jared thinks outloud

Saturday Night Thoughts

2012-02-01T13:05:00.000-08:00

With HBC Saturday Night now 5 months old, we are asked frequently how do we think things are going and progressing. In case you don't know...here is some quick history:

HBC made the decision to launch a new service with the idea of reaching people who do not attend church regularly and to minister to people who think church isn't relevant.
We assembled a launch team and made preparations for over a year (research, meetings, advertising, etc...).
We launched this new service on September 10, 2011.

Did we have our ups and down in the preparation? Absolutely...but we assembled a strong team of volunteers, worship band members, children's workers and many others who made commitments to help begin this new service.

Has this been successful? Well...

18 people have made first time decisions for Christ
12 people have been baptized in our Sat Night service
Many people have taken HL101 & HL201 (our assimilation process)
Many people are now involved in Connection Groups
New people are discovering their gifts and are now using them in ministry

Are we perfect? No! Do we have a long way to go? Yes! But we are seeing fruit and seeing people experience new life. Our prayer is that we would witness this happen over and over again and see more people in our community find a home at HBC!

Finish

2012-01-12T06:40:00.000-08:00

That's right, I am finishing up my final 2 classes at Southwestern Baptist Seminary to complete the MDiv program. Looking at the syllabus and emailing back and forth with the professors have reminded me why I have "put-off" finishing the degree since 2008. Why have I put these classes off? First, I could only take these classes online since moving Michigan and one class in particular (Baptist Heritage) hasn't been offered since 2008, and the second reason is because I haven't been motivated to finish the degree (yes, I admit that I have been lazy). Although, I expect the next few months to be challenging, I am excited to begin, excited to learn, and excited to finish the degree.

Here is my challenge: Regardless of any decision that we are "putting-off" in our lives (relational, financial, losing weight, completing a major project, etc...), I encourage each of us to finish strong and complete what we have started out to do. There is joy to be found and I think we will simply just feel better about ourselves.

Top 5 Books of 2011

2012-01-03T06:04:00.000-08:00

On a regular basis, someone will ask me what books I am reading or have currently read. I try to tweet each book, although tweeting is still a work in progress for me. So I figured that I would answer these questions here in my blog. I read many great books in 2011 but here is my list of the top 5 books from last year:

1. Great By Choice (Jim Collins) - I have read every book that Jim and his research team has put out in the last 10 years and I thoroughly enjoy each and every one. Great By Choice is an incredible book on leadership and I am looking forward to implementing these principles in my ministry both now and in the future.

2. Emotionally Healthy Spirituality (Peter Scazzero) - Right time and right place. This book greatly encouraged me in a time of great spiritual need in my life.

3. Onward (Howard Schultz) - I read this book on my summer vacation. You just can't go wrong with a leadership book by the founder of Starbucks. Before you read Onward, I would encourage you to first read, Pour Your Heart Into It. That would give you a good base line for Onward.

4. The Principle of the Path (Andy Stanley) - This book was packed full of great reminders. I encourage everyone under the age of 25 to read this book now.

5. Deep Church (Jim Belcher) - I am thankful for the approach that Belcher took in writing this book. It cleared up some confusion and encouraged me to strive for balance.

How about you? What are your top 5 books of 2011?

Journey Through Philippians

2011-11-09T06:38:00.000-08:00

At HBC Saturday Night (if you still haven't checked it out...you need to), we started a new series last weekend on the book of Philippians. I try not to get too excited about the next series until I am finished with the current series so I remain focused and centered on the sermon series at hand. Don't get me wrong, I loved teaching on the attributes of God and we saw much fruit from it, but there is just something special about the book of Philippians.

If you missed last week check out the sermon here: 11-05-2011 - Jared Moore

Hopefully you will see what I mean when I say that there is something special about this book written by Paul 2000 years ago that has enormous relevance to our lives today.

Book of the Month

2011-06-27T07:49:00.000-07:00

Since I get asked by people what books I am currently reading, I have decided that each month, I will show you a book I have read or am reading for the month.

