Advance 30

As a church we are looking through the windshield at our greatest opportunity to date which also happens to be our greatest obstacle to date! The good news is as we peruse the Scriptures we quickly see that this was often the formula for a miracle...an opportunity for God to do what only he could do! We are entering a chapter unlike any in our existence and I believe it calls for us to take action like never before. Join us Monday, April 30, 6:15-7:00pm at our future home as I share our vision for a 30 day journey of prayer and fasting called "Advance 30". No childcare (but families are welcome), no lights, no sound systems. Just a church coming together to beg for God's supernatural activity among us! This will absolutely be a night to remember.

125 hours=Practically Loving Our Neighbors!

"Do for one what we wish we could do for all"--We say this often because strategically partnering with and blessing groups within our city is part of our dream and plans at Ridge Church. 45 Ridge volunteers joined together on Saturday giving roughly 125 hours collectively to doing MAJOR clean up and landscaping improvements to Piney Grove Elementary School. Piney Grove is the "first" title one school that we have adopted and we really want to make a difference. For those of you that give generously to Ridge Church every week you are part of this too! We couldn't afford to provide these type of events for Piney Grove without your generosity. Here are a few pictures from the day:

He's making Beautiful Things out of us!

I truly believe that the essence of the church by God's design is to be a giver not a taker. Our vision as a church is to bless and serve our city in ways that bring undeniable Glory to our example and our Savior Jesus. In alignment with that, our mission is to usher people into a relationship with that same Jesus. Go HERE to hear "The winds of change". "When your memories exceed your dreams, the end is near". God is making beautiful things out of us. We would love for you to be part of it! Check out this video for a glimpse (thanks to Catalyst for video inspiration!)

Redefining what is essential (one chair at a time)

One of the epic challenges of life is to suspend our own personal conveniences for the sake of others. The problem with our lives of convenience is that we have become accustomed to them--so much so that often times the conveniences we enjoy have come to feel like ESSENTIALS and the line gets blurred. In fact we have convinced ourselves that these conveniences are essential to our lives to the point that we feel very real anxiety when one of these conveniences is tampered with...[cable, our second car (or first car), our house, our x box, our iphone, our starbucks habit, our hair coloring appointment, our vacation etc]

I want to extend a challenge, Ridge Church...let's step up and allow ourselves to be inconvenienced for the sake of people whose lives will be changed! We have made a decision not to take out a loan in order to complete our current up fit project. Simply stated--when we run out of funds we'll will stop building until we can raise the rest. You have been generous and we have been fantastic stewards of resources and time and as a result now we can literally see the finish line! We need to sell 450 chairs ($199 each) that symbolically represent the people we are praying for. So PRAY for a person--PAY for a seat. For some of you, buying one chair will be a stretch. For others of you buying 100 chairs would be very doable. So do what YOU can. Allow yourselves to be inconvenienced for the sake of this mission! USE EGIVE HERE.

"I left the church when I was 17"

When we were still doing interest meetings for Ridge Church I remember quoting this alarming statistic that 85-90% of high school seniors that grew up in church would leave the church as soon as they graduated and most would never return. The number one reason why?--"the church and her message was judgmental and not relevant to life". That bothered me so much that it literally shaped much of how our church functions. We are passionate about creating environments that would capture the hearts of a generation teaching them how to apply God's word to every day life and equipping them to pursue Jesus even beyond high school or college. We also wanted to work hard to create environments where the "85-90%" would one day, maybe even as adults, come back and find the church and message of Jesus to be more relevant than they ever knew it could be. I share this because Nicole's baptism story is evidence that IT IS WORKING! This is our mission in action!:

This never gets old!

We had the privilege of baptizing two more adults this weekend at Ridge Church. When we started this church our dream was simple "To create a church where 'church people' would love bringing their un-churched friends...and a church where those un-churched friends would love attending". Along the way we've had people of all ages realize their need for a personal relationship with Jesus. Every person has a story--they are all powerful! This is just one of them.

I'll post the other video later this week. This never gets old. Grateful to have a front row seat to life change!

Ridge UPDATE: Demo has begun!

DEMOLITION BEGINS
I'm long overdue on an update of the happenings around Ridge Church. The demo permit is here and we are starting demo on our future home. Demo should take 2-3 weeks then construction will begin. Our capital campaign called "1 twelve" has been wrapped around the idea that every chair represents a person that matters to us and even more importantly matters to God. We have received just over half of the funds necessary to renovate our future home. We are in our final push to the finish line. Our new facility will have 450 total seats and we are inviting people to symbolically purchase a chair for $199--for a family member, friend, or co-worker. If all 450 chairs are spoken for that should enable us to finish the interior. Go HERE to give through e-give or you our 1 twelve ipad kiosks on Sundays.

NEW STUDENT ENVIRONMENT OPENS THIS SUNDAY
Our middle school and high school students get to start in their new environment before the adults will arrive in theirs. We we make the audio/visual installs this week in their new permanent environment. I heard rumors of a DJ and free XBOX drawing--9AM at this address: 1031 Matthews-Mint Hill Road, Matthews, N.C.

NEW SERIES BEGINS
Last but not least we begin a fantastic new teaching series this week called "Recovery Road". Can our nation be saved from economic crisis and political turmoil? Come see what Jesus had to say about it. 9:30A.M. and 11:00A.M.