A dream come true!

Actually, it was a vision, not a nighttime dream. My wife just shared it with me yesterday afternoon, and I remembered her original ‘vision’, back in 1990, when we were in the process of launching CLC through a series of telemarketing to 14,000 families and follow-up mailings to about 1,900 who expressed interest in this ‘new church’ starting at Tinley High School. During a time of prayer and fasting, the Lord gave her a vision of automobiles lined up, one after another, all waiting to turn into the parking lot for one of our services. She shared the vision with us back then, to encourage our little group of 50 adults that God was going to honor our efforts and that people were going to respond by attending. In fact, we thought the vision would soon be fulfilled after the opening at the High school.

Of course, that was not to be, and even though we tripled our little group on the opening weekend, our growth as a congregation was slow at best in those early years and didn’t really accelerate until the late 1990′s.

However, yesterday Chris was here at CLC Tinley before service, putting the finishing touches on her sermon to be delivered in Shorewood. She left the office here just after 9am and walked into the parking lot to drive to the Shorewood campus, when, to her amazement, she saw a line of cars on Ridgeland Avenue, one after another, all waiting to turn into our parking lot for service. As she drove around the lot to enter 183rd street and head towards Shorewood, it was more of the same – as far as she could see, one car after another with their blinkers on, all waiting to turn into CLC’s parking lot for service (all a little late for worship, I should add!)

Besides her excitement of seeing all those cars lined up, it hit her – the vision from 17 years earlier – is now being fulfilled every Sunday!

I wonder how many other ‘visions’ God has given you that perhaps you’ve forgotten or thought were never going to come to pass, since there’s been such a long delay from the time you received the promise until now. Maybe you’ve given up hope of ever seeing it fulfilled. But we would urge you today to keep the faith – because of this!

Now if God is fulfilling visions from 17 years ago during this season of acceleration, what do you think He’s going to do here next? I’m ready to GO!

Sunday afternoon reflections

What a weekend! I don’t remember when I’ve been this tired, but it’s all good.

After that incredible Leadership Retreat on Friday & Saturday, we went right into the 3 weekend services in Tinley and all 3 were bigger than usual – I’m sure by the time I get the reports tomorrow, we will have been near 1,500 folks here worshipping in the middle of summer vacations!

Not only that, but the energy level in the services, especially when we introduced the Kim’s (see my previous post about the Korean-language outreach we’re beginning) and perhaps even more so when we announced that South Bend is now our 3rd campus!

It was also a service packed with unusual stuff, including the KidsTown presentation for Family Sunday and the testimonies from our newly-returned teams from Peru, and China/Mongolia – awesome stuff!

By the time I got to preaching, we had precious few minutes left (and you guys graciously gave me some ‘extra’), but I sure did enjoy talking (yelling) about the treasure hid in the field – it’s so awesome to know how much Jesus values us! (if you don’t know what that’s about, get the CD or download the podcast!)

CLC, the accelerator is on – the pedal is to the metal, as they say – we’re about to GO!

I lied.

Well, kinda. In my last post, I said the adrenalin was starting to wear off about 2 hours after our MEGA retreat opening session had ended. The truth is, when I awoke this morning before 5am, the adrenalin was still there.

I can’t help it – I’m pumped. When I think about how far we’ve come in the past few years, and especially about how much the pace has accelerated this year, I can’t help but be jazzed about where we’re about to GO!

A few minute’s ago I was reading in the Gospel of Mark (I’m reading thru the New Testament with you by Sept. 9) when I came across this passage: Mark 10:27

Then I remembered: that’s how all of this got started! Just before our First Love Conference in January, I was struck with the verse in Genesis and the idea that the word of the Lord came to him, and I sensed that the word of the Lord would also ‘come’ to us during those meetings. Sure enough, when Pastor Gordon Banks ministered that Sunday morning, he read Mark 10:27 and I was immediately arrested – because for the past few years, I had ‘stopped’ at the first part of the verse: humanly speaking, it is impossible. In my personal life, in my finances, and especially in my leadership of CLC, I had often thought, ‘it’s impossible’. But that Sunday morning, I saw the rest of the verse: not with God, for with GOD, all things are possible!

I’m not sure this adrenalin is going to wear off…..I think it may be Holy Ghost adrenalin.

