Are There Errors in the Bible?

On Sunday, May 1st, we begin a series called Q & A.  This past Sunday at LCC, someone submitted a question about errors in the Bible?  Check out this answer video from the truelife.org website.  (Click the link below)

Are There Errors in the Bible?

Q & A Series Begins May 1st

I'm in deep study now for this week's message...part 1 of our May series - Q & A.  Here is the line-up of questions I'm going to attempt to answer in a 35 minute message this week :-)


Sunday, May 1st - QUESTIONS ABOUT GOD’S SOVEREIGNTY:  Does God preselect people to go to heaven or do they have a free will to choose?  Why would God harden Pharoah’s heart?   Should we try to convert hard-hearted people?  Why would God instruct the Israelites to kill innocent women and children of opposing nations?  Why doesn’t God protect innocent children from abuse, molestation, and starvation?  If everything is already predetermined, then why pray for a particular outcome?

Easter Sunday Recap

What an incredible Easter Sunday at Life Community Church.  Easter is always a great day, but 2011 was truly one of the greatest days in the history of our church.  God moved in a great way and I'm so thankful on this Monday morning for what He did.

• At least 15 people prayed to receive Jesus into their life.  This is the best part by far and why we do what we do...to proclaim the resurrected Jesus!
• We set our new worship attendance record...first time over 300 with 317 people in attendance!  It was a great feeling to see the big school auditorium filled up.  This is how it should be every week!
• The worship band was amazing...they always do great, but yesterday was especially good!  Always great to have the violin in there as well.
• A HUGE THANKS to our nursery and preschool staff serving behind the scenes, giving up the service to take care of the precious kids.  Thanks for the sacrifice you made to make yesterday possible!
• A special thanks to Jason and Ashley Bell for providing an incredible spread of homemade goodies for before the service.  It was tremendous!  See the picture below.

•  The kids enjoyed an Easter Egg hunt out on the baseball field with over 1,000 eggs filled with candy and other prizes.  Thanks Jeff & Nicole for a job well done!

I was able to spend the rest of the day with family and friends...a delicious Easter dinner.  Truly grateful for all God had done at LCC and in my life.

It's Friday, but Sunday's coming

This is not a new video or sermon excerpt, but it always inspires me and gets me pumped up about Jesus and his victory over death, hell and the grave!

Celebrate Easter at Life Community Church!

Celebrate Easter with us at Life Community Church!

Easter is the greatest day of celebration for believers in Jesus.  Come and worship the risen Savior with us this year.  We'd love to have you, your family and friends join us.

Here are a few highlights:

• Come early for some free refreshments and great fellowship!  We'll be providing coffee, juice and an assortment of goodies beginning at 9:30 am.
• The service will begin at 10:30 am with an exciting line-up of music and video to inspire.
• My message is entitled, "Empty Promises."
• We'll have an OUTDOOR EASTER EGG HUNT after the service at approximately 11:45 for all kids 5th grade and younger.  The toddlers and preschoolers will get a head start.

Special Note:Because Easter Sunday is a family-oriented day, we are having a family-friendly worship service for ages kindergarten through adults.  We will not have Kid's Church this day so all families can worship Jesus together.  Of course we will still have Nursery & Preschool classes available during the service.


Spread the word...invite your friends, family and neighbors!

Easter Egg Hunt

Jeff Keeny, our Next Gen Pastor, has prepared over 1,000 Easter Eggs for this Sunday's Easter Egg Hunt after the morning service at LCC.  This will be take place outside immediately after the service for children 5th grade and under.  The toddlers and preschoolers will get a head start before the older kids!  Each egg will have some sort of surprise inside.  Spread the word about the Easter Celebration at LCC.  It begins with amazing refreshments and coffee before the service (available starting at 9:30).  The service begins at 10:30 and the Egg Hunt should start at 11:45.  Don't miss the biggest day of the year!

