Good Things Continuing Since Grand Opening!

Just wanted to thank you for praying as we work hard to assimilate guests from Grand Opening into the family of ClearView. This has been going really, really well. We are thankful to God for many things, including the following:

• Many guests from the community on Grand Opening Sunday have returned. We have had a really, really high return rate. It is hard to gauge accurately, because with so much sickness going around, some people that are planning on coming back have missed the last few weeks due to sickness. But, even so, attendance numbers are running about double our regular attendance before Grand Opening. Praise God!
• Also, Trish and I hosted a get together this past Sunday evening for those new to ClearView. We enjoyed having almost 40 people in our house. This was a real fun time of getting to know new people, seeing those present enjoying making new connections, and for me to share with our guests the real heart of ClearView- a bit about the vision and values that drive ClearView.
• Several new people are already asking how to get more involved and sharing excitement about helping ClearView move forward.
• We've been doing a series (running in October and November) called Crazy Love: How God's Love Gives Our Lives Purpose. I have enjoyed studying for this series and am using it as kind of a base line to establish our foundation together (as a group of people that is primarily new) on the Good News of Jesus and how God calls us to share His love with others (mission). My hope is that this series seeds Jesus' key DNA (love) into us and stirs us to share it with others.
  

Please keep praying with us as we get to know these new friends, learn their life stories, find out where they are at on their spiritual journey, and ultimately become a church full of people in love with Jesus and on mission for Him. There is MUCH work to do...because God has been so good.

Thanks for praying with us!

Grand Opening Doesn't Disappoint

Sunday, October 11, was a milestone for ClearView Church! After more than two years of hard work, our start-from-scratch church plant celebrated it's Grand Opening! The celebration was full of fun, new faces, great music, an official welcome to the community from Mayor Ferguson, and a message detailing why ClearView exists. We had a great day of energy...one that was truly a culmination of a lot of work and many answered prayers. God gave us a beautiful day outside for the festivities that followed- free pizza, grinders, salad and ice-cream along with activities for children (face-painting, games, and bounce houses). All-in-all, I think all of the 162 in attendance sensed God's presence and had a great time.

Personally, I'm not sure I've ever felt so satisfied (vocationally). The day was just a clear movement of God in many ways. I left feeling that I/we had so much to be thankful for and that God was/is just really, really good to us. Here are a few things I've contemplated this week that I give praise to God for:

• I am so pleased with our ClearView team. I've been amazed, over the last few weeks, how people have come together, new people have plugged in, and we've made significant strides to improve all of our critical systems (Sunday worship, KidView, Wow Factor, Set-up/tear-down, etc.). There has been great energy, wonderful commitment, and excellence from people that are truly excited about ClearView's vision. In some cases, families that have only been with us a few weeks carried out vital roles to make our Grand Opening a success.
• The decision of our team to rally and move locations has proved to be truly wisdom from God. Moving to New Albany High School has acted as a rallying cry for our crew and I believe God used this transition point to create a sense of urgency in us that was needed to make this final push towards the great goal of a large Grand Opening.
• Things on Sunday went really smoothly. Considering that we just implemented sound and video into our services over the last 4 weeks (since we started meeting at the High School), we've had to train people, troubleshoot, and figure out our systems in these areas in a compressed amount of time. God was truly good to us in how well the program went. Also, our greeters and children's workers were on the top of their game and all facets I observed (and got comments on from others) were excellent.
• We were pleased with the attendance. Even though I had prayed for 200, I think 162 is full of miracles. It was SO exciting to see a full house and so many smiling new faces. There was a great buzz of excitement in the air...and I think our team felt a great sense of praise to God for answering our prayers for a good turnout.
  
• God worked through the marketing He helped us put together. Well over half the audience came due to a post-card or billboard or other form of promotion. It was exciting to see a lot of hard work in this area pay-off.
• It was personally gratifying to me to hear a lot of positive comments about the message I shared. I loved putting this talk together because it was a simple explanation of our purpose statement: ClearView exists to love people to a clear view of Jesus and His mission. I shared from the Bible about why we work to love people (because Jesus did, God does, and mission requires it), that we want to love them to Jesus and then help them adopt Jesus' mission as theirs. I heard a response from several people that they felt compelled by this vision and want to help ClearView fulfill it! Praise God!

