It's Launched!
Well we got home today from a huge weekend of ministry. I started at 5:30am saturday morning. I had to pick up my friend Joe at City Life at 7:15 and be at the Angel food distribution site by 7:45am. We got our food and got back and passed out the food people had purchased until 12:30am. Everything went well and we even had everyone show up this time.
I left there and left for Benton Harbor for an outreach event at the mall. We had a youth group come in from Indiana to serve Overflow. I had arranged for a few store owners to have some tasks ready for them. They showed up to stores and served the store employees with our new Overflow labeled water bottles and then got busy. They washed windows,took out trash, cleaned video machines etc. We want to continue building relationships with our nieghbors.
While they served the stores I took a shopping cart full of water bottles and a camera and handed out water in the mall. I was shocked at the amount of people that turned me down until I told them it was free. then they gladly accepted. I did trick them and tell them they had to pose for a picture to get water. I got some great pictures! I'll share them if I get them from the owner of the camera. I'm going to have to get a cheap camera, I'm having to much fun! I had a blast interacting with the people. I had two big African American guys posing and laughing as I posed them with the water bottles and baloons. Whooda thought!
Later I just sat back and watched people walking around with their bottles and reading the launch information. Brian (pastor) later told me he was at the office watching people with their bottles pointing to the signs at Overflow getting the connection. It was a great night of outreach.
One more quick story....The owner of the video arcade was friendly and I struck up a conversation about the church and it's vision. He seemed receptive and allowed me to display some Overflow brochures in his lobby. Then he gave the kids tokens and let them play some video games. Who knows what future relationships will bring.
Exhausted I went back to Holiday inn Express and Janice was working again. She remembered me and gave me a big smile and greeting when I arrived. (that was really cool to me) I spoke to her about dates that we are launching the church and she programmed our next one into her phone. She said she was going to bring her sister and all their kids. I sure hope she does!
This morning I showed up at 8:00am to help transport equiptment to the Celebration Cinema for our first practice launch of Overflow. The work went pretty well. We had our gliches but we worked through them and we'll get better as time goes on. It was just really humbling to see all the talented people God has brought together for this purpose. We are going to have to use another larger theater from here on out. the smaller one was about 40% full with just launch teams and their families. (About 40)
The worship band was fantastic and talented! Of course the musical worship seemed to really be sweeter knowing all the work that has gone into this. Mark the Music leader did a soulful blues rendition of "It is well with my soul". It blew away anything I've heard in church before!
Brian had a great message about the woman at the well and how Jesus crossed cultures to connect. Just like we will be doing.
After service we went house hunting and found one we liked but it really early. It's a 3 bed tall brick home built in the 1800's with a two stall garage. It's cute and downtown pretty close to the beach! Who knows what God has for us! We have to sell our home first.
Anyways then we had another launch team meeting at 4:00pm. and got done around 6:30pm. We arrived home tonight about 7:30pm. and are exhausted.
The greatest thing about this weekend is seeing all the planning and work come together. Seeing it all get this far and the stories that have happen are just so exciting. And we're just getting started. Yup I'm tired but I'll take this kind of tired any day!
God Bless,
Randy
I left there and left for Benton Harbor for an outreach event at the mall. We had a youth group come in from Indiana to serve Overflow. I had arranged for a few store owners to have some tasks ready for them. They showed up to stores and served the store employees with our new Overflow labeled water bottles and then got busy. They washed windows,took out trash, cleaned video machines etc. We want to continue building relationships with our nieghbors.
While they served the stores I took a shopping cart full of water bottles and a camera and handed out water in the mall. I was shocked at the amount of people that turned me down until I told them it was free. then they gladly accepted. I did trick them and tell them they had to pose for a picture to get water. I got some great pictures! I'll share them if I get them from the owner of the camera. I'm going to have to get a cheap camera, I'm having to much fun! I had a blast interacting with the people. I had two big African American guys posing and laughing as I posed them with the water bottles and baloons. Whooda thought!
Later I just sat back and watched people walking around with their bottles and reading the launch information. Brian (pastor) later told me he was at the office watching people with their bottles pointing to the signs at Overflow getting the connection. It was a great night of outreach.
One more quick story....The owner of the video arcade was friendly and I struck up a conversation about the church and it's vision. He seemed receptive and allowed me to display some Overflow brochures in his lobby. Then he gave the kids tokens and let them play some video games. Who knows what future relationships will bring.
Exhausted I went back to Holiday inn Express and Janice was working again. She remembered me and gave me a big smile and greeting when I arrived. (that was really cool to me) I spoke to her about dates that we are launching the church and she programmed our next one into her phone. She said she was going to bring her sister and all their kids. I sure hope she does!
This morning I showed up at 8:00am to help transport equiptment to the Celebration Cinema for our first practice launch of Overflow. The work went pretty well. We had our gliches but we worked through them and we'll get better as time goes on. It was just really humbling to see all the talented people God has brought together for this purpose. We are going to have to use another larger theater from here on out. the smaller one was about 40% full with just launch teams and their families. (About 40)
The worship band was fantastic and talented! Of course the musical worship seemed to really be sweeter knowing all the work that has gone into this. Mark the Music leader did a soulful blues rendition of "It is well with my soul". It blew away anything I've heard in church before!
Brian had a great message about the woman at the well and how Jesus crossed cultures to connect. Just like we will be doing.
After service we went house hunting and found one we liked but it really early. It's a 3 bed tall brick home built in the 1800's with a two stall garage. It's cute and downtown pretty close to the beach! Who knows what God has for us! We have to sell our home first.
Anyways then we had another launch team meeting at 4:00pm. and got done around 6:30pm. We arrived home tonight about 7:30pm. and are exhausted.
The greatest thing about this weekend is seeing all the planning and work come together. Seeing it all get this far and the stories that have happen are just so exciting. And we're just getting started. Yup I'm tired but I'll take this kind of tired any day!
God Bless,
Randy
posted by Randy W. @ 8:39 PM
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