So the book for month that I would encourage you to read is: 'Sun Stand Still' by Steven Furtick. This book has encouraged and challenged me more than any other book I have read in the last year. As I finish the last few chapters, I have been challenged to pray a 'high-risk' prayer and live a life of faith believing that God wants to accomplish the extraordinary in my life/ministry.

As we embark on HBC Saturday Night, I'm believing God will do the extraordinary in our ministry!!

Video Blog - June 13

2011-06-15T08:24:00.000-07:00

Video Blog (June 13, 2011) from thegatheringgr on Vimeo.

Mission Trip Preparation

2011-06-01T07:07:00.000-07:00

Don't get me wrong, I am very excited for our upcoming mission trip to Haiti (we leave in 2 days). When I mention to some of my pastor friends that I am taking 23 college/young adults with me and for 15 of them this is their first time on a cross-cultural mission trip, they look at me with that look which says that I am crazy without actually telling me that I am crazy. Normally, I wouldn't take this many, but we have a great group of young adutls going and I am confident they will do just fine. I have learned a lot over the last few months so I thought I would share a few pointers for the brave few, and I mean few, who wish to maybe one day plan a mission trip for their group.

1. Plan Enough In Advance - If you know me, you know that I am a planner and try to be well-organized. I would encourage you to begin the initial planning one year out. Time always moves faster than you think and I refuse to allow things to sneak up on me. Things always change when working with missionaries on a foreign country so being well prepared makes these changes a bit easier. This is also helpful in raising funds, we needed to raise $35,000 for our trip and all of our money has come in.

2. Use a Travel Agent - Takes all the headache away in using a quality travel agent. You will pay a fraction more for using an agent but it is a small cost for not having to worry about dealing with the airlines. As a leader of a group, the last thing you want to do is make sure you get enough seats on the plan and have every ones names spelled correctly.

3. Have Enough Team Meetings - We had 1 meeting each month (6 months out). We gave each team member enough information and made sure that each member knew exactly what is expected of them. Even though we had several meetings, I still get questions. I simply refer them to the handouts and tell them to read and memorize the booklets.

4. Pray - This should go without saying, but already we have seen God work in our group in numerous ways. God has proven himself faithful and we are already experiencing the fruit of our labors. Our prayer is that the gospel will be made known through us and God will receive the glory that He deserves!

Assimilation Processes

2011-05-12T11:24:00.000-07:00

Over the past 3 months, I have been working with our Christian Education Pastor (Mark Antram) to develop a new assimilation process for HBC. There are tons of definitions for assimilate/assimilation but the easiest way I have defined this term is this: It is the basic process of taking new attendees of a church and giving them easy steps to become part of the local body.

My boss (my father and pastor) has given us the challenge to create this new process. We did plenty of research into other churches who have successful processes but we felt we needed to create something that fits our DNA. This has been a HUGE undertaking because we are creating from scratch a process that is original with us and fits into the purpose of HBC (Making much of Jesus by Worshiping, Growing, Building, Serving, and Reaching).

We have been blessed by God at HBC over the last year with many new families/people coming and many people trusting Christ. But if you know me, I’m never satisfied with how things are. I always think things can and should be better. Because of our lack of a process over the years, I believe we have hindered the spiritual growth of many and have made it difficult for new Christians to be effectively assimilated.

I believe more now than ever before that a successful assimilation process is a successful discipleship process. They go hand in hand. Not only will our people be encouraged to take their “next steps” in their faith, but they will be taught what it means to make much of Jesus by Worshiping, Growing, Building, Serving, and Reaching!

Vision

2011-04-18T12:22:00.000-07:00

Over the last several weeks, I have presented many changes to thegatheringgr.org about this ministry and HBC. It has been exciting to see the enthusiasm we all share about our ministry and the opportunities that await us. In case you missed it, here is some basic...and I mean basic info:

There are 65,000 people in our local community that do not attend church regularly.

HBC is launching a Saturday Night service (September 2011) to remedy this problem.

I will be leading/teaching this service under the leadership of our senior pastor, Bo Moore.

