My Favorite Things

I spend a lot of the time on the internet looking for creative inspiration. I came across these videos from Granger church in Indiana. I love to see churches being this creative. Low production cost too.

Weekend Rap Up 7-27-08

OK so the Stone mountain Laser show got rained out for most of us. The weekend service did not. "For Instance" a youth band that normally plays over at Rockdale Baptist and is led by our very own Austin Studebaker led worship this morning. You were awesome thanks guys!

Philip then spoke on why we should not doubt God and how to overcome doubt. You would be amazed if we took a pole here in Rockdale county of how many people believed in God. I have a feeling that we would be suprised how many people actually beleive in God. Listen to Philip sermon below or check out the full audio podcast to hear more.

Here is Take it All Performed by For instance



Dare you to move


Clip from the service today


Have a good night

Thanks to Everyone Who came OUt

To Stone Mountain and got wet. Hope those of you who stayed had fun. We were drenched all 6 of us. Thanks again to Joe and Jana for having a huge car that would fit all 13 people in it and thier willingness to fit 13 wet people in it.

For Instance Leads Worship on Sunday

For those of you who do not know the B=band for instance will be leading worship This Sunday! For instance is a group 20 somethings who are lead by our very own Austin Studebaker. This is a killer Group with a great sound if you have never heard them before please do your self a favor and come hear them.

Church Marketing Sucks turns 4

For those of you that don't know churchmarketingsucks.com turned 4 yesterday. CMS.com is a website who's aim is to educate, frustrate and inspire churches in all things marketing. They dared to ask the question "should the church market itself?". I love read this site and have been doing so for about a year. If you have never checked it out make today the day.

Why We FaceBook

Some one ask me the other day why we try to keep up this blog not only on here but on Myspace as well and why we have Facebook page and why we have a mini feed with "Twitter". We are a small staff why do we keep up with all of this stuff. My initial reaction was that's an easy answer but the more I thought about it there are many reasons why we keep up with all this stuff and more. Not only are we going to continue do all of these things we are going to add more things as our schedules permit. The reason being is that people need to hear the awesome story of Christ and the internet is the most effective way we can build relationships outside of day to day contact. We want to show people who have misconceptions about church that there are churches out there that are not stuck in the stone age. We do not want to promote Discover Point Church we simply want to show people that churches can still share the word of God and use modern technology to do so. We also want to keep in touch with our members. Facebook, myspace and twitter are ways for us to share information with you quickly and for you to share information with us quickly. Thirdly it is a method for our members to invite their friends to church. If people are skeptical they can see everything we are about right on the web without stepping a foot in the door. Ultimately what it is all about is see people come to Christ and grow in that relationship. That's why we facebook.

Weekend Re-Cap

This weeks message was titled The White Knight. If people see Jesus through you what does Jesus look like to them? As a Christ follower you ARE the light in a darkened world (Matthew 5:15). How bright is your light? The Movie this week was Batman and the theme obviously centered around the character Harvey Dent and how he was the "White Knight" in Gotham. Now I know that there are more twist and things happen in the movie but we took this one theme and ran with. You can view a clip from the sermon below





You can hear the full podcast by visiting our Podcast Page

Oh and by the way yes almost the entire staff went to see Batman and most of us loved it!
Say what you want to about this video its funny!







This was also the 2nd week of our VBS and it is a screaming success! The kids love it! I will post some pics tomorrow. Till then.......

Church gives away Semiautomatic Assault Rifle

I found this story combing through some of the blogs I read. I am all for the church marketing itself. I also do not believe that all publicity is good publicity when it comes to the church. I give these guys credit for trying to be creative but if something were to go wrong it would be bad PR for the church in general. I guess what I am trying to say is that you have to see the bigger picture. I let you read the story for your self.


OKLAHOMA CITY -- An Oklahoma church canceled a controversial gun giveaway for teenagers at a weekend youth conference.

Windsor Hills Baptist had planned to give away a semiautomatic assault rifle until one of the event's organizers was unable to attend.

