Church Irrelevant, Boring - Not For Our Students

There is a whole generation of young people that think church is irrelevant and boring.
Not our students.

We had SSM (Saddleback Student Ministry) host and lead our weekend service two weeks ago.

Our goal was to highlight how God is working in the lives our students and help our people get involved to invest in the next generation. Well, the student band was unbelievable. They had no problem playing with the crowd, encouraging them in praise and worship and having fun. We all had a blast but it just shows how talented and passionate our students really are... all for the glory of God.

Leo, our highly talented SSM Director, shared ways to get connected, encouraged people to be unafraid of students and love them by getting involved.

Surprise, surprise - We had several people sign up to serve in SSM! It also gave me time to teach SSM at the 11am service so I got to know our students, and they me. BTW, our volunteers that serve already in there are fan-tastic.

After some reflection, I realized that we need to regularly do this. It communicates to our people and to the next generation - we value, we trust and we invest in students.

And we should, it's biblical... 2 Tim 2:2.

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Leo Helps Students Realize Real Hope

Leo gave me the privilege of sharing with our students about HOPE. Specifically, helping their friends find HOPE in Christ rather than in POPULARITY, POSITION, PRESTIGE, other PEOPLE. This was my favorite graphic used in illustrating what Leo placed HOPE in before finding Jesus - being so POPULAR that he would be on the Tyra Banks show. Thankfully, someone cared enough to help him find REAL HOPE.



Here were other examples from Leo's life to help illustrate how HOPES in anything else besides God can't deliver the way He can:

HOPE IN OUR CAREERS/FUTURE



HOPE IN A PERFECT RELATIONSHIP:



HOPE IN POWER/GOVERNMENT:



Which is why God has called us to overflow and share the reasons for our REAL HOPE in Him.

Romans 15:13 (NLT) I pray that God, the source of hope, will fill you completely with joy and peace because you trust in him. Then you will overflow with confident hope through the power of the Holy Spirit.

1 Peter 3:15-16 (NLT) Instead, you must worship Christ as Lord of your life. And if someone asks about your Christian hope, always be ready to explain it. But do this in a gentle and respectful way. Keep your conscience clear. Then if people speak against you, they will be ashamed when they see what a good life you live because you belong to Christ.

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Addressing Rick's Larry King Interview on April 6th

Here is a statement from Rick's media rep regarding the Larry King Interview in case you have people asking you. This is from Kristin Cole:

"I’m providing this to you in an effort to clarify statements made by Pastor Rick Warren during his April 6th appearance on CNN "Larry King Live." Several comments he made during that interview have caused confusion which I would like to clarify on his behalf as media representative for Saddleback Church.

Throughout his pastoral ministry spanning nearly 30 years, Dr. Warren has remained committed to the biblical definition of marriage as between one man and one woman, for life -- a position held by most fellow Evangelical pastors. He has further stressed that for 5,000 years, EVERY culture and EVERY religion has maintained this worldview.

When Dr. Warren told Larry King that he never campaigned for California's Proposition 8, he was referring to not participating in the official two-year organized advocacy effort specific to the ballot initiative in that state, based on his focus and leadership on other compassion issues. Because he's a pastor, not an activist, in response to inquiries from church members, he issued an email and video message to his congregation days before the election confirming where he and Saddleback Church stood on this issue.

During the King interview, Dr. Warren also referenced a letter of apology that he sent to gay leaders whom he knew personally. However, that mea culpa was not with respect to his statements or position on Proposition 8 nor the biblical worldview on marriage. Rather, he apologized for his comments in an earlier Beliefnet interview expressing his concern about expanding or redefining the definition of marriage beyond a husband-wife relationship, during which he unintentionally and regrettably gave the impression that consensual adult same sex relationships were equivalent to incest or pedophilia."
---
Kristin U. Cole
a. larry ross communications

Hopefully this helps you if you are encountering people in your life confused by the Larry King interview with Rick this past Monday. Please be praying for him as he preaches all weekend long!