Weekend Recap

It's Easter week!  I always love the sense of anticipation this week leading up to Easter Sunday.  It's always the the most exciting day in church for us as believers in Jesus.  We serve a God who is NOT dead, but surely ALIVE!  What a privilege and opportunity we have.

A little about yesterday...

• The Band was awesome...great set of worship songs, the drums sounded great...can't wait for next week!
• The new back lighting on stage was very cool and well done...thanks Billy!
• The size of the crowd was surprisingly healthy...I had heard from so many regular families that were traveling for Spring Break that I was starting to go into a mini-depression before Sunday...but it actually was like an average Sunday.  Great to see 3 new families as well!
• Another $2,000 was given for the Next Step fund which puts us over $31K given so far, around $270K committed.  Praise God for the increase!
• We wrapped up the Evangelism series talking about 6 Evangelistic styles.  Here's a link to a "test" you can take to help figure out your style.  The message audio and video will be online later today if you missed it.

Personally, I really missed my wife and 3 youngest kids...they went up to MD/PA for Sherri's grandmother's 85th birthday.  It was odd doing church at LCC without them.  Glad they had a safe trip and got home last night.  LCC is truly a family thing for us and it was fun to recap together last night...we were only apart for about 30 hours and had so much catching up to do :-)

I'm heading into staff meeting at 9 am.  I'm blessed to work side by side in ministry with 2 great young men.  We will be putting a lot of focus on making sure all is set for EASTER Sunday!  I'm looking forward to a great week.  

This Sunday @ LCC

I know lots of our regular families are traveling on the front end of Spring Break, but if you are in town, I hope you'll join us this Sunday at LCC!

Evangelism: Plain & Simple - Part 2.  This Sunday, I'm going to talk about how we can best broadcast our faith and how that fits our personality.  I'll be sharing 6 different evangelism styles and 6 biblical examples of each style.  Don't miss this message designed to better equip you to fulfill the Great Commission of Jesus.

Sunday service is at 10:30 am!  Invite a friend...spread the Word!

Dance Your Shoes Off

A pretty cool dance by more than 2,000 people of First Baptist Church in Houston, TX.  Check it out.

The Daniel Plan

Rick Warren, pastor of Saddleback Church in California and author of The Purpose Driven Life, has recently launched a new 52-week plan to encourage people to get healthy.  Like many pastors, Rick found himself in the category of those who don't exercise enough, have poor eating habits and are well overweight.  He has already lost 33 pounds since the beginning of 2011 in this plan.  They brought in 3 well known and highly respected doctors to work with their staff to develop this plan.  All of the resources are available on their website for free.  If you don't have a personal health plan or strategy, check this out.  Even if you do already exercise and eat healthy, you might find some helpful advice here.

http://saddleback.com/thedanielplan/

SERVE opportunity April 24 & 30

We have our upcoming quarterly opportunity to volunteer at the SERVE Homeless Shelter in Manassas.  The people of LCC will be providing lunch on Easter Sunday (April 24th) after our morning service.  Then on Saturday, April 30th, we are responsible to provide breakfast, lunch, and dinner.  Ed Rotchford is our coordinator of this outreach project.  Please contact ed@lifecc.us to volunteer to help with the meals...We need your help!


SERVE Homeless Shelter is a 60-bed emergency shelter that provides a safe place to sleep and three meals a day for 85 families and 225 single adults each year. Children occupy 41% of the beds.


Here is the link to their website - http://nvfs.org/pages/page.asp?page_id=91788

Q & A Series is Set

We just recorded a video promo for the upcoming Q & A Series.  It's in the editing phase now...I'm sure Josh will create a masterpiece for this series that starts the week after Easter.


Here is the line-up of questions.  There were a few submitted that didn't fit that I will attempt to answer on my blog.


