Another Survey Saturday!

Okay, everyone must calm down! Yes, it's another survey, but that doesn't mean you have to act like a bunch of hoodlums. Let's just chill out and get to the survey. Are you ready? Okay then ... Here's today's question:

If I want to be a person who reaches lost people, and be part of a church that reaches lost people - what is the one blog I should be reading?

Give your answer as a comment to this post. - And don't say this one. Flattery will get you nowhere. (However, if you want to send me money, that will get you everywhere.)

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Quote This

Are you like me? Do you like the good quotes? If not, go find something else to do. If so, read on, my friend, read on...

"Living the good life is frequently dull and flat and commonplace. Our greatest problem is to make it fiery and creative and capable of spiritual struggle."
– Nikolai Berdyaev

OR, For you "Fight Club" fans:
"This is your life and it's ending one minute at a time."


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Launch Team (2 of 5)

When the four of us moved to Virginia Beach to start Forefront Church, we knew no one. Not a person. We wanted a large Launch Team, and just assumed we’d start meeting people and they’d all jump in and we’d be rolling. We were wrong. After four months we had added no one to our Launch Team. We were desperate and had no ideas. Finally, I came up with one. We made a flier which explained that a new church was starting the following year, and that there would be an information picnic for those interested. We made about 10,000 copies and walked non-stop for a week, putting them on people’s doors.

The flier said that only people who didn’t already attend church were welcome at the picnic. To help ensure that church people didn’t attend, we had it on Sunday morning.

Shockingly, 104 people showed up for the picnic. I shared my story and our vision. I invited people to join a small group. 89 signed up. The next day I called everyone. The first question I asked is, “What church do you attend.” Everyone said, “I don’t. I thought I wasn’t supposed to.” Except one guy. He informed me he attended a church. I told him he couldn’t be a part of ours’. He claimed God told him to. I told him God told me not to let him.

We decided we wanted to start Forefront with a Launch Team of non-Christians. Starting exclusively with non-Christians is unusual. But non-Christians are the one kind of Launch Team member you want who do not fully buy into the vision. In fact, non-Christians probably won’t buy into the vision at all. They don’t even believe in Jesus yet! But, in my opinion, you still want them on your Launch Team. Why? Remember we said yesterday that your first 100 people will set the tone for your church’s future. So if a church’s first 100 people are all Christians, what future would you predict for that church?

Next week we’ll talk more about growing the size of your Launch Team. Until then, it’s like a soggy dream come true.

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Exciting Opportunity

For those interested in church planting and/or global missions (and if you're interested in either of them, why exactly are you reading my blog?) there's an exciting opportunity you may want to check out: On February 7 & 8 GlocalNet (from Northwood Church in Kellar, Tx) will be having a Turbo Training. It's NorthWood's Global Engagement and Church Planter training rolled into a two-day intensive. You can find out more at www.glocal.net/cp-wives/

The two speakers are Bob Roberts and Matt Chandler. In my opinion, Bob is one of the best leaders and thinkers we currently have in the Kingdom of God, and Matt is easily one of the best preachers I've ever heard.

If I could, I'd be there! Maybe you can .....

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Launch Team (1 of 5)

Thought I’d take a few posts to talk about issues related to Launch Teams in church planting. I realize you may not be a church planter, but hopefully there will be application for you as well…

So if you’re starting a new church you will hopefully have a Launch Team. This is a group of people who are with you before the beginning, and will help catalyze a successful start for your new church. This group is critical for a variety of reasons, and one important issue is the size of the group. I’ve heard that the rule of thumb is that after your first couple Sunday’s, the size you will settle in at is typically twice that of your Launch Team. This means that you want a large launch team.

However, there are some things I would not sacrifice for a large launch team. I would not want anyone on my Launch Team that does not fully buy into the vision. In the future, you won’t have this luxury. You will eventually have people who aren’t totally bought in. But with your original launch team, you want radically committed people. This group is going to set the tone for everything to come. In fact, my friend John Burke (who is an expert on this stuff) says that your first 100 people are THE critical factor about your church. They will set a DNA that will be almost impossible to alter in the future. So in your drive for a large launch team, don’t accept people who aren’t exactly what you want.

