I can’t believe that we’ve already had four worship services in the Ellijay Elementary School! Honestly, we expected there to be a BUNCH of weird kinks that we’d have to work out. While we definitely have to “grow into” a few things, I have been amazed at how smooth the transition has been!



I have to give a HUGE SHOUT OUT to our teams, because that have really gone the extra mile to iron out any wrinkles BEFORE they had the chance to pop up! Of course, our Logistics team is thrilled that they don’t have to be on at the theater late on Saturdays... And they’re doing a great job getting everything set into place early on Sundays. Our Hospitality team makes everything warm and welcoming. Our CHILDREN’S MINISTRY team are just plain knocking it out of the park with GREAT environments for babies, toddlers, preschoolers, and elementary school kids every weekend. Get this... We’ve seen our children’s ministry EXPLODE from an average of THREE kids in preschool & nursery to over 40 kids in just four weeks! WOW!

Here are just a few observations that I’ve noticed in the past four weeks:

• We’ve had over FIFTY first-time visitors since our big move! If you’re one of them, thanks for visiting!
• We’ve seen 12 people turn their lives over to Christ for the first time! Praise God!
• Kidmo is a LOT more fun than I thought it would be! I sneak in there sometimes during worship in big church.
• Everything is WAY spread out now... I can’t just leave my notebook lying around somewhere or I will NEVER find it in time for the message!
• There are LOTS more people in the room now!
• We have a “confidence monitor” on the back wall now. It has the same image as the screens in front. It doesn’t instill me with confidence. Why is that?
• ONE service is easy.
• ONE service allows us to get everyone together
• ONE service gets us to lunch quicker, too!
• Ken Neybert is an encouragement BEAST. Thanks for lifting me up, dude.
• Green signs everywhere!!!!!

If you haven’t joined us yet on a Sunday morning since we’ve moved, you really should... We are the SAME church that we were in the movie theater, but there are some very different dynamics going on now, and I love it!

What can I possibly say after that? God moved. It was INCREDIBLE to see how SO many people pulled together to make this past Sunday’s FIRST SERVICE in the Elementary School happen. EVERYTHING was fantastic... From the signage, to the Children’s Ministry, to the worship service. What a blessing!!



We also had a BUNCH of first-time guests as well! And FOUR people turned their lives over to Christ for the first time! God is at work at The Orchard Church, and I am just thrilled that I get to be part of it. Bring it on!

This weekend, we had a great opportunity to get into the Ellijay Elementary School Auditorium and have a short little run-through of the sound and lighting systems. It was great to try out the equipment in there and get a little bit of a feel for it.

The buzz is happening again! It feels like our initial launch all over again... Everywhere I go, SOMEONE says “I hear you guys are moving this fall!” People are talking and it is because of YOU! Keep up the good work!!! We only have TWO MORE WEEKS in the movie theater... And we have plenty more cards for you to use to invite people to come join us at the Ellijay Elementary School on September 12! More details right here.

Great news! The Orchard Church has finally acquired some temporary office space that will get us through the next year or so! As you know, our space beside the movie theater is no longer very useful, AND we have several staff members that will be needing to work together. SO, GOD has made available the basement of the Blue Ridge Log Cabin model home for us to work out of! This new, convenient location is on the north end of The Highlands Shopping Center right beside highway 515 here in Ellijay. It is just two doors up from Larry Vorpahl’s Rocky Mountain Log Home sales center.



This spot will not only provide office space, but it also has a large enough room for us to have team meetings, small groups, training, and maybe even the Orchard Orientation in! The old tenants moved out this week, and I got the keys today. I’m hoping to get a little time to clean the carpets and everything sometime this weekend, so we can move in early next week!

Thanks to EVERYONE who came out despite the heavy rain and took part in the family meeting on July 25. A BUNCH of you have called or emailed and requested the info that we passed out there... SO, I thought I would create a little “video blog” and communicate it. Just watch the 10-minute video below for MOST of what we covered last Sunday.

Well, having the last couple of Sundays off from preaching was really a nice break. BUT, I am ready to be “back in the saddle” this weekend. We only have THREE more weeks in our study of The Other Jesus in the Gospel of Mark before we’re DONE. Can you believe it?

