of the circle who have all gotten bigger. It gets crowded. Mom and dad get pushed farther apart. Notice I referred to them as “mom & dad” not “husband & wife” any longer. You see child centered parenting pushes the original, most important relationship in the family farther and farther apart. The identity of those two individuals becomes all about the kids. Now the kids are important, but they are not the most important relationship in the family.
• Now imagine this picture: the mom and dad holding hands in a small circle. Along comes a child and instead of being placed in the center of that circle, he/she is held with one hand in mom’s and the other in dads, allowing the husband and wife to still stay connected. This makes the circle extend and everyone stays connected…especially the husband and wife. That relationship never changes. Children thus become an extension of the family, not the center of it. The only thing that needs to be in the center of this ever expanding circle is Jesus Christ. The most important relationship in any family, after each individual’s relationship with Christ, is the relationship of the husband and wife. Someone once said, “The greatest security any child can have is knowing that mom and dad love each other“, without question. Child centered parenting…”its all about them”…points the focus in a different direction, and pushes the parents apart ultimately, because the focus on their own relationship with one another becomes secondary.

• Those kids don’t need any of the things that they’ve been given. The more stuff we give our kids, the less content they will be. They need a mom and dad who love each other and will fight for their marriage.
• Finally, child-centered parenting is ultimately a pride issue, because it usually becomes about US. It can become, if we’re honest, about how we think other people see US and what they think about US and how OUR kids turned out. My focus needs to be on how people see Christ in my marriage, because it is a picture of His relationship with his bride, the church. My focus needs to be on the mandate of Deuteronomy 6 and the challenge of Psalm 78:1-8. My passion should be about raising up a generation that will impact another generation, not about their temporary “happiness” as seen in the world, right now.

Just a couple of observations that we made as we looked at a very sad situation. I pray for Jon & Kate. I pray that God might miraculously intervene and heal and restore their marriage. I pray that they would recognize that He loves them unconditionally and that He loves their family more than they do. I pray that we as parents might have a Christ-centered perspective on our family. I pray that each of us will focus on keeping that first relationship in the family a priority, second only to our own individual relationships with Jesus. Date your spouse as regularly as possible. Let your kids see how important that relationship is. That will give them GREAT security…and much happiness and contentment.

Father’s Day Recap 6-21-09

Here’s some highlights from today@ The Ridge:

• I’ve decided that everyone goes to church on Mother’s Day because you are supposed to and no one comes to church on Father’s Day. Everyone I talked to at other churches were down in attendance today.
• We had a good time today though. Opened the gathering with some dads in a putting contest on stage. Gave away some Home Depot giftcards.
• BIG Announcement was given today: Jerry Davison will be joining our staff in July as Creative Arts Pastor! After 14 months of praying, searching, interviewing many, many candidates, God has led Jerry & his wife Cheryl and their family to join us @ The Ridge!  Our Creative Arts team has done an awesome job this past year + of keeping things going. MAJOR props to Jason, Kerry, Richard, Danny S., Michelle B., Kendall, Danny M., James, Michelle M., Shane, Chris, Stan, and others who have kept this ministry rolling.
• Continued our One Prayer series with a great message from Craig Groeschel: “God Is…Father” as we looked at the story of the prodigal son and the character of God illustrated in that parable.
• Got to chill some this afternoon after my lovely wife fixed one of my favorite meals: homemade French Dip sandwiches. MMMM!
• This evening went out with the family. While my wife was shopping with my older two daughters, I took the rest to the local RaceTrac where we partook of 68 cent Dr. Pepper Icees. Good stuff!
• After returning home I went over to Powder Springs for an ordination service for one of my former students and also former Ridger Mark Tanner. Mark is currently living in Savannah helping Doug at Canvas Church.
• After that, I got to go hang out with three other pastors at Taco Mac. Good times just hangin out and talking. No one understands what you’re dealing with if you are a pastor like another pastor.
• back home to kiss my kids goodnight and chill a while before going to bed.
• hittin the ground running tomorrow. Big week ahead with our IMPACT Week starting Monday evening.

This Week…

Wow! this has been a week of “brush fires” for sure. Lots of little things eating the week away…kinda like a bunch of little, yapping, ankle-biting dogs vying for your attention. I hate weeks like that!

Anyway, I’m looking forward to my wife (aka the most amazing woman in the world) returning home this afternoon. She’s been in Nashville most of the week at her parent’s house taking care of some residual details from her brother’s death (see here too) a few weeks ago. Been hangin out this week with my two oldest daughters while she took the younger kids with her to “Nanny & PawPaw’s”. Appreciate all those who have continued to pray for her and her family. There is still a long road ahead with all of this.

I am excited about this Sunday @ The Ridge as we continue in the OnePrayer series. Father’s Day @ The Ridge is going to be great! Don’t miss it!

There is going to be a HUGE announcement this Sunday that I have been anxiously waiting to make for quite some time! Be there to hear about it!

This next week we have IMPACT Week at The Ridge. This is a huge community outreach as we will be doing a sports and arts camp for kids in teh community. If you haven’t signe your kids up yet, you can still get them in by going online HERE. Some groups are already full, but there are several great options. Let us know if you’d like to volunteer too. Pray for this week. It is a great chance for us to connect with many families in the community. Ridgers, makew sure YOUR kids are signed up too!

At the end of this week, we will have FamJam on Thursday evening. You need to bring your family to Austin Middle School Thursday night at 6:00pm for an amazing, high-octane experience you and your kids will not forget! Don’t miss it!

See you all Sunday @ The Ridge! Did I mention there is going to be a HUGE announcement?

Gotta Link This

Matt Willmington had a great post earlier this week. Love this guy and his insight! What should an unbeliever see when he/she comes into our church? Check it out HERE.

What Is That To You?

Great post by Steven Furtick today. Check it out HERE.