The church’s youth pastor, Bob Ross, said it’s a way of trying to encourage young people to attend the event. The church expected hundreds of teenagers from as far away as Canada.

“We have 21 hours of preaching and teaching throughout the week,” Ross said.

A video on the church Web site shows the shooting competition from last year’s conference. A gun giveaway was part of the event last year. This year, organizers included it in their marketing.

“I don’t want people thinking ‘My goodness, we’re putting a weapon in the hand of somebody that doesn’t respect it who are then going to go out and kill,'” said Ross. “That’s not at all what we’re trying to do.”

Ross said the conference isn’t all about guns, but rather about teens finding faith.

“You make a lot of new friends down here,” said Vikki Goncharenko, who attended the conference. “You get to meet new people. There's a bunch of things that are going on. It's just, you have a wonderful time.”

Friday evening, Ross said the gun giveaway had been canceled. Pastor emeritus Jim Vineyard, who ran the event, injured his foot and wouldn’t be able to attend. The gun giveaway was also removed from the church Web site.

Ross said the church would give the gun away next year instead. He said the church spent $800 buying the gun for the promotion.

August 3rd Events

August 3 is a big day for Discover Point. Not only does our new sermon series "Basic" begin but we have a back to school cook-out and fantasy football draft. Ok first the cook-out will be held in the gym at Peachtree academy directly after the service. We will have a sign up sheet to bring side dishes this coming week. You don't have to sign up bring one to attend. I am assuming we will be grilling hamburgers and hotdogs. I will let you know if that changes.

The second event on that day is very close to my heart. I love fantasy football! You don't have to know how to play to join the DP League. I will try to do a little explaining in this blog. Fantasy football is a game where a group of people draft real players that play in the NFL. Your team earns points based on what your players do every week (ex one of your players scores a touchdown your team gets 7 points). Each week your team goes up against another team in the league and who ever scores the most points wins. Whoever team has the most wins at the end of the season wins. There is more to it than that because you can trade players, drop and ad players and other stuff. We will be playing on ESPN. They allows us to have free leagues and we can keep up with our teams online. You need to register with ESPN and join the league before the draft begins. I will be able to help you if you have issues To register go to ESPN FAnTAsY FOOTBALL and click the register tab at the top of the page. Go through all of the registration steps and please write down your user name and password (PHILIP I am talking to You!). Once you have creates an account send me an email brad@discoverpoint.org and I will send you an invite to the league. For more information go to ESPN FFL and read the rules and read about what players you can draft and overall general strategy. Everyone is welcome to join and play. If you have any questions fell free to email.

For clarification on August the 3rd we will be drafting our teams (Picking our players). A player can only be on one team. For example Peyton Manning can be picked by one team.

Crazy about twitter!

If you are not using twitter you need to start! Well if you need instant technological gratification like I do then start! What is twitter? Twitter.com is a micro-blogging site that allows users to enter and receive updates about different people all over the world. Discover Point Church will be using twitter to communicate with you: New announcements, schedule changes, podcast, video releases prayer request and just general information. The coolest part is you can receive the information through your text messaging system on your cell phone. Look just check out Twitter. com for more information and once you figure out cool this really is visit the Discover Point page and follows us.

Weekend Recap/What this world needs/VBS/Project Go

Weekend Recap
Well it was a great weekend at Discover Point! Philip's message was entitled "Hancock" based loosely on the current hit Hancock. Philip spoke on how what ordinary people becoming extra ordinary. How God calls us not to sit the bench and observe but to participate. To hear his entire message click here


"What This World Needs"
Our Band performed this Casting Crows hit at our weekend service and may I say it rocked!




Project Go
Also this weekend we introduced our Project Go Promo Video. I will be telling you more about Project go over the next few weeks,






VBS
We started our 5 week VBS program this week here our a few photos from the weekend

Basic Training Part one

On August 9 we will begin a new series entitled "Basic". This series will cover the Core values of Discover Point. The series will cover what is at the heart of DPC and what we see happening in the near future. Since this series begins in 3 weeks I thought it would be helpful to go through some of the core values and try my best to explain them.

