WEEKEND UPDATE 062711

Greetings in the name of Jesus!  What a fantastic weekend I had.  Just sayin'.  Got to spend all of Saturday with Leslie doing tons of things I don't usually get to do on Saturday, 'cause Sunday I had the day off!  Woot!  Went to Crossroads 10:30AM service to worship with friends and hear from Student Pastor Chris Brooks who shared Sunday's message: Masquerade.  GREAT job Chris!  Exceptional, clear, compelling confrontation with the truth!  Loved the visuals, loved the delivery, loved the message. 

It was extremely cool getting to play "first-time attender" at Crossroads.  I really tried to put myself in the mind of someone coming for the very first time.  Loved the Lobby experience!  The worship band did a great job, and the message was something relevant to my life and easy to understand.  I would definitely come BACK to Crossroads!

In the days to come, I'll be sharing a really important series of Blog posts about something near and dear to all of our hearts:  M-O-N-E-Y, and what we do (and don't do) with it.  Good stuff for our lives.  Hope you connect with the messages.  Link the posts on your Facebook page.  Help spread the word.

Speaking of spreading the word...we are kicking off a brand new Summer Series this Sunday July 3rd called SUPER!  It's about discovering the Superhero in each of us.  I hope you show up big and invite even BIGGER for this Summer Blockbuster.  Look for more information on SUPER in this weeks email blast!

On a final note, we launched a brand new campaign this week on our digital billboard at Hwy 84 and Boll Weevil Circle.  It's designed for one reason and one reason only: to reach those who are not reached by the traditional church.  There's a link provided on the advertising that you might find interesting.  I won't post it here.  Get out there and sleuth it for yourself.  It'll be better that way.

Have a GREAT week!

Crossroads Permanent Home: Part IV

Over the last week or so, I've been sharing a series of Blog posts about our journery as a church from portable to permanent.  This is the final post in this series until the Fall of this year.  Make sure you read all the posts in the series.  Thanks for connecting!

Today, as I write this post, there's some things that we know, and some things that we don't know.  We know that God has chosen to bless the work at Crossroads in ways we never imagined.  We know that with God's blessing we have already beaten some very daunting odds: (80% of all church plants fail in the first 18 months, and 80% of churches that do not reach 200 in attendance within the first two years, never do).  We know that we CAN do portable church.  We know that we have a great place to do it with a landlord who has never raised our rent, or fussed at us in any way for something we didn't deserve (a few minor things).  We know we have a great (and exclusive) relationship with Clark Theatres.

We know we have a permanent home for our growing Children's ministries, Youth ministry and administrative functions.  We know that Clark's intention is to build a new movie theatre complex sometime within the next 18 months, and we know that we have entered into a formal agreement to purchase the College Cinema when he does.

But we also know that plans change.  And that opens the door to talk about what we don't know.  Here's a biggie:  Can I promise you with absolute certainty that Clark will build and move out within the next 18 months?  No, I cannot.  I don't KNOW that he absolutely positively will.  But I CAN promise you that if he DOES (in a timely manner), Crossroads will secure a mortgage on the building and take possession of it.

Because plans change, we felt it was important to explore other options.  Because we now own a building (a mortgage) in the College Plaza, we feel those options include building right where we are.  Because we feel strongly compelled to remain at our current location, we are comitting to securing the property (17,500 SF) immediately adjacent to our existing building.  Should Clark move as planned, we have room to expand on the other side.  Some possibilities for that expansion might include a fellowship hall, cafe, workout facilities, educational facilities, but most importantly, a place from which to distribute food and other essential items to people in trouble.  Should Clark opt not to move, we have room to construct a 700 seat auditorium, lobby, restrooms, and expanded children's and youth facilities, and tie them to our existing building.  Either way you look at it, it's a smart play for us to acquire that land. 

Additionally, since the College Plaza is our home, we feel it's important to make a modest investment in making the place more appealing.  We're going to start that when the weather cools down a bit (say mid-August, LOL), by having a couple of Clean-up Weekends, getting a roll-off dumpster, assembling some volunteers (are you up?), and clean up all the flippin' garbage, trash, building materials, and other junk that is laying around all over the College Plaza.  New signage comes next (look HERE for an example of why that's important).  We want to raise the bar on what it means to be a tenant in the College Plaza - so we're going to have to lead big to make it happen.