If you are starting a church in the town you’ve been living in, you hopefully have a group of people who love you and what you want to do. If you are moving to a new town to plant a church, this is more difficult. I know several guys who asked friends to uproot, move with them, and find new jobs in a new town so they could be part of their launch team. Several new churches had sizable groups who did just that. That’s awesome.

If you move to a town and meet Christians who want to be part of your Launch Team … be afraid. Be very afraid. Approach with caution. Don’t just say yes. Sure, you want a big Launch Team, but you’d rather have a small Launch Team with the right people than a large Launch Team with the wrong people.

There is one kind of person you DO want on your Launch Team who is NOT bought in to what you’re doing, and we’ll talk about that person tomorrow. Until then follow the white rabbit…

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Christmas Shopping Still Left to Do?

Still need to purchase a last minute gift for that hard to please loved one? We at Forefront have found something incredible that we made available to our people, and is available for you if you can still find it this late. Check this out:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DL9LdCe4y5s&feature=related

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Christmas Eve!

Hey - for all you doing Christmas Eve services - knock 'em dead!

This is one of your best chances to talk to people who are far from God. Make sure you speak their language!

Also, throw a hook out there with some bait on it. What I mean is that we all complain about people who only show up at church on Christmas and Easter ... well give people tonight a reason to come back before Easter! Talk about something coming up at your church that might interest them. For instance, we're showing a commercial advertising the new series we're starting in January.)

By the way - the series we're starting in January is "I Became a Christian and All I Got Was This Lousy T-Shirt" which is based on the book I have coming out on February 1st. We are making this series available to churches for free. For more info, read this.

Have fun, and have an awesome Christmas!

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It's Survey Saturday!!!

Calm down, calm down! I know you can't control yourself because it's Survey Saturday, but you must chill! What is Survey Saturday? Well, I'm not sure exactly, but I think it's when we do a survey. So ... here it is:

What one church do you know of that is REALLY reaching truly lost people?

Okay, so it's not "What church claims to be really reaching truly lost people," or "What church do you think might be..." But - do you know a church that you have good reason to believe is REALLY reaching truly lost people? Not one or two lost people, but like, this is a church that is really doing a killer job at reaching truly lost people? If you know some, I would love to know of them so I can learn from them. So leave a comment with the name and web site of that church and we can all check 'em out.

There are two churches I know of that I'm pretty sure are really doing it. (I wish there were more.) I've heard of others, but I'm a 'I don't believe it until I see it' kind of guy. So here's my two:

(1) Gateway Community Church: http://www.gatewaychurch.com/site/
(2) Central Christian Church: http://www.centralchristian.com/home.asp

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Another Prayer Request

My wife is giving all our neighbors (about 8 families) a variety of four dozen home-baked Christmas cookies today and inviting all of them to our Christmas Eve service. If you can take a second and pray that we get some yeses, that would be awesome!

By the way, who are you inviting to your Christmas service?



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Quote This

Are you like me? Do you like the good quotes? If not, go find something else to do. If so, read on, my friend, read on...

“Most people spend their entire lives indefinitely preparing to live.”
- Paul Tournier

OR, For You "The Office" Fans:

"There is no such thing as an appropriate joke. That's why it is a joke."
- Michael Scott


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The Strike

I've just gotta say, this writers strike is killing me. Since November 5th I've had to write my own sermons ... blog posts ... romantic notes to my wife. This really bites. The whole strike is over DVD residuals, but as far as I know there are NO DVD residuals for my sermons, blog posts, or romantic notes to my wife. All I know is that if I have to write another one of my own sermons, blog posts, or romantic notes to my wife, I'm gonna shove a fire poker down my throat till it pierces my heart and I die of internal bleeding. I need some writer to cross the line and come to work for me! Until then, if any of you want to write a sermon, blog post, or romantic note to my wife, leave it in the comment section ... and you may keep me from killing myself. We'll see.