Peace,
Erin

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Special Prayer Time tonight @7pm, Sback Irvine

Just wanted to let you know a few of us will be gathering at the parking lot for prayer. Pastor Erin and others will be praying for the community, Saddleback Church and our specific four Easter Services. Come out and re-live our "Prayer in the Parking Lot" experience before we launched the campus!

Time: Friday, 7-7:45pm,
Location: Saddleback Irvine, El Camino School Parking Lot
Address: 4782 Karen Ann Lane, near corner of Walnut/Yale

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GOT 45 MINS TODAY? 2PM, IRVINE CAMPUS OFFICE

We are distributing invitation cards and goodie bags to 300 of our immediate neighbors today at 2pm inviting them to our Irvine Easter services. We don't knock on doors (though you can if you'd like) - we just leave them a treat and an invite.

We did this for Christmas as well. If you have about 45minutes, we (well, Erin) would really appreciate the help! (and forward this to someone who may want to help!)

Maybe see you at 2pm today!

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Invite Friends to One of Four Irvine Easter Services

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Some Verses...

I was really challenged this morning in my devotional by these verses from Psalms. God is never done with us. There are always areas in our lives that can be refined by Him. I pray that these verses would encourage you to find the joy that comes through obedience to God!

Psalm 119 1-8
1 Joyful are people of integrity,
who follow the instructions of the Lord.
2 Joyful are those who obey his laws
and search for him with all their hearts.
3 They do not compromise with evil,
and they walk only in his paths.
4 You have charged us
to keep your commandments carefully.
5 Oh, that my actions would consistently
reflect your decrees!
6 Then I will not be ashamed
when I compare my life with your commands.
7 As I learn your righteous regulations,
I will thank you by living as I should!
8 I will obey your decrees.
Please don’t give up on me!

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Help! I need somebody.

Ok, that was a reference to a quite famous Beatles song.

If you haven't heard Pastor Erin say it recently, let me reiterate something.... The Saddleback Irvine Campus has thrived this past year because of the faithful service of all of you! What a blessing it has been to serve alongside all of you.

We're excited to launch a third Sunday service at Irvine (4:30 PM beginning Easter Sunday, April 12). God is allowing us another opportunity to reach more people in the community that do not know Him.

Yes, we're making announcements to recruit more volunteers... we're placing ads in the weekend bulletin. But what I've found to be most successful is a personal ask. Similar to sharing your testimony, people get more excited about serving when they hear how fulfilling it is in your life. My question to you is this, "Who can you invite to serve alongside you?" Your small group members? The new friend you sit next to during services?

Another blessing which I'd like to share with you is that three different people privately told me that they'll do "whatever it takes" to make the Sunday 4:30 service a success. I love Saddleback Irvine!!!

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Saddleback Laguna Woods Opens Easter!

Saddleback is really excited to announce the opening of our 4th regional campus this Easter!

The campus will be centered in Laguna Woods Village, which is the largest and most well known retirement community in Orange County. It will be lead by Pastor Rick Bradford with the assistance of Ron Ferrante and Joe Marchione. These three guys will be able to ‘bring’ Saddleback to this community with future hopes of having the residents find ways to invest in the next generation at our Lake Forest campus (about 15 minutes away) and with hopes to decode the model of how these types of retirement community regional campuses could pour into the local churches around them.

Help us pass the word along and be watching for details on www.saddleback.com under the ‘Saddleback Campuses’ section. This service will be for LW and their guests only.

If you’re interested in helping Rick, Ron, and Joe establish this campus please email Rick Bradford at RickBr@saddleback.com

We’re all very excited and appreciate your prayers!

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God of this city....

Hey Saddleback Irvine,

As we are approaching our 1 year anniversary (can you believe it?), I was trying to think of a song that we could all sing together that would show our thanks and gratitude towards God for all HE has done through Saddleback Irvine. Chris Tomlin's version of "God of this city" paints a great picture of the church (you) praying for lives in the surrounding community. The song also gives thanks to God by explaining that "There is no one like our God". Take a look at the lyrics that follow and know that God is not done here, He has only begun!

