CreativePastors Blog & Podcast

Your Stories: Launching a Church in Massachusetts

One of the joys of partnering with church leaders throughout the world is hearing your success stories and sharing your "Yeah, God!" moments. This week brought such a story from Pastor David Payne, who just launched Lifesong Church in Millbury, Massachusetts. Check out his account from their opening weekend:

"We have been planning our church launch for the last 12 months - working on raising funds, putting together our team, finding facilities, etc. When asked by one of my coaches if I'd picked my first series yet, I said that I hadn't but was looking at several. Finally I made the decision and picked 'Pronoun' as the opening series and 'why i' as the second one. I wanted to have the media content and the skeletons all set so I could focus on the flesh and the function following launch sunday. Well we launched on 9/10/06 and it was PHENOMENAL. We had about 420 people at our launch in Worcester, MA - New England, man... that don't happen up here unless God does the work. Anyway, I am preaching the 'You' message day after tomorrow - of course adapting to my own experiences - but the response to week one was unbelieveable and the media resources are top shelf. Thanks for sharing your creativity as a springboard for my own. God bless you guys...."

Thank you, David, for passing on the awesome story of your church launch. Make sure to keep us posted on your progress! And we know Millbury, Massachusetts isn't the only place where God is doing amazing things - let us know what your church is experiencing!

Sharing What You're Made Of! - Part 5

Time is running out! We'll be announcing the winner of the Show Us What Your Made Of! contest very soon, but you can still get your entry in. Meanwhile, check out this effective idea for an outreach event.

The First Assembly of God in Rockwall, Texas was on the verge of closure in 2001. Though they are located in a thriving area with an average age of 37, their congregation consisted of about 40 people. Since their town is on the shores of Lake Ray Hubbard, they decided to use the 4th of July weekend to take their evangelistic efforts to the water's edge. 

They enlisted church attenders, neighbors and even some people from other churches to load their boats with bottled water, sodas and bags of chips with the church's information attached. With many donations, the total cost for the outreach was about $75. They proceeded to hang out in the "no wake zones" to talk with people, stock them with drinks and snacks, and invite them to a God and Country Day Celebration at the church property.

That first year, they served over 700 people at their celebration event. Today, their now growing congregation has more than doubled! Way to go!

Show Us What Your Made Of - Part 4

We're still having a blast sorting through your entries for the Show Us What You're Made Of! Contest. Check out this idea that caught our attention.

Celebration Church  was meeting at two campuses in two cities—Round Rock and Georgetown, Texas. As they opened their brand new building and consolidated the two campuses, they wanted to make sure that everyone found their way to the first service at the new location. So what did they do? They took us on a drive with them!They developed fun and creative videos for each campus that showed each turn in the road and landmarks along the way to steer people to their new site.

Watch the video!

On their first week, they had more than 1,200 first-time visitors and 3,100 in the building with dozens of salvations and rededications. Sounds like pretty great results!

Sharing What You're Made Of - Part 3

Love Shack Ba-by! Can't get the song outta my head now! Troy Gardner of Valley Fellowship Christian Church in Goodyear, AZ sent us this creative entry. This 19-month-old church plant decided to catch the attention of their community (consisting of an average age of 36) by using the jams they would all recognize. Their goal was to squash the prevalent opinion that church is "boring and the music sucks!" They flooded the area with 20,000 of these psychedelic flyers to draw in the crowds. Then they completed it by decorating with "hippy" flowers and an inflatable tiki hut "Love Shack" right on stage. Their band learned the music to the song, re-wrote the words...and it was on!

Tell me this song isn't just playing over and over in your head...

Keep 'em coming!! Show Us What You're Made Of - we're still taking submissions! You have until the end of October so get your entry in! Keep an eye on the CP blog for more great stuff!

Sharing What You're Made Of - Part 2

Sometimes our jobs are just way too much fun. Your entries for the Show Us What You're Made Of Contest are blowing us away! The entry from Crossover Church in Tampa, Florida was creating quite a buzz around the cubes yesterday. To start, they have one of the best taglines around: "Our sole purpose is to give your soul purpose."   This hip-hop church submitted two items: a welcome magazine and a mix CD they use for evangelism purposes. The welcome magazine is an alternative to the traditional welcome packet or tri-fold brochure, and is much more in tune with the community they are trying to reach. It has a great urban look and feel which just makes you want to share it and pass it around. And they have used in-house designers and like-minded advertisers to help reduce the cost of the piece. The mix CD (Crossover Cypha Mixx CD) not only includes hip-hop and Rn'B tunes, but also testimonials and an invitation to establish a personal relationship with Christ. What we love about these entries is that they are great examples of creatively stretching to reach people in their own context, right where they are.

There's still time to Show Us What You're Made Of - we're taking submissions throughout the month of October. Keep checking back for more cool ideas!

Sharing What You're Made Of - Part 1

The entries are pouring in for the CreativePastors Show Us What You're Made Of! Contest and what we suspected is proving to be true. You guys are doing some really cool stuff! We'll pull out a few of the entries and highlight them here throughout the month, so be sure and check back often. You just might find something that will spark an idea for your own church!

