Category Archives: Uncategorized

One of the 7 core values of the Ridge Community Church is Generosity.  Over the course of the next 10 weeks, the Ridge is going to be showing some crazy generosity to the people of Oak Ridge.  Here’s just a small glimpse of what is coming…

• Friday night our Ridge crazies will be out at the Clinton vs Oak Ridge football game serving in the concession stand, free of charge to help out the school
• November 1st, we’ll be all around Oak Ridge handing out FREE 9v batteries to everyone, reminding them to set their clocks back and change their smoke detector batteries
• Black Friday/Day after Thanksgiving, the craziest of the Ridge Crazies will be at Walmart in Oak Ridge starting at 3:30 a.m. spreading Christmas cheer and to hand out FREE hot chocolate to those waiting in line to get the best deals of the shopping season
• In December, we’re going all out and one elementary school is gonna get shown some crazy love when the Ridge invades and gives every student there a brand spankin’ new pair of shoes (more details on this later!)
• We’re in the process of cooking up some crazy, fun, generous ideas for the Oak Ridge Christmas parade as well!

Needless to say it’s going to be a busy couple of months.  We wouldn’t have it any other way.

ALL THIS….FOR OUR KING

“You can not plan for a move of God, but you must be prepared for it”

This was a quote that I had heard from Perry Noble a few months ago that has kept me up at night ever since.

One simple truth about God is, we never know when He’s going to do something amazing in our lives.  There’s no way that we can possibly plan for His movement.  Sometimes we would like to think that we can by saying, “well if I do this, and if I do this, the God will do THIS.”  Spoiler Alert: That never happens that way.  God moves when God moves and there’s no way of knowing when, but what we can and SHOULD do, is always be ready.

3 things you can do to prepare for a move of God

#1- Be READ UP

How are you going to to know that God is doing something amazing if you don’t know anything about Him?  Get a daily bible reading plan and STICK TO IT! If you have to start with small chunks, start there. Don’t read for the sake of reading, but read for the sake of getting closer to Jesus, and inspiration from His word

#2- Be PRAYED UP

Sometimes God’s movement comes from Him speaking through times of prayer and if  you’re waiting on Him to move, he wants to hear from your HEART.  Pray BIG, BOLD, AUDACIOUS prayers, almost laughable prayers if others heard what you were praying for.

#3- Be WORKED UP

Anticipate and believe God for the BIG, BOLD, AUDACIOUS things.  Why would you pray it if you weren’t going to believe God for it?  When I’m praying big prayers, anticipating God moving in an area, I don’t walk around going, “Well I really hope God does this….”  No, I walk around believing God for it until He tells me yes or no.  And if it’s NO, then He has something greater that I can’t see yet in mind.  That’s the beauty of anticipation.  We trade in the smaller gift for the BIGGER gifts!

Something that has been DISTURBING me over the last few weeks is phrase that I heard pastor Perry Noble say in the coaching network I’m in:

“You can not plan a move of God, but you better be prepared for it.”

That phrase has literally caused me to loose sleep.

I think that all too often I’ve been trying to plan when and how God’s going to move but I haven’t been prepared for it.  Trying to force God with our own hand is a good way to get left out of His blessings. You can’t put a move of God on the calendar.  Read Acts 2: 1-5 and see what I’m talking about through the lens of scripture.

I believe that God wants to bless us and He wants to bless you, giving you a fullness of  life that is better than you could ever dream up,  but that’s not going to come until you can handle it and it will come when it’s not planned.

Being prepared for a movement of God looks different on a individual level as well as on the church level.  Tomorrow I’ll talk about being prepared on the individual level and then we’ll hit some points on the church level.

Back in black!  I hit the…..just kidding!  But I am back.  It’s been awesome week of vacationing with my family and hanging with the Newspring Church clan for a day with my own staff and volunteers.  Here’s a rundown of what’s been happening!

• Spent a few days in Charleston South Carolina with my bride and newly, one year old son.  It was something of a blessing to be able to do so.  Thank you to the staff and team at the Ridge for sending us out for a few days!
• I LOVE downtown Charleston!  What a great place to just hang out.  We walked the streets and checked out the historical battery and loved it!
• Best part of downtown…the Quiksilver store.  Very cool for my non-surfing self
• Best part of being at the beach besides…well…it’s the beach?  Seeing my son run on the beach and away from the water
• Love all the history associated with Charleston.  I didn’t want to nerd out my wife so I laid off of it a bit
• Recently watched the movie Into the Wild and it was literally one of the best films I’ve seen a # of years
• The soundtrack isn’t bad either!
• Spent Thursday with some of our staff and volunteers at Newspring Church hanging with Pastor Perry Noble and the NS staff.  Love that they offer themselves up to us to answer questions, pray for us and just help in any way they can
• I have to say that this coaching network has really been invaluable.  If you’re a pastor and/or church planter, I recommend getting involved in a coaching network.  You’ll be glad you did
• And for all you haters out there, being in Perry Noble’s coaching network isn’t about being with or near Perry.  It’s about learning and growing in what God has called me to do.  Perry’s a great leader and pastor that has a heart to share what God has taught him with other leaders and that alone is worth the price of admission.  Plus they give me all the Monster Energy drinks I can handle.
• Big thanks to the Newspring staff that went above beyond the standard to take care of our son while we were visiting!
• I’ll blog about the Newspring experience in detail later this week!
• Sunday was one of the best days we’ve had at the Ridge
• Not sure what it was, because nothing extraordinary happened, but I’m not gonna lie….it felt good.  It felt real good.
• Even with several key families out on vacation, it was still a really full crowd.  Gotta love that!
• Not only that, had more first time guests!
• Kicked off the Urban Legends series from Lifechurch.tv today and talked about the myth that there are many ways to God.  BTW, if you’re wondering, there’s not many ways to God.  There’s one.  Jesus.  #Truth
• Felt really good preaching today.  Felt like it was flowing.  I love that.
• Had to move locations this week to Oak Ridge High School.  I’m always worried when we have to do that, that no one will show up.
• It’s not the most conducive place to worship, but our team works hard to make it an inviting environment.
• Had lots of great comments about the freedom to worship today.  Great job Deena Robbins, Matt Robbins, Chris Hill, Scotty Herrell and Nick Miller and the Ridge band!
• Proud of our production team led by Denira Williams that made some things come together last second.  I think they work best under pressure
• I think the production/creative team leader must be a good leader to make all that work.  We’ve been blessed.
• It’s gonna be a crazy week ahead!  Lots going on and lots to do!  Hoping to get caught up from last week and maybe get back ahead.  It’s gonna be a fight, but I’m leaning in!
• Big congrats to my friend Ken Joslin who launched Life Church in Gainesville Georgia!  They’re gonna kill it!

Not here!

I kid…but it’s really not as of yet.  I’m hanging with my family at the Isle of Palms in South Carolina for a few days thanks to some AMAZING people at the Ridge. Yes…we have a staff that takes care of us!  Thank you guys and gals!

We’re gonna be kicking back, taking in the beach, gorging on crab legs and maybe hitting downtown Charleston before meeting up with our team at Newspring church on Wednesday for another installment of the coaching network.

I’ll get to the Sunday Replay sometime this week and let you know how the final week of our series Chainbreaker went!  Next week….new series borrowed from our friends at Lifechurch.tv called Urban Legends!  I’ll talk about that one too…gonna be a great one!

Gotta go…my Starbucks Via is calling my name!