Love you all

Stearnzie

Verse 1
You're the God of this city
You're the King of these people
You're the Lord of this nation
You are
You're the light in this darkness
You're the hope to the hopeless
You're the peace to the restless
You are

Pre-Chorus
There is no one like our God
There is no one like You God

Chorus
Greater things have yet to come
And greater things have still to be done
In this city

Greater things have yet to come
And greater things have still to be done here

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Are you in a Desert?

Hey Irvine Peep's

I wanted to share some lyrics with you from a song we will be playing this Sunday. These lyrics are powerful and instrumental during this time in all of our lives. I pray that our hearts would connect to God through these lyrics.

Love you all!

Desert Song by Brooke Fraser

Verse 1
This is my prayer in the desert
When all that's within me feels dry
This is my prayer in my hunger and need
My God is the God who provides

Verse 2
This is my prayer in the fire
In weakness or trial or pain
There is a faith proved of more worth than gold
So refine me Lord through the flame

Chorus 1
I will bring praise
I will bring praise
No weapon formed against me shall remain
I will rejoice
I will declare
God is my victory and He is here

Verse 3
This is my prayer in the battle
When triumph is still on its way
I am a conqueror and co-heir with Christ
So firm on His promise I'll stand

(BRIDGE)
All of my life in every season
You are still God
I have a reason to sing
I have a reason to worship

Verse 4
This is my prayer in the harvest
When favour and providence flow
I know I'm filled to be emptied again
The seed I've received I will sow

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Weekend Sweetness

Hey Team, I just wanted to share with you some cool stuff I saw today.

I think I may do this every week.

Actually, it would be cool if you shared too. Please comment!

1. We had 11 people get baptized today! I love hearing the stories of how people came to a decision about Jesus and why they wanted to be baptized.
2. The message HIT people - God was on the move. Brandon did a fabulous job. People loved seeing Stearns on stage at Lake Forest (that's our guy!).
3. Fresno Pacific brought their (basketball???) team to church - so cool, at least for the people sitting in front of them.
4. I had a great meeting with Derek and many of our deaf congregants regarding next steps for making it an official ministry. They were so receptive and positive.
5. I cannot tell you the joy I have when I see our leaders and teams enjoy one another. You guys love each other!
6. Dan S. is on fire for the Motel Outreach - heck, he has a BINDER.
7. I heard Ron H. gave a hilarious interview with Cody regarding his mustache.
8. Linda A. is ENGAGED! WHOOHOO - congrats!
9. Susan F. was finally back at church after her medical treatments - she shared with me how POWERFUL this campus, the data entry team and her small group have been in her life. Ask her what real fellowship looks like - she experienced it.
10. "Jim" prayed to receive Christ during the 9am service - gave him a FSWG kit. Thanks Mary for pointing him out to me. (Psstt, his name wasn't Jim).
    
11. We had our highest attendance on a non-launch or RW weekend - 1130. Please pray for our search for a new facility - any leads, email me.
12. We ran out of bulletins.
    
13. We ran out of space.
14. Cody is not allowed to interview me impromptu with a video camera on stage anymore.:)
    
15. There definitely is a hole in the baptismal.
16. Can you believe it has almost been a year? March 23rd is our 1 year anniversary! (we will be celebrating it on Sunday, March 22nd).

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Prayer Team And Data Team Rockin

I was talking with a key volunteer today and he told me how he filled out a prayer request last weekend during the service. By the time he got home from church and checked his email that day, there was ALREADY A NOTE FROM THE PRAYER TEAM that his request had been prayed for!

He was blown away.

Talk about EXCELLENCE!

Wow - what a testimony to our data input team and our prayer team!

Question: Is there anything you and I might do better or differently this weekend to help people experience this kind of care in your ministry?

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One of many ways the Irvine peeps serve

The Saddleback Irvine people responded to the call to bring food to be given out in the community. Guess how many bags were returned in one week. (Go ahead and try to count from the photo of the bags in our back kitchen storage. Answer below.)















Keep scrolling to get to the answer....






















108 and counting! Way to be generous Saddleback Irvine!

