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I’m Beside Myself September 4th, 2010
I’m at the office putting the finishing touches on tomorrow’s message and I’m in awe of what God has done over the last couple years. I can’t believe that in 5 weeks we will have three locations meeting every single weekend. I’m so floored by what God allows me to do, I’m so honored that he uses messed up people like me to advance his Kingdom. As a portable church that held it’s first launch team meeting with 12 people and 270 dollars only a short time ago, this past week has been nothing short of a miracle. We ordered ALL of the equipment for our Dover and Portland locations and we we’re able to do it with excellence! Our Dover location is honestly the coolest venue I’ve ever been in and I’ve been in venues all over the country. I’ve never seen anything like Dover! Next week, we have all of our lighting and video equipment arriving. Remember we are launching there on the 25th of September…..2 weeks from tonight! We are going to wait a few weeks to do a marketing campaign…we are going to be doing a HUGE marketing push at all of our locations in late September. Dover is going to reach people no one else is reaching…that pumps me up!
I’ll talk about Portland over the next few months more than you’ll want to hear 
Portland is one of those God things that I’m freaked out over. This is going to be HUGE! Alright, I need to get focused on tomorrow…Newington I’ll always have a special place in my heart for you…it all began with you! I love you guys and you are not going to believe what you guys were used by God to start in New England. Don’t miss tomorrow – may be one of the greatest messages God has ever dropped on my heart. It’s all for HIS GLORY!
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Dover location photo September 3rd, 2010
This is Daniel here, with the first of many photo updates as we near the completion of our Dover location before our launch on September 25th!
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HUGE NEWS! 3:20 challenge update September 1st, 2010
Alright, this is one of the most exciting blogs I’ve ever had the privilege of writing. A little over a month ago while on the phone with a mentor and friend, they mentioned that they would match dollar for dollar everything we raised up to 25,000 dollars towards the launch of our new locations. I was pumped up and scared at the same time. We had just raised a good amount of money to get Kaleo Coffee up and running and I wasn’t sure how NLC would respond to another challenge so soon. Well…..THEY RESPONDED! NLC, you rocked it! In the month of August, I gave you a challenge of 25,000 dollars and NLC you gave over 35,000! Here’s the most amazing part…August is traditionally (in two years) our lowest attended month and not only did you raise 35,000 dollars, our regular giving was the second highest month we’ve EVER had! THAT’S NOT NORMAL! I am so proud of you! You are trusting God to do the impossible and he’s doing it! We have 60,000 dollars (and growing) towards the launch of Portland and Dover in the next 5 and 1/2 weeks and we raised it in 6 weeks! Praise God!
The 3:20 challenge was a 3 month challenge…we’ve completed 2 months and here’s what I’m going to do. Because you reached our goal in two months, I’m going to honor you and celebrate with you! I’m not going to keep raising money for the same thing…as your pastor, I set a goal and you hit it in 2 months. I’m not going to break my word after you kept yours! Here’s what we are going to do…in the third month of the 3:20 challenge ALL THAT YOU GIVE above and beyond your tithe will go directly into paying off our Newington location debt. Newington was our original location and, as expected, has accrued some debt. It’s a very small amount of debt for a church our size, but it’s still debt. We are launching Portland and Dover with NO DEBT! We are going to reach several hundred people a week at these locations and have NO DEBT – that is awesome! My goal is to have all three locations along with our coffee house debt free and completely healthy within the next year. Think about it…we will be a 3 year old church with three (maybe four) locations and a coffee house with well over 1000 people a Sunday and NO DEBT! So that’s what I believe God would have us do now…focus on getting Newington debt free.
I am so proud of you! I am so honored to be a part of NLC! If God has done this in two years, what does the future hold? I can’t wait to see! God is using us to change the landscape of New England. We will be one of the greatest moves of God the North East has ever seen. Not because we do “cool” series or have “cool” experiences. Not because our band rocks it out or we have good teaching. But because we are a large group of people who are ALL ON the same team under the SAME vision and stop at nothing to see the lost saved! I love you NLC! The best is yet to come!
