Element Church Insider

Amazingly beautiful day here in Cheyenne.  Hard to believe it’s April.  Honest moment: Every pastors dream would be for it to RAIN every Sunday.  If it snows, people don’t come.  When’s it’s beautiful, people don’t come!  RAIN is our best friend.  LOL  Here are my ruminations on the day.

—  16 people acknowledged to us they accepted Christ as Savior today!  WOO HOO!

—  We preached on generosity and got to live out the core value of “If only for the ONE!”  LOVE it!

—  I joked about the weather affecting attendance, but we actually had an awesome attendance day today.  2nd service was SLAMMED.  Had to pull out extra chairs.

—  A full service was a GREAT reminder that it’s time to take some steps with our expansion & remodel.  This coming Sunday is the official close of IMPACT and I’ll be updating the church on where we are and what our next step is.  I believe God has given us the wisdom we need to move ahead, and while there is still a level of uncertainty on HOW it will all work out, we have the clarity we need to take our next steps.

—  We aren’t taking a special offering or asking for additional funds.  We will be celebrating all that God’s provided, what He’s been able to accomplish in 18 months, and talking about what’s next for us as a church.

—  Continued our series “This is how we change the world” today by talking about Core Value #3:  Leading the way in generosity.  Preached from John 2:1-11.  Here are some excerpts on the day:

• Leading the way in generosity:  We serve a radically generous God so we will be a radically generous church.
• (After sharing some startling perceptions about the church from a national poll)  It sure seems like when the world looks at the church they are able to see lot’s and lot’s of things, there’s just one problem…none of them seem to be seeing JESUS!
• The way we live, both individually and as a church, should cause people to catch a glimpse of Jesus.
• Ultimately, our goal is not for people to see our values or for people to see our church.  The goal is, whether they realize it’s happening or not, that by living out the values of Jesus they would catch a glimpse of who He is and He might possibly break through to their heart.
• We don’t want to do crazy things FOR money, we want to do crazy things WITH money FOR other people BECAUSE we serve a generous God.
• Generosity from the church should be commonplace, yet it’s become unconventional.  It should be expected as what we do, yet it’s elevated as something extraordinary.
• We serve a radically generous God, so, not only do we want to be a radically generous church, why wouldn’t we be a radically generous church and why should the community expect anything different?
• Undercover Boss and Extreme Home Makeover shouldn’t be leading the way in generosity, GOD’S CHURCH should be.
• A need isn’t only nourishment, a need is sometimes just being known.
• For us, doing outreach or being generous is not about getting something in return, it’s about doing what is RIGHT!  It is RIGHT to be generous.
• If your giving something to someone in the hopes that you’ll get something in return that’s not generosity, it’s manipulation.
• Generosity doesn’t stop at the bare minimum, it strives to achieve maximum impact.
• We want to be a radically generous church because God has been radically generous TO our church!

—  Announced an AWESOME opportunity we have coming up in August.  We are taking the entire month to lead the way in generosity.  We’re doing a series called “I heart Cheyenne”.  We are challenging the church to give 1,000 backpacks and school supplies to kids in need, serve 10,000 hours in our community and MUCH more!

—  The outreach team is putting together some AMAZING opportunities for all ages of people to serve, and they’re doing a GREAT job putting “I heart Cheyenne” together.  But as the pastor, I challenged us today to up the ante.  In the month of August, Element will be giving 15% (instead of 12) of every offering to outreach and generosity in our community, I challenged us to give 1,500 backpacks and serve 15,000 hours in our community.

— On August 25th we are holding our first ever Element Church 5k as well.  You can register HERE.  The cost is $20 and 15 of those dollars will go straight to Comea Homeless Shelter or LifeChoice Pregnancy Care Center.

—  More details will be coming about “I heart Cheyenne”.  I am STOKED about this opportunity to be the hands and feet of Jesus.  Start praying now about what YOU can be a part of in August, as well as God preparing divine appointments for us as we serve that month.

—  Had a 12 year old boy give us $1,000 for Impact today.  His dad said “He sold his four wheeler and motorcycle so he could give to Impact.”  I shook that young man’s hand, looked him in the eye and said “Not many adults in our church would do what you just did.  I’m proud of you.”  It was inspiring.  He was living out our core value of generosity and didn’t even know it.  HE was leading the way.