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Derek's reflection/recap on Irvine Campus Life meeting

Hello fellow servants at Irvine. I recorded a short video (under 7 minutes... that's short when compared to the 2-hr meeting) trying to quickly recap two deliverables I requested from Ministry Leaders at the breakout session. And I also reflected upon a personal experience from a visit to Lake Forest through the lens of our serving values: K.P.M.T.H.E.N. asking the people which value was not observed.


If you need a refresher on those values, look over to the right side of the blog under "Serving Values." =)


For reference when watching video (you'll need sound by the way), "IUSD" refers to Irvine Unified School District and in my case this elementary school that we are renting. Also, I may have mentioned that the next Irvine Campus Life Meeting is March 15. PLEASE NOTE: the corrected date is March 22 and all volunteers are invited (not just volunteer leaders). We'll be recognizing the one-year anniversary of Saddleback Irvine.

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Test 3

Hey friends - sorry... just getting this figured out.

Please comment on the blog and tell me how many times you receive this post in your email.

I am trying to make sure we don't send you more than one when we post - thanks for your patience.

Erin

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Meeting with Rick

Great meeting today with 50 of our Saddleback staffleaders and Rick. Aside from the myriad of one liner leadership nuggets I got from listening to him, I was really encouraged.

Rick is revisiting with us the 10x10 goals and it looks like we are going to be recalibrating those goals to make them more accessible, more clear, more personal, more pronounced and celebrate our progress more often!

Why do we have goals? He reminded us, "because they are statements of faith!" That God is going to do something in this time through us.

We set goals because Jesus commands us in Matthew 28.19-20 to go and make disciples! This requires goals to move forward in this... fires me up.

More to come on this one.

He also threw out some ideas of how to leverage PD CONNECTION and the PD website because he sees the need for us to provide tools for people to connect with God and one another daily. He challenged us to think through some ways to use it in a creative way to help more and more people get connected - stay tuned.

If you haven't checked out the site, it's here.

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Technical Question

Hey Friends - thanks for your pateince as we work out the kinks of this blog.

Are any of you receiving MULTIPLE emails from FEEDBLITZ when we post ONE article?

If so, can you tell me WHEN? And how many per post?

I want to keep the email subscription function (I don't have a problem on the other blogs that use feedblitz) because not everyone uses RSS.

Please comment.

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Great Gathering

Hey Saddleback Irvine Leaders!

I am sure you were wiped with all of the wonderful chaos Sunday. But you still showed up to our Campus Life Leadership meeting - thank you for, as Joe so articulately says in CR, "sitting your bums down". Ha! So much of ministry is just showing up and seeing what God will do. It was a joy to be with you Sunday.

The staff is reading Spiritual Leadership by Oswald Sanders (a good basic leadership book you may consider going through with your team) and I just read Chapter 11 for this week. A nugget I wanted to pass along (it's on prayer and leadership):

"When I go to prayer," confessed an eminent Christian, "I find my heart so loath to go to God, and when it is with Him, so loath to stay."

I can relate to this. No, not the eminent part... the prayer part.

I relearn this all of the time. I know what I need deep down but I double check elsewhere first. I wander from one distraction to another, "God, I'll get to you later", "let me do this first" or I think to myself, all I need is that Del Taco #12 meal to satiate my restless heart... that will do it. Ugh, did I just eat that?



And yet, as I do what Fields' says in his new book REFUEL, I STOP, am QUIET... and CONNECT... I LOVE IT!

Do you guys experience this? What do you do to help your overcome your barriers to pray?

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Test Blog

Our apologies to subscribers. There is some technical issues regarding delivery. After a post, it immediately sends it to all our subscribers (which is great) but sends an ADDITIONAL email at 1:36am every night with no post included (which isn't so great).

I am trying to eliminate this double email per day.

Thanks for your patience as we figure this out.

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Some Bible Verses on Humility

Phil. 2:3 Don’t be selfish; don’t try to impress others. Be humble, thinking of others as better than yourselves.

1 Peter 5:6 So humble yourselves under the mighty power of God, and at the right time he will lift you up in honor.

The Bible says that we are to humble ourselves. Here are some practical ways to practice humility.

Prayer- Prayer draws us closer to God and it shows our need and dependance on HIM. It communicates to God that we don’t have it all figured out and that we need him to supernatually intervene. This is an act of humility.

