Administration

This past Sunday, we did something pretty risky at Freedom Church.  We had our first baptism service and gave people the opportunity to be baptized.  (Not so risky, right?)  However, we gave them the opportunity to be baptized spontaneously.  Sure other churches have done this, but I had never actually seen it done. 

What if no one responded?  Would we have looked crazy if no one responded?  Would all of the hard work to set up a baptistry in a portable environment been a waste?

The cool thing is that God answered those questions by sending 17 people our way that needed to be baptized.  We tried to go overboard by removing every excuse that a person might have had.  We provided towels, shirts, shorts, flip-flops, underwear, hair dryers, deodorant, and many other things to make sure no one could say that they couldn’t do it because they weren’t prepared.

It was a great day in the life of our church.  The risk factor made the day even a little sweeter because we realized that God had to come through for us or we were going to look pretty foolish.  In the end, God did come through.  He tends to do that from time to time:)

(We were able to do lots of planning thanks to these guys!  If you would like to see our information on the event, send me an email at todd@freedomlive.net.  I’ll be glad to help you out!)

I just finished having lunch with Paul Marshall and Adam Haskett at The Meeting Place restaurant.  These guys are the financial geniuses that help make minstry happen at Newspring.  They were a HUGE help!

They not only answered the questions that I had but also were willing to give me some advice about things that will help us to go to the next level.  I was honored that they were willing to give up some of their busy day to help me and Freedom Church go to the next level.

Paul and Adam – Thanks so much for stretching me!  You guys are awesome!!

Yesterday, I began a discussion about the things we discuss at staff meeting.  I wrote about the things that we discuss on a weekly basis.  Here are some other general things that we discussed this week.  I’m not going to go into detail about them, but just wanted to give you a glimpse of what staff meeting looks like.

* Newcomers’ Luncheon Follow-up

* How do we move to the next level?

* We discussed a HUGE announcement that is coming Sunday.  Want me to tell you what it is?  Not on your life.  You’ve got to be there Sunday to find out.

* Who is attending that needs to move to the next step in the process of becoming a partner?

* Mother’s Day – Bring your mom, your cousin’s mom, your mom’s mom, and any other mom that you can get here.  It’s going to be awesome!

Every Monday night, our staff meets to discuss the past Sunday, the upcoming weeks, and what we will need to do to go to the next level.  Here are a couple of things that we discuss EVERY week:

* Hits / Misses – We discuss what went right on Sunday and what went not so great.

* Who are you learning from? - Each staff member is responsible for building relationships and learning from others.

* Cultures and Values – We just did this last night for the first time.  We grade ourselves on our core values and cultures that we are attempting to create.  In these areas, we talk about strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats.

* Guest Follow-up - We make sure that guests are being contacted and discuss some of the stories from those people.

Obviously, these are just the things that we talk about each week.  There is much more discussion that takes place from week to week.  Tomorrow, I’ll post some of the other things that we talked about last night.