Many people have asked via text, email, and Facebook, so I thought I would give a recap of all that God did on our opening weekend.
- Saturday at 830am we got to Spindler Park and began setting up for our Easter Egg Drop.
- We had a team of around 50 people very organized by our outreach coach Ashton Rank so the work went quick and we were ready to go by 10am.
- All we really did was set up sound, have an information table, mark 3 soccer fields with stakes and caution tape, and spread 37,000 eggs out evenly.
- We didn’t know how many people would show up but we took around 12,000 flyers door to door and also put another 3,000 in area businesses. We also got on some family activity websites.
- Once people arrived we had a parking team that got everyone in the lot in an organized way. We had around 800 spots in the parking lots and filled all but 10 or so.
- We also had a greeting team that passed out flyers explaining the flow of the morning and helped parents find the age specific field they were looking for.
- We estimate that we had between 2,000 and 2,500 people show up which is exactly what we asked people to pray for so that was cool to see God provide.
- The helicopter arrived around 11:15 and dropped the remaining 3,000 eggs (1 large garbage bag on each field). It’s funny to hear the ooo’s and ahh’s in this vine my wife put up. There is something special about a helicopter to little kids.
- The day was a great success and we made some great connections and were convinced that people knew who our church was, knew that we loved them and their family and wanted to serve them, and many would be at church the next day. Thank you Jesus.
- We sent our team home around 12:30 because we got permission to set our facility up on Saturday night so everyone could bring a friend and not have to come early and be distracted with details on Sunday.
- We met at Harmony at 5pm and set up the lobby/VIP and Movement Kids areas first while the team prepped tech stuff.
- Setup was different because we had to include a baptism tank for the first time and also use all 200 of the chairs we owned so we could handle the anticipated crowd. Our room is not big so this required a little thought.
- Eventually it was all setup and ready to go so we took advantage of having two large screens and watched the Buckeyes Elite 8 game…too bad they lost L
- Sunday I did my usual routine and stopped at our PO Box to pick up any support that comes through the mail. I prayed and thanked God as I drove and actually started crying. It was an emotional day to have known this was what God has wanted for so long and to just thank him in order for all the ways he has already answered prayers, opened doors. And been faithful.
- Our team came in at 8 instead of our usual 7 and go to sound check and relax a little more. We topped off the baptism tank and tried to make it warm (fail).
- We had extra greeters, extra ushers, an extra VIP table and were ready to go when the crowd started rolling in.
- As with any church plant launch that is close to home or your sending church(es) for many we saw some family and familiar faces who wanted to come support us and that is ok because it helped give us a crowd.
- It was so awesome to roam the lobby and say to people “I saw you at the Egg Drop yesterday right?” and know that God had brought them that day.
- The service started with our new bumper video that Chris Guyot hooked us up with. I have known him since he was 15 and got to be his student pastor. It was an absolute blessing to have him want to give his gifts to our church and to bless us.
- Next we cut to this video http://vimeo.com/63017692 which was something I dreamed up and Josh Howard just made happen. We are so blessed to have him and I try not to gush too much, but this video was just him showing his commitment to excellence and talent and eye for all things creative. Josh thanks for being on our team, thanks for your heart and passion and for giving yourself far beyond what we can pay you…..for now.
- We had some songs after that and as they were playing seats started becoming a hot commodity which was awesome to see. I took some quick iphone pics because I could.
- We did our usual welcome and invite for VIP’s to fill out the connect card for a T-shirt. We had 59 VIPs so I am sure a good portion of my week will be spent on the phone which is the problem we want.
- We showed this video from Fellowship Creative http://vimeo.com/40297738 to begin focusing our minds on Easter and the resurrection and new life.
- Speaking of new life after the video our band played Overcome and in the middle we had the 4 people being baptized come forward and share their story and why they wanted to be baptized. As the band played we had a party and it was one of the most powerful moments of the day watching them come up out of the water.
- Our theme for the day was Jesus changes everything and we used Titus 2:11-14. We had one guy indicate that he wants Jesus in his life so I am very excited to follow up with him this week and talk about that.
- We closed with some worship and its official that our band/Jeremy Noland’s version of “All the poor and powerless” is better than the All Sons and Daughters version…in my humble opinion. They not only have a great backing track that borders at electronic at times, but they also had him play a tom drum from the set , and they even switch up the temp in the 2nd verse and it had a Mumford vibe for just a second. Truly excellent. Thank you to our band for working so hard and building a great atmosphere. By the final song you could hear the crowd singing back and it was a very worshipful moment and I loved that they got to lead in that.
- All things said and done it was a great day. We had 199 people at our service.
- I am sure we will put some pics up from the weekend. We had 3 photographers going nuts all weekend to document it.
- I FORGOT TO MENTION SOME DETAILS OR SOMETHING I BET, BUT THE MAIN POINT IS……………. Thank you Jesus!
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