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Dangers of living your dream August 26th, 2010
One of the greatest lies a person can believe is once I obtain a certain platform, paycheck, influence, relationship, etc… life will be so much easier. Before we launched NLC 2 years ago, I used to think if we could grow to 100 people I would be so happy. When we had over 100 people on our launch day, I remember thinking if we could consistently see over 200 souls per Sunday I would feel content. The cycle went on and on all the way up till now. We are 2 months away from having 3 locations! We will be 2 1/2 years old on 10/10/10 when we launch our Portland, Maine location and I’m still thinking, when we break 1000 souls hearing the Gospel message at NLC on 10/10/10 I’ll be content. Here’s what I’m learning: as long as there are people in this world that have hell as their eternity plan, I’ll never be content. As long as I am called by God and not by status, I’ll never be content. Now, although I don’t believe in being content with people going to hell, I have learned that there are dangers in living your once upon a time dream. Here are a few…
1. You see momentum as something that will always exist, rather than understanding momentum is only as effective as your current level of effectiveness. Momentum isn’t an excuse to stop doing the things you did to achieve your goal, it’s an encouragement to continue pressing forward.
2. Decisions become harder. I always heard this statment and thought to myself, bring it on! Now that we’re a 2 year old church with a lot more influence than we deserve, decisions become a lot harder. Pastor Craig Groeschel told me recently: “There are some decisions only you can make! That’s why you’re God’s man for the job. Every decsion will be talked about in one fashion or another.” In other words, every leader that has a desire to do the impossible through Christ is going to be willing to take the game winning shot. You make some, you miss some…but in order to do the impossible you have to be willing to make decisions few would embrace.
3. What got you there, won’t keep you there. I feel as far from Jesus today as I did 2 years ago…but I spend WAY MORE time in intimacy with Jesus today than when we launched NLC. At every stage of your dream there will be a decsion that needs to be made, and it’s this one…are you willing to up the temperature again? Are you willing to do what no one else is doing in order to see what no one else is seeing? Most churches stop growing because the cost of growth became higher than what they were willing to pay in order to grow. What area do you need to go deeper in?
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New Car Smell! August 24th, 2010
This is a long blog, but I pray it ruins you like it did me!
I was on my way to CT to preach a few weeks ago and as I was driving down the interstate looking at all the different cars this thought hit me…every single one of these cars were the showcase car of their day. Think about it, every vehicle you see was the hot new model coming out the next year. That rust box driving down the road was someone’s pride and joy, the cars sitting in junk yard being used for parts were the nicest cars on the road at one time. There is, however, this rare occasion when you will see a car from decades ago that has increased in value. We’ve all seen that antique car driving down the road and what happens when one of those cars step outside the garage? Everyone looks in awe at it! Everyone is amazed by its beauty! It’s not because there isn’t any new 2010 models driving down the road, it’s because somehow that old car kept its new car smell and that amazes people!
So what happens? How does a used car keep it’s new car smell? The owner is desperate to maintain a high level of excellence. The owner has a vision for that car and no matter how many people try to dirty up the car, or get in the way of the vision, the owner manages their decision and holds true to the vision.
I think that most churches have become the old car driving down the road or the car sitting in the junk yard. Every church starts with a dream and a vision, but somewhere along the way the lack of excellence and the desire to stay true to the vision have caused most churches to become just another car on the road. Most churches have lost their new car smell. The scariest thing is that instead of going through the hard process of restoring the church back to the vision and excellence it once had, we buy “new car smell air fresheners” – a fake imitation! Far too many churches are pretending to make hard decisions. Far too many leaders are pretending to lead. Far too many churches pretend they will do anything short of sin to see the lost saved. Far too many Christians pretend that they want to see the lost saved. We have become a country full of churches using the imitation of vision and change but they are never truly changing. The car can smell new on the inside and still be full of rust on the outside…in the same way the church can fake their desires to those on the “inside” but the world, those on the outside, only see an old model of the church that has lost its new car smell.
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