I’d also like to say a special thanks to John Bailey, who really made some extra study time possible. I really believe that it ALREADY IS paying off in big ways! In fact, yesterday I delivered a “series overview” to our board and our creative team that lays out how we are going to approach the book of Genesis beginning on Sunday, September 12, all the way through May of 2011. (That’s right... We should be able to handle 38 chapters of Genesis more quickly than we took the 16 chapters of Mark!) I’ve also written up synopses for all of the first 10 or so individual messages. This will allow us to pray ahead on the preaching AND the creative communication! SO, we’ll be able to use music and other resources much more effectively! I am really excited about this series. I think it will be a blessing to Ellijay and Gilmer County.

NOT ONLY are we GOING to be more creative in the upcoming weeks, but I’m going to let you in on a little secret... I’ve already had enough extra time to piece together a little “teaser trailer” for our upcoming series that we will show in church later in August. BUT, we will give a SNEAK PREVIEW of the trailer this weekend at the Family Meeting! I showed it to the board this morning, and they were excited about it. I hope you’ll be there with us on Sunday evening for that meeting.

So, I’m up at Carter’s Lake for a couple of days taking a “study break,” where I’m not breaking FROM study, but breaking TO study. I’ve hauled our Starcraft popup to the campground and set up shop to have some study time with a little peace and quiet.



I don’t normally do this... I just wanted to get a little ahead on the NEXT big study that we’re going to do... I think we’re going to spend some time in Genesis, looking at the beginnings of our faith. Starting with Abraham, we will explore how God began to interact with man in his redemptive work.

You can see my “study setup” in the picture above. Here are some of the books that I brought with me:

• The Holy Bible: NIV, NASB, ESV, NLT, and others
• Genesis 12-50, Baldwin
• Primeval Saints, James B Jordan
• The Patriarchs, Beth Moore
• Joseph, Charles Swindoll
• Plus, of course, the many commentaries and other sources in my Logos Bible Software program... An entire book case on my laptop!

When I get back, I hope to have at least a good part of the series mapped out, and be able to begin to meet for creative planning with Sherry, Rachel, and Casey. I am really excited about this next study! More details to come!

Things are really rolling along as we get ready to roll out our big, BOLD MOVES! Last week was HUGE for progress on Bold Move #3, “Moving into a new field.” I am SO proud of our board, because we have all agreed that our greatest resource is not money, but people. We would rather spend money and save people, than spend people and save money. You may know that we currently spend HOURS on logistics each weekend, moving things around, cleaning things up, patching cables, etc. I’ll just be honest... Weekends are hard. BUT, we had a consultant come in from “Portable Church Industries,” who showed us a LOT of things about reducing our effort and maximizing our potential. We are VERY excited.

One of the many things we saw were these amazing cases that roll into a venue (say, preschool, for example) and contain everything you need for the morning! These things are an amazing time saver, equipment saver, and effort saver!



They make cases for everything that we will need as we move into the elementary school. If you have 8 minutes, you should definitely check out this video... It shows what an “efficiency upgrade” (like the one we’re getting) looks like!

Okay, here is the first quick update on our THREE Bold Moves that we’ve undertaken. It is summer, and some of these things are starting off slowly, but we are building up steam quickly.

Move 1: Mentor Training
On Sunday, Gail is holding our first Mentor Training since we set our goal of thirty mentors in the Gilmer County School System this coming year. She’s received a lot of support and response on this, and it seems very exciting! We still have room for more mentors, though... If you haven’t already planned to do so, please plan to be at the Deli Junction after the second service for the training.


Move 2: Family Ministry Core Team
Doug held the first core team meeting on Sunday at the Log Home Sales Center in East Ellijay. His turnout was good, and everybody there had a definite sense of excitement. WE NEED MEN! We aren’t doing classes or anything boring on Sunday mornings. We are going to be pouring into the lives of some young ones in a fun and engaging way. Guys will LOVE this. If you want to get involved, you should email Doug

Move 3: Moving Sunday Morning Services
Wow! Logistically, this is going to be a big, big deal. We’ve got to buy a BUNCH of equipment and gear to add children’s ministry, and to make ourselves portable. We’ve decided the best way we can be good stewards of our people is to NOT burn them out, so we’re meeting with a portable church consultant in a couple of weeks. He will come out from Tennessee and evaluate what we want to do and help us figure out the best way to go about doing it. We’ve got to figure out lighting, stage/set design, projection, and lots of other things. I will let you know how it’s going.

Man, I am just as thrilled as I can be to announce that beginning in September we will be meeting in the Ellijay Elementary School on Sunday mornings! This big, bold move will allow us to go back to having ONE service, AND allow us the space to do ministry with all ages of children!!