CLC, we’re getting ready to GO!

MEGA leadership retreat, part 1

We kicked off our annual MEGA leadership retreat for CLC tonight. The first session ended over 2 hours ago, and the adrenaline is just now starting to wear off! I laughed (a little), and I cried (a lot) with the largest group of leaders we’ve ever assembled – not sure the total count, but there must have been between 150-200 people in the room.

The main reason I cried so much was because tonight we took a little stroll down memory lane as I reviewed how we got to this place in our history as a church, and we heard a few stories from some of the folks who are now helping make it happen. Probably the highlight of the evening was when we saw and heard from the newest members of our CLC family – the delegation from our newest campus in South Bend, IN (read my previous posts to get that story) AND especially when we heard from the pastor of our Korean-language congregation, Kim Do Yoon, just hours after he and his family arrived at O’Hare!

We talked about all the times God has said “GO!” to us at CLC, and how the pace is accelerating now. What gets me so excited is that One GO always leads to another! In fact, I neglected to mention the latest example of that: John Nordstrom, Sr. had put his house on the market in South Bend several weeks ago, in anticipation of his retirement and upcoming move to Southern Illinois to work closely with his son, Phil and the church he pastors in Murphrysboro. However, he had not received any ‘nibbles’, despite several showings. Then last Sunday in their service in South Bend, they officially announced to the congregation the decision to dissolve their corporation (of more than 50 years!) and transfer all their assets to CLC, to fully become our 3rd campus. That evening John received an acceptable offer for his home, and he is closing on the sale in less than 2 weeks!

I can’t tell you how excited I am about what God is doing here and we’re dreaming BIGGER than ever before in our lives. I can’t wait until tomorrow, when we share the plans we have for our future – but I promise you, CLC – it’s gonna be good. Buckle your seat belt and get ready to GO! You’ll hear more about it beginning August 25/26.

What a wonderful techno world!

I know some of us 50-somethings are entering the 21st century reluctantly, kicking & screaming as we go – but I’m not one of ‘em. (Well, I am in the 50-something group, but I like technology). Today I had one of the neatest surprises of the year:

Between the 2 Sunday services I was standing in the atrium greeting folks, when I met a neat young couple who were visiting CLC for the very first time. When I asked my standard question, “How did you hear about us?”, the husband replied, “Been listening to your podcast for this series, and decided to come today to hear it live”.

Now get this: they live over 40 minutes’ drive away from CLC and had no other contact with our church family whatsoever! In fact, he explained that he often watches Joel Osteen on television and noticed that Joel has a free podcast of his sermons. He thought, ‘hey, that’ll be something to do when I’m mowing the lawn – I can listen to the Word at the same time”. After trying that for a while, he thought, I wonder who else has sermon podcasts, so he did an internet search, and CLC popped up on his screen!

He said we were about halfway thru the Old Testament portion of our “Road Trip 4 God” series when he & his wife started listening, and they enjoyed the teaching so much they went back to our website and downloaded the earlier messages, before deciding to drive up today to get the Word in person.

How cool is that? I’ve noticed for a few months already that virtually every newcomer I speak with in the atrium tells me that before they visited the church in person, they visited our website – but this is the first time someone has told me they were already listening to the messages via podcast.

This 21st century technology is giving us the opportunity to get the Word out to people all over the globe, in ways we could only have dreamed of before. My new friend, Mark Batterson has actually said that he now ministers to more people thru his podcast each week than hear him live in his church in Washington, DC!

Don’t talk to me about the “good old days” – I’m living in them, right now!

Read thru the New Testament in 7 weeks!

Boy, I dunno when I’ve enjoyed preaching/teaching as much as I have this summer during our “Road Trip 4 God” series — and all your comments have blessed me, too — I love knowing that people are ‘getting it’!

This weekend I felt impressed to ask us all to commit to a 7-week sprint rather than the year-long marathon we promote every January. If you weren’t here, it’s simple: start in Matthew and read 30 minutes a day or less for the next 7 weeks ending on September 9, and you will have completed the entire 27 books of the New Testament!

More importantly, as you’re reading the LOGOS over these next 49 days, I believe God is going to speak RHEMA words directly to your spirit! Make sure you have a notebook & pen nearby, to capture His thoughts to you.