—  Don’t forget, Impact closing AND update this Sunday.  Excited about sharing with you where we are!

—  That’s gonna be it for today!  Element Church, you guys are awesome.  I love you!

Till the end,

Jeff

HAPPY EASTER everybody!  I hope wherever you found yourself this last weekend that you were able to celebrate the resurrection of Jesus with a church family somewhere.  At Element, we had an AMAZING time celebrating Jesus!  Here are my ruminations on the WEEKEND!

— 59 acknowledged to us they accepted Jesus as Savior today and found new life in Him.  WOO HOO!  If only for the ONE!

—  LOVE LOVE LOVE seeing people surrender their lives to Jesus.  I saw many making that commitment to Jesus and acknowledgment to us with tears streaming down their face.

— We SMASHED every attendance record in Element history yesterday.  In fact we had smashed them with one service still to go.  AMAZING!

—  Preaching 5 times was an adventure.  I’m SO glad that’s a once a year thing.  Not sure how long I’d be able to keep up with that.  But MAN, am I also glad we had that Saturday night service with the kind of attendance we had.

—  Saturday night service was SLAMMED!  By far it was our biggest service.  Thanks to all who helped us clear out space in our Sunday morning services by coming Saturday.  It was a HUGE help!

—  Pastor Adam and the band did SUCH a great job leading us to the throne of Jesus in worship.  We closed out service with a song Pastor Adam just recently wrote.  We hadn’t planned on using it, but I heard it Tuesday and said “I think I want to close out service with that song.”  We did, and it was PERFECT!

—  The first time I heard the song I was SO moved.  It’s called “We bring You honor”.  Appreciate Adam’s heart of writing the language of our church!

— VERY cool moment on Saturday night.  On the front row, a man came with his family and his health requires him to use a walker.  You can tell it’s hard for him to even stand on his own.  He was sitting throughout worship, but during the song “Great I Am” he had someone help him up to his feet, and leaning on them with his hands in the air he was worshiping Jesus.  It was AMAZING!  Moved me to tears.  So cool!

—  The presence of Jesus was SO thick this weekend.  It really all started at our Night of Worship this past Tuesday.  God’s presence is what we long for.  If HE’S not there, NOTHING else matters.

—  We started a new sermon series today called “This is how we change the world”.  I preached from Philippains 2:3-11 and we asked the question “How can we change the world?”.  We are talking through the core values of our church in this series.  Here are some excerpts on the day:

• Lot’s of people are waiting on the world to change, we want to work on changing the world.
• We can’t change THE world, but we can change OUR world; and when OUR world changes, so d0es the WORLD.
• Values are not just the words that we speak; they are the WAY we live, born out of WHAT we believe, because of WHO God is.
• A list of values, especially in the church, don’t do any good unless they are linked to the heart of Jesus, and lived out in our every day lives.
• Core Value #1:  Obedience IS our success —  Our success is not determined by OUTCOME, but by our OBEDIENCE to God.
• Jesus was not just PART of creation, He was the power OVER creation.
• To me, the power of Easter weekend is not just in the wake of the resurrection, it’s in the WILLINGNESS of Jesus to die.  In order for Jesus to rise from the dead He had to be OBEDIENT unto death.  The author of life allowed Himself to be killed.
• We should pray this prayer every day: “God put ME where I can do YOU the most good.”  Instead we often pray “God do this FOR me so I can FEEL the most good.”
• We don’t obey God SO we’ll be accepted by Him, we obey Him BECAUSE He already accepted us.
• Spent a LONG portion of the sermon talking about the absurdity of the reality of what Christ did.  Humble HARDLY describes what Jesus did.  The WORD became flesh!  It is ABSURD.
• Took a risk on an illustration we did but I think it worked out GREAT and paid off well!  Drove the point home of how absurd the actions of Jesus were for us.  And it was the first time I’ve used LIVE animals in an illustration.  It involved fish and a fish tank.  Too long to explain here, you can watch online later if you like.

—  Leading up to today’s sermon I have been SO MOVED by what Jesus did.  I think sometimes we’ve done ourselves a dis-service by “churchyizing” the story of Jesus and the Easter miracle.  I hope we helped each person who attended to maybe see the work of Jesus in a brand new light.  Remember, if you were the ONLY ONE, He still would have done it for you!

