Love+friendship=Brotherhood

A friend posted this on their Facebook page today....

They say everlasting friends can go long periods of time without speaking and never question the friendship. These types of friends pick up like they just spoke yesterday, regardless of how long it has been or how far away they live, and they don't hold grudges. They understand that life is busy but you will ALWAYS love them.

I think this is the kind of friend/brother that Solomon was speaking of in Proverbs 17:17 and 18:24. And also that John was describing in 1 John 4:19-21. It came as a gentle reminder to me.

Will you be that kind of friend/brother in this lost and hurting world today?

BE THE CHURCH!! Blessings as you GROW.....

Lake Sun Church of the Week

CHURCH PROFILE

THE POTTER’S HOUSE OF CAMDENTON

YEAR ESTABLISHED 2001

Founding and Senior Pastor- Tom Ford

FAITH Non-denominational

CHURCH MEMBERS 400+

EXECUTIVE PASTOR’S QUOTE “We are faith filled, big thinking, bet the farm, risk takers and we will never insult God with small thinking and safe living,” Executive

Pastor Guy Lombardo.

VISION BA2C = Becoming an Acts 2 church. To help believers become fully devoted followers of Christ to the point their lives resemble Jesus.

About the church

WORSHIP SERVICES

Children and Adult worship 10 a.m. Sunday

Celebrate Recovery 5:15 p.m. Tuesday for help recovering from life’s harmful hurts, habits and hang ups.

COMMUNITY OUTREACHES The church is involved in the planning stages with the Child Advocacy Council, for a back to school effort for summer 2011. To provide back packs filled with school supplies and essentials to help children have a fresh start and be successful in school. The council hopes several other churches will partner with the project.

MISSIONS Samaritan’s Purse/Operation Christmas Child Christmas Boxes; According to Guy, for each box given, 10 people are affected by the gospel. Members have a goal of packing and collecting 500 shoe boxes, filled with small items for children, to be shipped overseas, which equals to 5,000 lives impacted. A prayer and packing party is scheduled 11:30 a.m. Sunday, November 7 after the morning service.

EVENTS The church is planning a special Christmas series Sunday, November 28 through Sunday, December 26. 2010 entitled He Came.

ADRESS 2073 South Business Route 5 Camdenton

INFO (573) 346-3951 www.tphoc.com

Potter’s House uses multi-media to present the gospel

Potter’s House endeavors to communicate God’s unchanging truths in culturally compelling ways. “Some say we are contemporary, we do things differently than traditional churches,” said Executive Pastor Guy Lombardo. Guy believes that because the culture is ever changing, methodology should be ever changing. “The truth never changes, but the way we present it does,” said Guy. Such as giving away eight IPODS during a sermon series, dropping balloons from the ceiling, and riding a motorcycle into the building. A recent popular series of services was an ‘at the movies’ series using the movies Blind Side and Bucket List to pull out scriptural allegories in order to teach how to apply them in everyday life. For the series the Potter’s House changed their church into a movie theater complete with pop corn and soda dispensers. “It felt like you were actually in the lobby of a movie theater,” said Guy. “There are creative ways to make spiritual truths come alive in order to drive home a scriptural point through visual effects,” said Guy.

Time to ‘be’ the church, not ‘do’ church

“We want to teach believers to stop doing church, and start being the church,” said Guy. The Pastors encourage their people to go out and live their faith outside the walls of the church by reaching out to people in need. “We can do lot of meaningful things in the church like studying the word and worshipping with like believers, but unless we step outside the walls of the church, and apply these things we are just a social club. The bible says faith without works is dead,” said Guy.

The goal of helping people find their gift

According to Guy, there are five things God gives everyone; a spiritual gift, a heart or passion for something, natural abilities, or things they are naturally good at, a personality, and life experiences. “Our goal is to help people identify their giftings. Once we discover what it is that God has called us to do, we can then go ‘be’ the church,” said Guy.

Family is most important in teaching children

The Potter’s House believes that what happens at home is more important than what happens at church. “American culture started looking to the church to teach their children faith. God’s word mandates the spiritual head of the family should teach children faith. Families have been in crisis for 20 years because we have gotten away from this God given mandate. Our goal is to come along side the parent and partner with them. In one way they do this is regularly scheduled Sunday’s where the children and adults worship together. After a sermon, they move into age appropriate groups to discuss the lesson and bring it into real life perspective. “Hopefully families will take these discussions home with them and continue to communicate and teach faith,” said Guy.

Freedom Splash at Captain Ron’s

The Potter’s House holds “Church at the Beach” 10:30 a.m. Sundays, Easter through Labor Day, at Captain Ron’s in Sunrise Beach. The attendance has doubled since starting one year ago. They recently held “Freedom Splash 2010” on the 4^th of July celebrating our freedom as a nation and freedom in Christ. It included a time where 13 people followed the Lord in baptism. One of those baptized said the church on the beach was the first church they ever attended and felt accepted.

Guy invites everyone to come and pay them a visit. The atmosphere is relaxed and the dress is casual. “We would love the chance to serve people. We are more concerned about meeting the life needs of people than in what they are wearing,” said Guy.

Don't SETTLE for Good

I can’t stand to do something that’s just good enough. It torments me when I feel like I pass with a C+. I am constantly evaluating each area of ministry and looking for ways to do it better.

Some people don't like that part of me. Most of our society wants us to buy into the lie that good enough is...well...good enough. Do they really think that good honors God? I don't!

Reject mediocrity. Don’t hand in a rough draft. Mediocrity never inspired anyone. And I just can’t believe it brings honor to our great God. Finish any job you start with a spirit of excellence...and always look for ways to do it even better. I think that's what honors Him.

