An Exciting Time to be at KCBT!
The past couple of months have been a whirlwind of activity. Just stop and think for a moment about all that has taken place.
- The Summit 2.0 – Wow! There is so much to say and so much for which we need to thank God – the powerful testimonies, Morgan Jackson’s eye-opening and challenging emphasis upon the power of story as we introduce the Bible to people who have never had one, the praise that ushered us into the very presence of God, the New Missionary workshop and so much more. To me, the most inspiring part of the week was simply to see the students of our church so completely given to worshipping God and engaging in his mission.
- Groundbreaking – It finally happened! It was so great to see the entire church assembled on the parking lot. Since we can’t all fit into the auditorium at the same time we rarely have the opportunity to get a perspective of what God is really doing here. The excitement of the kids who helped turn over the first dirt is contagious and a reminder of why we are doing this. Just as soon as the city gives final approval to the plans, we’ll really see the ground broken up. I am still trying to absorb the amazing news of getting the bids back and finding out that this poor economy is God’s tool to save us two million dollars on this project!
- Youth League – We have been asking God for 600 kids to play and all the necessary workers to make the ministry function. At last count we were well above 500 officially enrolled and well above our numbers from last year. Not only that, the response from so many of you willing to coach, clean, keep score, umpire, etc. has been wonderful. As I have pointed out, this is a great example of what I mean when I say the church is the missionary.
- The K’s – The last night of The Summit we adopted this special group of people as our second “church as the missionary” project following the kids in Youth League. I’ll have more to say about this straight ahead.
Looking back over all God has been doing among us I am struck by a realization that there is a common element responsible – our church is finally, just beginning to learn to pray. Perhaps no single factor has played a greater role in the life of our church over this past year than to see our prayer ministry begin to mature. Tuesday evening prayer ministry has grown from a handful of people (mostly students) in The Point to a more diversified and growing group of people in the auditorium.
I do not aim to put anyone who cannot come to the Tuesday night meeting on a guilt trip. There are often times my schedule prevents me from coming. But, I do believe that what is happening on Tuesday evenings is beginning to spill over in influence toward the creation of a culture of prayer in our church as a whole.
The K’s
If you follow my blog, you have noticed that I often use expressions like K’s or CP’s. I also try to avoid using complete names in such contexts. Some of you have asked me what those letters mean and why I do that.
For years we have trusted God to move our missionary outreach in a more focused direction toward those areas where the church does not exist and where people have never heard the Good News. Now, God has opened the door to work with a very special group of people that I call the K’s. I use such letters and incompleteness in order to respect the security of the people with whom we partner in those parts of the world where words like church and Christian have meanings far different from what you might imagine. These are places where such misunderstanding makes faith in Jesus Christ potentially dangerous. We must be very careful in what we post on the Internet or communicate in any digital form – email, Facebook, MySpace, etc. Not just among this specific group of people, but any area where faith in Christ is a sensitive, restricted or dangerous matter, we have to be cautious. This is why many of the most exciting things going on as fruit of our ministry often cannot be publically communicated.
As we trust God to build an alliance of churches to work with us and Grace Church of Overland Park, we have set our main goal this first year simply to develop a network of extraordinary prayer for the K’s. You’ll be hearing more about that in the weeks ahead. Meanwhile, check out the six operational elements of our strategy in partnership with Epic International as we go down this path where we have never been before. I wrote about them recently on my blog and you can go there by clicking here.
The Men Behind the Wall
Easter and another very special Sunday punctuate the month of April. However, I will take advantage of two Sundays this month to lay the foundation for a new series of studies in the Book of Nehemiah. We often remember Nehemiah for rebuilding the walls of Jerusalem, but that is only a portion of the whole story. The real thrust of Nehemiah is that he was a builder of men. As we progress in our campus expansion, my desire is that we constantly remember that our goal is not a building, but to build men to live Christ-like lives. We have been blessed with many strong men in our church and we will hear from many of them over the months to come as we make our way through Nehemiah’s story.
Setting up this series in March, I preached from 1Chronicles 11 and 12 on David as a builder of men. Thinking back to what we learned from Morgan Jackson during The Summit 2.0, I concluded that morning by pointing to where we are headed in the study of Nehemiah and by challenging you to – enter the story!
Jeff Adams is the Senior Pastor at KCBT
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