(By the way, my wife's name is Jennifer.) (If you want to write her a poem that'd be cool, but I don't know of any word that rhymes with Jennifer.)

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A Church, A Hooded Sweatshirt, and a Crackpipe

Had an interesting service tonight at the White Horse Pub (for those who are new - our church has three campuses, and one meets in a bar, which is open for business when we have our service).

The message was: "Christianity for Cavemen: The Gospel, So Easy a Caveman Could Understand It" and I talked a lot about sin, death, and hell. Never done that to a room full of drunk people... fun!

But the most fun was after the service when a guy was telling me about his experience in church (before Forefront). Three years ago he broke into a church to steal stuff, but was so wasted that he fell asleep in the process. The next morning the church secretary found him, called the cops, and he was arrested. The church didn't press charges, but he had done over $200 damage breaking in, so he was still put in jail. The happy ending was that at the jail the cops took his hooded sweatshirt, and when he got out they gave it back to him, and his crack pipe was still in the pocket. He was so excited he went and bought some crack, and got arrested again that same day. -- That was his experience in church before coming to Forefront at the White Horse Pub. Nice.

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Christmas Eve Invite

This year we made a video Christmas Eve invite. You can check it out (but I warn you: You will never see anything much more stupid than this, so if you've already had your fill of stupid for the day, avoid this video) here:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=juFXXkivvUY

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Captain Caveman!

I've been meaning to share things we're doing, not necessarily so you can steal our ideas (though that's fine - we steal ideas), but more in hopes that it might spur you on to some new ideas...

So, we started our two new campuses a couple months ago. I knew I wanted to do a series on some of the basics of the faith to get all the new people kind of "oriented" in Christianity. We could have called it "The Basics of Our Faith" or something like that, but we're calling it "Christianity for Cavemen." Why? Because we always want to emphasize what we have in common with the non-Christians who show up to our services, not our differences. Our faith is our difference, but we all watch TV and have laughed at the Cavemen commercials. So packaging the series that way helps new people to see what they have in common with us (therefore making them feel a little less out of place, rather than what is different (and thereofore making them feel even more out of place).

Branding it as "Christianity for Cavemen" also makes it easy to be creative. If it was "The Basics of Our Faith," I don't what creative pieces we could have done. But with "Christianity for Cavemen we have shown one of the cavemen commerials each week, highlighted some of the funniest commercials on TV in the last few years, and this morning had a caveman outside of each of our locations, protesting Forefront. (They were dressed as cavemen yelling, "Forefront is anti-cavemen!" "Don't go to Forefront!")

Hope this idea helps you as you plan a future series. Ask yourself: How can we package this series in a way that emphasizes what we have in common with non-Christians? And, how can we brand this series to make creativity easy?

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Southpaw

I said when I began this that I wasn't going to talk about anything personal or non "outreach" oriented. But I've got to tell you this, because it just made my year.

I have this weird thing I do just about every day (I got the idea from the book of Isaiah) - in the morning I write "The Lord's" on the palm of my left-hand.

So today I came home from an early morning meeting and I noticed that my 6-year-old daughter had what I thought was just a smear of ink. I asked her if I could see it and she showed me. She had written, on the palm of her left hand, "Daddy's Girl."

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What If Your Friend Showed Up? (6 of 6)

This week I am having a guest blogger - Forefront's worship leader: Joe Heilman. He is fantastic at what he does and you can learn a lot from him. So here he is:

Everything changes when it’s your unsaved friend showing up for the first time. It makes you put everything you do as a church under the microscope. You know how to lead worship for all your saved friends. You do it every Sunday and it’s cool. Now it's time to lead worship knowing unsaved Bob from work is sitting in the third row. And BTW he came cause you keep telling him how different you’re church was. (No pressure.)

So there’s a good chance you may alter some of the things you normally say to help Bob understand what the crap is going on. You may even choose to cut a song, or explain a verse, or talk about something you never would have had he not been there. What’s even more interesting is that you may change the way you normally talk or act on stage because you know he’s there.

