Creative Scribble

We are about to launch some new plans for blogs at OneLife Church. Starting soon, the main blog for Sunday recaps and other blog posts will be http://blog.onelifeknox.com. That gives us the opportunity to do two things with blogs starting 2010.

First of all, creativescribble.com will start serving its orginial purpose. That is to be a site where churches all across the country can share creative thoughts and ideas about sermon series, production, graphic design, and more.

It will also give me (Rodney) the chance to have a personal blog where I can share thoughts about what I am learning throughout the process of launching a new church and watching it grow. What theological, leadership, family, and other life lessons am I learning in the process? Those will be shared on the new personal blog that will launch later in 2010.

So thanks for your support of creativescribble.com over the past 14 months or so. We hope you'll continue following us at http://blog.onelifeknox.com.

Yesterday might have just been the best day I’ve had since the day I got married! Seriously…it was as if nothing could go wrong! Maybe I’ve just been watching too many TV preachers telling me that life is all roses with God on your side. It felt like it yesterday…until I woke up today.

• Kicked off a new series yesterday called New Thru 30. Trying to go through the entire New Testament as a church in 30 days!
• The first sermon was about the central issue of the Gospels: who is Jesus?
• We learned that getting close on this answer isn’t close enough.
• The only answer that cuts it is that He is the Christ – the one way to God.
• Worship was once again the best it has been yet. The band was incredible and the choir (aka the congregation!) was phenomenal.
• At one point Dillan backed off his mic during “Glory to God” and listening to the congregation sing the line “Take my life and let it be all for you and for your glory” had me balling like baby on the front row.
• I love worshipping with the OneLifers!!!
• There were lots of them yesterday too. It was our biggest “normal” attendance yet with 212 (normal meaning no special event to attract out of towners like baptism, etc.).
• If someone told me when we launched that we would have more than 200 people in less than four months I would have checked for narcotics. But God is bigger than my plans!
• What’s even crazier is that was with lots of roads still snow covered and temperatures below 20 when the morning began. Knoxvillians don’t like that! But they came anyway.
• Better than that, two people decided they wanted to do more than just get close and gave their lives to Christ!
• So I left church pumped up and went to THE game. Tennessee vs. #1 Kansas in basketball.
• Of course, the Vols pulled the shocker of the 2009-2010 season and beat up the Jayhawks!
• I couldn’t believe it. I was starting to think maybe there was something to the whole health, wealth, and prosperity message you can see from the TV preachers.
• But then I woke up this morning. Sick and horse. No voice at all. Not even close.
• Oh well, back to the reality of the...umm...what's it called? oh yeah, Bible!
• But it was still a dang good day! Can’t WAIT for next week. We get our college students back and have our first ever baby dedication. Going to be AWESOME!!!

• The first Sunday of 2010 got the new year kicked off in a great way for OneLife!
• It was STINKING cold outside. 14 degrees when I left my house. That's nuts.
• The OneLife Band got us all warmed up, though, with a mostly up beat worship set.
• It was THE best our band has sounded and the most engaged our congregation has been yet. Just keeps getting better every week!
• We had lots of new faces. OneLifers keep doing a great job inviting people to come.
• Even with the cold temps and holiday weekend, we still had our second highest attendance ever at 184!
• Can't wait to get everyone back from the holidays and to have all of our college students back for the new series starting next week.
• Today's was a stand-alone day as we celebrated all that God has done already at OneLife and look forward to 2010.
• We learned from Jesus' story about the Prodigal Son that we celebrate when the dead are brought back to life and the lost are found.
• So in 2010 that's when we will party: when the dead are alive and the lost are found!
• It will take three things for us to get there: involvement, invitation, and investment.
• As individuals, we must be involved in ministry, invite the people God has put around us to come closer to Him, and invest our time and resources into the Kingdom.
• As a church, we are taking some big steps to do these three things. We are getting involved more on a local and global level with missions and social causes, creating more opportunities for OneLifers to invite people to church and a relationship with God, and investing a lot of time and money into ministries and missions causes all around the world.
• Afterwards, the party continued with cake and coffee in the lobby. It was great to connect with some new folks!
• The next five weeks will be huge for OneLife as we go through the entire New Testament as a church.
• Don't miss the start of New Thru 30 next Sunday!!!

Happy New Year!!! Over the past week, everybody has been doing their top 10 lists for the past year and even the past decade. I thought I’d look ahead instead of behind. So here’s my top 10 for 2010 at OneLife.

10. I will lose weight, getting back to pre-marriage shape so I can wear skinny jeans like the OneLife Band.
9. We will start a second service, expanding our reach to more people and more families who don’t go to church already.
8. Our volunteer teams will continue doing an incredible job creating a place on Sundays that people wake up and look forward to coming to. As a result, we’ll have more and more volunteers plugging in.
7. The high school girls will quit turning the stalls in the girls’ bathroom into an X-rated comic strip and graffiti display so we can stop painting (and repainting…) the stalls every Sunday!
6. After our next baptism service, I will return the baptistery without the lid flying off and landing in the middle of I-40.
5. Our staff will get to start being full-time so we can focus on what God has called us to give our lives to.
4. Our staff will grow as God raises up volunteers who want to commit to giving their lives to children’s ministry, administrative ministry, and more.
3. OneLife will start making a difference on a global level, getting involved in world-wide missions – spreading the Gospel to the world – and world-wide social justice – doing our part to stop sex-trafficking, hunger, AIDS, and more.
2. Small Groups will begin, giving OneLifers a chance to go even deeper in their love, discipleship, and accountability of each other.
1. Hundreds of people in Powell and beyond who may know about Jesus will finally KNOW Jesus as we rock this community for Him!

• Had absolutely no clue what to expect at the Christmas Eve service. Would anybody show up? Would it go over well? Was it worth trying?
• All of those questions got answered in a big way!
• Our goal was to stay true to OneLife in terms of what it's like to be with us on a Sunday but yet still be traditional since "that's what you do" on Christmas.
• I think our team did a great job striking a balance between modern and traditional.
• We opened with a couple of full band, rockin' Christmas songs. Then we transitioned to an accoustic feel, complete with cello!
• I wrapped up the "Do You Hear" series talking about how hearing from God is like seeing a light in the darkness. When we hear from Him, everything starts to become clear.
• What's neat is that Jesus was called the "light" at birth by Simeon and as an adult by John the Baptist. But Jesus called us - his Church - the light of the world. That's a pretty high standard we should live up to!
• We then walked through the Christmas story with candlelight and Christmas carols.
• 170 people showed up which was great! I would have been happy with 100 so I'm glad God is bigger than my little box!
• What was really exciting was seeing OneLifers be so excited about their church that they brought entire rows full of family members, friends, and neighbors.
• Not only was it a good crowd, but it was a generous crowd. Nearly $1500 was given toward our Christmas offering - all of which goes toward helping us reach out into our community and beyond.
• I'm really excited to see how all of this momentum rolls over into the New Year.
• We are kicking off 2010 with a New Year's Party on Sunday. Don't miss it!!!