Juiced up Pastor

The sun is streaming down into my office, and I’m a bit in awe of God this morning, and I can’t stop thinking about OCC’s membership class last night. I'm a bit juiced up...

God is so good. Another full, and over-full class, another amazing collection of humanity…a cross section of intergenerational, multi-ethnic, amazingly talented, incredible humans…a picture of heaven. One couple had been at OCC for 5 years. Many had been attending for more than a year. But the majority are new to our church within the last 12 months. New life, fresh perspective.

We crash-coursed through Unity, Purpose, Truth, and Covenant. Then we prayed, and after that the conversations began. Pastor Gary and I spent an hour or more just hanging out and connecting with individuals and families who floored me. This couple is from Brazil, she’s a famous folk singer there, and they want to start a Portuguese-speaking life group in their home. This couple started a web resource called Soulbyte, and they want to make products specifically to support the congregation of Overlake. This woman is so passionate about Seattle that she can’t wait until we open a venue down near Pioneer’s Square so we can welcome the demographic that can’t make it to our campus into the same kind of dynamic environment where they can meet Jesus.

There were the amazing stories of how people found our church. Some by accident. Some were looking for another church, and happened to get the directions wrong. Some were planning on going to another church with an earlier service and didn’t get ready in time, so they had to find a church with a later service start time (ours are 9:20, 11am, and 6pm on Sundays). One couple was interested in trying every church EXCEPT Overlake, until a friend earnestly suggested that she give it a try. They did, their family loved it, and now they’ve found a home. One family drives up from Tacoma! What the what?!

These things I share knowing that God is up to something. It is something good. Something exciting. Something impactful. Something that glorifies HIM. He’s on the move at the OCC…

To those of you who were at our membership class last night, I simply want to say again what an HONOR it is to be on this journey with you. To those of you who aren’t yet connected to a life-giving, freedom-living, passionate-for-Jesus kind of church, I humbly want to invite you to check out OCC. And to those of you who are IN, who are ready to charge the gates of Hell with a war-cry and a watergun, I want to say, “Let’s DO this thing!”

Love God.
Love People.
Serve the World.

And remember that its all for Jesus.

p.s. OCC.org is a great place to go to get questions answered…our current series on LOVE: THAT 4 Letter Word…our archives contain all sorts of Hot Topics as well if you’re curious…love to invite you to poke around a bit…Blessings today...and JUICE!!