12 years ago today…

..I was introduced as the new student pastor at Cedar Creek Church.  Been quite a ride.  Still am incredibly thankful to Richard Swift for taking a chance on this punk kid .  Some interesting changes at CCC (and in me) have occurred along the way:

Then: When I first arrived, we were still meeting in a day care and were averaging close to 400 people and had two services.  Our offices were in downtown Aiken in the old post office.  The only staff at that time was Richard (Lead Pastor), Kay (Secretary), Travis (Small Groups Pastor), and me as student pastor.

Now: We’re averaging close to 3,000 people across 3 campuses and a total of 5 worship experiences.  I think our staff is around 30 and we’re trying to find places for staff offices.

Then: I was coming in to my second student ministry position and was still learning the ministry ropes.

Now: In 2004, God shifted the focus of my ministry and I began leading our visual media and production at Cedar Creek….and I’m still learning the ministry ropes.

Then: Kim was pregnant with our first child Hannah.

Now: We have two kids, Hannah and Spencer.  Hannah is in middle school.  That is still a scary thought.  After doing student ministry for that long and being able to remember my middle and high school days, it helps to keep my prayer life focused.

From what I know, I think 12 years is a probably above average in one church considering most people in ministry tend to move around more often than that.  Have no clue what the journey has ahead, but if you would have told me I would be where I am at 12 years ago, I probably would have laughed.

Rescue Me Bumper

http://www.vimeo.com/8577608

Bumper for stand alone message at Cedar Creek West Campus 12.27.09

Production Notes: Shot in a locker room with a Panasonic DVX100. Literally the morning of the shoot, we asked for volunteers at the West Campus just to very briefly (in a few words) tell their story. Audio was sketchy as I was getting some major interference on the wireless mics. Treated with Magic Bullet Looks Suite in Final Cut Pro and message graphic/motion at the end created in After Effects.

Be The Church Photo Montage

Here’s the photo/video montage that we showed this morning at the Banks Mill and West Campuses.  It was a part of the Be The Church celebrations.

Be The Church Bless Back

Today we did something at Cedar Creek that we have never done before.  As a part of our Be The Church series, we gave away a total of $50,000 across our three campuses.  As people walked in to each of our worship experiences, they were given a sealed envelope.  Inside each envelope were various amounts: $5, $20, $50, and $100.

Phillip taught on how we are blessed by God to be a blessing to others.  It doesn’t take a huge amount of time, money or resources to bless someone.  In fact, the focus of today’s message was to begin with the “little things”.

Here are the only stipulations on how the money is to be used: 1. Don’t bless yourself.  Use it to help someone outside of your immediate family and 2. Don’t put the money back in the offering basket.

Kim and I have been talking about some ideas of how we’re going to bless back someone.  Looking forward to see the ripple effect in our community.  If you go to Cedar Creek and want to share your story about how you used the money to help someone, you can do so here.

ccc baptism video

This summer we broke up our baptisms into three different times.  This was intentional in the hopes of making it less of a baptismal service and more of a baptism party.  I had planned to get some interviews with some of the baptizees before but was having some mic issues.  Next time.  Just never gets old seeing people going public with their faith.  Teared up seeing all of them, but I about lost it when I saw Logan being baptized.  His baptism is at about 1:05.  You can watch some of Logan’s story on an earlier video on the blog.  The guy helping Phillip baptize is the “Mr. Chuck” from that earlier video.  Good times.

http://www.vimeo.com/6629632

Prentice Story Video

This morning Phillip concluded his message with a video about the Prentice family.  This was a video that I shot last Sunday afternoon and edited this week.  Going into the video, we thought it was going to be primarily a video to promote Grace Kidz, the special needs ministry at Cedar Creek Church.  However, like what happens much of the time, the video ended up telling a bigger story.

We wrapped up our vision series this week and this video ended up painting a picture of what it looks like when the body of is working toward the same result and the church is fulfilling its vision.  Christian was invited by a friend in our student ministry.  Jamie and Logan ended up getting plugged in to our special needs ministry in several areas.  That’s not to mention all the other areas (care ministry, home groups, greeters, worship, media, etc.) that all played a part in helping them to feel welcome but also communicating God’s grace.  Now, they’re investing in people’s lives, too.

http://www.vimeo.com/6345276

couple of On The Ridge Campus photos

Here are a couple of photos (compliments of Nick – Ridge Campus Pastor) of the worship center at Cedar Creek On the Ridge in Ridge Spring.  For those that don’t know, this is our second multi-site campus about to launch within the next few weeks.  It was very cool to see the reaction of those who had not seen the set completed (for the most part) this past week.  Tomorrow we’re having small worship gathering for the volunteers at the campus.  Just a few notes and comments from the production side of things.