Something else we don't know - but we suspect may be all too true - is how many people come through our doors, only to find that their Cinema One experience is a bit dark, and a bit smelly, and a bit worn out.  And as a result, choose not to come back to Crossroads.  The condition of Cinema One is something we've overlooked for the past three years, but I don't think everyone is willing to overlook it.  We can do better.

This Fall (best guess on the exact date is Sunday, September 18th), we will be RE-LAUNCHING Crossroads main service down the hall in Cinema 3.  Cinema 3 is newer, and nicer, and brighter, with exactly the same number of seats (that don't squeak) as Cinema One.  The difference is, it's wider and makes for much better sightlines for those in attendance.  The staging will be better, the sound will be better, the lighting will be better - the entire Sunday service experience will be better.  We're going to renovate the hallway that leads to Cinema 3 as well, to make it brighter and more modern.  We're also repainting the worn out, faded and raggedly looking metal awning on the front of the building.  As long as we're in the College Cinema, we're going to make every effort to make it a place that people are PROUD to call their church home!  

Well guys, that's it on this topic for now.  Coming this Fall - in conjunction with our RE-LAUNCH and move to Cinema 3, we'll be announcing a new Capital Campaign with specific goals and specific timetables.  Thank you for everything you have done to honor God with your special giving over the past year.  It has born an abundant harvest of fruit for the Kingdom of God in the people that you have influenced for Christ, and the lives that have been changed as a result.

One day Crossroads WILL have a permanent home.  It will happen on God's timetable and not ours.  In the mean time, we're going to do everything we can possibly do, with the resources God has given us, to grow His Kingdom on the earth.  We want MORE people to know Jesus!  We want His Church to grow and grow and grow!  And while we're doing that, we believe and we understand that people, not buildings, come first.  We also believe and understand that:

"A church isn't a building, it's a family..but every family needs a home."

Mid-Week Update

Greetings!  Been out of the loop for the last couple of days as Leslie and I made a visit to Birmingham for UAB's Student/Parent Orientation.  It was awesome, but a little like drinking from a firehose.  Lot of information in a short amount of time.  We'll do our best to digest it and make the most of it!

This past Sunday we celebrated Father's Day with an extra-special service for dads (and those who have them), called Father Knows Best.  If you are a dad, or you ever had one, you know all too well that Father Knows Best is a seriously moving target.  Fortunately we have a Heavenly Father who absolutely DOES know best.  If you weren't able to be with us Sunday, check out the message by clicking HERE.

If you've been following the Intersection, then you know I've been sharing with you a multi-part series on Crossroads Plan for a Permanent Home.  Check out PART 1, PART 2 and PART 3 by clicking on the links.  We'll be continuing that series of posts this week.

Summer Semester of Small Groups will begin the week of 10 July and go for eight weeks.  We'll be providing an in-house DVD-based study guide called DRIVE.  It's packed with awesome essentials to help provide Fuel for You Journey...with God, with Others and with the World around you.  Great stuff!  If you are currently a small group leader and you have not contacted Pastor Ben Rice about whether you will be leading a summer semester small group, please do so as quick as you can.  Also, please let him know who in your small group wants to attend the summer semester.  If you've never been in a small group before, but you sent in an e-request, or you signed up in the lobby, we'll be contacting you with information about your summer semester small group in the next week.

Stay connected with everything going on at Crossroads and make sure you use all of the resources available to you that are provided on this blog, in our weekly email blasts, and at our WEBSITE!  If you have TEENS or CHILDREN at Crossroads, there are fantastic resources that you can use to stay connected, and informed about what's going on in your kids areas of ministry at church.

Have a GREAT week!

Crossroads Permanent Home, Part III

A ridiculous work schedule kept me from my blog for a couple of days.  Hope you're still there.  This is a continuing series of posts on our current plans for Crossroads permanent home.  Be sure to read all the posts in the series.