See you Sunday folks....it's going to be the BEST ONE YET!! Radical Generosity. Bring a friend and a spirit of excellence to worship.

Sell EVERYTHING?

Recently I was reading the story of the Rich Young Ruler (Luke 18:18+). He had it all. God had truly blessed him...probably lived in a gated community, had the latest camels for transportation. Can't believe he wouldn't have had the newest flat panel HD stone tablets in his living room for entertainment. He had to be a GOOD man...a stand-up citizen supporting lots of GREAT humanitarian efforts as well as making certain that he tithed to the local temple. He may even have had a position on one of the temple committees. Yet something with his life troubled him to the point to ask a question of Jesus. "What must I do to inherit eternal life?" It seems he had it all except the security of what eternity held for him.

As with all of us, when we ask Jesus a question, His answer will usually rock our world. "Sell EVERYTHING you have and give to the poor....then, come and follow me." The story goes that he went away sad. HE WENT AWAY........SAD.

As I read that, I couldn't help but wonder what the young man was thinking. But then my thoughts turned to Jesus. Why didn't He go after the man? Tell him it was what was best for him? Explain that if he just maybe started selling a little bit and see how it went that He would help him? No...Jesus didn't pursue or conj ole. He just challenged the man's heart and let him make his own choice.

I think that's the way Jesus chooses to grow us. When we come face to face with Him and have the courage (or fear) to ask Him what's on our mind, He sometimes brings a hard word. Something that will either deepen our devotion to Him or leave us going away...sad.

These last couple of months I have been looking at my life and asking myself "where is God asking me to sell everything"? There have been times when I have gone away from the hard word God has shared with me...not defiantly or lacking understanding what He was asking. But with sorrow because I lack the faith needed to respond. I am trying to change that and be obedient to the hard ask of Jesus.

Today, is God asking you to "sell" something? What will your response be? Keep growing.....

FREEDOM SPLASH 2010

When the idea to close the main building and have everyone head out to Captain Ron's for church was first discussed, it seemed like a neat option....one of those out of the box things that fit PH. As the date slowly approached, second thoughts crept in allowing fears and doubts to add an element of worry. A few offered warnings that it might not be a good idea. To top it off, Sunday morning's weather looked ominous at best.

As I drove north on 5 with my windshield wipers wisking away the "liquid sunshine", God and I had a talk. I told him that I couldn't believe He was doing this. After all our prep and prayer, it is raining and will probably keep many from coming out...and even let the nay sayers condemn the decision more vocally..." I tried to tell you"... The last thing I remember saying was "God, this is your day. I believe this was your idea to have this BIG event on the beach on the 4th of July. If you want it to rain, let it rain. If you want it to clear up, so be it. But I am going to head to the beach and worship YOU no matter what. And if there are only a hand-full of folks that show up, those are the ones you wanted this for."

Well, I am soooo glad that He is God and I'm not. His day was BETTER than any one of us could have scripted. The rain stopped, the light cloud cover kept it cool and unbelievably pleasant and hundreds showed up to celebrate our FREEDOM. The number of "new" faces nearly out numbered the familiar and God used the music, message and multitude to lead at least one young person to take Jesus into his heart and make Him Lord.

Thanks Potter's House for understanding that the church is not a building and for your willingness to take church to the beach. Did FREEDOM SPLASH 2010 spur any ideas for other venues or opportunities? Let's GROW some more.....

God-honoring obedience

We will do anything short of sin to reach people who don’t know Christ. To reach people no one is reaching, we’ll have to do things no one is doing.

The above statement is one of the values that we believe God has called us to live out at the Potter's House. You'll be hearing more on "The Code", a collection of 13 values honoring God's direction for TPH, in a series in late July entitled I Love My Church.

Today we witnessed how God is blessing our obedience as a church through that value. As of 9 AM Sunday morning, 15 people had registered to attend the Intro to Membership Class. So we prepared for 20. Well.....God did His thing and BAM! 36 showed up. Unbelievable. We have not had a membership class that large since we moved into our new building. (God also stretched the deli tray for 16-20 so that EVERYONE was fed! Remember the story of the loaves and fish...this time it was turkey and wheat bread.)

GREAT work PH! Keep living out the faith in community and inviting those that cross your path to experience a weekend service. Your staff is committed to staying the course of creative and innovative worship and God is growing His KIngdom through the efforts of all involved. The mission He has called us to is being fulfilled, one transformed life at a time!!

Have a Blessed week! And don't miss next week...BAPTISM Sunday!!! It's going to be AWESOME...the BEST Sunday yet!

LOVE GOD LOVE OTHERS SERVE THE WORLD

EASTER AT TPH AND CAPT RON'S

Easter Sunday was a landmark day for Potter's House once again. Not only did God bless us with a record number of folks (563) at the Launching Pad (the name we have given our main campus) but we also had a record number of people (110) at the second annual Easter service on the beach at Captain Ron's Bar and Grill in Sunrise Beach.

God continues to lead us to things that no one else is doing and our prayer is that we are reaching people no one else is reaching with these efforts.

At the main campus, our adults saw a beautiful painting take life right before their eyes as the service progressed. This use of the arts touched hearts and drew people to a place and to an emotion that only visual art can. At Capt Ron's, the beach setting (God's creation) provides a backdrop that also evokes emotion and draws our attention to God's Grace as nothing else can. I am so thankful that our church understands and supports these kind of "out of the box" ministries for God to use in growing His kingdom.

Do you have any ideas or inspirations for other God venues or experiences? I'd love to hear them!! We are always looking for new ways to share the old stories of Jesus and His love!! Have a GREAT week as we continue to celebrate the empty tomb. He's Alive!!