As I prepared for this weekend’s service, it got me thinking of when Kristen and first became parents. We were young. Super young. And, unlike many young married couples, we had no time to prepare. Motherhood and fatherhood came to our doorsteps without a hint of its arrival. Landon, our oldest, was born nine months after our wedding (a honeymoon baby, as they say). Shortly after saying our “I dos,” we were cleaning poopy diapers and sleep-walking our way through late night feedings.

It is 8.5 years since we were surprised by the pink line on the stick. Since then, we have watched our, now, 3 children grow from diaper-wearing “pet rocks” to self-sufficient, writing-and-reading, baseball-hitting, costume-wearing, Jesus-loving, creative kids. But, this post is not about them. It’s about her.

For all of the growth my kids have gained over the last 8.5 years, nobody has grown as much as my wife. Thrusted into motherhood with no time to even do a little research, my wife has risen to the challenge. God has used her faith and discernment to raise kids who love Jesus. She has learned to manage incredibly demanding schedules under a lot of stress. She spends hours learning from women who have “been there” and “done that.” She has inspired other women to live into their destiny of being a Godly woman.  And, she supports, encourages, loves, and serves me even in my worst moments.

She has had an incredible impact on my life and rightfully deserves a double-dose of honor from me and the kids.

My guess is that if you’re married or have even a semblance of a relationship with your mother, you probably feel the same way about the women you’re closest to. So, let me encourage you (men especially): let’s not scrimp on some chintzy gift or card. Let’s give her a double-dose of the honor she rightfully deserves this Mother’s Day. Serve her. Praise her. Honor her. Because, She is fearfully and wonderfully made in the image of God and is deserving of it all.

Oh…and make sure you’re their on Sunday. Kristen is gonna kill it.

On Sunday afternoon, I received word that 150 people attended one of our 2 Easter services. 13 decided to follow Jesus and picked up a New Believer’s Box. The heavens went nuts over what was happening in our worship experiences on Sunday.

Immediately after hearing this information, my thoughts went to you, Advancers. You, who built loving relationships with people and courageously invited them to join you this Easter at Advance. You, who spent 36 hours praying and fasting for God to unleash His favor and kindness on our church and those who entered it. You, who selflessly gave of your time and talents to shake hands, serve donuts, sweep sidewalks, and sing loudly. You, who taught our kids, ran the lights, and mixed the sound. God worked through you–all of you.

So, as the days continue to move forward, I can say: the other side of Easter is as sweet as always. God is alive and He is still in the business of resurrecting lives. I can’t wait to see what He has in store for us next!

As a church, we want to see correctly. We don’t want the vision that God has given us (to see lives altered by Jesus and mobilized for His glory) to be clouded or distorted. We want it to be crisp and clear. Which is exactly why we are taking a break from our Mark series this weekend and focusing, once again, on what God is calling us to do and be in this city.

If you are new to Advance, Vision Sunday will be the perfect weekend to get to know us better. If you’ve been around a while, this Sunday will be a time to grab hold of the passions, talents, and resources God has given you and commit (or recommit) to using those things to help fulfill what God is asking of us as a church.

This Sunday is the most important Sunday of the year, Advancers. It has the potential to be a tipping point for us to see the future more clearly and set us up to make a profound impact for God’s kingdom in the year head. So no excuses. Sleep in on Saturday instead. Call someone if you need a ride. Let the Advance Kids volunteers care for your children during the service. Bring (don’t just invite) your friends. Do whatever is necessary to be at Advance on Sunday morning.

To my surprise, I have never had a class go by as quickly as the four classes I had with my professor. Somehow he captured my attention with his incredible wealth of knowledge and humor. Colonel Sanders or not, I didn’t want this class to end. It is, to this day, my all-time favorite class.

As we studied the four gospels in the New Testament, I was immediately drawn to Mark. Short, fast-paced, and to the point, Mark’s urgency for the gospel to move forward struck a chord with me. I couldn’t let go of how raw and powerful Marks’ gospel was despite his lack of description. One evening I read Mark’s gospel from beginning to end. I’ve never been so moved by a book in the Bible.

And then, as if my attachment to the book of Mark couldn’t grow anymore, on the final day of our class my professor had a time of confession. He told us the gospel of Mark has always been his favorite gospel account. In fact, he enjoyed it so much that as part of his thesis in seminary he actually memorized and performed the entire book of Mark.

“Say what?!?!” I thought. “Memorized and performed the entire book of Mark?”