Are you up to the challenge? Please add your comments to this post as you hear from God thru the pages of the New Testament-

it’s official: a 3rd campus for CLC!

At last it can be told: I just now hung up the telephone, and this morning we ‘officially’ acquired our 3rd campus – in South Bend, IN!

Many of you know John Nordstrom, Sr. who has served on our Board of Directors since it’s estabishment in 1993. John & his wife Phyllis have been in pastoral ministry for over 40 years, most recently serving Christian Tabernacle in South Bend. At our CLC Directors meetings this past April, he asked to have a private breakfast with me, and there he related his desire to retire from the senior pastorate (he’s 67 years old) and move to southern Illinois to assist his son Philip, who is leading a growing church in Murphrysboro, near the SIU campus. Then he dropped the bombshell: would we consider taking over the South Bend congregation as our third campus?

Our of my love and respect for John, I promised to pray – although I confessed that while the “multi-site” approach is definitely our vision for CLC, I had never considered the idea of taking over an existing congregation, and certainly not one 90 miles away!

Over the past 4 months we’ve had much prayer, discussion, meetings and visits with our staff, his leaders, and even a congregational visit a few weeks ago. All of us have come to the conclusion that this is indeed a “God-thing” and that we were simply being obedient.

So today, they decided t0 offically dissolve their corporation (this is a church that’s been in existence for over 40 years!) and transfer all their assets to CLC, in order to fully become a part of our family: “one church, multiple locations”!

I’ll have more to day in the days ahead, and we’re planning some opportunities for all of us to meet together soon so you can see the newest part of our growing family. I can tell you that the South Bend campus is about 125-strong, and is already multicultural, with at least 3 or 4 African nations represented in the congregation. The folks who are already there will become our “launch team”, as we spend the next several months training & preparing them for a major “grand RE-opening” in January of 2008, when we hope to see over 400 people in attendance!

If you’re a part of our Shorewood or Tinley Park campuses, and you feel the Holy Spirit nudging you to be a part of helping us on the ground floor of this new venture, we certainly welcome your involvement. Just shoot me an email or talk to us at any upcoming service.

How do you spell a-c-c-e-l-e-r-a-t-e?

Did you know you can subscribe?

Are you sitting down?

If not, please do; this is a bombshell:

we’re about to open another church!

No, not the one I’ve been writing & talking about for the past several weeks. A Korean church, right here at CLC!

We were approached in December of last year about the possibility of opening a Korean-speaking church, to be pastored by a Spirit-filled Presbyterian pastor from Seoul who has sensed a call from God to come to America as a missionary. He and his family are fully-funded, and only needed the right ‘fit’ for a sponsoring church here in the Chicago area (that’s us).

Even though there’s been several emails back and forth since their brief visit early this year, I’ve honestly had so much else happening so fast that I had kinda forgotten about this one until this evening, when I received an email informing me that they are arriving at O’Hare next Friday, July 27!

Of course, they’ll have some ‘settling in’ to do, what with buying a house and a car, enrolling in English language school, getting their 2 children enrolled in school, etc. – but they’re already asking how soon they can start early morning prayer meetings at CLC, as they’re custom is in Korea!

So, in just a few months we’ll be holding 9 weekend services in 3 different campuses and 3 different languages – which is pretty amazing when you consider we started this year of 2007 with 4 weekend services in 1 location and 2 languages!!! Would you call that acceleration like the prophet spoke over us in January?

Buckle your seat belt, CLC – we’re getting ready to GO!

More books a’coming!

We’ve been promoting Mark Batterson’s visit to CLC next month (August 11-12, all 3 weekend services) lately and I didn’t realize until yesterday that we had already SOLD OUT of the 2 cases of his book, In a Pit with a Lion on a Snowy Day. So today we ordered 2 more cases for all of you CLCers who haven’t had a chance yet to read what is simply the BEST book I’ve read in the last year.

I promise that it will challenge & inspire you. And it’s a real page-turner, an easy-read (I literally couldn’t put it down, and would have finished the whole book in one sitting over the Christmas holidays had my wife not insisted I turn the light off when I was in the next-to-last-chapter!)

So get your copy this Sunday and mark your calendar for August 11/12. His visit is SO timely for CLC – because we’re ALL gonna need an extra shot of courage to GO where God is taking us next!

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