Yes, even Oxford felt right. Not the red and blue aspects of it. But what I would be doing and who I would be doing it with. And at the time I didn’t realize that I’d be living in my dad’s basement for five months or that gas prices would get so crazy. Nor did I anticipate the chore of finding a house in Oxford. But after looking back on that first day here in Oxford lots has happened. 

As I said in the last post, I’m going to put together a few ”

I think I’ve learned quite a bit the last 12 months. But I realize how much more I need to learn, study, and apply myself. I see where God has worked, but I see lots of opportunities to partner even more deeply with God in serving Oxford and Lafayette County.

And it would be like tooting my own horn or something if I were to say, “Congratulations, Blake!” Plus it would also seem weird if I started talking to myself in 3rd person. My wife would give me a sideways glance but the people I work with might start questioning my sanity. And how lame would it be on top of all that? I mean, it’s just fantasy football, right?

So, since I am not able to congratulate the winner of the 2008 Fantasy Football season here with The Orchard, I’ll just post a small screen cap of the winners.

Last night was Art With Santa for our church. It’s our 2nd annual event that happens right before the Oxford Christmas parade. Kids come in and make Christmas art projects and get to sit on Santa’s lap if they’d like to. I don’t know exactly how many showed up. But it was pretty full in The Powerhouse for about two hours. And Pat said it was at least three or four times as many people who came last year. [a few pice below].

Then afterward we walked the parade route handing out signs for kids to hold up that said “SANTA, I’VE BEEN GOOD THIS YEAR!!!” The cool thing was that on the back side was our church name and info. So hopefully we’ll have a few more people hearing of us and maybe coming by.

We’re about to eat a little supper, and then decorate the tree. We were afraid it might not fit in our house because the house in Clinton had higher ceilings. The tree is a 9 footer. But it made it barely.

Now for some ART WITH SANTA PICS:

Last night The Orchard was a host for a screening of the new Invisible Children Video, GO. You probably remember me talking a bit about it last week.

Suffice to say it was pretty amazing. The turnout was less than we expected and hoped for, but the event itself was a blast. The roadies from the IC were great. Very helpful, knowledgeable, and genuine. The movie was inspiring. It told the stories of three out of 15 high school students who were allowed to go to Africa and see the effects of the money they raised. 

In turn it inspired some of them to make an even deeper commitment to helping the cause of children in northern Uganda.

And The Lyric Theater….it’s freaking amazing [or freakhog amazing]. It’s a great venue for a movie for sure. And I look forward to seeing some bands in there soon. But even the Roadies said that normally while the movie is showing they hang out at the merch table because they’ve seen/heard it so many times. But they said that The Lyric Theater in Oxford was by far the best venue they’ve been to in terms of video quality and sound quality. They said it was like watching the movie almost for the first time again.

All in all it was great night. Hope to have a better attended event next time. I think we learned a few things about getting the word out too.

Lastly, here is an older video from Invisible Children. It shows a bit about their Displace Me Campaign from a couple of years back. The more I see from these guys, the more I’m amazed with their video production skills. Plus, this video has one of my favorite songs in it too.

Invisible Children has made and is making a big difference in the lives of those children. And this weekend The Orchard in Oxford is partnering with them to bring their latest movie, GO, to The Lyric Theater on The Square in Oxford.

We set up a website for it today: InvisibleChildrenOxford.com.
Go visit it. Find out more. And attend the screening.
October 12. The Lyric. 6pm.
Two videos below you should watch…

The trailer for the movie GO:

Part of what led to the movie:

Now the thing is, both of those guys, the top two ranked teams, are the PASTORS of The Orchard. Yep, funny how that happened. That’s Pat and me atop the week one standings. Of course you can’t go on just one week. I know that. Heck, the Patriots won every game but their final one last season. And all people talk about are the Giants.

Week Two is almost in the books. And as fate would have it Pat and I are matched up. We still have Monday Night football to go. He’s got Brian Westbrook playing and I have Jason Whitten. But here’s the score total heading into tonight.

Truth be known, which ever of us loses will probably have the 2nd or 3rd highest point total for the league, but be 1-1. I plan to be 2-0!

Next week I’m heading out to Indiana. I’ll fly into South Bend and then hitch a ride over to Granger, IN. I’ll be attending the Innovate 08 conference at Granger Community Church.

I had a friend that went last year and raved about it. And I read a few blogs of folks who had attended, and they said it was exceptional. My friend actually said, “It’s better than anything I’ve been to at Northpoint…” Those were some big words there.