Our first highlight is from Keith Tusing, Family Ministries Pastor at Firewheel Church in Garland, Texas. He submitted one of their most successful student outreach events - Battle of the Burgers. At a church of 450 they had 380+ teenagers attend this event with many long-lasting results. Check out some of their promotional pieces here  and here . The promotion also included radio spots with the same flair and information on local secular radio stations. This event worked so well that they are planning on doing it again next spring. Way to go, Firewheel Church!

It's not too late for the rest of you to get in on the fun. We're taking entries through October 31, so dig into your repertoire and Show Us What You're Made Of!

That's what were talking about!

Creativity is boundless. We see it time and time again in all the cool things you are doing at your churches. Bernie Federmann at Lompoc Foursquare Church in Lompoc, Calif. was kind enough to share how his church used the Who's Kidding Who? series. Check out what he had to say:

We normally don't have a Sunday Night service, but instead we use this night for special teachings, leadership meetings, water baptisms etc. Recently we showed the Who's Kidding Who? series, one per night for five weeks. We provided children's crafts and programming and when people arrived we had popcorn, candy, and giveaways including Kid CEO books and even a Mate Date Package. We used the clips from the videos as a part of our morning service announcements to hook people and to introduce them to Ed Young. We provided notes and some outlines to fill in and wrote our own questionnaire based on the first video. I also followed up the night with by asking people what their take-away was. We spent no more than about 15 minutes on discussions - including our giveaways - so most nights were approximately one hour. I thought it was great and easy to use this way, or in a small group discussion setting.

Thank you Bernie for sharing. We are always energized by the ingenious ideas of our CP users.  Now it's time to share your story. Send us an email and show us your stuff!

Team Creativity

Check out what Gary Lamb at Mad Babble from a Church Planter had to say about switching to creative team planning:

About two months ago, we started creative team planning for our Sunday morning messages. I have to admit this was a hard change, yet we stuck with it and the last two weeks we are finally getting in the groove. If you are a pastor, order this CD from Creative Pastors and put this into action. It is amazing the difference in my sermons. The stress I feel during the week is so much less. The pressure to do it all myself is gone. The different ideas have been great. It is very hard work to get in the groove and there is much I have to learn about tweaking it but, try it, stick with it, and be amazed at the results.

It is an odd feeling when your people are talking about how much better a speaker you are over the last month but, ego aside, that is what they should be saying.

Thanks, Gary! For those who want to get a glimpse of what creative team planning looks like, check out this DVD.

A Creative Twist

Recently we asked to hear about creative ways that you are using our resources in your churches.  Check out this amazing story from Kevin Green, Senior Pastor of The Living Room Church in Martinsburg, West Virginia, who put his own cool spin on a CreativePastors video:

My wife and I had the opportunity to attend Total Access with the Fellowship staff.  Our church is only a year and a half old and we have never been away on a Sunday. Our creative team talked over what we should do and decided to take the church with us to Texas via video.

We started out the service with the band and other abnormal stuff.  Then we went to video for the greeting (prerecorded by my wife and I).  We did the shoot with a private jet on display in a building.  We were careful on the angles not to show where the jet was. Included in the shoot was some B roll of worship and speaking at Fellowship.  Beth and I talked briefly about the influence Fellowship has had on our church.  We grabbed our bags from the above cargo and invited everyone to enjoy a Fellowship experience with us in Texas.  Until playing this video our people didn't know we weren't in the service.  We then rolled into one of Ed's messages from Retro that fit in with a series I was in the middle of.  Our people laughed at the jokes and interacted with Ed on the screen as if he was there. At first we had no idea how effective it would be, but the people thought they were in the same service we were.  We never did tell them the difference.  Our people now have a greater appreciation for our Fellowship Connection.

You should try it sometime.  Ed is a great guest speaker and super on video so you should plan a vacation soon.  Your people will enjoy it and may want to send you away more often.  Ha!      

Note: One thing I will do to make it better next time is rent out a center projector and screen to place Ed at center stage.  (We currently have screens left and right of the stage.)

There is no limit when it comes to creativity!  If you have an innovative or artistic story of how you have used one of our products in your church, let us hear about it!

Creativity is going and growing.

This month, CreativePastors.com broke the 8,000 membership mark. Why is this important? Because this tells us that pastors and church leaders are excited and committed to infusing their churches with creativity.

With the launch of this blog, we really want to hear from you. I have personally spoken with many of you who have shared some outstanding stories of how CreativePastors and the team have played a vital role in your ministry. Here is your opportunity to put those conversations into action.

If you have a great story about innovative ways you’ve used our products or how CreativePastors has helped you re-shape your ministry, tell us about it. Take a moment to jot it in an email and send it to us at info@creativepastors.com.  We will be sharing your God stories on the CP Blog regularly. So whip out that email and let us know what’s happening in your world!