"For which of you intending to build a tower does not sit down first and count the cost?" 

Luke 14:28

Those words Jesus spoke, and the words that came after them, have implications for many areas of our lives.  The context in which he is speaking is discipleship - the cost of being a disciple.  But the Scripture is completely relevant for anything you're building, whether it's a life, a family, a career...or a church home.

One of the things we recognized while God was opening the door for us to purchse the dance studio, was that we had long ignored, or just looked past and stepped over, how makeshift and shoddy our Children's Ministry facilities were.  We also recognized that we have a young congregation at Crossroads and, as a result, some days our toddler and pre-school areas are bursting with children. 

We began to recognize that not everyone who walk through the doors at Crossroads would automatically understand - or appreciate - the opportunities represented by portable church.  In fact, we saw many young families leave Crossroads because our children's facilities left much to be desired.

We counted the cost, and the cost was too high to afford.  The cost, that is, of ignoring how important and valuable for our entire church family, upgrading our children's faclities would be.  We didn't have a lot of cards to play, so we went "all in" with the cards we had.  We might not have a permanent home for our entire church, but what God placed in our hands was the opportunity to have a permanent home for all the children of every Crossroads attender.

"Let the little children come to me,  Don't stop them!  For the Kingdom of Heaven belongs to those who are like these children".  Matthew 19:14

We dove into remodeling our new building with tremendous passion.  We constructed modest offices for our staff, and with tons of volunteer hours, creative ideas, and staff members with hammers and paint brushes in their hands, we turned 4000 square feet of space into awesome PERMANENT facilities.  A new nursery, toddler area, pre-school, and elementary space that is shared with our teens.  We planned and worked dilligently to make the very best use of the resources we had, spending less than $10 a square foot to renovate a frumpy, worn-out dance studio into Kids Crossing, Crossroads Teens and the church's permanent offices.  It was a tremendous comittment.  It cost something to do it.  But we counted the cost, and the cost of NOT doing anything far outweighed the cost of progress.

All of a sudden, PLAN B began to look more like something God actually envisioned in the first place.  A project we could take on and accomplish.  Something we could handle.  If you read from Luke 14:28, you see Jesus explaining why it's so important to count the cost.  He says:

"Who would begin construction of a building without first counting the cost to see if there is enough money to finish it?  Otherwise, you might complete only the foundation before running out of money, and then everyone would laugh at you.  They would say, 'There's the person who started the building and couldn't afford to finish it'".  Luke 14:28-30

No one's laughing at us, and they're not going to either.  And I am SO GRATEFUL that God directed us to THIS project FIRST!  We were not ready yet in any way, shape, or form to begin renovating the College Cinema.  We weren't ready to buy the building as a church family, and we weren't ready to finish it.  We have a building now.  It's small, but we're not "despising the day of small beginnings".  We're rejoicing that God has protected us from our own zeal, and given us time to grow and get stronger.  Along the way we have learned a great deal about doing a big project together.  We've learned about raising some money to do it, and the sum total of that experience is that we have a permanent building RIGHT NEXT DOOR TO WHERE WE MEET ON SUNDAY that is an absolute showplace anyone who calls Crossroads home can be proud of and grateful for.

What will God do next?  In the next post I'll share with you exactly where we are today with Clark Theatres, and with the land on the OTHER side of the building we now call home.  Peace!

        

Crossroads Permanent Home: Part II

This is a continuing series of posts about what's next for our church in terms of location and permanent buildings.  Make sure you read all the posts in the series.

When we left off yesterday, we'd only raised about half the money we were trying to raise, and Clark was more than a year behind in his plan to move out of the College Cinema.  It's important at this point to note that none of this took us by surprise.  By late Summer of 2010 it was obvious to me that Clark's timetable for moving had slipped dramatically.  But something happened while I was in Haiti that changed our course.

