blog.arrowheadchurch.com

If you just dropped by for the first time or the first time in a long time, this Sunday is the first week in our new location! Join us at either 9:30 or 11:00 at 6111 W. Andrew Johnson Highway in the Fred’s shopping center. See you there.

So surreal that this week was our last Sunday at Rose Center. Walking out was very odd, but it was an amazing day. I am so thankful for that place. They opened their doors to us when we had no other option, and it was the perfect spot. I have no doubt that our growth can be partly attributed to the location and visibility of where we were.

All that to say, I’m so pumped about our new location this Sunday!

Here’s a recap of the day:

• Continued our Punctuation series with a message called @. Yes, I know @ isn’t punctuation, but just roll with it.
• Talked about the building of the Old Testament temple. Our bodies are now the temple of the Holy Spirit, but we can still learn from the respect the Israelites had for the place where the glory of God dwelled.
• Songs were Solution (Hillsong United), O Praise Him (David Crowder), The Stand (HU), and God of This City (Chris Tomlin).
• Reading quotes from people at Arrowhead about what the Lord is doing in their lives just about puts me out of commission to teach every week. We simply cannot manufacture the activity of God in the lives of people, and I am so grateful.

It’s gonna be a wild week! Don’t miss next Sunday!

One of our core values is Biblical Teaching. A church isn’t a church without the Bible. Heck, many churches have a hard enough time living out what a church should be even if they do believe the Bible. I can’t imagine trying to stand for God without being fully convinced of the truth of His Word.

We believe the Bible is fairly simple to understand. There are many mysteries and we surely can’t understand everything about God, but most of the basics are black and white, so we try to teach it that way. The Bible speaks to our everyday lives - our homes, habits, friends, finances, fears, and struggles.

Day in and day out we are sustained by the simple truths of God’s Word.

Mother’s Day is such a funny church phenomenon to me. Either a mom wants everybody to come to church with her and so the whole family is gathered together or mom wants to sleep in so lots of people are absent!

• Kicked off a new series called punctuation. What goes between your quotation marks when you say “I’ll pray for you,” is a big deal.
• Do you pray casually or desperately? Do you pray whenever or are you persistent? When you pray, are you hoping or believing?
• Songs were You Are (Todd Fields), Hands of the Healer (Fee), Mighty to Save (Hillsong United), Jesus Paid It All (Kristian Stanfill version), and The More I Seek You (by…I don’t know!).
• Great to meet a few extended families of people who traveled in to come to church today.
• The big move is 5/23! The energy is building!

May 23 we are in our new location! Can’t believe it, but it’s going to be incredible. You do not want to miss it! Construction is nearly the close and we still have lots of cosmetics to do, but it’s just around the corner.

This space is going to give us room to see more people continue to take their next step with Jesus. I can’t wait to see what the Lord is going to do.

We need people to come work on Saturdays May 8 and 15 and probably the week in between at night. Don’t you want to be able to say “I painted that bathroom” every time you see someone go in to do their business?!

We’ll still be in two services at 9:30 and 11:00.

Pure madness from 6:30-1:00. Sometimes that’s all you can say to describe a Sunday at Arrowhead. Absent band members, sickness, a double-booked Rose Center…wow.

• Wrapped up The Dip. Sometimes God puts us in places to say something we could never hear if we were anywhere else. AW Tozer said, “It’s doubtful God can use a man greatly until He’s hurt him deeply.” Hard to get our minds around, but true.
• Acoustic worship set…out of necessity (remember the absent band members part…). Still things went great. Songs were Glory to God (Fee), You Said (Hillsong), Here I Am to Worship (Chris Tomlin), and Hands of the Healer (Fee).
• Proud to pastor a church where people really feel welcome. There’s no way to coach or prepare that before a Sunday. It’s just awesome people.
• College Cookout after the service was fun. We’ll miss the CNC students but the WSCC people will rule the summer!
• Shared the move-in date - MAY 23!  More to come tomorrow.

I get asked a lot: So where do you all get that stuff on Sundays? Meaning, where do you get all the graphics, promo stuff, etc. It’s a good question and we have no secrets.

Our sermon series are a mix of graphics designed by Tyler Patterson (on our staff) and from other churches across the country who give away their stuff for free. TP is very talented and learning more all the time, but we use programs like Photoshop, Adobe Illustrator, and Final Cut to create graphics and video. We also utilize free resources from great churches with large media departments who are so kingdom minded that they realize they are blessed with resources that many other churches our size don’t have. So, they publish their stuff online for free. That means as a pastor and worship team we can decide what we want to talk about, write the sermons and choose songs then go out and look for graphics to “brand” the series.

Why is this necessary? The short answer is that it really isn’t. The Bible speaks for itself. But, we believe the Bible speaks specifically to our culture, and our culture speaks the language of media. We want our Sunday worship experience to match people’s throughout-the-week experience. That doesn’t mean we water anything down or try to look like the rest of the world. But, it does hopefully help communicate that our faith is relevant to our culture.

Kicked off a short series today called The Dip. Everybody hits the dip. When we receive Jesus everything is new and everything is great, but it doesn’t take long for things to begin sliding downhill. God has a purpose for the dip, regardless of how it happens.

• Songs were: All Creation Sings (Todd Fields), Your Grace is Enough (Chris Tomlin), From the Inside Out (Hillsong United), and Rescue (by lots of people).
• I love sharing the stories of what God is doing at Arrowhead because it reflects God’s heart for people. Getting to do that every week is a privilege.
• We have setup and teardown down to an art. Too bad we’re moving!
• I’m still amazed at the flood of first-time guests every week. So proud to be the pastor of a church where people love inviting their friends and family.
• Stay tuned for a moving date!

There is no one alive who is unimportant or insignificant. God sent Jesus to bring back people from every race, tribe, social status, financial status, and background. People matter to God. He knows and loves us all.

At Arrowhead we do what we do because we love God but also because God loves people. We try hard to do Sunday’s programming from music, video, and the sermon in a way that is excellent and well-done. But, if in the process we can’t do church without significant time to interact with people, it’s a failure.

If you live your life working hard, studying hard, trying to make ends meet, but there is no time for people, it’s a failure. It doesn’t matter whether it’s family, friends, classmates, co-workers, or the guy at the cash register - people matter.

I pray God makes Arrowhead a place where people from all walks of life recognize that God cares about them and we do too.

If you don’t know Traci Bishop, you need to! She’s our new ArrowheadKids Director and she’s awesome. Greg & Traci and their 3 boys attended Arrowhead’s launch Sunday, got in the car and said “we’ve found our church,” immediately began volunteering, and haven’t looked back. Traci has been a faithful teacher in our Elementary class since the beginning. She’s a hard worker and she has experience on a children’s ministry staff at a huge church in Houston. I can’t wait to see how the Lord uses her in leading our children’s ministry!