Vince has already talked about the Joe DiMaggio principle. It’s one of the principles we use that I like the best.
Every week someone’s unsaved friend is there. And they're looking to you to be the voice of the church they’ve bragged to their friends about. So do their unsaved friends the same courtesy you would your own.

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Hey Ladies!

I don't think I've ever mentioned this, but my wife has a blog that is for church planting wives. If you are (1) a church planter, and (2) have a wife, and (3) your wife can read, and (4) she'd like some good practical help on being a church planting wife, and (5) she has access to a computer, and (6) you communicate with her enough to tell her a web address, share this with her:

http://www.planterwives.com/

Thank me later suckers.



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Watch Bono (5 of 6)

This week I am having a guest blogger - Forefront's worship leader: Joe Heilman. He is fantastic at what he does and you can learn a lot from him. So here he is:

No, I’m serious, watch the guy. Get a live concert DVD of U2 and study what Bono does. U2, for over 20 years, have been giving their audiences a total musical and visual experience at live shows. But not only that, I think you'd agree, it’s a spiritual experience. And, as they’ve grown older, it’s more and more a Christian experience. And Bono is leading this experience for mostly non-Christians. And these non-Christians are happy to go along and let themselves be taken into this worship experience, even if they don’t yet know the God they’re praising. It’s a powerful thing to watch if you're committed to reaching people in a culturally relevant way through worship.

But like I said watch Bono during the show. Yeah, he’s a little showy and goofy at times. But watch him use his body to communicate each song. And when he speaks of spiritual issues, which he does quite often, listen to how he says stuff. He breaks down deep spiritual concepts into language everyone understands, while at the same time dropping the f-bomb. (In my world that’s a thing of beauty.) He’s poetic, but not pretentious. He’s passionate, but not preachy. He’s dramatic and emotional, but not effeminate. He very real, and yet he let’s each song lift him to a place of worship that become surreal. Bono is a great worship leader. Watch and learn.

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Fun! (How Do You Say "Fun" in Korean?)

Okay, these last few hours have been totally fun. Six different churches have let me know that they're going to do the "Lousy T-Shirt" series in their church, which is cool and humbling.

And, I just found out that "I Became a Christian and All I Got Was This Lousy T-Shirt" is going to be published and released in Korea. I find that totally hysterical! You have no idea - the fact that I've written a book, a Christian book, is quite absurd enough - but that people in Korea might read it - that's a stinkin' laugh riot!

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Be Excellent (4 of 6)

This week I am having a guest blogger - Forefront's worship leader: Joe Heilman. He is fantastic at what he does and you can learn a lot from him. So here he is:

I hope this takes no one by surprise, but excellence is really important in reaching our culture. I think that’s why places like Willow Creek, love 'em or hate 'em, have been so effective. Our culture is used to excellence; they expect and demand it, especially in music.

So how do we compete when we don’t have professional musicians coming out our ears, and we have volunteers running the soundboard. My advice is: Do excellence like you can, not like you can’t. For example, if you only have a keyboard player and a vocalist who are truly gifted, and every one else you could put on stage isn’t there yet, just put out the keyboardist and vocalist.

Don’t worry about all the parts that are missing. Forefront started with me. Just me. I was the worship team for 6 months. We built a musical core slowly. Now we have a couple bands. We strive for excellence musically, to a fault at times. If we can’t do a song with excellence we don’t do it or change so it does come off as excellent. You don’t need a stage show like Kiss or a backup band like Dave Matthews to be excellent. What you need is restraint and the ability to say “no” to people or things that bring the excellence level down.
I’ve heard many Christians say that the church ought to lead the world in the arts. I don’t know if that’s true, but I do know that we at least better not lag behind.


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First Church to Commit

Yesterday I had my first church let me know that they're going to do the, "I Became a Christian and All I Got Was This Lousy T-Shirt" series next year. That's fun, because I honestly think it will be one of the best things that happens for that church.

