Together We Build

Good Friday and Easter weekend was amazing – we saw lives changed and got to reach more people on one weekend than ever before! It was our biggest weekend (yet). Last weekend (April 6/7) we launched “Awaken All Weekend” as we added a Saturday night service to our 3 Sunday services, making for another huge weekend for our church. We saw almost as many people at Awaken in our 4 weekend services as we did at our huge Easter service at Austin Peay! And if that wasn’t a cool enough weekend, we also baptized 18 people on Sunday afternoon. God is moving in big ways among us, and we’re honored to be a part of it!

But He’s not done…

After a lot of hurdles and negotiation, God has also provided some additional space for Awaken Church to grow into. It’s a Band-Aid, not a permanent solution, but it will help immensely. We’ve finally been given the go-ahead to begin buildout in the adjacent 1200 sq ft next to our current building. This will improve the flow of Awaken Kids and provide some extra work/office space as well, which is much needed.

We’ve had MANY people ask how they can be involved, so I wanted to give a quick update. There are 2 main ways you can help…

Physically

Pastor Nate will be leading our first Together We Build meeting this coming Saturday at Awaken. We’re asking anyone who wants to help us build, lay carpet, put in ceilings, paint, etc. to come. Pastor Nate will be casting the vision for the new space, giving a brief overview of what it will look like, and seeing who can help with what. However you’d like to be involved, come out this Saturday at 11am to find out more!

Financially

As with any building project, it will not only take work, but also money. This is where anyone (in Clarksville or anywhere else around the world) can be involved. You can donate a gift of any size securely online HERE. Make sure to include “Together We Build” in the comment section. Any excess that we bring in will go to our current building fund as we continue to seek God’s provision and guidance for a new building (which is a big need as well!).

I think it goes without saying that we also ask for your prayers. Please thank God with us for providing this new space, and pray for provision and safety as we build.

However you’re involved, remember: we’re in this together! TOGETHER WE BUILD.

This means war!

Last night kicked off the Easter weekend party with our Good Friday service. It was an amazing night – full house, heartfelt worship, Communion, and even salvation! After service, a whole group of us headed over to the Austin Peay campus, where we’ll be holding our Easter service, to pray. We spent about 30 minutes in the dark cold parking lot crying out to the Lord and asking Him to move powerfully this weekend across the city.

Tonight continues the fun as we gather together with the team of servants who are making Awaken Easter happen. Many visitors will show up on Easter at APSU and not even think about the countless hours and team members that it has taken to get to that point. With that  team of servants, tonight, we’re going to worship loud, pray big, and get stoked. This is our version of a tailgate party before the big game. The difference is, we’re not going into it wondering if our team is going to win - He already won!

I’m honored to go into battle with the people of Awaken Church who selflessly serve week in and week out. One thing I love about them is that they’ve caught the vision – they know this is war, and they know that it is won through prayer. One of the items of our CODE at Awaken says…

The Battle Is Super And Natural. God has promised the victory, but that doesn’t negate our responsibility. We will do everything we can within our natural abilities and trust God for the supernatural.

We believe that with all of our hearts. We’ve given our all to this event, but we know that our resources are very limited. Anyone can put on a show and draw a crowd, but only God can change hearts. We’re going into this weekend with prayer and expectation as we give it our all to see God move.

The Easter Team Rally will also get us stoked and warmed up for the kick-off of Awaken All Weekend beginning next Saturday & Sunday. Whereas most churches get a break after Easter is over, we launch into our fourth weekend service and baptisms next weekend! I’m telling you, the people of Awaken Church are nothing short of amazing. They are a gift to me, to the church, and to this city.

This means war. Let’s go into battle in prayer, Awakeners. BIG things ahead!

The Flood: 1 year ago today

One year ago today, May 3, 2010, I woke up thankful that the rain had ended and the storm was over. We had driven by the church the night before, and although the river was very high, all the water was still in the river. I spent some time with the Lord that morning, and as I got ready for work, I saw a picture on Facebook that alarmed me – the water was no longer in the river and it had flooded Riverside.

I checked in at work, then headed down to the church to make sure everything was ok. I was sure there must be at least a little water in our church parking lot. I was right. This was the scene I walked up on…

I couldn’t believe my eyes. My friend, Denver, was there with me, and together we ran down the hill, waded through the parking lot, and into our flooded church building.

You can’t prepare for something like that. I was immediately overwhelmed with emotion and broke down in tears while I stood in disbelief shin-deep in muddy water in our church sanctuary. We had moved from the desert and lost everything in a flood. This was not in our plans!

