What do we celebrate? We celebrate progress, commitment, sacrifices of character. We don't have to be told to celebrate when we see things being done the way they "ought to" be done.
Attendance:
Average attendance:
EB CS
2008 3111 572
2009 3480 4??
Community = 20,000+
Sunday crowd = 2000
Attenders = 3000
Committed = 1400
Core = 500
Healthy balance of servers to attenders.
Clear Springs campus won't grow without personal invitations and relationships. Our life is a circle of responsibility. It is providential who you have proximity to. Need to be proactive about Conversations and Invitations.
Goal = 1000 in attendance at Clear Springs by March 2010. We all own that, not just Clear Springs. We all need to invite people we know all over the Bay Area. We are one church in two locations.
Groups:
We can't be the church to you if you're not in a group. Community is the best atmosphere for making disciples. We do that by using the "7 G's" (Glorify, Grace, Growth, Group, Good Stewardship, Gifts, Go). In a group you are naturally challenged to move from consumer to contributor. Do you have those "2am friends?" Be a Paul / Barnabas (pouring into people, challenging them to grow).
1422 Adults in group
222 Navigators (group leaders)
Goal = 250 Navigators by March 2010.
Helping people in need:
IKE Assist : IKE came and YOU assisted.
We helped 100+ families last year with $82,000 through our People In Need Fund.
Church planters used $131,000
- Ukraine
- Cuba
Goal = 100% of groups serving outside the church.
Volunteers:
884 committed volunteers on Sundays and Wednesdays.
Goal = 2400 by March 2010
What's next?
Move into our new kids building by Aug 2009
Aug 2010 - Start a third campus
If you think that's too big of a goal "what are we going to do with our lives?!?" We need to resist the tendency to "get comfortable." Take a risk, be uncomfortable, be daring.
Bruce concluded by reading "I stand by the door." I loved it, so I will post it here for you to read.
Thanks for taking the time to read this post!
I Stand at the Door
By Sam Shoemaker (from the Oxford Group)
I stand by the door.
I neither go to far in, nor stay to far out.
The door is the most important door in the world -
It is the door through which men walk when they find God.
There is no use my going way inside and staying there,
When so many are still outside and they, as much as I,
Crave to know where the door is.
And all that so many ever find
Is only the wall where the door ought to be.
They creep along the wall like blind men,
With outstretched, groping hands,
Feeling for a door, knowing there must be a door,
Yet they never find it.
So I stand by the door.
The most tremendous thing in the world
Is for men to find that door - the door to God.
The most important thing that any man can do
Is to take hold of one of those blind, groping hands
And put it on the latch - the latch that only clicks
And opens to the man's own touch.
Men die outside the door, as starving beggars die
On cold nights in cruel cities in the dead of winter.
Die for want of what is within their grasp.
They live on the other side of it - live because they have not found it.
Nothing else matters compared to helping them find it,
And open it, and walk in, and find Him.
So I stand by the door.
Go in great saints; go all the way in -
Go way down into the cavernous cellars,
And way up into the spacious attics.
It is a vast, roomy house, this house where God is.
Go into the deepest of hidden casements,
Of withdrawal, of silence, of sainthood.
Some must inhabit those inner rooms
And know the depths and heights of God,
And call outside to the rest of us how wonderful it is.
Sometimes I take a deeper look in.
Sometimes venture in a little farther,
But my place seems closer to the opening.
So I stand by the door.
There is another reason why I stand there.
Some people get part way in and become afraid
Lest God and the zeal of His house devour them;
For God is so very great and asks all of us.
And these people feel a cosmic claustrophobia
And want to get out. 'Let me out!' they cry.
And the people way inside only terrify them more.
Somebody must be by the door to tell them that they are spoiled.
For the old life, they have seen too much:
One taste of God and nothing but God will do any more.
Somebody must be watching for the frightened
Who seek to sneak out just where they came in,
To tell them how much better it is inside.
The people too far in do not see how near these are
To leaving - preoccupied with the wonder of it all.
Somebody must watch for those who have entered the door
But would like to run away. So for them too,
I stand by the door.
I admire the people who go way in.
But I wish they would not forget how it was
Before they got in. Then they would be able to help
The people who have not yet even found the door.
Or the people who want to run away again from God.
You can go in too deeply and stay in too long
And forget the people outside the door.
As for me, I shall take my old accustomed place,
Near enough to God to hear Him and know He is there,
But not so far from men as not to hear them,
And remember they are there too.
Where? Outside the door -
Thousands of them. Millions of them.
But - more important for me -
One of them, two of them, ten of them.
Whose hands I am intended to put on the latch.
So I shall stand by the door and wait
For those who seek it.
'I had rather be a door-keeper
So I stand by the door.