"For all who are led by the Spirit of God are children of God".  Romans 8:14

It should have been obvious to me when Tracey Solomon called me in Haiti telling me she wanted to sell the Enterprise Dance Studio so she could buy a building owned by someone I knew that God was up to something.  It should have been obvious when the person I knew who owned the building she wanted called me and told me how desperate he was to sell his building (BTW, the same building we'd looked at and planned to lease three years earlier, only to see the City of Enterprise intervene saying, "We don't want a church in that location").  It should have been obvious to me when Tracy called me back saying she wanted that new building so much she was willing to sell Crossroads her building, deferring the downpayment for a year, and carrying the note herself.  It should have been obvious.  But it wasn't...at least not to me.

"Do you see a man who is wise in his own eyes?  There is more hope for a fool that for him". 

Proverbs 26:12

"No, Tracey.  We have a plan (PLAN A) and we're going to stick to it.  It's never been our plan (PLAN A) to do anything other than put our money together for a down payment and acquire the College Cinema.  that's what we've been planning to do all along (PLAN A)".  I heard myself tell her that a half dozen times.  She persisted.  It was shameful really.  She did everything in the world to make it 100% painless to purchase her building.  A building we were already renting from her every Sunday for our children's Ministry.  Finally, I had to begin admitting to myself that it was possible that God was opening a door for us to do something different than we thought He wanted us to do.  We did the numbers.  By purchasing her building, our operating expenses would be about $700 a month less than what we were currently spending to rent space in Morgan Square Mall for our Annex.  It would take a financial commitment to remodel the space for our full-time use, but we had resources.  Clearly...it was Plan B time.

"God is using your circumstances to position and prepare you to accomplish His vision for your life".  Andy Stanley (from 'Visioneering')

Over the Fall of 2010 as we waited to take possession of the dance studio next door to the College Cinema, we dreamed and planned what could now be accomplished.  Yes, it looked different than what we originally envisioned.  But it became clear that God was orchestrating all of this, in spite of what we had thought He was going to do.  The move gave us more time.  It gave Clark more time.  It gave us time to pray and learn and grow and get better at what we were doing without a $750 thousand mortgage hanging over our heads.  It gave us time to restructure and reorganize our entire approach to ministry.  It gave Clark time to seek the best possible terms for funding his project, and it removed his own self-imposed pressure to build before he was ready.

God has a vision - a plan and a purpose for what He wants to accomplish in and through Crossroads.  I'm in a hurry.  He isn't.  I look at the calendar.  He doesn't.  In the end, spiritual transformation (for a person, or a family, or a church) doesn't take place when we get what we want...it takes place in the waiting.

Tommorow, more about Crossroads PLAN B: what the immediate results and benefits of purchasing the dance studio were, and what it all means as we continue looking forward to a permanent home for our church family.

    

Crossroads Permanent Home: Part I

This week, I'll be sharing about Crossroads plan for the future in a series of blog posts and email blasts to help get everyone up to speed on our current plams and timetable for a permanent home for Crossroads Church.

"A church isn't a building, it's a family.  But every family needs a home."  -  Rick Warren

Rick Warren had a reason to say that.  Saddleback Church had their first service in 1980 with 205 people, and was a "portable church" without a permanent home for many years.  Bill Hybels, senior pastor of Willow Creek in Barrington, Illinois shares a similar story - one not unlike our own.  They started out in 1975 in a movie theatre, where they met every Sunday for over six years before they had the opportunity to build.  Today both church's have grown to more than 20,000 members each.  What will God do at Crossroads?

"Do not despise these small beginnings, for the Lord rejoices to see the work begin..." 

Zechariah 4:10

We started in our house with 33 people.  A few months later it was 65 people in a rented storefront.  A few months later 172 met in a rented movie theatre.  Today, over 2400 people have attended Crossroads Church.  While our average attendance on Sunday morning is around 270, we have over 400 regular attenders, with nearly 800 either in attendance or remaining connected to Crossroads through our website or other electronic resources.

"Unless the Lord builds the house, the builders labor in vain".  Psalm 127:1

A "win" for us has never been to have the biggest church in town, or become a "mega-church", or have to have the local cops direct traffic because our parking lot is so clogged.  At Crossroads, a "win" is defined as influencing people for Christ.  Portable, or permanent, God has given us abundant opportunity to do just that, with each new group of flight school students, and each new family that moves to Enterprise.  Even though the face of Crossroads Church is constantly changing, we are most definitely a family.  And a family needs a home.