It WAS in God’s plans though. He may not have caused the flooding, but He allowed it and would use it powerfully in our lives and our church. Not only was the church flooded by water, but we were also flooded by God’s provision and faithfulness through it all.

 A 7-month old church plant with 10-15 people in regular attendance should not have survived something like this. After we had removed as much as we could from the building, the church owned less than when we had originally opened our doors 7 months prior. Everything we owned fit neatly into the bed of my truck. 2 days later, we met in the same living room that our Bible study had begun in 9 months prior. We were starting over.

Thankfully, God had plans to use this flood in ways we never dreamed of. The following Saturday, after the water had drained, many of us from the church met at the building and began stripping it down to the studs. There was even another local church that brought a group of college students to help us out! I can’t think of anything that could have brought the people of Awaken Church together more than the flood. We met that night (and for the following 2 months) on Wednesdays and Saturdays in the second story of a bank, where another church was meeting on Sundays. It wasn’t “home,” but it was a place to meet!

On July 11, 2010, we made the switch from Saturday nights to Sunday mornings and reopened our renovated church building on Riverside Dr. Clarksville’s local newspaper, The Leaf Chronicle, did a featured news story on our Grand Re-Opening and Channel 4 news from Nashville sent a news crew to cover the story. We made state-wide headlines! That Sunday, we immediately tripled in size.

We celebrated our 1-year birthday on Sunday, September 19 with a huge birthday bash in our parking lot. Jimmy Needham came and led worship and put on a concert in our parking lot. It was an amazing day of celebrating God’s faithfulness and provision!

It took only 3 months for us to outgrow our renovated building. Kids Ministry was bursting at the seams and the sanctuary was filling up. Not only had God used the flood to bring our church together and provide for the church, but He also used it to clear out some space for us to move into right across the parking lot from us! We began renovation on 585 S. Riverside Dr. on Saturday, October 23 and we opened the doors for our very first church service in the new building on Christmas Eve 2010. On our very first service, we completely filled the sanctuary that was 2 1/2 X the size of our old one! We were blown away! That was just the beginning.

God is still evidently at work at Awaken and we’re still experiencing lots of growth. Since we reopened, we’ve seen exponential growth, many lives and families changed, people getting involved in ministry, launched Awaken Groups, and made national headlines with our Good Friday Funeral. Easter Sunday was also a huge success with 250 people in attendance, 7 salvations that weekend, and 2,000 Easter eggs for the kids!

I would have never guessed some of things that the Lord has taken us through over the last year, but I’d never change any of them. They’ve all worked together for our good (Romans 8:28) and we’ve been changed and stretched through it all! I have no idea what lies ahead, except for that if God is for, who can be against us? It may sound crazy, but I now tell people that the flood of 2010 was the best thing that ever happened to Awaken Church!

Isaiah 43:2 – When you pass through the waters, I will be with you; And through the rivers, they shall not overflow you….

Good Friday Funeral: K-Love’s Featured news story

Apparently news got out beyond Clarksville about what we did for Good Friday this year – it’s the featured news story today on klove.com!

I know it says I’m a pastor in Virginia, but I assure you, I do not live in Virginia. All the rest is accurate though!

Click HERE to go to k-love’s news page or click HERE to listen to the brief news report.

If you didn’t hear/watch the funeral message yet, click HERE.

Good Friday Funeral

If you missed our Good Friday Funeral, you missed out. We celebrated the substitutionary death of Christ by confronting people with the reality of His death. If Jesus had lived in American culture, His funeral may have looked something like this. Below is the video of the funeral message I gave for those of you who missed it. Enjoy, and remember…

Jesus really did die…

But He didn’t stay dead!

Read a few of my thoughts and the news article from the Leaf Chronicle HERE.

Here are some pictures from the funeral (thanks to Erica Swaringen)…

a few things that DIDN’T make the newspaper

As you may have heard, a journalist and photographer from the local newspaper, The Leaf Chronicle, came to our Good Friday Funeral last night. She interviewed me before and they hung out for most of the service, taking pictures and chronicling the event. They did a great job capturing the meaning behind the funeral and it turned out to be a great opportunity for the message of the cross to be printed for the whole city to read!

Make sure to read the article HERE.

It was an amazing evening and exciting to see plenty of new faces, curious about what we were doing.