Nate Manning and the gathering band will be leading worship for this service.

Saturday Night @ HBC will be committed to Bible Teaching, Contemporary Worship, Loving our Community, and Sharing the Gospel.

Saturday Night will have a nursery, preschool, and full KiDS Ministry.

The gathering will still exist but will be a "true" college ministry.

Continue to pray with us as we endeavour to reach our community with the life-changing message of the gospel. We have a BIG vision, but our God is BIG and our desire is that He will be pleased with what happens at HBC.

Stay tuned...more info to come soon about HBC Saturday Night!!

Preaching/Communication

2009-06-25T06:52:00.000-07:00

I've been challenged in the last few months by personal accountability and study to rethink if my preaching/communication style is making the text clear. I came across this article today by Steven Smith (my preaching professor at Southwestern) in the Southwestern Journal of Theology:

Preachers are communicators. There is more to say about preaching, but it could be said fairly that contemporary preaching is often cursed with individuals so committed to a certain style of preaching that they fail to communicate. The ministry of the word is not the attempt to mirror a style or react against a style, rather it is to make the teaching of the text plain.

Does anyone else need to rethink their style of communication?

Talent Offering

2009-06-09T09:03:00.000-07:00

Last night at the gathering everyone in attendance received a $1 dollar bill. We discussed the passage of Matthew 25 (the parable of the talents), and explained that God has given everyone gifts and abilities and it is up to us if we are going to be good stewards or waste them.

We encouraged everyone to take a $1 dollar bill and ask God what he or she should do to raise money to renovate our worship room. I got some really creative responses from some of our college students: yard sales, selling hotdogs at the beach, doing yardwork for people, etc.

It is up to you to raise the funds...we are excited to see what God is going to do this month as we raise money to renovate the worship room! What are some of your ideas?

Anyone been invited?

2009-05-26T10:47:00.000-07:00

I am studying for this weekend's talk at the gathering and I am going over some research that discusses how many active church goers actually invite their friends and co-workers to church.

"Only 21 percent of active churchgoers invite anyone to church in the course of a year. But only 2 percent of church members invite an unchurched person to church." (The Unchurched Next Door, p.25)

This is a staggering statistic that needs to be reversed. Any thoughts on how we can do this?

Summer Schedule

2009-05-20T06:48:00.000-07:00

In the past 9 months, the gathering has grown really fast...we are seeing more and more people come every single week! This is definitely a God thing, but there are a few opportunities that we need to address so we can continue to see the growth we desire.

The biggest issue that we are facing is that there are a few people that are failing to make a connection when they come to the gathering. We can't tell who is a guest or who is a regular attendee. Our welcome team does a good job most of the time, but there is always one or two that come that we don't get a chance to meet. There are also some who come weekly because they enjoy the music or teaching but they have yet to connect with another college/young adult.

So this summer, we are going to focus our attention and resources on building healthy relationships. We are going to have multiple events/activities with the sole purpose of getting to know each other better. Please check this website and our facebook page for the summer schedule so you can connect with other college/young adults in our community and church!

Do You Have Vision?

2009-04-29T12:36:00.000-07:00

Dwight Smith had this to say about people with crystal clear vision:

"There is an itch about something that must be done that animates their lives. They cannot let it go! It is important to emphasize that such a vision does not come from trying to have one. In all of these people, it simply comes! God has so demonstrated Himself that they are filled with a picture of something that must be done." (www.scpi.org/index.php?page=peopleofvision)

Is the vision for your life self-centered or is it God-breathed?

Cell Phone

2009-04-28T11:55:00.000-07:00

My phone is broken and I will be without a cell phone for a few days. I guess I will be able to enjoy some quiet evenings. I'm just glad I'm not the pastor on-call this week! ;)

HIllsong London

2009-04-23T05:48:00.001-07:00

On Tuesday night, the band from the gathering went to Hillsong London at Granger Community Church. Needless to say, the concert was incredible and many people trusted Christ.

I heard this quote that night from the lead singer of the band and I have heard my father say this before: "Stop asking God to bless what you are doing. Find out what He is doing because it is already blessed."