I'm sure there is more that I could share. But, if you are a regular blog reader and have prayed for us over the last 2.5 years as we've worked towards this special day- thank you. God has answered your prayers and done a great work. Ephesians 3:21.

New Attendance Record!

We were elated and praised God that there were 63 smiling faces (4 guest families) at ClearView this past Sunday, October 4! This beats our previous high of 55. It was fun to hear stories of people finding out about ClearView through mailings, billboards, and our effort at Oktoberfest on October 3. God is good!

Please pray with us that these guests would come back and bring their friends, neighbors, family, work associates and pets (well, I guess that is overstating it a bit) this Sunday for our Grand Opening!

Pray Our Invites Hit The Spot

One of the chief attributes that sets our Grand Opening Sunday apart from our typical weekly worship gathering is the significant push we're making to invite the community to participate with us. We've developed a multi-layered marketing strategy and are working hard to invite guests through personal invitations, Facebook Ads, newspaper ads, a billboard (see above), and three mailings (38,000 pieces each).

The three mailings are being sent out each of the the weeks leading up to October 11. That means one has already gone out, one should be in boxes today or tomorrow, and the last one will be sent out in the middle of next week. These are made possible by the generous support of our sponsor church, Northwest Chapel, that covered the postage, much of the printing expense, and assembled a team of about 20 volunteers that worked for four days to AFFIX MAILING LABELS ON 114,000 PIECES OF MAIL BY HAND.

Would you pray with us that this promotion hits the mark? To me, it's not about how many people show up to ClearView on October 11. What I'm asking God for is to, by His power and control over each detail in the universe, guide these promotional pieces before the eyes of spiritually searching people. I believe there are people in northeastern Franklin County that are asking spiritual questions. People that are sensing God's movement in their hearts. Maybe they're even looking for a church. Maybe they need some encouragement. Perhaps they know their life is missing something...and they're open to hearing about Jesus' intended purpose for their lives. Would you pray with me that God works through our marketing to help us love people to a clear view of Jesus and His mission?

Please Pray For Our Grand Opening (October 11)

Many of you know that Trish and I moved to northeast Columbus in February of 2007 with a mission- start a new church from scratch. As we've prayed and worked hard to plug into the community, we've met a lot of great people along the way. Through a lot of prayer and sweat, God has brought together a really, really great team that drives what is now ClearView Church. We're so excited and thankful for the people that now share our mission of building a church that will love people to a clear view of Jesus and His mission.

On a quick side note- many of you have been reading this blog and praying with us from the point we first signed on as church starters (fall of 2006!). If you remember back to some of our early writing... we asked you to pray that God would bring us 25 families or around 75 people. This was the mark at which we felt we would be able to launch a new church with momentum. Yet, we found out the hard way that finding that number of families or people to help in a community where you don't know anyone... was next to impossible. This has been the great challenge of our journey- finding the number of people necessary to establish the initial systems of a healthy, baby church. Anyway- fast forward two and a half years. How many family units do you think are actively involved at ClearView? 25 :)

So, in God's PERFECT timing... we're ready for our Grand Opening Celebration. Complete with a new location, we've been working hard to use the resources God has given us to reach excellence in our Sunday morning worship environment, KidView (children's ministry), and Wow Factor team (guest relations). God is helping us make great strides in these areas. Would you please pray with us for God's work on October 11? Here are some specific ways to pray:

• That God would lead spiritually seeking people to our Grand Opening event.
• That God would move in the hearts of people the ClearView team is personally inviting.
• That God would answer the prayers that have been prayed for many years by hundreds of people around the world for ClearView’s Grand Opening.
• That God would be honored by our hearts and all that happens on October 11.
• That God would use us to love people to a clear view of Jesus and His mission.
• That God would burden us with a continued excitement and challenge over the call to love people to Jesus and figure out how to develop missionaries in our context (no matter what does or doesn't happen on 10/11…this is our mission).

Thanks!