—  Easter is in March next year.  Don’t forget to invite someone!  HA!  Never too early to plan for the next one is it?

—  I think that’s all I got folks.  I’m wiped.  GREAT weekend celebrating a GREAT God with GREAT people.  I love you guys!

Till the end,

Jeff

Spring is in the air and Spring Break has begun.  AWESOME weekend here at Element.  Had the gas buydown yesterday and church today.  Here are my ruminations.

—  Our team KNOCKED IT OUT yesterday for the gas buydown!  WOW!  Cars started lining up about 2 hours before we started.  Steve and his team literally did SUCH a great job.  It was the BEST buydown we have done so far.

—  We paid down gas by $1 per gallon for four hours.  I wasn’t there the whole time but it sounded like our volunteers had some great conversations with people who were coming through the line.

—  Why do we do this?  We believe we serve a radically generous God so we want to be a radically generous church!  Leading the way in generosity!!

—  Overall 241 vehicles came through the line and we pumped 5,871 gallons of gas.  So cool.

— My wife served at a pump with another couple who was serving.  They actually came to Element BECAUSE of a previous gas buydown, and there they were serving at this one.  LOVE IT!

—  You can check out some news coverage HERE and HERE.

—  We’ve done the buydown four times now and it NEVER gets old!  SO GLAD we are able to serve people like that in such a practical way.  When are we doing it again?

—  Attendance was weird today.  Some services were pretty normal while others were way down.  Expected a much lower day with the BEAUTIFUL weather and the start of Spring Break.

—  Concluded our series today called “Marked”.  We’ve been asking the question “What are the marks of a disciple?”.  Today we talked about the concept of coaching, and the big idea was “Coaching requires commitment”.  Preached from 2 Timothy 2:1-10.  Here are some excerpts:

• Blizzards…MMMMMMM!
• Our discipleship strategy here at Element Church is to always be REACHING more people FOR Jesus, then RAISING them up to be LIKE Jesus.
• As a church, if we aren’t teaching our people to reach other people, we’re not raising them up to be like Jesus; for Jesus said “I have come to seek and to save the lost.”
• If you say you’re a disciple but your not willing to reach more people, you’re actually a Pharisee.  “You diligently study the Scriptures…but the Scriptures point to ME!”  — Jesus
• Jesus didn’t need three years to die, he needed three years to disciple twelve people, equipping them to do HIS work so they could turn around and change the world.
• If you wait until you know it all you’ll never teach anyone else what you already know.
• If all we do is equip other Christians, we’ll never engage AS a Christian and we’ll end up being empty.
• Sometimes in discipleship we are so concerned with finding the answers we fail to connect to Jesus.
• Discipleship is like women…if you wait ’til you understand them you’ll never connect to them.
• Instead of being concerned with finding the right answers, we need to be consumed with connecting to God.
• If we’re not careful we can get so caught up in doing things FOR Jesus that we forget to connect TO Jesus.
• God is not as concerned with WHAT you’re doing, as He is with WHO you’re becoming.
• Suffering in Paul’s life was just an opportunity for salvation in someone elses.

—  This series has been a BIG challenge to me.  Not only a challenge on what discipleship is and what the marks are, but fitting it all into 4 weeks.  We literally just scratched the surface of discipleship in this series.

—  Pastor Andy did SUCH a great job preaching in my stead.  As I said today, Pastor Andy doesn’t just fill the pulpit and is not pulpit supply.  He is a bold and courageous preacher that handles the Word of God with EXCELLENCE.  So appreciate his leadership as your Discipleship and Teaching pastor!

—  Don’t forget the Night of Worship this Tuesday, April 3rd at 7 PM.  Pastor Adam and his team have a GREAT night of music planned for us.  I want to see that place PACKED OUT with worshipers of Jesus as we set the stage for Easter weekend.

—  Also don’t forget we have FIVE worship services for Easter.  We added the 6 PM Saturday service just for Easter.

—  We are starting a new series called “This is how we change the world.”  SUPER excited for what I get to share.  Some BIG STUFF coming down the pike for Element.  April 29th and May 20th are two dates you need to mark on your calendar to be there.  More info coming soon.

—  Below is the trailer for our new series:

—  That’s about it!  Thanks Element for just being YOU!  I love you guys.

Till the end,

Jeff