My hand immediately shot in the air. I asked what I know everyone was thinking: “Can you still perform it?”

“Parts,” he replied.

“Will you do a couple parts for us?” I asked.

“Sure.”

What occurred next was one of the most moving experiences of my life. He began by performing Mark 5:1-20 (The story is of a man who is possessed by a demon). Amazingly, each character had a different voice, complete with accents that seemed to represent their character well. When the demons spoke in verse 9, he sent chills down our spine with what could only be classified as the perfect voice for Satan’s demons. He then performed a portion of Mark 8. Jesus tells his disciples he must suffer and die. As Peter rebukes Jesus, he does so with a New York accent. ‘How perfect is that?’ I thought.

My classmates and I sat in astonishment of his performance. We demanded more. He entertained us until our time was up and we all thanked him for such an amazing class and experience.

I will never forget what my professor showed us that day. He showed us that the Bible is not just words on a page,  but they are words of life. The gospel of Mark was brought to life in such a way that you couldn’t help but want to hear more!

As we study the book of Mark it’s my hope that the words we read won’t just be words on a page, but words of life. It’s my hope that what Mark has written will come to life for us in the same way they came to life for me that day in a classroom. It’s my hope that the story of the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus will be so moving that it will alter us and cause us to follow Him even more closely.

1. Pray. Over the last few weeks we have been praying for God to do amazing things on Christmas Eve. Ultimately, our pray is to see lives altered by Jesus. We have spent gobs of hours preparing a service that will not only be memorable, but life changing. Pray for the service and all who are involved. In addition, pray for many people to come to one of our two services.
2. Invite. Hopefully you’ve already extended invites to friends, neighbors, family, etc. If you haven’t, there is no time but the present. Make the phone call. Give them the invite card. Send them the text or the email. Do what you can to get those you love to one of our services on Monday evening (5 or 6:30pm).
3. 24 Hour Prayer Event. Beginning Sunday afternoon at 5pm we will be having a 24 hour prayer event at the church. We are asking everybody to sign up for one hour during that time period, come to the church, and pray for the services and our community. If you haven’t signed up yet, you can still do so tomorrow morning (Sunday) before or after the service. If you have signed up please make sure to double check what time you will be coming.
4. Stand By: Get Ready. Though our Christmas Eve services have been a focus of ours this week and for the last month, we will be wrapping up our Stand By series Sunday morning with a final message entitled, “Get Ready.” I believe this is maybe the most important message of the series, so don’t miss it. In addition, Jordan and Kristen Lindstedt will be doing a special acoustic set of music that is bound to be excellent.
5. Year-End Gifts. I want to challenge you to consider giving a special year-end gift (above your regular tithes and offerings) to Advance before the end of the year. There is nothing more important than the work of the church as, in the end, it will be the only thing left standing. Therefore, every dollar you give goes to helping other people know of the grace and love of Jesus Christ. In addition, your special gift will help the church to stay on track with our budget and meet the needs of the daily workings of the church. You can give your gift during one of the upcoming services (including Christmas Eve) or you can give online using your bank account or credit card

I can’t wait to spend this Christmas with all of you and your guests. See you Sunday morning and again on Monday! Merry Christmas!

1. Christmas Eve Invites. We have asked everybody to think of 3-5 people who they would like to invite to Christmas Eve this year. If you didn’t fill out a card on Sunday, write down the names of 3-5 people you would like to invite and begin praying for them daily. If you did fill out the card, take the time to pray for them and a favorable response toward your invitation.
2. Christmas Eve Services. A lot of time and energy is spent on making Christmas Eve a memorable and impactful worship experience. Pray for that time to be instrumental in the changing of hearts. Pray that we would see lives altered through our Christmas Eve services.
3. Christmas Eve Mailer. A 10,000 piece mailer will be going out to our surrounding community in the next couple weeks. This will be the second mailer our neighborhood has received (we sent one during our Reset series). Pray that we would get a good response from the mailer and that we would see many come to church that evening.
4. Finances. The final month of the calendar year and the final quarter of our fiscal year is upon us. Pray that we will be able to meet our budget and that we would continue to manage our resources carefully. In addition, pray about how you might be able to give a year-end gift to help continue the mission of Advance moving forward into 2013.

