That Just Happened (Vision Weekend)

I am writing this post after preaching for the first time in WAY TOO LONG! I was just coming off my summer Study Month when it was time for our first Vision Weekend. For each of the first 9 years of Quest Community Church my annual Vision talk was on Wednesday nights at Celebration. We decided to move it to the weekend for year 10.  So here are 10* of my observations…

1. Oh my gosh have I missed Quest…specifically opening God’s word together to learn & stretch…Questers are a joy to teach because they have the “want to.” I could see it in your eyes…you are wanting to make some Courageous Choices…go for it!

2. Putting the Annual Vision talk on the weekend was SOOOOoooo the right move…it was a slam dunk…a huge hit. We grew by nearly 500 people who just couldn’t miss it. We had one of our top 5 biggest (non Easter or fall kickoff) weekends ever. That’s in AUGUST…still summer!!!  I love that we want to hear from the Lord and that it is a high point every year…

3. The image of those 150,000 rocks being poured on stage will haunt me forever…I hope! 150k people dying every single day with most not knowing Jesus Christ personally is a wretched reality. Can you believe it happens? God made these people. They are His kids…yet most are lost & it breaks His heart. God adores all of His kids enough to send Jesus to die in an attempt to rescue as many as possible…more must be done to join the search.

4. Questers really are my heroes. Name another bunch of people who hear the call of God to join His search & rescue team & just dive headlong into the business of reaching lost people. I can’t help but believe God has such radical…audacious plans in store for a church this willing to go where others won’t…this determined to be the hands, feet, lips of Jesus to a world that really does look at the church as the Amish of the 21st century. An army of love daily reaching out in the name and honor of Jesus! You all rock!

5. “Unless the antidote comes into contact with the cancer it does no good.” The Holy Spirit gave me that line on Sunday & it hit me (and much of the room) like a ton of bricks. So lets go for it…let’s aggressively attack the spiritual cancer that is ravaging the globe with the antidote…the love of Jesus as embodied by those who have been cured.

6. “Nice and sweet never changed the world…nice & sweet never kicked down doors of darkness…nice & sweet never rescued a 12 year old girl from a brothel in Thailand…nice and sweet never got a 9 yr. old boy to stop running drugs in the ghetto…nice & sweet never rescued you from your nice, sweet life and make you a redeemed child of God” These are all accomplished by a bloody cross, nail pierced hands & a violent love that stopped at nothing to set you free.” Really…can you think of a time nice and sweet changed someones eternal destiny?

7. I lost my mind every single service when we sang Kim Walker’s Where you go I go …I wasn’t kidding about that song being straight from Jesus and being so anointed that we are gonna sing it A LOT! That song embodies who we really are all trying to become…LEARN IT…DOWNLOAD IT…WATCH HER DO IT ON YOU TUBE! I really couldn’t keep it together as we all sang…I could tell most were really trying to sing it from a real place and as people would finally catch on to it…they would just beign to lose themselves before the Lord…I love it…one of the best songs ever!

8. The song Extreme Days was too cool. I especially loved that part where that adorable, talented, brilliant, captivating, remarkable, godly 5 year old with the afro jammed under that baseball hat came out. He clearly stole the show…anybody know who he is? Tweet me if you do please…I gotta get to him before some talent scout or agent does.

9. Man did I love all the churches and pastors that came out for service both online & live. I know of 5 churches that came to cheer Quest on and get pumped up with Vision so they could go back & preach all lit up the following day.  Thanks to the Tweets, texts and emails from those pastors/churches telling us to go for it. Remember friends…we are partners in the Gospel…I love advancing the cause of Christ with you all…co-laborers in the Gospel.

10. You could’ve heard a pin drop the room was so engaged & yet so tense on many different occasions during the talk. When I said, “you have one life, one shot, one dash…what life are you waiting for” & when I took us from the thrill that 24 people a day have been coming to Christ every single day for all of 2009 to the horror of explaining that at this rate it will take 1400 years to reach the 12.6 million we feel called by God to reach for Him & when I told you how that church did nothing when the man asked for help learning about Jesus & when I laid out those very real Courageous Choices I truly do beleive we will all have to grapple with to really live out God’s audacious plans for our lives! There were other spots…those just stood out to me…so grapple away friends. Really ask Jesus to help you tackle those areas. He will and you are needed.

BONUS 3* SINCE I’VE BEEN AWAY

11. I meant it when I said “No where in my job description does it say that I am suposed to make you comfortable…it says I’m supposed to help you become a wholehearted follower of Jesus” BTW…I wrote my own job description!

12. What could possibly improve such a fantastic Vision Weekend after great services, record crowds & hundreds of names being written on the floor of our new auditorium with whispered prayers & quiet tears in every corner? How about a call saying “run back inside & up to the auditorium because your friend said he’s ready to accept Christ.” So I ran…and to cap off an unforgettable weekend I got to bow my head with Tim G. as he surrendered His life to Christ, had his sins washed away & became a follower of Jesus…which he said was certainly quite a surprise to Jesus

13. So let’s do it Quest…as Chapter Two: The Audacious Years begins…let’s together make some really Courageous Choices for the sake of lost people headed for an eternity separated from Jesus. Remember “Heaven and Hell are still real places and real people spend forever in one of them.” So let’s Courageously choose to reject fear…trust God with our money…give Him full access to our time…and let our hearts break with His! It is the only chance the people of this dying world have!