Karrer Middle School FCA

This morning I had the opportunity to speak to the Fellowship of Christian Athletes (FCA) group at Karrer MS. Five blog entries back titled, "An Opportunity to Speak", I wrote about speaking at Sells MS, also in Dublin. The topic was, "Submitting to and praying for those in authority over us".

This morning the topic stayed the same but I had a current life illustration to share. You see, two days after I spoke last week I got a speeding ticket on the 270 loop. I was driving 75mph in a 65mph zone. So after reading the teens Romans 13:1,2 & 4, which says all earthly authorities have been placed there by God and are in a position to punish wrong-doers, I ask them what they thought I said to the State Trooper...You bet I said "Yes Sir" and "No Sir". I even told the man I knew I had done wrong. I would've been happy if he had just given me a warning, but alas he did not. Lesson learned.

The Sweet Taste of Victory

As I two finger type I am enjoying the spoils of sending out my children last night to get free candy from our neighbors. They all gave me their unliked candy, but they're not home now:-) Don't worry I'm not stealing...I told them I'd be pilfering their stashes.

Here's a shot of them from last night. Zach's a pirate, Abby a Zoo Keeper, Sara a cowgirl and Rachel an angel.

I also had a fun time connecting with various neighbors who were on their driveways handing candy out. I'd say halloween is one of the best times of the year to do this. When else do you have permission to walk onto every person in the nieghborhoods property, stand in their doorway and possibly have a conversation.

"The Main Event II"

Here in Columbus, Ohio we don't have an NFL team to cheer for, BUT we do have The Ohio State football team. They are known as the Buckeyes and the fans here are absolutely nuts about them. Two years ago a player on the team named Joel Penton sat in our churches conference room telling our pastoral staff about an idea he and a few of the other players had for reaching Columbus for Christ. That was to rent out St. John Arena (the old basketball building beside the football stadium), bring in the band, some cheerleaders and have players talk about how they came to have a personal relationship with Christ. And to top it all off, have the nationally known, highly respected Head Coach Jim Tressel speak of his own relationship with God and respect for his players. That event two years ago had so many attend they were tuning people away at the doors. Hundreds of people came to Chirst and the area churches were given the names to follow-up on.

Tonight, two years later, was the Main Event II. Not as many people came this year but my son Zach and I got the chance to be part of the event staff and see up close and personal these soon to be pro athletes speak of Christ. We ended up being on the front row where the band marched inches from where we were standing. It was neat to see people we knew from church and school who had brought their neighbors and friends.

I was glad to spend the time doing some ministry with my son as many came to Christ tonight.

Visit to Vineyard

As I've mentioned before, our launch team has been visiting numerous Columbus area churches to see how others are "Seeking HIS Kingdom First". This morning we went to the Columbus Vineyard. They are very proactive with planting churches and may be Columbus' largest church. We enjoyed our time there and got some more great ideas on how to do Sunday morning services.

An Incredible Story

Every other month I attend the North Central Ohio (NCO) pastor’s fellowship meeting. Today it was held at Grace Polaris, which is Grace Church’s mother church. That makes her my grand-mother churchJ. It’s an opportunity to reconnect with other pastor’s in our fellowship and hear updates of what God is doing from individual churches in our district and around the world. Today we heard a story from an African pastor named Francois Ngoumape about how he was kidnapped last November by rebels and how his life was miraculously spared. Tears fell from his eyes as he spoke of God’s protective hand actually inhibiting his captors from killing him with a machete and a machine gun. It was stunning to hear. Here is a picture of him telling his story.

When the meeting ended we all had a delicious lunch provided by our hosts. After that I attended the NCO District Missions meeting where I was asked to give an update on how things are going with Encounter Church. The last time I was at one of these meetings was five months ago and the minutes had down that I had said there were 7-8 families committed. Today I had the pleasure of reporting there are now 17 committed families and that we are having 19 people baptized on November 9 at the Powell YMCA. I also informed them that our Sunday morning launch team meetings will continue until mid-December and that we'll be onsite at Eli Pinney Elementary starting in January. Finally I told them that February and March '09 will be our eight weeks of practice/preview services leading up to April 2009 which will be our Grand Opening month.