In part I believe that because I think the book is good and will catalyze spiritual growth in people, but also I think that having the whole church focused on one thing - everyone is reading the book, hearing messages on it on Sundays, and talking about it in their small groups - will create an awesome synergy that will be really dynamic.

If your church wants to do this, you can get 6 sermons, 6 small group studies, 14 videos, graphics, top ten lists, song ideas, and all kinds of stuff ... all for FREE. You can also purchase the books (I can get them for you cheap) and have your people buy and read them as well.

If you're interested, the web site with all the materials should be ready by the end of December, and the book comes out on February 1st. Let me know (vince@forefront.org) and I can help you out with whatever you need....

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If You Wanna Ride, Don't Ride the White Horse

We keep having our Tuesday night services in the White Horse Pub ... and cool things are happening.

Last night in the middle of my message a fuse blew and the power went out. I was suddenly preaching without a mike and to a dark room. That was not cool.

I also started ad-libbing at one point and said something about someone in the body of Christ having to be the sphincter of Jesus. That might border on blasphemous?

But this week we had a guy from this bar service give his life to Christ and get baptized. That is extremely cool.

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How to Speak Tatooed (3 of 6)

This week I am having a guest blogger - Forefront's worship leader: Joe Heilman. He is fantastic at what he does and you can learn a lot from him. So here he is:

Christians who don’t get it don’t get that they don’t get it. This is especially true of worship leaders. I meet this cool ordinary worship leader in the church lobby but as soon as he gets on stage with his guitar he starts singing and saying things only the most initiated of Christians understand. What's up with that?

So if you wanna reach the tattooed I'd go through ever worship song you have and take a good hard look at the lyrics. Would they make sense to who you’re trying to reach? If not, bag it.

And not only the lyrics, it's also what you say and how you say it during worship. On Monday mornings at Forefront we go through almost every sentence spoken on stage from Sunday morning and evaluate it. We wanna be sure that the seekers never feel like they don’t know the language and are therefore not in the club.

As a worship leader this is tough because there are certain words and phrases, used by countless leaders we’ve admired, that we now instinctively say. So I challenge you, before you throw out your next “hallelujah” or “praise the Lord” or proclaim that he is “exalted on high,” stop yourself and in your mind translate it into modern speak. It’s not always easy. It will come more natural as you discipline yourself to remain yourself on stage. Because the truth is you don’t talk like that to your buddies or wife right? So why put it on when you get on stage?

Trust me, I believe in biblical terms. I believe in bible language for bible things. I have nothing against the words “hallelujah” or “redemption” or “propitiation.” I have nothing against them in their proper context. But if your not gonna define or translate them for the uninitiated, don’t go there. Use the creative mind God gave you and find a more culturally relevant way to express it. If you don’t think you can be objective about this get someone to help you! You don’t have to dumb it down or be overly simple. You just have to communicate in a way that makes sense and pulls people into what you’re expressing.

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A New Conference

There is a brand new one-day conference in 2008 that is totally worth checking out. It's being put together by Ben Arment (who is one of my favorite people) and is called "The Whiteboard Sessions"

It's on May 22 in Reston, Virginia (just outside of D.C.).

One day: 8 speakers. (7 of the speakers rock. 1 is me.)

Check it out!

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Metallica Weeping (2 of 6)

This week I am having a guest blogger - Forefront's worship leader: Joe Heilman. He is fantastic at what he does and you can learn a lot from him. So here he is:

Imagine you go to a Metallica concert. You enter amidst a sea of black t-shirts. The language you hear and smells you smell introduce you to the “real people” you wanna reach. Welcome to the show! You’re amazed as the opening band comes on and the first rows turn their backs on them and give them the finger. It’s tradition at Metallica shows. This is a sign of devotion from Metallica fans. (I told Vince we oughta try it on a Sunday at Forefront during his sermon. He wasn’t down for it…)

Metallica hits the stage! It’s ear bleeding loud. It’s rock-n-roll thunder from the word go… Mayhem breaks out, fists pump in the air, grown men sing along with every word, heads and hair are flying, dogs and cats living together - mass hysteria!!!