Although they did a great job with the article, I wanted to mention a few things that didn’t make the paper…

SALVATION

The whole point of the evening was to point people to the freedom that Christ’s death offers for all people. We looked briefly at the story of Jesus replacing Barabbas, the notorious criminal, and I shared that anyone who had not committed their life to Christ was just like Barabbas – a criminal on death row. At the end of the message, I gave an invitation for those who, although they had lived like Barabbas, wanted to walk free that night. Praise God: 4 people responded to the invitation, including a guy I had counseled with earlier that week! THAT is the whole reason behind the funeral!

BEHIND-THE-SCENES

Although my face is the one in the picture and only a few names made the article, there were LOTS of people serving behind-the-scenes to pull this thing off. Everyone from our Kids Ministry Director, Jenn Witiuk, to all those who helped her teach the kids about Jesus’ substitutionary death. I know it was a sacrifice for many of them, considering that they wanted to be in the funeral, but their service allowed others the chance to experience it for themselves. We also had an extra staff of greeters, counselors, and even people who came early and stayed late to clean and straighten up chairs. Chris, our video & audio engineer for the evening rocked it as well, making it all go off without a hitch!

To all those who served behind-the-scenes, THANKS! Your service did not go unnoticed and lives were changed because of you!

THE FUNERAL HOME

The process of putting this funeral together began months ago. The first place I called to rent a hearse thought I was insane and said they don’t rent hearses anymore. So, I called the first funeral home that I could find in Clarksville – the Neal-Tarpley-Parchman Funeral Home. I couldn’t believe how generous, giving, and easy to work with they were! They donated everything from the hearse parked out front, to the casket, candle holders, and more! They did it all from the kindness of their hearts and without any recognition. It was a huge blessing to work with them. Although many people don’t do a lot of work with funeral homes, that will be a growing part of my job as a pastor. They’ve got my business.

The moral of the story: serve with your whole heart as unto the Lord, whether you get noticed or not. You never know how your sacrifice can impact lives all around you! Whether anyone notices or not, God notices…

Hebrews 6:10 - For God is not unjust to forget your work and labor of love which you have shown toward His name, in that you have ministered to the saints, and do minister.

Oh, and don’t forget, EASTER IS TOMORROW! We’re going to party! Bring some friends!

Sunday is coming…

I can honestly say I’ve never been this excited for a Good Friday-Easter weekend before.

In my years as a youth pastor, this weekend was always an easy one for me. Youth group was canceled so that families could be together and my main job was to show up early wearing a suit, eat a burrito, and welcome people. I loved that. It was a rare treat.

Good Friday and Easter took on a whole new dimension last year, since we were just 6 months into the church plant at the time. Last year was the first Good Friday & Easter messages that I had ever preached. On Good Friday, I pulled a reverse Superman (minus the telephone booth) by leaving work, putting on a tie, preaching, then heading back to work for the afternoon. That Sunday, we held a sunrise service on the river. It was an amazing first Easter at Awaken Church!

The church looked a lot different just one year ago. We had about 15 people in regular attendance at the time and we had no idea that a flood was in our near future. We were still in our first brown and blue church building, plugging away, praying for God to provide. We’re still praying for God to provide today, but almost everything else has changed – numbers, church buildings, and even the way we’re running services this year.

We’ll be holding a funeral on Good Friday this year, instead of our lunch time service last year. We’ll have a casket, hearse, pallbearers, eulogy, and all. We’re praying that many are confronted with the reality of Jesus’ death and turn to Him to experience true life. On Sunday, we’ll be holding two Easter services – both will feature our first-ever Awaken Church band, led by my beautiful wife. We’ll be partying on Sunday with a special message from Matthew 27. We’ll even have an Easter egg hunt following the second service!

We’ve rented extra chairs this weekend in prep for the influx of people we’re expecting and praying for. We’re also wired for overflow seating in the foyer and prayer room, just in case. Kids Ministry is stocked with extra volunteers, and we’re ready to see what God does.

On Thursday, I’ve opened the church building at 7am for prayer as we ask God to change lives this weekend and pour out His Spirit. We’re anticipating HUGE things and my heart is filled with faith and anticipation with what He will do.

Why?

GOD IS NOT DEAD!

He was dead, but now He’s alive forever more! THAT is a reason to party!

3 months

Last Thursday, March 24 was the “official” 3-month mark for us in the new building. We opened it on Christmas Eve 2010.

After that opening service in December, I got an email from one of the guys from the church saying we’d outgrow the building in 6 months. I laughed. I shouldn’t have.

Today we had to pull out extra chairs for our Sunday morning service. We only own a few more that are still in the storage closet.