There is some major truth to this quote! What do you think about it?

Leadership Proverb

2009-04-21T11:02:00.000-07:00

I read this proverb from a Chinese philosopher some time ago and have been pondering it ever since. What do you think about it?

A leader is best when people are hardly aware of his existence, not so good when people praise his government, less good when people stand in fear, worst when people are contemptuous. Fail to honor people, and they will fail to honor you. But of a good leader, who speaks little, when his task is accomplished, his work done, the people say, "We did it ourselves!"

Out-of-balance

2009-04-18T06:25:00.001-07:00

Many of us are out-of-balance. We do not recognize who God is, and we don't recognize the critical balance between fear and love.

If we focus our attention on the fear side, we become legalistic. Christianity becomes nothing but rituals and regulations. "I must jump through this hoop, I must do this and do that, or else God might punish me."

On the other hand, we can go in the opposite direction when we take too many liberties with God. We think that since God loves us unconditionally, it does not matter how we live our life. Yes, God does love us unconditionally; but His judgment is connected to our love for Him. We should obey Him because we love Him, but a part of that love is a fearful realization that God is an awesome and powerful judge who will hold us accountable for our actions.

If we fall too far on the side of love and liberty, we can become lazy about our Christian commitment. Achieving this perfect balance between fear and love is one of the greatest goals of spiritual maturity.

White Paint

2009-03-23T10:58:00.000-07:00

My wife and I bought a house two weeks ago. This is our first home and we are incredibly thankful to manage this home that God has given to us! Unfortunately or fortunately (however you look at it), this home is a foreclosure.

If you know anything about foreclosures, most of them have been trashed by the previous residents, and our house is no exception. The carpet was molded to the basement floor and the walls and ceilings have been stained by years and years of smoke. To say the least it has been an interesting experience for the both of us
.
The last few days, I have been spraying white paint over the ceilings and trim to give our house a fresh new look and make it attractive to live in.

Last night I couldn't help but think that what Amanda and I are doing to the nasty walls and stained ceilings is exactly what Christ has done in our lives. He has taken all of our mess ups, our junk, our mold and our screw ups and He has washed them clean and made them white never to be seen again.

I don't know about you, but I am thankful that I don't have to look at all of my stains and mold. I can look at my life and see that I have been made clean by the blood of Christ.

Monday Morning Thoughts

2009-03-16T07:12:00.000-07:00

Last night we held the gathering at Davenport University. I am grateful to Davenport and the many volunteers that helped make last night incredible. We saw many many people walk into the room and most importantly we saw four college/young adults give their lives to Christ!

God is doing some amazing things in this ministry and I humbled that he has allowed me to be a part of it. I can't wait to see where God is going to take us in the next few months, and we want you to join us on this incredible journey!

Davenport Service

2009-03-06T07:28:00.001-08:00

Yesterday, I spent over an hour at Davenport University checking out the room that we are going to use on March 15 for the gathering's service. The room is sweet and I am convinced that it is going to be a great night.

After spending time on the campus and hanging out with a few of the students that attend the gathering, I am convinced that the students at Davenport are ready for something like this. Be in prayer that we will see God do some amazing things on March 15!

IT'S FINALLY HERE

2009-03-03T12:11:00.000-08:00

Check out our new website:

www.thegatheringgr.org

We are praying that God will use this new site as another way we can reach out to college/young adults in our community!

New Website

2009-02-18T13:12:00.000-08:00

Hopefully in the next few weeks, the gathering's new website will be up and running. We are pumped for this opportunity and we hope we can use this as another effective tool to reach our community. Check back for a future post when the website is complete.

www.thegatheringgr.org

Planning vs. Preparing

2009-02-10T14:18:00.000-08:00

Anyone who knows me, knows that I am a big time planner. I have a 10 year plan for my private life and I have a 10 year plan for my professional life. I can't help it, this is the way my mind works. But this week, I read something that has really messed me up...it has made me think and evaluate my life and ministry.

