The empty chair..  As I prayed and prepared for today’s experience, God put something very heavy on my heart to implement at H2O in Perry, and to share with all of you that follow this blog.  A few years ago,  I read a Stephen Covey book about families, and in the book, he talked about the concept of “No Empty Chair” for their family.  The idea was that all family members would be unconditionally loved, respected, valued, and accepted no matter what... no matter what... there would be no empty chairs at the table for any family member for any reason.  Every person would have a seat at the table.  I really loved the concept back then and still do today, although I had not thought of it too much... until today.

Here's what God put on my heart today.  Why can't that same ...

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Ok, it's not really true but it looks like I have been fasting from the blog postings!  A whole month has passed since I poured out my heart and ideas.  I've got to do better!

A lot has happened in the past month, both in our lives and the planting of the church.  One thing that has become crystal clear to us is that God is already moving and ministry work has already started even though most of our energy has been put toward the physical labor of planting HeBrews and H2O the past 4-6 months.  Here's a great story from a couple of weeks ago to reinforce that point - I call it the "202."

We had a couple come to the church asking for help with their utility bill.  If they didn't come up with $202 by Monday, their electricity, water, etc. would be shut off.  Of course, we wanted ...
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Last Sunday, August 30th, was an exciting day for the Perry campus.  As most of you know, the core group has experiences every Sunday at 10am in the soon-to-be seating area of the HeBrews Coffeehouse.  We don't market to the general public, but certainly encourage specific people to join us each Sunday.  We generally average about 15-20 people/weekend.  Well, yesterday (August 30th), God did an amazing work and brought in 33 people!  Here's what was exciting for me - putting out chairs to seat everyone.  That's right - there's nothing like running around the alley side of the building to grab more chairs to seat everyone!  So cool...

I'm not that concerned about "numbers" of people that come to H2O.  We all know God is in control of this anyway, but I must admit that adding more chairs to seat everyone is very exciting.  It gave me/us a taste of what ...
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Last night, we had our first "official" core group meeting in some time.  It was awesome.  More than anything, we enjoyed the icebreaker, hanging out, sharing the vision, updating the progress, and praying with one another. We are so very lucky and so very blessed that God has brought us a group of people that are so passionate and committed to the "cause."  Together, I believe that God will do amazing things In Perry through these people, and beyond. 

We continue to make progress inside the HeBrews Coffeehouse.  The 1st Christian Church in Perry is sending a team of people to help us next Saturday, August 29th.  Isn't that awesome to have another church help us reach the lost in Perry.  The Ardmore H2O team is returning Labor Day weekend to complete the flooring in the coffeehouse.  Obviously, we are not going to make the Sept. 1st "deadline" to open ...
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Today, we launched our first Sunday morning experience with the core group and here's what I observed:

** The worship was amazing.  Stephen Cole's set from LCTV was absolutely unreal.  If you ever had a doubt about video worship, I challenge you to come and see it for yourself!

** The people that came, and a few others that were unable to attend this today, are all in... and I mean all in.  It takes a special mindset, commitment, and heart to be a church builder.  It's not for the faint of heart by any means!

** God does the hard work in this process.  We have not had to "convince" or "influence" anyone to be on the core team.  God has moved people... convicted people... burdened people... and changed people.  It has been a humbling and awesome process to watch!

** These are the good old times if you are a builder.  So ...
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