• As you can see, the house lights are on full…as we found out from our electricians on Wednesday, these particular lights have to be on (per the manufacturer) for 100 hours straight before dimming them.  They actually use a fluorescent bulb (not a fan) vs an incandescent bulb but are dimmable.  Not ideal for tomorrow morning but should be good to go for the first public worship service.  Once that 100 hours is up, we can really set the lighting the way we want.
• Table at the front in the photos is for communion tomorrow.  Normally that is where Nick will be to greet, announce, speak, pray, etc.
• We utilized a combination of LED washes, par cans and ellipsoidals in our theatrical lighting.  We also have a large spot mounted in the back (not pictured).
• Ceiling was blacked out.  I was hoping that the back wall would be as well, but that was a no go.  I’m thinking perhaps some black fabric/curtain may be a good call to go behind the transformants and trusses on the back wall down the road.
• Lighting is controlled by some free Chauvet computer-based software.  It actually is pretty cool in that you can setup 2d and 3d renderings of your stage setup, create scenes on your computer anywhere, bring them in and load them up..nice for volunteers.
• Total of 4 screens, 2 on the sides, one on the rear wall (not pictured) and then the motorized screen that drops down from the center for the message.
• 2 analog way switcher/scalers for the screens.  One for the side and rear screens, one for the center screen.
• Imac using propresenter for media.
• Small behringer board for media mix before sending it to house sound.
• Right now we’re going week delay and using dvd’s for the ridge campus.  Quality is okay on the dvd, but we may quickly change over to using captured video from either p2 cards or from dvcpro deck.  We’ll see…still a work in progress.

to reach people that no one is reaching….

…you have to do things that no one is doing.  The message doesn’t change but the methods MUST.  Check out this clip from Craig Groeschel.

its former glory…..

I had a meeting with the Augusta Symphony about a website so I met with them a few weeks ago.  They are housed at Sacred Heart Cultural center in downtown Augusta.  Sacred Heart was a church that closed in 1971 and was renovated and restored in 1987 as a cultural center for the community to rent.  It also houses several organizations.  I have looked at this building a lot in my days as it is right beside Curtis Baptist Church and School, two places where I spend A LOT of time growing up.  My older brothers use to sneak across the street during church into the old abandoned building and would often explore through it.

I wasn’t sure where exactly their offices were located so I slipped in through a door I saw open.  Straight ahead of me I saw a sign that said “Auditorium Entrance”.  I hadn’t been in Sacred Heart since shortly after it reopened in the late 80’s and just had to see it.  So, I snuck in through the auditorium door and when I walked through a small corridor, there I was on the stage at Sacred Heart.  If you have never been inside this building, you must see it (here’s a photographer’s site that I came across that had some great shots of the interior – Shawna Herring & here is a photo gallery on the sacred heart site).  As I looked around, it literally took my breath away…I was just blown away!  Just an incredible sight.  The summer sun was pouring in through the stain glass windows and the architecture, paint, the craftsmanship…just unbelievable.  I just stood there for a while taking it in.

As I stood there, all of the sudden this thought hit me:

This use to be a place where people came expecting God to move, expecting to worship, encountering Jesus.

My mood changed.  I felt crushed as I began to think about that.  I was reminded that this church was like so many others that I’ve seen and know: Churches that at one time were thriving with life and were impacting the community around them.  Over time they had lost that focus on Jesus, lost what it meant to present and be the Gospel in the context of their community at that time.  So many churches are just dying…just empty buildings.  Now, don’t get me wrong.  I am thrilled that this beautiful building is being used so effectively in the community.  But as I was driving back to Aiken I thought a lot about those two extremes of emotion that I had just experienced.  It made me wonder about Cedar Creek, and other churches that right now are making an impact in their community and the world.  Here are some questions:

• What will our church/churches look like in 40 years?  In 5 years?  Will these churches keep their focus on Jesus or will they cease to exist?
• Will we hold to our styles and methodologies as sacred and become culturally irrelevant?
• As the “contemporary churches” become the new traditional churches (by the way, that is happening all over in churches that were birthed out of the Saddleback and Willow Creek models), will they be willing to ask the hard questions and make the even tougher decisions that it takes to change their methods (not the message) as needed over time?

CCC Baptism Video

http://www.vimeo.com/5902288