Now let's pretend that in the middle of one the band's biggest songs, front-man James Hetfield tells the band to quite down. He needs to “share” something. He begins to share “his heart”. He gets emotional and weepy as he tells the crowd how difficult this tour has been on him. He has a little breakdown right there on stage.

As sympathetic as Metallica fans are towards the band, this would be bizarre. First, because this is out of character for James Hetfield. Metallica are musicians, but present themselves as tough guys. Second, this behavior is totally antithetical to what a Metallica concert is all about. And, third, fans would be up in arms at the interruption of their favorite jam with this freaky emotional whirlwind. This is a Metallica show, not Oprah!!

So what do we learn from our little pretend concert experience? I want to challenge the age old thought that the worship/music time is when everyone gets emotional and “in touch with their heart” thus becoming a big estrogen fest. It's like the person who cries the most is the most qualified to lead worship. But could it be that worship can involve many expressions and we've chosen "weepy" as the only valid one?

It is not effective if the guy we’re trying to reach comes to our church and sees a guy on stage who dresses like him, looks like him, rocks like him, but then suddenly makes him emotionally uncomfortable because the dude was "touched by the Lord" and gets all teary-eyed. The worship guy says he's "just trying to be authentic" but there's something not so authentic about it when the dude does it week after week. I think there’s a better way to reach that guy's heart and have him totally hooked into what God is doing. But maybe we learn how that looks more from a Metallica concert than the church down the street.

Please don’t get me wrong. There is a time for emotion in worship. I find myself there a lot. But as worship leaders let’s not get hooked into the thinking that unless we wear our hearts on our sleeve we’re not spiritual enough. As I said in my last post, this is an art form you develop as a leader. To find how you communicate, but chances are it doesn’t look like the weepy worship leader down the street. Maybe try just being you.

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Looking 4 A Great Staff Hire?

I know a guy (he's actually been in our church for a couple years and working with our staff for almost a year) who is available for a church that wants to make a great hire - is that you?

He would be awesome doing Youth Ministry or Creative Arts Ministry. He's also been involved in Small Groups, Missions, and Community Service for us.

He has a great personality, team player, good relationship with God, etc., etc.

If you're interested or want to know more, e-mail me at vince@forefront.org and I'll get you connected with him.

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Adventures In Leading Worship For Unchurched Tattooed Jake (1 of 6)

This week I am having a guest blogger - Forefront's worship leader: Joe Heilman. He is fantastic at what he does and you can learn a lot from him. So here he is:

I knew I wasn't in Kansas anymore when, after leading worship at Forefront for a couple of months, I looked up and I saw something I’ll never forget. I was in the middle of a slower song our church loved. I had my eyes closed. When I opened them I was a little taken of guard. In the very back of the movie theater, at the very top of the stadium seating, there was a guy in his early 20’s, tattoos up one side and down the other, who had just gotten out of prison. I knew was definitely not yet a believer . He was standing up, while everyone else sat, holding up his lighter! Like this is the encore at a Motely Crue show! I knew I must have been doing something right. The worship was getting a universal sign of approval from this seeker.

Over the years I’ve lead worship for hundreds of non-Christian people who’ve come through the doors of Forefront. Yes, you read that right, I’ve lead worship of people far from God. That carries obviously weird theological overtones and it may cause somecognitive dissonance. But let me push it further: I now lead worship in an open bar every Tuesday for a crowd of people that is probably 85% non Christian. I would never be so bold with such statements about what God’s done through us if it didn’t bare results. The response to our worship and music has been is one of the biggest drawing cards at Forefront over the past 10 years.

There are other weird signs you’re doing alright from seekers. In the middle of worship I’ve heard, more than once, “Free bird!” (I took it as a sign of love.) I’ve also seen folks hoot and yell for their favorite worship song, high five their buddy when the open riff starts and even throw up the Ronny James Dio “Rock Horns” when they’re really feelin’ it… Crazy but true.