Sunday, May 1st - QUESTIONS ABOUT GOD’S SOVEREIGNTY:  Does God preselect people to go to heaven or do they have a free will to choose?  Why would God harden Pharoah’s heart?   Should we try to convert hard-hearted people?  Why would God instruct the Israelites to kill innocent women and children of opposing nations?  Why doesn’t God protect innocent children from abuse, molestation, and starvation?  If everything is already predetermined, then why pray for a particular outcome?


Sunday, May 8th - QUESTIONS ABOUT RELATIONSHIPS: How are we supposed to deal with annoying people?  How should Christians deal with public schools teaching our kids evolution? Does the Bible really consider sex before marriage sinful?  How can I tell if my marriage is built on counterfeit love?  What is my spouse has a different level of belief in God?


Sunday, May 15th – QUESTIONS ABOUT THE CHURCH, GOD’S WILL & CHRISTIAN LIVING: How do we know what God wants us to do in certain situations? How did God call you to start a church?  Are Paul’s views in the New Testament about women serving in the church still applicable today?  Why do pastors talk about tithing (10%) to the church when that was only applied in the Old Testament to Jews?  What does the Bible say about Christians serving outside the church?  Should Christians be involved in politics?

Sunday, May 22nd - QUESTIONS ABOUT ANGELS, SATAN & THE FUTURE:  What does the Bible teach about angels and demons?  Did God create Satan…why?  If God is all powerful, why would he not destroy Satan?  When is Christ returning?  What is the judgment day going to look like?  Are Christians now exempt from any type of judgment?

Sunday, May 29th – MISHMASH QUESTIONS: How long did God wait before He created anything?  How can I articulate the Gospel in a simple manner? How can God forgive a murderer? How did all the races come about? What makes a bad word a bad word?  What is the Christian view of things such as dinosaurs that seem to suggest an old earth?  Is sola scriptura biblically based? What actions are considered blasphemy? What happens to someone who commits suicide?  How long should a person grieve? 

Weekend Recap

I actually love Mondays.  I know that sounds odd.  Most people dread them.  For me, it's a time to reflect and celebrate what God did on Sunday, meet with staff, and then chart out the course for the upcoming weeks and months ahead.  I get into the planning and admin side of things, so yep Mondays are fine with me.

My weekend recap post will usually be a bunch of bullet points like this...

• I'm thankful for generous giving people of LCC.  Our Next Step campaign is off to a great start.  3-year pledges are at about $230K now, plus we have already received approximately $50K in donations and property.  Our goal is $600K, so we are close to 50% there in terms of commitments.  God is going to provide exactly what we need to get into a permanent home in His perfect time.  Keep praying!
• We had a 2.5 hour staff meeting this morning.  Great stuff...
• Reviewing the service and details from Sunday
• Making plans for Easter Sunday
• Discussing the prayer request for people in the church having surgeries and other issues
• Making plans to fix the York Drive sign that is slightly broken
• Lots of time reviewing the calendar details...here's some highlights:
• 4.24.11 - Easter Sunday
• 4.30.11 - LCC's day to serve meals at SERVE homeless shelter
• 5.1.11 - Baptisms & start of Q & A series
• 5.8.11 - Mother's Day - we have a new creative idea to honor the moms & Baby Dedication
• 5.15.11 - Next Step Celebration Lunch after service
• The last hour of our meeting was sifting through the 36 questions that were submitted for our May series.  Wow...some really good questions...I've got my work cut out for me!  We grouped them together as logically as possible.  I will probably just answer a few on the blog here because they don't fit with the rest.  The LCC website will soon have a page with the question line-up.
• It's great to have first time guests every week, but even better to have 2nd time guests!  I love to see people show up the second week in a row...always a good sign.
• It seems like we are in another wave of people getting into church later and later again...I wonder if it's time for me to make another sarcastic pointed remark...that seemed to help last year.  Does the Spring weather make people later?  By the way we still start at 10:30 am :-)
• Speaking of weather...I want more of today!  Beautiful!
• If you are a regular at LCC, be thinking about doing your part in EVANGELISM.  Did you receive yesterday's message?  Who are you inviting for Easter Sunday?  Point people to www.easterinwoodbridge.com. 