The day after Thanksgiving until Christmas Eve were the five most torturous weeks of my life as a kid. The anticipation of presents, cookies, parties, and a week off from school was almost unbearable. In fact, I was so bad at waiting for the magical night that I, along with my sister, would scour the house for unwrapped gifts. Together we would search places like the trunk of the car, under my parents’ bed, or the top shelf in our storage room. Inevitably places like these would produce some manna (socks, pajamas, a football), but not the meal we hoped for: the latest Atari game, Guess jeans, or the infamous “hockey game” (also known as the Christmas mistake of 1986). These gifts, the top echelon of gifts on our Christmas lists, were secured in the least expected areas: the attic, random boxes inside random boxes, and even underneath the house in our crawl space.

We found all of them. And, if one appeared under the tree that we couldn’t immediately recognize, we would carefully unwrap and then rewrap the present to discover its contents. By the time Christmas Eve arrived, the opening of presents was just a right of passage to getting what I already knew was wrapped. In all honesty, it wasn’t all that fun.

Then, one year, I stopped. My private detective days came to an end. I’m not sure what stopped me. Maybe it was my conscience. More likely it was my laziness. It took a ton of work to find and then conceal the knowledge that you had found the gifts you were getting. On more than one occasion, my sister or I came close to spilling the beans on a gift we were getting.

And that’s when I discovered the truth of a pithy statement I had heard numerous times before: some things are worth waiting for! I don’t remember anything about the Christmas I decided to wait. All I know is that, ever since, I’ve learned to wait patiently during this season.

In all reality, it’s not that hard to wait for Christmas. In fact, this time of waiting will be over before we know it. But, what do we do when God asks us to wait in other areas of our life. What do we do when we are forced to wait on the bigger things? What do we do when God tells us to “Stand By?”

Well, during the month of December we will be looking at four characters (some obscure, some not) who were forced to wait for some big things. Not only were they apart of a nation who waited 400 years for God to step in, but each would be put on stand by as God made His move to rescue the world from sin. Each of them teach us a valuable lesson in waiting; lessons I hope will teach us some things (especially God things) really are worth waiting for.

Here is a post from Denise about how God laid this need on her heart and then provided an opportunity for her to be mobilized into her world through a garage sale…

Shortly after the storm hit the east coast, the Lord woke me with a still small voice saying, “Sell some of your things and give the money to those who have lost everything.”

My closest friend and sister in Christ moved to Manhattan in early September, joining her husband who had to relocate there 18 months ago due to a lack of work in Las Vegas for construction. The week prior to the storm they were faced with a family emergency here in Las Vegas, so they prayed and trusted God to protect their property. When talking with their neighbors back in NY they realized that their apartment, his job site, and the building where their storage was located all were spared; a neighbor said, “The water came right up to your building and stopped.” He took pictures for them, and water literally touched the corner of their building and stopped. All this provided the opportunity for them, upon returning to NY, to encourage others with the faithful mercy and provision of God.

Even though my friends did not sustain a direct hit from the storm, many people lost everything. More than 100 houses burned to the ground in Queens and Staten Island, families lost everything, and there was another storm, a Nor’easter, on the way.  I could not sit by and do nothing. My heart was broken for the loss and suffering seen on the nightly news. These precious ones need whatever help we can give them and many prayers.

On the Sunday following the storm, I woke up with the above thoughts from the Lord….and so I am having a sale on December 1. I am so excited to see what He does.

**

Denise Sutton has been an Advancer for four months. She’s lived in Vegas for 35 years where she and her husband of 30 years, Craig, raised two sons. To donate items to her sale, please contact Outreach Pastor Shawn Breker (shawn@advancechurch.cc).

We are thrilled to be hosting this webcast alongside more than 100,000 people in all 50 states and nearly 100 countries. We want to gather together with other followers of Christ in their local churches and homes and encourage one another in the disciple-making process. To “make disciples” is to intentionally show the life of Christ before others, to share the gospel of Christ with others, to teach the Word of Christ to others, and to do all of this with a view toward reaching every people group in the world with the gospel.

In the weeks and months following the webcast, we want to provide resources and materials that introduce foundational biblical topics for those seeking to learn God’s Word with the intent of helping others follow Jesus. We will do this through a weekly Sunday afternoon Multiply class led by our Executive Pastor Jon Wallerick and his wife, Becky. Using the Multiply curriculum, everyone who attends the group will begin to understand what it means to follow Jesus, study scripture, and be the church.

The Multiply group will meet at Advance on Sundays after the 10 AM worship experience beginning this month, and childcare will be provided. If you are interested in joining the group, let us know on Saturday at the Multiply webcast or by telling us on your connection card this Sunday.