I share those stories because what they point to is communication. When you’re doing it right you get feedback. When you’re doing it wrong you get hung up on. So then when you try to call back you get no answer because the people you were trying to reach have moved onto another place that speaks their language. Call it whatever you like, but when people feel safe to speak their native tongue back you know that you've crossed that wonderful bridge from “Weird Christian subculture” to more universal musical communication.

Granted, if you're not areful it can degenerate into just another rock concert. But if you’re a worship leader who has God’s agenda in mind you can use this powerful language to communicate the gospel. Over the next couple of posts I’ll try to articulate some hints to better worship communication

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Baptism Service

Just came home from a Forefront Baptism Service ... wow! We had ten people get baptized. It was awesome. One lady was a hard-core Buddhist up until she came to Forefront. Another was a hard core Wiccan. There's even crazier stories than that, but I'm not sure if I'm allowed to share them.

I'll tell you what: If you really commit to reaching people who are truly far from God there are all kinds of costs you'll pay ... but the rewards are fantastic, and eternal.

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Question...

Those of you who are reaching people who aren't already committed Christians ... how do you get your people to read the bible???

Thinking about it because today our sermon was all about why to read the bible and how to read the bible, but I'm not sure if it's going to produce results. We also provide people (in the program they receive on the way into the service) six "ready made" bible studies to do every week but, again, I'm not sure if they're being used much.

So what do you do? Anything you've found helpful in getting people to be in God's Word consistently?

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Repeat Saturday: Stuck

No new post this weekend, so here's a repeat you might have missed:

One time when I was in college a bunch of my friends and I went to a party. We drove back to our dorm, but couldn’t find it. (Yes, we all had been drinking.) (No, I wasn't a Christian yet.) We seemed to be driving in circles because we went past a BP Gas Station a couple of times. We were very frustrated; how could we not find our way to our own dorm? Finally, we stopped at that BP to get directions. We set off, now confident that we’d find our way, but were soon lost again. Awhile later we saw another BP Gas Station and decided to stop at this one to ask for better directions. Unfortunately, when we walked in we realized … it was the same BP.

A few years ago I lost my wallet on a trip. A week later I flew to Austin, Texas. I brought a church credit card with me. When I arrived I went to pick up my car, but the rental agency wouldn’t let me have one because I couldn’t produce a driver’s license. I showed them my credit card, but they wouldn’t let me drive without a license. I sighed and walked out to a taxi. I asked a guy if he could drive me to Gateway Church. He said yes, and told me how much it would cost. I said no problem, I had a credit card. He explained that he (nor any taxis) took credit cards. I didn’t have enough cash. And so I stood there, knowing where I wanted to go, but having no way to get there.

On a Sunday morning last month about a half hour before service I went into a stall in the men’s bathroom. Soon after I was done, but there was only one problem – I couldn’t leave. The door would not open. I unlocked it, turned the handle one way and then the other, pulled, pushed. I slammed my body against it. It would not open. I started evaluating my options. I looked down and decided there was no way I could slide under the door. I could just stay in there and skip the service. It would, of course, have a glaring lack of a sermon. Another option was to start screaming for help. This would probably get me out of the stall, but I wasn’t sure I could ever overcome the embarrassment.

We’re trying to use this blog to think about how to become more effective at reaching lost people. Last week we said we need to understand God’s heart for lost people. This week we’re trying to understand the heart of lost people.

Here’s one thing we need to understand: Somewhere down deep inside every person doing life without God feels stuck. They feel like they keep going in circles, like they know where they want to go but having no idea how to get there, like there’s no way out of the problems they have (but aren’t willing to talk about). They may give the impression that everything is perfect and life is a party, but inside they feel stuck.