The first one I have chosen to cover is "Casual and Contemporary". I understand that this is not the most important value but it is something that the staff of Discover Point feels is vital in reaching and helping the Rockdale and Newton county communities. For years I wrapped my self in the idea that going to church meant that I had to follow certain rules and standards that the church set. I also looked down on those who did not follows these rules. Now not say that there should not be rules in the church but the church should not make the rules based on there own personal preferences or ideas. But that is a whole other chapter in itself. When I moved to Atlanta to help plant Discover Point it took me a good six months to get used to the idea that you don't have to wear a Suit and tie to church. Philip calls it de-toxing getting away form the idea that church conducts itself in one way and one way only. Let me state this to I am not slamming the traditional church. There are many people who go to a traditional church and could not worship any other way and thats fine. The church I came from reached and Baptised many many people. God uses traditional churches to reach many many people with the gosple. In 1 Cor 9:20 Paul writes to reach the Jews I became like the Jews and in verse 22 he say "I became all things to all men so that I might save some" Tim Stevens wrote an awsome book called "Pop goes the Church" and in it he refrences a passage in Act where Paul is in Athens and is called in front of all of the great wise men of Athens. This meeting probably took place just below the Acropolis so Paul did not have very much time to think of what he was to say to these men. Paul said to them " When I arrived here today I was facinated by all of the great shrines and then I found one that said "to the god nobody knows". I am here to introduce you to this God so that you may worship him intelegently. Wow Paul leveraged the culture of that day to reach probably some of the most important men he ever spoke to. That's what Discover Point is trying to do to leverage the culture not to become like the culture. We want people to feel comfotable when they come to church. I would have a hard time listening to pastor if I did not feel comfotable. We want the spirit to convict people and our messages do not consist of fluff. They are real and they are (because God allows them to be) powerful. Our music is contemporary because that is how some people want to worship, If you cannot worship to an upbeat style music don't come to our church. We have a heart to reach our community and if that means playing an upbeat style of music and wearing shorts to church then by all means that is what we are going to do.

We are Blessed

On August the we will be throwing a huge party for all of our volunteers. We are Blessed with amazing people who help every week with sound, lights, greeting and and tons of other stuff. This is not just a party this is a Celebration!

The Description sounds a little corny but don't be fooled we have a lot planned for this night. We want to really throw a huge party to show our volunteers exactly how important to us they are. There will be food and entertainment and a few surprises. So if you are a volunteer please come and help us celebrate what God is doing at Discover Point Through You!

4th of July Weekend

What a week end it was! On Friday night we set up a booth at the Horse Park in Conyers and traded Free Family Photos for email addresses. We took about 100 or so pictures of about 370 or so people so we collected a lot of information. This is our third year with a booth at the horse park and we get better at it every year. This was the first yer I actually got to watch the fire works.

Sandra Sporting our "The back of this shirt could change your life T"

The Back of the T- Shirt

The Whole Group from the Park. Thanks Guys

Pastor Philip and his Family

Honor Guard

Ethan Chillin'

On Sunday we had our first tailgate Sunday. An event we hope become a Discover Point tradition. We held our service an hour earlier packed up and headed down to Turner Field in Down Town Atlanta to eat lunch and watch a Sunday afternoon Braves Game. We got there had time to tailgate and then the skies opened up. Some of us went inside and some of us stayed in our cars and waited out the rain. In the end it was a 17 inning Braves win (which no one stayed until the end) the longest game in Turner Field history and a whole lot of fun. Thanks to every one who helped on both events.

Images for the Braves Game

Tailgate Sunday is THIS SUNDAY!!

Please do not forget that Tailgate Sunday is this Sunday and Service will start at 10am! We will be cleaning up and leaving after the service to go down to Turner Field and cook out and have a good ol' time and then enjoy the Braves Game.