September 26, 2004

63! That was our attendance for today, and man, are we stoked! God continues to bring people our way, as today we have 9 visitors with us, as well as a couple named Corey and Jill who returned for the 2nd week in a row. From what I know, they recently moved from Dover to Milton and are members of Durham Evangelical Church, but I think the drive might be a little long. They are a super nice couple with a cute little baby named Abigail. We continue to pray for 10 more in 2004, and maybe they will be part of that.

Speaking of 10 more, we have almost officially reached our goal! Lee & Joanne Thompson will be joining us (along with their kids, Chelsea and Silas), and Ralph and Mary Johnson want to be baptized in November, which would mean that we would have officially hit the 10 family mark! Praise the LORD! However, we would like to replace two families that are no longer with us on our list. Maria moved to Maryland, and Jenn Granger has decided to not come any more (and we miss her so much!).

But 63 for today, which was over our previous high of 62 back on Easter. God continues to grow The Journey. I preached the last in my series of messages on Extreme Makeover: City Edition, preaching on making over our city through evangelism. I thought the sermon was great, but unfortunately, our printer paper was out, and so I didn't have handouts on a day where I really needed to. Nonetheless, I was very proud of the sermon. I liked how I prepared and delivered it (self-critiquing is ok - I know that the glory goes to the Lord and I strive to do my best to honor him!).

No one was saved today, but I think our church is really beginning to move to a higher level of commitment.

Friday & Saturday, September 24th & 25th, 2004

Extreme Makeover hit The Journey on these two days, as so many people from our church contributed in re-doing our auditorium, closing on the rafters in the ceiling, repainting the walls and ceiling, and cleaning the upholstery on the chairs. It took our workforce 31 hours (which if I were to add up the actual man hours, it would range in the hundreds) to do the makeover, but it is so worth it! The pictures are below, and I am amazed at the transformation. There are still a few small things left to do, but overall, I praise God for giving us such wonderful workers to get this job done!

A view of the auditorium almost one year ago - even though we made some adjustments with where things were, this was still a good "before" picture.

A view of the ceiling and the rafters above...

Patching and priming (Joanne, Pete, & Flo)

Priming water stains in the ceiling (Joanne)

Priming the wall (Candace)

Chuck spackles the ceiling as we start to close it in...

Krista paints the trim around the front door

Still closing in the ceiling (Chaz on left, Chuck in center)

Kyle cleans the upholstery on the chairs

Kyle looking up as the lights are put in place - notice the blinds!

The finished product!

The finished product!

The finished product!

The finished product!

The finished product! 

Sunday, September 19, 2004

I must admit that I began this day with trepidation. I did not have nearly the amount of time this week that I normally have to get prepared, and so I was praying that God, in His mercy and grace, would extend some extra coherency and thought as I preached. It actually worked - my sermon, while it began a little slow, picked up steam and, at the end, I challenged our people to follow me in the area of serving our community - we are on week 3 of "Extreme Makeover: City Edition," and so we were learning about how to change our city through service from Matthew 5:16-18.

But beyond the fairly successful sermon, we had John Buldoc with us from Granite State Baptist, our mother church, down in Salem, NH. John did a great job, and we had the opportunity to go out with him and his wife, Linda, after the service.

But even beyond that - the overall success of the day (including Corey & Jill from Milton visiting with us, and Candance returning for a 2nd week) - we had Chaz Trombley, the husband of Tara Trombley, pray with me and invite Jesus Christ into His life! It was phenomenal, especially considering almost exactly 7 months ago, Tara accepted Christ as her Savior! Praise GOD!!!

Our impact, while not a tidal wave, is slow but steady - changing one life at a time...

September 12, 2004

What a great day today was! We had 5 adult visitors, and one of them, Kim, prayed with me and accepted Christ as her Savior. I preached the second sermon in the series Extreme Makeover - the sermon was titled, "How to Be the Church that Changed the City." It went alright, the highlight being that I played and we all sang the theme from Cheers - the idea was that we want to create a community where everyone does know your name, where people feel like they belong. The woman that received Christ, by the way, is a result of Rod & Elizabeth's opening themselves up - they are next door neighbors with Kim and her husband Andy. So he was also VERY excited about what God did. In the service we had 48, but we would have been at 60 if we hadn't had several of our people missing. God is doing something great here, and I am so privileged to be part of it.

September 5. 2004

Today at The Journey we started the sermon series "Extreme Makeover:City Edition - Changing our City for Jesus Christ." It was a good start to a month in which we will talk about how we as a community can change our cities/towns for Jesus Christ, through prayer, a Christ-centered community, service, and evangelism. I spoke today on the prayer aspect, challenging people to ask God to open a door to speak the gospel. It was pretty well received...

The attendance was good, as we had 47 on Labor Day weekend. God continues to bless us - people keep showing up - I am so privileged to lead this church!