This is what I read:
Leaders must focus more on preparation than on planning. Planning relies on predictability. But preparation helps leaders stay clear amid uncertainty. Planning assumes continuity; preparation equips leader to be flexible enough to seize opportunity. It forces them to pray, learn, and discern what God is doing - all aspects of understanding God's unique vision for the church. After all, isn't it God who does the planning (Jer. 29:11)? [Church Unique p.25]

Does anyone else need to throw away their 10 year plan?

Coffee

2009-02-03T08:10:00.001-08:00

For those who know me well, they know that I am a huge coffee drinker. Over the past year, I have been introduced to the Keurig Single Cup Coffee Maker. I was leery at first to try this, but I now love it. In fact, my mother-in-law gave me a coffee maker for Christmas and now I wouldn't know what to do without it. Stop in my office sometime and will make you a cup of the sweet sweet goodness!

Church Unique

2009-01-29T05:56:00.000-08:00

This book has rocked my world the past few days!

Friendship Registry

2009-01-19T12:34:00.000-08:00

Yesterday we started something new at Heritage (I know it is crazy...something new in a baptist church). We presented to our people a new way of managing our Sunday Morning attendance...we call this the "Friendship Registry." Everyone who attends the Sunday Morning service will need to write their name in a folder and pass the folder down their row.

To our amazement, "most" people took the time to fill out the sheet in the folder. Because of the Friendship Registry, we had a record number of guests give us their information. This can only help us as our church continues to grow and as we strive for great organization.

This process will only be effective if we do the necessary follow-up on these people and stop making excuses of why we don't do the necessary follow-up that is needed to take our church to the next level.

Too much is on the line!

Life Stories

2008-12-15T08:15:00.000-08:00

There is truly something special about hearing from others what God is doing in their lives. Last night at the gathering, we had the unique opportunity to hear from several college/young adults of what God is doing in their lives and how the gathering has played a vital role. I believe that last night was a defining moment for this ministry and as I said last night, "greater things are still to be done." I can't wait to see where God will take this ministry in the next few months.

Later this week (hopefully), I will upload the video so we can share together the greatness of God as we watch "Life Stories."

Purpose VS. Process

2008-12-03T08:45:00.000-08:00

Ministries and Churches come up with catchy "purpose" or "mission" statements all the time. They think that if they make these fancy statements that the ministry will take care of itself, and volunteers will gladly follow the purpose and there will be no issues and everyone will be in unity. I know of ministries that are struggling, and they decide to come up with one of these purpose statements and they are excited to do a sermon series based around their purpose because they think it will solve the problems...but in three months, the pastors are just as frustrated as they were before.

Why are the pastors still frustrated, after all, didn't they come up with a great purpose statement? The reason why these leaders are still frustrated is because the ministry is doing the exact same things as it was before. The only thing that has changed is now they have a fancy purpose statement on the wall. They have a great purpose statement but they have no clearly defined process on how to fulfill the purpose.

In seminary and even my first few months on staff at a church, I was the one who thought that the purpose/mission was the means to the end, and once the purpose was clearly defined, the ministry will take care of itself. Don't get me wrong....the purpose (the what) is important, but we cannot neglect the process (the how)...and this is where ministries fall miserably short.

We have created our nice statements with never clearly defining how we are going to fulfill the purpose. How do we know this to be true? Because nothing has changed, we are doing the same exact things we were doing before the purpose statement was ever written and we are seeing the same results.

It is time to create the process, because the process (the how) is more important than the purpose (the what)!

the gathering

2008-10-17T10:57:00.000-07:00

Many have wanted to see pictures of our college/young adult ministry, "the gathering." Here is a glimpse of our new ministry. God is blessing and we are seeing some amazing things happen each and every weekend!

Continue to pray that we would see new people each weekend cross the line of faith and trust Christ with their life. Many young adults in our community need to hear the life-changing message of Christ.

