Went to bed thinking about this weekend’s message at Elevation Church.

And really the premise of the whole message is that God uses the problems in our lives to develop us as individuals.

I started to think about the people around me in my life and someone said this to me this week, they said, “(So and so) has never had anything bad happen to them in life, that is why they are so selfish and hard on others.  They haven’t ever had a chance to examine themselves.”

WOW.

It made me think.

Are the valleys designed by God for us to be developed into the person God knows we can become?  Just thinking about this in relation to myself it makes me realize that I did grow the most as a person when I faced opposition.

What about you?  Do you think this is true for you or how it has worked out in the world around you? 

I’m not allowed to say anything public yet…but I believe what we have prayed and fasted for as a leadership team for 40 days is coming around.

The next step for Elevation Church and our community center is here….I’M SO EXCITED! 

Here is my thoughts from today…

• attendance was very low today.  the summer vacation bug has started to bite.
• worship and communion made for a great time of reflection
• our production team did a great job of getting the theater set-up
• we need a few more people to volunteer to set-up nursery…email brianna if you are able to brianna@elevation.cc
• enjoyed meeting the new people that were at elevation this morning.  we always have the radest people hanging with us
• love hanging at starbucks before coming into the theater…feel so refreshed and ready for the day
• we took our pictures of our leadership team right after the gathering today…was fun to laugh with everyone as we got some great pics
• Brandon bought a scooter.  Yes Brandon it looks very manly (wink)
• next week is my last Sunday before I take two Sundays off…I’m following my own advice

Today I played on a foursome in a golf tournament to raise money for The Christmas Box House.

The Christmas Box House is a non-profit organization that Elevation Church has taken on as  one of our community investments.  We want to not only invest money, but time and energy to see their vision fulfilled.  What is their vision?  To see every kid have a childhood even when bad things happen to them in life.  They have provided short term shelter for kids when the state steps into a situation.  If you are interested in getting involved in a bigger way, please leave a comment with your email and we would love to connect you.

The golf tournament today yielded over $30,000 to Christmas Box House!  WOW!

Our team, not only represented the Ogden Christmas Box House, but Elevation Church as well.  We did alright…pulling in a score of 65.  Good job Russ, Sam, & Brian!  It was only the second time I have played golf this year.

I need to get out more and maybe I could have helped our team more.

BUT…the good news is, that for once…yes for once…I finally won a drawing at a golf tournament.  You always get those raffle tickets that yield nothing, but today was my lucky day.  I won 18 holes of golf for myself and three other people at Thanksgiving Point (one of the best golf courses in Utah) and I won a brand new set of golf clubs.  Not a cheap set of clubs either.  But Ping G10s & a brand new PING bag!

I know…for all you non-golf people, you are saying WHO CARES?  Don’t worry…I’m not a golf person either…I’ve been out 2 TIMES this year.

But I finally won.

The church has lost the art of celebrating what is so important about following Jesus.

Seriously, think about what churches in general will spend large amounts of money and time celebrating.

• new building
• Christmas
• Harvest Party
• summer parties
• Easter
• ground breaking
• new sign out front
• new fund raising campaign

This is not an exhaustive list, but it was all the things I have seen from churches. One church I was connected with spend more time planning out the dedication of their new building then we ever gave to Easter!

What about baptisms? Have we lost celebrating baptisms? Isn’t this the physical point of saying YES to Jesus? Isn’t this why we are doing the outreaches? Isn’t that an eternal answer?

Out of necessity really, we had to go off site from the theater to do baptisms, but then it became how can we celebrate this and really bring back the IMPORTANCE of this event. It shouldn’t be just something we add into the service schedule for 5 minutes and then get on with what we had planned for the day. It should be the PLAN.

We have even made it EASY to do baptisms, by putting a tank under the platform that is revealed by moving trap door on the top. That way we don’t have to go anywhere, pay anything, or do anything out of the ordinary (other than remove a trap door on the stage) to baptize people.

We felt like all of that made us forget something. The importance. The mystery. The love. The amazing decision that was being made.

So..that is why we throw baptism parties. We don’t feel like we have it down, but we sure wanted to make it a celebration. A celebration of the right thing! We even put together a basket for each person with an assortment of things (bible, book, shirt, cross, DVD, picture frame, picture of them getting baptized)…sure beats getting a baptism certificate.

What other things need to be celebrated in our Jesus communities that we don’t?

Here is our newest Baptism Video from June 1st. You are going to love this. Leave some comments on what you think.

I’m not feeling like a champ today.

Just found out that one of my best friends, Brian, is moving to Arizona so his wife can be closer to her family.

Seems Elevation has become a revolving door the last year with people coming in for a time and then leaving to move across the United States.  I could start a whole other church with the people that have moved to other areas of the U.S. from Elevation.

Took last week off from blogging…to practice what I was preaching about this last Sunday.

Relaxing.

It is hard to relax.  For me at least, I’m sure there are people in your mind that relax too much.

I keep going and going and keep adding things to my schedule to take on.  I’ve got to slow down and relax.

So…this last week I tried.  I tried to limit my work load, I tried to limit my time away from home.

Today I’m taking another JESUS DAY.  Another day just hanging with the Big Guy.