.Real.Greg.Lee.

I got a text at 3:30 this morning with news from the Liberia team with another hiccup.  Their flight from London to Brussels was canceled and it became impossible to replace the flight quickly.  It looks like they will be spending a day in London and almost 2 days late in Liberia as they now make a connection through Nairobi, Kenya that was never planned.

We have preached preparation and flexibility for the team for a year now, so they are going to take it in stride and make adjustments.

I just talked to Danny Buegar, our partner in Liberia.  The news is really the worst for them because of all the plans that will have to be adjusted of what our team wants to do.  But, as always, his spirit is great and he understands better than anyone how hard it is to make all the logistics work with their country.

More updates as I have them.

Posted in Suncrest

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Posted in Suncrest

There is too much to type to tell all the baptism stories.  Some are super-personal (to me and to them).  I often feel like highlighting some might diminish the others…and every one of them was a life-shaping decision.  So I’m just going to bullet point a few highlights (some I shared Sunday at the St. John Campus) and share a couple others that have been passed on to me. 

• A young woman who I had done a wedding ceremony for 6 years ago. 
• A young man who had one of life’s “wake-up calls” in a serious accident a few weeks before.
• A lady who is often my teller when I go to the bank.
• Seeing a few “whole families” being baptized together.
• Watching a husband jump in to baptize his wife.
• People I had prayed for over many years…and People who were in their first few weeks at our church
• The person running mediashout/powerpoint in our sound booth walked down from there to get baptized.

A very personal one:  If you were with us in the first week of the series, I told a story about a teenager I met with years ago and after a conversation I thought was good, I was so disappointed when he said Jesus was (on a scale of 1-10) a “5” in importance in his life.  That very guy (now a young man) was in church and came up to get baptized…and made a commitment to follow Jesus (as a 10!). 

A couple other stories that I think capture the morning…

From Jerry Jackowski…”When I decided to be baptized, all I could think about was who was going to do it.  When I saw Gordon in the water, I thought how fitting.  Gordon was the leader in my “Starting Point”.  It is amazing how God placed Gordon at the “start” of my following.”

From Linda Barnett’s grand-daughter who now lives in Florida, but grew up largely at Suncrest made a surprise visit to see her.  She tell’s the story…

On Friday the 5th, I went to Brenda’s for the evening.  Once I got there, she took me aside and told me she needed to talk to me in the computer room.  The door was closed, she opened it, and there in a chair sat my youngest granddaughter, Hayley (15).  Unbeknownst to me, she had flown in to surprise me.  She was worried since she had heard my diagnosis, and I had not seen her since Christmas 08.  You can only imagine how I felt.  Hayley had wanted badly to be baptized, and she wanted to be baptized at Suncrest.  I don’t believe in coincidence, but I do believe in the divine providence of God.  I just remember her saying at second service…can I go up now?  She was second in line.  I cannot tell you what peace it gave me.

Thank you again for baptizing Hayley.  It was the number one thing I wanted to see accomplished on my bucket list!!  

Posted in Suncrest

I think social media is an effective tool for ministry as much as perhaps any other profession/field.  It may have its limitations, but it is still a great way to connect with many (and I think we are learning the limitations are fewer than most first thought). 

Here are the Suncrest staff that are utilizing twitter…follow them!  

Doug Gamble — @douggamble 

Jared Mehrle — @jmehrle 

Wes Blackburn — @wblackburn0316 

Nash Propst — @nashpropst 

Brendon Foulke — @folkynator 

Denise Tribble — @dtrib

Oh yeah…Me — @gregleenow  

And Also… 

the Church — @suncrestchurch 

And…the Hobart campus — @suncresthobart 

If you do twitter and I’m not following you yet, let me know.

Posted in Suncrest

Thoughts running through my head this morning…

1.  I have the most wonderful wife in the world.  Valentine’s Day just reminds me of that.

2.  I was looking forward to a week off from teaching.  But with the call that Jared was sick Saturday night, I ended up teaching at St. John.  I’m a late night person…but it was 2:00am when I decided the sermon wasn’t going to get any better by staying up later!  I’m teaching the next 4 weeks too, so I’ll look forward to the break after that!

3.  I was REALLY looking forward to being at the Hobart Campus on Sunday…that was the worst part of getting the call to teach at St. John on Sunday.  I’ll get out there soon!

4.  I had breakfast with Mike Moseng this morning at the place we used to meet weekly for breakfast.  Good times.  I’ll miss he and Laura in big ways.

5.  I love the Olympics.  Even more, I love that our kids love the Olympics.

6.  My mom and dad were at the Daytona 500 again this year.  Long race yesterday with the delays, but they got to see a great finish!

7.  Our upcoming message series is “The Jesus Mission”.  It has HUGE implications for each of us who are followers…and for our church.  If you want to get a head-start…begin memorizing Acts 1:8 today.

8.  I like to give Wes Blackburn (our worship/cultivate intern) a hard time, but the response from the crowd on Sunday when I said “should we try to keep this guy around?” was pretty telling about the positive impact he has already had on our church.  Maybe…an announcement soon?

9.  It was awesome to introduce Brendon Foulke as our Student Life Pastor for the St. John Campus yesterday.  We are very fortunate to have someone with his leadership gifts on our team.  Young guys usually are full of potential.  Brendon has that…but also already has some pretty impressive experience.

10.  And I can’t forget to mention Nash Propst.  He’s our worship guy at the Hobart Campus, but did a really nice job leading at St. John yesterday.  On the flip side…Bobby Jackson was leading out at Hobart and came back totally impressed at how that campus was engaged with worship.  Great stuff going on out there!

Posted in Suncrest

OK.  We condensed it as much as we could, but this video is long (you know there were 80 baptisms), but it is full of stories.  And you have to watch it to the end so you can see the Hobart campus baptisms too.