Being Lazy

2008-10-04T07:52:00.000-07:00

Tomorrow I am bringing a talk to our college ministry (the gathering) on Slothfulness. I have had a difficult time preparing this talk because if I was to ask a group of people if they are lazy, I highly doubt I would get any takers. Most Americans are dedicated to our work and dedicated to our recreation, and at the end of the day or week, we are lucky if we have any free time.

In my opinion, slothfulness has little to do with work or with how crazy full our schedules are. Slothfulness has everything to do with whether we are lazy with the important things of life. Here (in my opinion) are important things of life: Our relationships with God, our marriages, our children, and our church. We can be so busy with everything else in life that we become slothful with the important things.

When I hear people say, "I am just so busy during the day that when I come home all I want to do is relax and watch TV," I think to myself, "You are slothful!" Nobody denies that we all are busy with work, but when we say we are too busy to spend quality time with God daily, to have meaningful conversations with our spouses, and to not serve in our local churches, we have sure signs of sloth.

What say you? Are we a people of sloth?

New Paint, New Furniture and New Bulletins

2008-09-24T11:59:00.000-07:00

I have been asked these questions several times in the last few weeks: "Why are we painting the lobby? Why are we building a new welcome center? Why did we change the format of the bulletin?" I respond with a smile (most of the time) and ask them the question: "Why wasn't this done before?"

As a staff, we are trying to be more intentional with our first time guests that come into our facility. We have asked ourselves these tough questions: "Is our welcome center noticeable or are people sitting on it (literally)? The information/details that we put in the bulletin, is it needed? The color of the walls, is it inviting or does it remind people of the 1970's?"

We have addressed some of these questions, but we still have a long way to go. The question that exists now is whether our members and regular attenders will get passionate about bringing their friends, co-workers and neighbors to experience a church that is trying to be intentional with them.

What A Summer

2008-07-31T10:53:00.000-07:00

I cannot believe that it has been almost two full months since I last updated this blog. I guess I am not as good at this as I thought I would be.
Needless to say this summer has been a whirlwind! Getting married, my first summer of full-time ministry, and finishing seminary makes for a crazy time. Even in the midst of the craziness of summer (those in Michigan understand what I mean) and the busyness of life, I was reminded last night in our Bible Study that my ministry and my life is not about ME...It is all about the glory of Christ!
Maybe some of you are going through a serious trial, maybe faced with some major uncertainties. Let me encourage you to remember that your life is not about YOU...It is all about Jesus Christ! When our focus is on Christ, maybe just maybe our situations will seem a little lighter!

Building The Core

2008-06-05T07:19:00.000-07:00

Our college/young adult ministry is booming! I can sense great excitement in our ministry as we move into the summer months. Our prayer is that we will continue to grow and build our "core group" as the summer passes along. We are trying several approaches on how to effectively build our core, but in my opinion there is no greater way than Bible Study.
Last night we started our first Bible Study (off campus) and we had a great response. We will continue this summer Bible Study with the hope of making effective small groups. We would love to have several small groups meeting during the week for Bible Study, fellowship, and accountability. Prayerfully by the end of the summer we will have two or three small groups for our college/young adults!

1/10

2008-05-30T07:47:00.000-07:00

Answer this question: If 10 prospective guests come to a church and only 1 becomes an active member, is this acceptable or not?

I hope you shouted, "Absolutely NOT!" I have concluded that the answer to this problem is intentionality. Churches today need to have a specific plan set in place on how to handle guests from the moment they drive on the property to the moment they drive off. From parking lot attenders, children workers, music, the preaching, everything needs to be on purpose. Even before guests drive on the property, the advertising and marketing needs to be intentional.

As we move into the summer months, we will take an in depth look at our advertising and also how we can be intentional with the guests who walk through our doors. Our goal is to have 5 of every 10 guests become an active member of our church!

Modern Missions

2008-05-09T11:34:00.000-07:00

Why would I fly over a mission field in order to get to another one? This question has been burning me up for the past few months. Don't get me wrong, I am not opposed to foreign missions, but are we neglecting our local communities for the sake of foreign missions?

My fear is that people in Guyana, Brazil and India know more about our church than people a few blocks away! Does anybody else hear me?