- This week much is happening on the church - carpet is going in, new doors, more mechanical stuff (not readily seen) and sound connections and equipment. While this is happening here, more work is being done on our multi-purpose building off our site. It is going to be incredible. Your continued prayers and financial giving are essential.
This past Sunday was a great day. Even though the storms were brewing, LFC had great attendance and a great spirit in our worship and communion time. People even came out to hear the “State of the Church Address” this past Sunday night. What a great time with a great many things to report. 2007 was a great year, and our second greatest year financially, off about 5,000 dollars from our all time high and (even with the expenses of the building project taking place). We are totally debt free and our enhancements to our expansion have been paid for with overages from our monthly income. We watched a well done video overview of 2007. I get a bit emotional when I see the faces of people touched by the efforts of LFC and during the water baptism segments - my heart is moved. I shared with the church family about the wonderful things God did in 2007. The greatest of all was to realize that over 220 people had said, “yes” to Jesus for the first time and that almost 1,300 had done so in the past five years through the efforts of LFC. God is amazing! I also shared two big words for 2008 – Relationship and Risk. Under both these themes I asked the question of: who of those who do not have a church home, will you invite to LFC this coming year? And, that we all need to have a desire to bring and include others. As a church family we will work harder at engaging both the marginalized outside and inside our walls. There are many who attend this and any given church who live on the fringe. Their best is never discovered, their heart is never filled and their gifts are never given away. Our prayer is that this will change as we all work together to be the heart and encouragement that God can use to bring about the best in and through others. 2008 will see us working harder at dealing with the largest challenges we face: - Dealing with our staffing needs.
- Growing people deep and strong.
- Emphasizing Life Transformation Groups (our small group ministry) and Various Life Development Classes.
- Bringing and included newcomers.
- Growing our various ministry teams.
- Involving as many as possible in the major events and outreaches we provide for our community.
- Finishing our expansion project and some additional site work.
- The removal of the corner house and the first steps in seeing our multi-purpose facility come to pass. (It is currently being built).
Three key areas for us in 2008:
Celebration: We will be more creative and grow the teams which make our Sunday Celebration times happen. From worship to drama, technology to creative ways to collaborate on what happens on Sunday and to simply making more room for team members. Greeters, parking lot greeters, enhancing our children’s ministries and making Sunday all it can be.
Doing Church as a Team: I never weary of sharing this concept because we have seen that it works. Allowing people to have a place and use their gifts in the church in which they attend is a great value. We could never do all we do if we had to wait until adequate staffing was in place. Our youth team, Children’s team, video team, worship team and so many more are making a huge impact on the heart and lives of others. We will continue to “kick it up a notch” in our teaming. We must build greater teams around our Sunday gatherings - and we will. Our tech team has grown and many new things are happening with our camera team (we run three cameras on Sunday to two live techs behind them) and many more enhancements Everything flows out of the services here.
Relationships: I am very excited about our new Young Adult / College Age ministry we are launching in March – illuminate! As well, our Life Transformation Groups will be “refired up” and some exciting time in the word, with our Journaling groups. Our men and woman will continue with their monthly gatherings and our brand new LFC CONNECTIONS will prove to really get people together. This is the dividing up of the church in alphabetical segments and with various leader and hospitality teams in place to provide, no pressure times for pot-luck or BBQ gatherings or simple family times. These gathering will be announced well in advance and our hope is to have everyone in the church participate and gather with their group three times during 2008. From this, relationships will be built and strengthened as these gatherings will allow for a closeness that can move into gatherings outside of the Sunday times, shared life and experiences (if people choose) and moving into teaming together on the various teams. This design is simple yet very exciting and more than I can describe here. In all we do let us remember:
We are not simply here to fill seats and fill an offering plate. But to fill people’s hearts with love and the truth of God’s word.
We are not here to mimic what other churches are doing, but to be to this community what other churches are not.
People’s eternities depend on what we do today.
The Future of the church depends on what we do today.
“The future is purchased by the present.” - Samuel Johnson
We cannot linger in the past … for God desires to do something today that will impact tomorrow. Isaiah 43:18-19 NIV "Forget the former things; do not dwell on the past. See, I am doing a new thing! Now it springs up; do you not perceive it? It will take risk to move forward and make sure that we are not only thinking upon today and tomorrow but for the future of the church in many years to come. Read the heart’s cry for this year:Matthew 9: 35 – 37Jesus went through all the towns and villages, teaching in their synagogues, preaching the good news of the kingdom and healing every disease and sickness. When he saw the crowds, he had compassion on them, because they were harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd. Then he said to his disciples, "The harvest is plentiful but the workers are few. Ask the Lord of the harvest, therefore, to send out workers into his harvest field." (NIV)Please read this text and catch the imagery….sheep without a shepherd, no one to guide them, care for them, protect them. Alert them. It was the heart of Jesus, and still is to care for those who needed care and touch the hurting. It was His heart for them………….It must be our heart too. Let us not miss that – the heart of Jesus for them was and is His heart for us and must be transferred to others. He did not come to condemn them but to see them free. It was HIS LOVE TO BRING AND INCLUDE them into the flock and it must be our heart too. The words must hit us hard, "THE HARVEST is plentiful – We measure our church not by the chairs, or how many attend but by how many are outside. Prayer and Labor that are fueled by love are essential to the harvest. We need each one of you to embrace the Harvest - the Harvest is people and they really do matter to God. It will take a risk and relationships to touch hearts all fueled by love. John 13:34A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. (NIV)What must Drive us in 2008 is the same thing that got us where we are - LOVE.Without LOVE – no one will care. Let us not assume that people know what we know about teaming, about Doing Church as a Team. Let us not assume that people know the things we are sometimes tired of sharing and hearing. We all must welcome and reach out to our newcomers and insure that they feel welcomed. Some wonder if we need them – we must invite them to our teams, make room for them when they come, welcome them with open arms and hearts. Bring and INCLUDE. Some think that because of the size of our church, we have all we need. This is not true! We actually have several teams praying for additional members and we have teams that must expand to increase ministry flow - but again this is not the issue. The real issue is the value of people living out their call and heart and finding the joy of serving and giving themselves away. Some may wonder if they can fit in here – it is up to us to go out of our way to love them.One great area you can help us in is: Our upcoming Children's outreach: Will you help? Come and build relationships with others and risk reaching out to the children of our area.Can I ask you to consider joining us on for Who's Your Valentine? It will be a great day, only if you come out and serve and make an eternal difference with us.
On Febraury 9th from 11:30 am - 1:00 PM on our multi-use / parking corner lot we are inviting the kids of LFC to join with as many kids from Lompoc to come and hear about the Heart of God and have their hearts touched by God's love. We invite you to come and serve with us and to invite children to the day.
I love being your pastor,
Pastor Bernie
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