It’s interesting that we’re here only 3 months into opening the new building. When we reopened our remodeled building after the flood, it also only took 3 months for us to outgrow it. Maybe 3 months is the mark for us. Sounds good to me!

All I can say it this: GOD IS MOVING IN CLARKSVILLE, TN! It’s a blast to be on board and to have the privilege to be a part of whatever He has planned!

If you live in the Clarksville area and haven’t been to Awaken yet, come join us on Wednesdays at 6:30pm (right now we’re in the book of Jonah) or on Sundays at 10am (we start Chapter 5 of 1 Peter next Sunday). We also have some pretty amazing Good Friday and Easter services planned that you won’t want to miss! Hope to see you soon.

Death vocabulary

Nate and I just met with one of the owners of Neal-Tarpley-Parchman Funeral Home here in Clarksville in prep for our upcoming Good Friday Funeral service on April 22. I’ve been to plenty of funeral homes before, as a pastor and also as a grieving family member or friend. It’s always a bit surreal. Funeral homes and grave sites have the unique ability to confront you with the reality of death in many ways.

One thing that stood out to Nate and I as we walked around and talked details with the owner was the “death vocabulary” that everyone was using. Here are a few words we used and/or heard multiple times in just 10 minutes of being inside…

death

casket

coffin

hearse

funeral

cremated

mourning

grave

pallbearers

deceased

died

dead

passed away

…and more.

The verse that immediately came to my mind as we walked out was Ecclesiastes 7:2…

“Better to spend your time at funerals than at parties. After all, everyone dies—so the living should take this to heart.” – New Living Translation

The stats are staggering: 1 out of every 1 person dies (except Elijah & Enoch, of course). That’s why Solomon says it’s so healthy to spend some time at funerals – they confront you with the reality of death.

I’ve performed quite a few funerals over the past few years: a 12-year old boy from my youth group, a 16-year old boy that I counseled, an 89-year old woman, a premature baby that was buried in a casket the size of a shoebox, and more… As a pastor, doing a funeral has a way of putting fire in my preaching like nothing is else. After all, the people sitting in a chair on Sunday may be lying in a casket on Monday. We’re not guaranteed another breath!

It would be healthy for us to remember how fragile life is more often.

Talking about death is not only healthy to think about, but it’s also a great way to share your faith with someone. If you want an interesting conversation, ask someone where they’ll spend eternity when they die. Most people don’t think that far ahead and they’ll stumble through a random assortment of unfounded beliefs that don’t even make sense to them as they’re coming out.

Have you thought about it? One day, you will die. Do you know where you’re going?

Awaken’s first funeral

Awaken will be holding its first-ever funeral on Friday, April 22 at 6pm.

The funeral service is for Jesus Christ.

In an effort to remind us all of the reality of the death of Jesus, we’ll hold a Good Friday funeral for Jesus complete with casket, hearse, pallbearers, and more.

The Day God Died

Last year, we went pretty traditional with our Good Friday service, but we wanted to think outside the box this year and do something that’s not normally done. We wanted people to really grasp the reality of the death of Christ. If He had died today, He might be buried in a similar way – His body placed in a casket, carried out by pallbearers, loaded into a hearse, then lowered into a grave.

For many people, the death of Christ has become a story that gets revisited once a year. Not this year. We want it to really hit home.

God’s Not Dead.

In addition to our Good Friday service, we’ll also be holding 2 Easter Sunday services on April 24 at  9 & 11am! That day, of course, will be full of celebration and a look at how the resurrection of Christ impacts our eternity.

Although Jesus really died, He didn’t stay dead! He’s very alive today!

Awaken Kids will be available for all 3 services that weekend, so that people of all ages can learn about the death and resurrection of Christ on their own level. We’ll be doubling our Awaken Kids staff on Easter Sunday so that everyone can be a part of one of at least one of the Easter services.

All 3 services will also include a Gospel message and an invitation for people to come forward and give their lives to Christ. We view these days as strategic time to bring hurting people to Jesus. In preparation for this huge weekend, a group of us will be fasting and praying each Friday leading up to Good Friday. Please feel free to join us as we ask God to work powerfully.

Beginning April 1, we’ll be renting out a billboard space in Governor’s Square mall to help us spread the word about the service. We also have 2,500 postcards available at Awaken for you to take to pass out wherever you go. In addition, we’ll be organizing some street teams for those who want to hit the streets and spread the news that way!

Read more about the events on our website HERE.

RSVP for Good Friday and Easter on Facebook.

Follow Awaken Church on Twitter to receive updates.

Email us for more info about the services.

Below is the video of the announcement I made on Sunday about the services…