I know how life can, on occasion, take the wind out of your sails. It can be hard to listen to me get up on Sundays and hear me say to be on mission connecting people to God one person at a time, and you don’t even feel like you are plugged in yourself.

Let me remind you friends, God, Himself, wants to be your very great reward. It is not money, it is not more time to yourself, it is not the perfect family, or someone to share your life with. All of these things are wonderful and I hope them on all of you, but God wants something better for you! He wants to be your very great reward! Let Him be your shield, let Him guard your heart. Spend time in His word learning who He is and what He thinks about you. Spend time praying (I personally type out my prayers – I spend so much time on a computer I have found that I am more focused when I just open up and start pouring out through typing). Find time to be silent before the Lord and let Him restore you.

Some of you need deep healing, and you are so busy looking for it everywhere else that you are missing the ONE who wants to give it to you!

and that… is a VERY great reward!

I have been studying this question of people who don’t know though. One of the interesting things that I have come upon is stories of people who have seen a vision of Jesus and accepted him and became Christ followers. Check out these videos on You Tube of Muslim men and women who see Jesus and follow http://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=muslim+vision+of+jesus&aq=f

Here is a book about Jesus appearing to Eskimo Indians – it’s really pretty interesting stuff

I just find this interesting. I love that God is unpredictable.

Keep praying, God is doing cool things in Andover!

As I walked home in the freezing cold I kept coming back to two things. The first is that I will not be satisfied unless we are reaching people who have felt disconnected from God. I will fight like crazy to reach those people. The second is that I want our church to be such a vital entity in the community that if it were gone there would be an outcry from those who don’t even know or care about God.

Those are the two things I feel like God is calling me to fight for in Andover and I will continue to give all I’ve got to fullfilling that call!

I have been blessed by so many friends, family and organizations who have placed their trust in Jenni and I and our ability to follow God as He unfolds His work in Andover.  I realize that the struggle I face is one they face as well.  We are partners in this mission to see people reached who are far from God.  I hope that each person who is financially backing Epic Church knows that I will do whatever it takes to reach those people – I will become all things to all men that I might reach them!

The struggle is not really one of finances or selling your vision.  The struggle is really to be a person of integrity and honesty – to be trustworthy.  I want for people to look at me and say, “I believe that he is invested enough in the Kingdom that he will really pull this off!”

So, the questions I have to ask myself:

• Are you hungering for the word of God?
• Are you spending real time in the word?
• Are you being faithful to your wife?
• Are you being a great dad to your children?
• Are you making friends with people who are far from God?
• Who are you investing in?
• Who is investing in you?

Answering these questions right will continue to turn me into the kind of man people will want to give to and support.

Our last meeting was really helpful in explaining the idea and giving people some very practical ways to pray for us.

If you can’t make it tonight we would still love for you to join us in prayer from 7-8:30!

We are planning on accomplishing this in a couple of ways.

1. Service: At Epic, we believe you grow through serving.  No, scratch that, we believe everyone grows through serving – your kids included.  There are plenty of ways kids can begin serving today and learning how to use their gifts and talents for the Kingdom of God.  This can be as simple as working with their mom to hand out bottles of water to over-heated passer-byers.  We envision kids helping pass out programs at church, helping set up and tear down, running computers, helping paint an elderly person’s house, and so much more!
2. Connect to God through Worship: We want families to feel comfortable worshiping together.  We love it when babies cry, and kids talk – we are in this for the family!  We don’t want you to ever feel like you need to split up your family to go to church.  This is not to say that your children are not more than welcome to attend our dynamic children’s program, we just want you to understand we love having kids in worship and strive to make it something that is enjoyable for them as well as for you!
3. Connect to People through Small Groups: Life is too difficult to do on our own, but if you are like our family it’s also too difficult to find time to do it with other people.  That is why we intentionally carve out time every week to spend with some of our closest friends to eat together, play games together, share insights into raising our families, and to grow in our relationship with God together!  There is no better way to safe-guard your family than to get involved with a small group!

We know that involving kids so heavily in the adult aspect of church sounds a little messy, and if we are being honest, it is.  Tomorrow’s post deals with this issue of having kids at the table when we are together at church!