Simple Acts of Service- The things we do when no one is watching. It can be as simple as picking up an extra piece of trash, paying for a persons meal behind you in the drive thru or saving the best parking spot for someone else.

Being Slow to Speak- Biting our tongue even when we know someone is clearly in the wrong.

Considering Others Better than Ourselves- Understanding that we may not always have the answer. When we consider others better than ourselves, we truly listen to what people have to say.

Lets continue to value Humility TOGETHER!

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Small Group Video Idea

Date My LifeGroup from LifeChurch.tv on Vimeo.

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Heroes?

This are a few headlines from the last couple of weeks:

"A-Rod admits, regrets use of PEDs"
"I felt a tremendous pressure to play, and play really well" - Alex Rodriguez

"Michael Phelps: Olympic Champion Caught Smoking Marijuana"

"Chris Brown arrested Sunday after allegedly getting into a physical confrontation with a woman who has been identified as girlfriend Rihanna"

I’ve heard kids playing baseball asked their parents if they are ever going to be like Alex Rodriguez. Boys and girls swimming only wishing to be like Michael Phelps and girls looking up to Chris Brown saying “He’s the perfect guy.” I have used 2 out the 3 guys named up here as an illustration to my message.

For the last couple of weeks I’ve been hearing and watching all of our modern day “Heroes” go down. But more than anything it bothers me that all of these guys are people who our teenagers are looking up to. I’m not judging or looking down on them or anything. We all make mistakes, I think that we should pray for them and ask God to help them in whatever they are going through.

Here is my question for you... Who can our teenagers look up to? I am not saying only in sports and entertainment, but in life. Are they going to use the same excuse that Alex Rodriguez used “I felt a tremendous pressure to play, and play really well?” We all know that they are feeling a tremendous amount of pressure from parents, teachers, coaches, friends, girlfriends, boyfriends and more. So what are we going to do? I just want us to take a moment today and pray for the future of this world - not only today but everyday.


LG

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Did You RSVP?

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Are You a Jethro or a Moses?

I am trying to read through the bible this year (as I try every year with mixed results!).

I came across Exodus 18...am I a Jethro or a Moses?

When [Jethro] saw all that Moses was doing for the people, he said, “What is this you are doing for the people? Why do you alone sit as judge, while all these people stand around you from morning till evening?”

Moses answered him, “Because the people come to me to seek God’s will. Whenever they have a dispute, it is brought to me, and I decide between the parties and inform them of God’s decrees and laws.”

[Jethro] replied, “What you are doing is not good. You and these people who come to you will only wear yourselves out. The work is too heavy for you; you cannot handle it alone."

So Jethro gives Moses a suggestion on identifying and training leaders:

1: Teach them what you know and how you live
Teach them the decrees and laws, and show them the way to live and the duties they are to perform.

2: Look for People of Capacity and Character
But select capable men from all the people — men who fear God, trustworthy men who hate dishonest gain...

3: Empower them with Responsibility
and appoint them as officials over thousands, hundreds, fifties and tens.

Maybe it's time:

1: To write out clearly what you do and how you do it to teach others
2: To get to know your team better - know their story, their strengths
3: To cast vision of what they can contribute, coach them to succeed

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What is RSS and what does a Reader do for me?

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Erin Tries to Embody 'Team'

This coffee maker was covered in ants the previous Sunday. Thankfully, I have such a 'team' spirit, I didn't care who got the credit for the clean up:).

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Test

Testing the blog. Well, this is the beginning of an attempt to be a leadership blog for those who call Saddleback Irvine their church. We hope to have helpful resources to develop your ability and your humility to lead and lead well.

Rom. 12:6-8 [NLT]
God has given each of us the ability to do certain things well. So if God has given you the ability to prophesy, speak out when you have faith that God is speaking through you. 7 If your gift is that of serving others, serve them well. If you are a teacher, do a good job of teaching. 8 If your gift is to encourage others, do it! If you have money, share it generously. If God has given you leadership ability, take the responsibility seriously. And if you have a gift for showing kindness to others, do it gladly.

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