In November of 2007 - long before we opened our home for the first service - we negotiated a lease agreement with Clark Theatres to use the Colleege Cinema on Sunday mornings for our church services.  But it didn't make sense to start doing that until we grew a little.  We started in the College Cinema in August of 2008, and have met there every Sunday since.  And Mack (Clark) Clark who owns Clark Theatres has been a fantastic landlord!

We had a standing verbal agreement from the beginning that when Clark moved, he would give us first right of refusal to purchase the building.  In the Spring of 2010, we made it official with a formal purchase agreement.  Clark's plan was to build a 10 screen multiplex on land he owned adjacent to the Enterprise Wal-Mart.  His target date for moving in was May 2011.  We kicked off the "I Love My Church" capital campain with a goal of raising $150 thousand by May 2011.  We received pledges (commitments) that equaled $90 thousand, to be honored by May of 2011.  As of last week, we had deposited since last June a total of just over $50 thousand in honored pledges.  As of last week, Clark is still in the financing and pre-design stages of his project.  We are so humbled by those who honored those pledges, and so grateful for everything Clark has done to help Crossroads get off the ground.  But clearly, we're not where we thought we'd be.  So... 

What do you do when God doesn't do what you thought he was going to do?  You do what anyone would do who was confident that God was with them.

Tomorrow, we'll talk about what "PLAN B" looks like, as we move toward the dream of a home for our church family.

PLAN B WRAP-UP and CROSSROADS BUILDING PLAN B

This past Sunday we bid farewell to our series PLAN B.  In three and a half years of doing this, I've never had so many people comment on how their lives were impacted by the teaching we shared.  In the past month, we've seen far more first-time decisions to trust Christ, decisions to renew a relationship with God, and first and second time attenders than usual.  This series absolutely struck a chord that resonated in my heart and in my life, and it seems it did in yours as well.

One of the things we didn't get time to talk about during the series was Crossroads "Plan B" for our new permanent home.  Those of you who have participated faithfully in our building campaign program recognize that May 2011 was our original target for taking up residence in the College Cinema permanently.  You also recognize that May came and went without that happening.  As of today, Clark Theatres is still in the financing stages of their proposed new cinema complex adjacent to the Enterprise Wal-Mart.  Clearly, that puts us another 12 to 18 months away from permanent occupancy of the College Cinema.

So what have we done in the meantime?  How are building fund resources being used?  Will we launch a new capital campaign?  When it comes to Plan B's, there are always many questions.  Over the next few days - on my blog and through email blasts - I'll be detailing the answers to those questions, and to the big question everyone wants the answer to: "What is Crossroads 'Plan B' for a permanent home?"

Don't forget, next Sunday is Father's Day.  We'll be sharing a brand new Father's Day message called "Father Knows Best".  Can't wait to see you then.  Have a GREAT week!

SUNDAY JUNE 6th at CROSSROADS!

Fantastic day at Crossroads today as we continued in our current series 'PLAN B'.  Here's a few of the many things that stood out to me today:

• Great crowd today (especially during second service), TONS of first-time attenders!
• Many people made life-changing decisions today!  Some chose to trust their lives to Christ for the very first time!  That's HUGE!!
• Land of 1000 Hills Coffee!  Do I need to say more?  It's awesome!  I'm addicted.
• Worship was superb today!  The sound was really, really good in the room, and Nic and the band we're very tight!  Great job!
• Live worship guides?  Yeah!  Click HERE.  Too cool!
• Absolutely LOVE our current series.  Here's a few takes that weren't in your worship guide, or in your notes:
• If you haven't experienced a Plan B moment or season in your life...you will.  If you've gotten through one and thought "Shwoo!  Glad that's over!", there's another one coming.  Don't fight it, becuase it's in the middle of those moments that we really find God.
• Instead of allowing crisis to steal your hope, look at crisis as a warning that your hope is in play and needs to be protected.
• It's easy to have faith looking back, but hope relies on faith looking forward.
• Sometimes God gets glory out of your shattered dream (read John 11).
• I don't like standing in line.  Doesn't matter if it's Disneyworld or Wal-Mart.  It's all waiting, and it's all the same to me.  I also hate waiting in traffic (like the paralyzing rush hour scene in Enterprie, Alabama).  Oh...and I also hate waiting on God.  I'm in a hurry...but God clearly isn't.
• As long as our hope is in something other than God (like a house, a job, a bank account, a relationship, etc), God seems willing to let those things go through STRESS, so will let go of them and grab on to Him.
• God (to you and me): "Stop struggling!  Let go of what you're trusting, and trust me...so I can bless you" (read Matthew 5:3).
• It's in the WAITING that your faith is tested, and unless it's tested...it isn't going to GROW.
• Spiritual transformation doesn't take place when we get what we want...it takes place while we're waiting.

