Bridge Happenings
Tomorrow is the first of four consecutive Sundays in which I won’t be teaching at The Bridge. I’m so grateful to be surrounded by a number of gifted speakers who are willing to jump in at any time. Hopefully this will serve as a strategic move that will enable me to utilize the time normally spent towards message prep to now go towards some new initiatives.
One initiative of a mens group is really exciting for me. I’m so pumped to get started. We have an information meeting about this in two weeks. I’ve chosen to make it a 10 week long study. My prayer now is that the Lord paves an ideal time and location for us to meet.
Another initiative launches next week in my absence. Our monthly prayer meeting gets kicked off January 6. I’ll be in Mexico with some friends building a house and hopefully getting some brainstorming done for Sunday messages post Easter. It is my hope that these nights grow in frequency. The idea of having intercession take place shouldn’t be that. It should be a reality and soon will be for us.
Our mass mailing will go out the fourth week of January. It will be promoting our upcoming Elements series. We have decided to expand the radius of the mass mailing. A resource that was helpful for me in finding what zip codes to use was here. In addition to 52501 we have added the following zip codes: 52553, 52536, 52561, 52563, 52533, 52537, and 52531. The strategy behind this is that we are hopefully building towards the south so that we can be in the position to plant a church out of The Bridge within our first five years.
We are having a Bridge information meeting the last Sunday of January. This will be a time for us to cast some vision and share a bit about where we have come from. Many of our regular attenders have only been with us for eight weeks and hopefully this will give them a chance to ask all of their questions. We also will have a sign up for those who want to join the Bridge as a member. Membership is the totally wrong word for what we have in mind but until we find a better one it is what we will be using.
We have two house groups planned for January. Now is the time for this part of our the Bridge to really form up. I have to be convinced the discipleship can take place on a Sunday morning. Corporate worship happens and teaching takes place but the reality is very few are discipled. Unless you are participating in the conversation and engaging topics from your life and faith you are very likely just going through the motions. I’m confident the Lord has something for us in House Groups and I look forward to finding out what it is.
Construction on the homeless shelter also begins. I’m hoping there will be plenty of opportunities for us to volunteer along the way in the project. Hopefully my Mexico trip will get me fine tuned for nailing boards.
I’m so excited about all of the above! January 2008 is going to rock!