It’s worth 12 minutes of your time…(click here if you don’t see the video in your email/reader).

I still haven’t stopped to tell all my cool stories about the people I knew personally getting baptized on Sunday.  Hopefully tomorrow.

Posted in Suncrest

Do you Pray?  We could use your help.

Some of our leaders are making sure that our next, bold steps as a church are saturated with prayer.  You don’t have to think of yourself as a “prayer warrior”.  We are just looking for people who will be faithful in praying and perhaps encouraging others to pray also.

There are different options for how this might express itself:

• Pray behind the scenes during some upcoming worship services
• Be the first person in your community group to commit to a specific kind of prayer, encouraging others to do so.
• Engage your family in praying for your church

Our next message series will talk about the mission we sense God leading us to…The Jesus Mission.

If you want to be part of a prayer movement around this contact:

Andy Kaser andy.kaser@suncrest.org 

or

Chrissy Book chrissybk@yahoo.com

Posted in Suncrest

On one hand…most every conversation I have had this week included something about our baptisms.

On the other hand…I’m still left wondering how to describe what happened.  So, for this post, I’m just going to pass on a sample of what people have been writing to me…in their own words:

A few from those who were baptized:

Definitely a day I will never forget! Thanks for bringing me yet another step closer to him. I have been on a spiritual journey for the past year and it’s just amazing how much I have learned about myself. My family and I finally found a home at suncrest and I wouldn’t change it for the world.   -Jessalyn

Thank you so much for yesterday, it was amazing! I love the spiritual spontaneity, and I greatly appreciate you bringing me into that next step with my relationship with God.   -Kristen

 I am getting chills just typing about it! …yesterday was an experience I will never forget. It was almost like I was in a spiritual zone and when you baptized me all I remember hearing is wash my sins away and I felt this whoosh come over me….like my sins were truly being washed away!!  -Amy

I write with tears of joy.  Our 23 year old son took this significant step today!  The word has gone out  to our family and friends.  It is a joyous day!  Suncrest has baptized both of our children now.   As a father I have been praying for this day for several years now and I feel a renewed energy to enhance my own relationship with Jesus Christ.  I pray that this will not only be a launching point for my son’s next step in his walk with the Lord, but that it can be used as a launching point for my family so that we can become less fans and more committed followers.   -Steve

We couldn’t stop talking about it on the way home. We were also still chuckling at how you thought out everyone’s excuses and eliminated those for them. Our dear family friend, Keith, needed you to take all those excuses away for him. It was amazing to see him make the step today! Have a great week! Today will always stay vivid in our minds. God was truly at work.   -Sheryl

Sunday was absolutely amazing. On Friday my youngest granddaughter made a surprise flight to Schererville to spend five days with me. I had not seen her since Christmas 2008. Hayley was baptized and very excited to do so yesterday. I am so happy. God was with us all, wasn’t He? His presence was so real.  -Linda

Absolutely breathtaking…amazing Sunday. I thought…well a few people will go up. I was wrong. Probably the most powerful Sunday ever!!! -Robin

I’ve been in lots of services where God moved in mighty ways, but I’ve never experienced anything like yesterday. I had read my devotion on Friday that was titled “Holy Audacity”. Basically, it talked about being willing to step out in faith believing God would show up and do what He said He would do. Holy Audacity, did He ever show up! It took me most of yesterday to stop shaking and come down from the mountain. What a privilege to witness such a move of God. I’ll never forget it.    -Marsha

Posted in Suncrest

Eighty people got baptized at suncrest yesterday.  I wanted to post last night, but I didn’t really know what to say.  I still don’t.  Here is part of what I wrote to our staff and elders today: 

I do know that we went into yesterday well-prepared and having had a number of conversations (some that have spanned years).  I’m thankful for each of your roles in that.  Still…we also all know that yesterday was one of those “Only God” days.   Would you please find your own time in your own way to Praise Him today for what we got to share yesterday? 

Probably the wildest part for me is that out of 73 people baptized at the St. John Campus, we only knew of 3 before Sunday morning that would walk forward.  I have lots of stories to tell and I’ll tell them here over the course of the week, but for today…Let me just connect you to some stories that are out there (here) in the online world.

Amanda Huber wrote about the day on her blog from an observers point of view.  Click here to read Amanda’s story.  Scott was baptized yesterday and wrote about it.  Click here to read Scott’s story.

I have a list of emails to work through.  Facebook was full of Suncrest people in awe of what God did yesterday.  And the comment stream on my page was more active than it’s ever been (click here if we aren’t friends on facebook yet).

The only way I have to describe people’s response yesterday is from the scriptures:  Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, for ever and ever! Amen.       -Ephesians 3:20-21

Posted in Suncrest

This is my favorite recent picture of Abby.  We are all thankful she got her looks from her mother!

Abby is a pistol.  She is hilarious, has the best facial expressions, knows how to get what she wants (also from her mother?), and every time I take her picture she says, “You can put that on your blog.”  (Even though I’m pretty sure she doesn’t know what my blog is.)

Tuesday night we went for a little daddy-daughter date.  She loves McDonalds…but only on her terms.  She wanted chicken nuggets with Apple slices and the caramel dip that comes with them.  Then…she dips the chicken nuggets in the caramel dip to eat them!

After McDonalds, I took her to an 8th grade girls basketball game.  I think Abby is our athlete so I’d love to nurture that early.  And…we have a young lady in our church that coaches the team at Clark Middle School.  It was a riot.  Abby was cheering for the other team to miss their free throws and she loved it that “Coach Erin” came up and gave her five after the game.  (A very impressive comeback victory, by the way!)

Good times.  Always trying to make memories…and capture them.

Posted in Suncrest