None of us WANT crisis in our lives.  We don't really WANT to experience stress, or be challenged by life's circumstances.  I'm pretty sure we can all agree on that.  One of the greatest privileges afforded me as a pastor, is that I have been blessed to hear your amazing stories of life-change.  The amazing thing is, all of our stories have a common thread.  God took us from a place of crisis, to a place of peace and restored our hope!  "And we know that God causes everything to work together for the good of those who love God..." (Romans 8:28, NLT)!

Have a GREAT week!

Vision Leaketh...all over the parking lot!

I have this problem with my daughters 2000 Pontiac Sunfire.  Well, better said, I share a problem with my daughter concerning her 2000 Pontiac Sunfire.  It leaks transmission fluid like crazy.  I'm constantly refilling it, and watching the effects on the pavement in front of my house and, I suppose...on the environment.  This fall she'll be going away to college.  It won't be in the leaky 2000 Pontiac Sunfire.

The car itself has held up fairly well.  We bought it for a couple grand, a couple of years ago.  During that time, we've only had to replace one engine.  That's not bad, is it?  And the air-conditioning doesn't really work...unless it's cold outside.  But the most frustrating thing by far is the continual, uniterrupted leaking. 

When the fluid is where it's supposed to be, everything runs fine.  Little by little it leaks out, and performance drops way off.  I'm not a mechanic, but I'm pretty sure if the leak is allowed to continue, the car will eventually be useless.

Andy Stanley told us all years ago that VISION leaks, too.  The amazing thing is that it leaks out constantly and quickly.  In fact - unlike repairing a leaky seal on a car's transmission - vision leak in a church is absolutely unavoidable.  And just as damaging.  When all the vision leaks out, the church becomes useless. 

Why does vision leak?  You know.  People are busy.  Life is challenging.  And unless we're constantly reminded of the things that are important...they literally leak out.  Andy says it way better, but you get the idea.

Leslie and I noticed vision leak that was as real and tangible as the tranny fluid spots on my driveway.  We used to put signs out in front of the church every week on Sundays.  We were so proud of those modest little signs.  We adorned them with balloons.  They mattered, because we wanted people to know, um...where the church was. 

Fast forward three years.  We have a building next to the Cinema where we meet.  It has a giant sign on the front of it.  We have an awesome website.  Billboards.  Car magnets.  T-shirts.  But if you pull up to the shopping center where our building is next to the cinema where we meet on Sunday, you see a mish-mosh of run-down signs, weeds, rusty hunks of metal where big signs once used to be, and a broken down van someone's trying to sell.  In fact, the van is the first thing you see when you drive by our building.  Ugh!

Clearly, vision leaked...and it spilled out all over the parking lot.  We're going to fix that so everyone knows where we are.  (Probably a good idea if you want people to, you know...show up.)  My mother didn't raise a dummy.  Just someone who sometimes fails to notice the obvious.  We'll try something like this: 

(BTW, none of the businesses on the sign attached to the big one are even in the shopping center anymore.  Their signs won't be there, and neither will the old Enterprise Dance Studio sign. Hopefully we can get the van moved too.  Just hope I don't have to buy it to accomplish that.  Hey wait, maybe my daughter could drive it to college.  Yessss!  Two problems solved!)