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Book It Dan-o

Someone asked yesterday if I could suggest some books on church and evangelism. I LOVE books, so that's easy. To be honest, I'm one of those guys who mostly prefers secular business books, but I'll just stick to church/evangelism books today. Someday maybe I'll do "reviews" on these, but for now just a list. (The books on this list that most resemble what we're trying to do at Forefront would probably be #'s 2, 4, 7, and 13). All of these are must reads:

1. The Seven Habits of Effective Ministry, Andy Stanley & Reggie Joiner
2. The Gutter: Where Life is Meant to be Lived, Craig Gross
3. What's So Amazing About Grace, Philip Yancey
4. No Perfect People Allowed, John Burke
5. An Unstoppable Force, Erwin McManus
6. Simple Church, Thom Raineer
7. The Forgotten Ways, Alan Hirsh
8. Go Big, Bil Cornelius & Bill Easum
9. Glocalization, Bob Roberts
10. The Creative Pastor, Ed Young Jr.
11. The Emotionally Healthy Church, Peter Scazzero
12. The Church of Irresistible Influence, Robert Lewis
13. Stripped, Judd Wilhite
14. God in the Alley, Greg Paul
15. The Big Idea, Dave Ferguson
16. Spilt Grape Juice, Mike Root
17. unchristian, David Kinneman
18. Lost in America, Tom Klegg
19. The Church That Never Sleeps, Matthew Barnett
20. In the Name of Jesus, Henri Nouwen

As far as books on church planting, to be honest I haven't read one yet. When we started Forefront ten years ago I didn't even know of any such books (or I would have read it!). But I have heard very good things about "Church Planting From the Ground Up" by Tom Jones and the Ed Stetzer books on church planting.

What's your favorite book on this subject that I don't have on the list?

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Planning Your 2008 Preaching Calendar?

I'm not crazy about self-promotion but... If you're a pastor and are planning out your 2008 year, I want to let you know about something.

I have a book coming out in February called, "I Became a Christian and All I Got Was This Lousy T-Shirt." I talk to so many people who become Christians, but then end up disappointed with God because "the Christian life isn't all it's cracked up to be." The only problem is that I think a lot of them have never actually lived the "Christian life." They may have authentically become a Christian, but they haven't lived the life. So how do we really live it? Well, hopefully this book will help people to do just that.

Anyway, we (me, Forefront Church & Baker Publishing) are giving away a six week church series/campaign that goes along with the book. We will offer six sermons, six small group studies, graphics, song suggestions, 13 videos, and other fun creative pieces ... all for free. They'll be on a web site for you to download in the very near future.

You can do this series without the book and it will still work great. But the series goes along perfectly with the book, and I really believe that if you have your people read the book AND you do the series on Sunday mornings - your people will experience tremendous spiritual growth. In fact, I think it will be one of the more powerful things your church will experience.

The series could be used anytime, but two great options would be to use it so that it concludes on Easter, or starts the Sunday after Easter.

So, if you're interested - all the series stuff will be available soon (for free) and the book comes out February 1st (not for free!) (But you can get discounts if you buy cases to sell to your church).

Self-promotion over. (But I can't promise I won't do it again!)

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Am I Just Your Target?

Gotta question for ya: This morning we finished our At the Movies series with "World Trade Center." Focused on Dave Karnes, who basically snuck into the crash site on the night of 9/11 to search for people buried alive in the rubble of the buildings. He found two and saved them.

I talked about how as Christians we are rescue workers, and our responsibility is to bring people to Jesus. (You can listen to it on our web site in a day or so.) This is the thing I'm most passionate about, and what I love to talk about more than anything. So, on that hand, it was great to get to preach on it.

However, on the other hand, I'm always hesitant to preach about "evangelism" on Sunday mornings, because we have a ton of non-Christians with us every week. And I wonder if hearing that will make them think, "Oh. Wait. Am I just your target?" Or maybe they'll think, "Man, I'm glad you care enough about me to make me a priority and want me to experience what you believe to be a life-changing relationship."

What do you think? Is this not something we should preach about on Sundays? And, if not, where should we talk to our people about it? And, if so, what are the best ways for us to talk about it so our people feel inspired, but lost people aren't turned off? I'm seriously interested in your thoughts, so leave a comment...

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