So what am I looking forward to?

• I’m looking forward to hearing Mark Beeson teach. He’s a gifted communicator and has pushed his church in so many creative ways. [I still find it interesting that he's in a very "innovative" church, yet still preaches with a coat and tie each week. But hey, seems to be working for him!]
• I’m looking forward to hearing Shawn Wood talk of their creative process of finding the sweet spot of who God created his church to be and who they are not. That way they are not trying to be a huge buffet of ministries, but being dang good at what they’re created to do.
• Getting to hear Tim Stevens speak about recognizing and using culture to communicate the life changing truths of Jesus.
• Maybe meeting Kem Meyer and Tim Stevens both.
• Attending the Granger Film Festival where churches bring their best vids from the last year or so for a competition.
• Hearing Rob Wegner speak his heart about missions and how to impact the local community for The Kingdom.
• To be able to hear Kathy Guy speak on the small group strategies of GCC and how it makes a difference in their people. Might even get to grab lunch w/ her at some point.
• Steven Furtick will tell the stories of how his church has had a wild growth as it’s barely 2 years old. And the struggles and processes they’ve gone trough. And I want to see his weird hair in person.
• Plus, I hope to be able to walk around the campus of Notre Dame while I’m there too.
• And there will be some good companions from The Orchard in Tupelo to be with.

I will have frequent updates and maybe some pics/video of stuff while I’m there. I’ll “take you along” so to speak.

Services start at 10:30 on Sunday mornings. And at about 10:20ish, it looked to be a normal Sunday morning. Summers have been a little slow for us in a few ways, while at the same time adding quite a few new couples and families. And even when Pat finally shooed everyone into the worship room at 10:33 it still seemed like a regular Sunday. But there was a little more energy to the room. But as Matthew began to welcome people and started the first song, people kept coming into the room. And then more. And more and more.

We were having to continually take chairs off the racks and set them up in the back. And then we ran out of room in the back and had to set them up along the side. It was packed. Part of it was that school started for Ole Miss today, so there were a lot of college students back in town who had been Orchard attenders. And part of it was new college students checking us out for the first time.

There also were a few friends from my old youth group who drove up from Mississippi State to spend the morning with us too. And…I was the one preaching that morning. It was more teaching about why we value Small Groups at The Orchard, and why we see Biblical precedents for them too. We launch SGroups next week and wanted to hit them good. But I was pretty confident about the morning.

So all in all, it was a great morning. And lunch afterward was good to catch up with some old friends.  The video above is dark. I know. But I tried to use my Macbook to capture some quick video. It was still plugged into a few cords and cables. So it’s shakey too.

But we fell that big things are on the way for The Orchard. Be in prayer for us.

How was your Sunday?

But then I got to work in Garageband for a while putting the pieces together, using the little intro music, recording a brief welcome message, and getting all the id3 tags right.

I’ve submitted our podast iTunes, but it will probably take a few days until it gets flying there. But we’re looking forward to this being a great way for our folks to keep up if they’re out a weekend. Also a great way for so many of our college students to listen in during the summer (or for their parents to check out where they’re going to church while away at college.)

Right now we have it set up on iWeb, so if you want to check out our first edition, go for it!

CRUCIBLE: (krū‘sə-bəl) n.

1. A vessel made of a refractory substance such as graphite or porcelain, used for melting and calcining materials at high temperatures.
2. A severe test, as of patience or belief; a trial.

Maybe calling my current life a crucible would be an exaggeration. But it does seem that there are a whole lot of things happening at once in my life and the life of my family. And I don’t feel like I’m anywhere near any breaking point. But sometimes it does seem like my head is spinning.

We finally sold our house (Yea God!) but we’re living in a basement. But YEA GOD! the basement is free. But this basement is a 35 minute drive from work. We’ve been looking at houses over all-the-time it seems. Today we just told a builder that a house we’d been having some serious conversations about just doesn’t seem right for us. We think it is a great deal on a great house. But it’s just not a great deal for us.

And our third child is due within the next week and a half. Which means it could be in two weeks or tonight. And then yesterday the transmission went out on my vehicle. When the mechanic calls you and says you have two options…and the price difference between the two is $1100, you say “ouch!”

Then there’s the basic “I just wish I had more time in the day” stuff. So it seems that life is busy, busy, busy right now on some front. But I’m really looking forward to the weekend. We have a Good Friday service, then an egg hunt on Saturday, then a Sunrise Service on Easter Sunday. Surprisingly I’ve never been to a sunrise service in all my life.

The image below is clickable.