A year ago, meeting in the school was simply not possible. For whatever reason, God has seen fit to throw the doors open for us to be in this beautiful auditorium right near downtown. You’ll be hearing LOTS more about this in the coming weeks! (our first Sunday will be September 12... That’s 14 weeks from now!)

Open our Arms to All Children
That’s right... We’ve been talking about adding “children’s ministry” for about a year now.. But God has kept that door firmly shut. BUT NOW THINGS ARE CHANGING! Not only has God thrown open doors in miraculous ways for us (read: Bold Move #3) BUT, He has clearly given us a vision for HOW we are to go about it.
Here’s the deal. Parents want the church to influence their kids for Christ, right? The truth is that we only have about 40 hours per year to influence them, compared with a parent’s 3000 hours! Seems like very little influence. Well, what if we teamed our 40 hours with mom & dad’s 3000 hours to send a single cohesive message all the time? If we can resource parents on a daily, weekly, and monthly basis, wouldn’t that make for much more powerful influence?
This fall, we’re NOT “adding” children’s ministry to our lineup. We aren’t creating a whole new department. We are putting together a cohesive strategy to influence kids Sunday through Saturday every single week from diapers to graduation. Doug gave us the brief overview on Sunday... You can listen to the podcast here. (it’s OtherJesus37.mp3)
What this will mean is a whole new scope of ministry for us at The Orchard! We are now going to be able to have a reach into the lives of parents with kids all over Gilmer County! HOW in the heck are we going to do that? I hope you’ll join us this coming Sunday to find out in Bold Move #3!

Branch Wide Into the Community
I know it sounds a little vague... Maybe it doesn’t even make any sense. I wanted to let you know about the FIRST BOLD MOVE that we are making as a church here in our community.
We have a UNIQUE opportunity! A few of us began mentoring some students at Clear Creek Middle School a little over a year ago, and we got HOOKED! We have seen some real life change begin to happen, and it is awesome. I wish I could just begin to go into some of the details... But suffice it to say that THIS is the KEY ELEMENT of our BRANCH ministry. It is all about Building Relationships, Answering Needs, and Changing Hearts.
The big problem has been the system of red tape. We’ve been severely impaired by a system that hasn’t been able to handle more than a few people getting processed to get into the schools. It has been a long-term issue for us... but we have been patient and prayed for God to open the door.
The GREAT news is that HE HAS opened the door in a HUGE way! The Orchard Church, and ONLY The Orchard Church has been given special permission to operate under a different system! NOW we can answer the loud call for MORE MENTORS in the school. Not only that, we’ve also been contacted by Gilmer Middle School... They are asking for mentors over there as well! Our goal is to have THIRTY mentors in the schools this fall!
This is an AMAZING thing. Some churches’ mission is to feed people. Others are to do door-to-door evangelism. Our call from God is to build relationships, answer needs, and change hearts. I’ve talked with pastors from all over the country, and it seems like NOBODY else has this kind of connection to the schools! What an incredible opportunity!
There is SO much more to it than I can share in a short blog entry. If you can, please take some time to listen to more details from the most recent podcast located here. It’s called “OtherJesus36” and the caption is “Bold Moves 1.”
This is such a vital move for us... A BOLD move. This is who we are, and God is using us in the lives of middle schoolers and their families. Join us! If you’d like to become a mentor, let us know via email. We will hook you up!

It started on an airplane two weeks ago. I was flying back from a church planter's Conference in Florida when God rocked my world.  Frankly, I had come to feel pretty good about how things were going at The Orchard.  We were just about to celebrate our first year of ministry, we had just baptized another small wave of people, our numbers were good, and everyone seemed generally happy.  At the conference, everything I heard and saw told me that we were doing great!



That's when God rattled my cage.  The Holy Spirit began to call my name on that airplane.  He reminded me once again that building the Body of Christ was HIS job... Not mine.  He also showed me that He was at work all around me, and that HE WAS JUST GETTING STARTED!  He began to stir in my heart on that plane about making some big changes in what we're doing. 
Over the next two weeks, as I prayed and investigated... HE continued to reveal ways that He was working, and to show me things that I had been blind to.  Here's the kicker.  Over the last two weeks, GOD has opened some doors that had been FIRMLY SHUT before that airplane ride.  Miraculously, God has begun to make possible what seemed impossible. 
I hope you can join us for this THREE-WEEK MINI SERIES here at the end of May about three bold moves that I believe God is calling us to.