Jesus Will Save Us

Sitting at the breakfast table this morning with my 2-year old Nic and my 14-year old Tori...and during our conversation, the refrigerator makes a noise which is the ice maker dropping a load of ice.  Nic says, "What's that?"  I reply, "It's the refrigerator monster coming to eat us."  (because I just can't give an easy straight answer and I am anxious to see a 2-year old reaction)  Nic's reply, "Don't worry, Jesus will save us."  Of course it caught Tori and me off guard and made us laugh.  Nic was serious.  At 2 years old, he's already learned enough to know that Jesus is mighty enough to save us from the fridge!  I am thankful for our awesome workers and teachers at LCC in our toddler class who teach our 2-year olds the stories from the Bible.  I was also reminded of that verse that we've all memorized at LCC over the past 6 weeks:


2 Timothy 1:7 - "For God has not given us a spirit of FEAR, but of power, of love and of a sound mind."


No matter what you are facing today...Jesus can save you!

Next Step Shout Out

The NEXT STEP campaign has been an exciting new adventure for our church.  For the first time in our 9 years, we have spent some time focusing on raising funds for our future.  Admittedly, it's not a comfortable thing for me.  I want to keep my focus and my attention on work of the ministry - the teaching, the outreach, the caring, the leading, etc.  In today's economic climate, most pastors would agree that they don't want to nor do they enjoy asking their congregation to be giving more.  Nevertheless, we have pressed forward and God is blessing tremendously.

This Sunday I will be announcing our total amount given or pledged so far to our 3-year campaign.  I am blown away by the generosity of our people.  I can't wait to share the great news!  To read more about the Next Step - click here.

Also, I want to give a shout out here to the great team of people who are part of making the Next Step happen.  Thank you to Scott, Lisa, Jan, Ed, Dwayne, Randy, Josh, Wayne & JoAnn, Tom and others who have contributed to the efforts.  Thanks for coming to all of those meetings and for giving of yourselves.  There's much more work yet to be done, but we are on our way.  God is blessing and He has that future facility for LCC already figured out!

There's no PLAN B

I'm starting a new 2-week message series this Sunday at LCC entitled, EVANGELISM: Plain & Simple.  When Jesus left this world, he assigned us with the task of telling others the Good News about the grace of God.  I love the way Paul speaks of his life mission in Acts 20:24:


"But my life is worth nothing to me unless I use it for finishing the work assigned me by the Lord Jesus—the work of telling others the Good News about the wonderful grace of God."


There is no PLAN B...it's our duty to share the message of Christ.  Why don't we do it?  For this week's message here are the list of reasons (or excuses) I've come up with so far...sound about right?  Any others I should add?

1.       It’s out of my comfort zone.

2.       I’m afraid of questions people might ask.

3.       I don’t want to offend people.

4.       It’s not my gift, therefore not my responsibility

5.       I don’t think people are really interested.

6.       I don’t really care that much about it…kind of apathetic.

Back to Blogging

Hey world...I took a blogging break about a year ago, but I am back and I hope you will check-in regularly or subscribe for regular updates.

What will I be posting about...

• Life Community Church stuff
• news & updates
• upcoming messages series
• recaps of Sundays and special events
• video and message notes
• Devotional thoughts
• as I read a passage or God gives me some thoughts to share that could help or encourage someone else, I will post them here
• follow-up questions from messages
• General news or other helpful articles, videos, or links
• not going to do a ton of copying and pasting of articles you can get on Yahoo, but when I see or read something that I think is especially important or helpful, I will repost here
• if someone sends me something that is especially helpful, I will share it here
• Personal stuff
• the purpose of my blog is not to share my personal family life daily stories and pictures (I'm on Facebook), but every once in awhile I may share something from life that you might enjoy. 

Thanks for reading!