Two weeks before the NFL draft, Anthony “A.T” Barnes called his agent and told him to withdraw his name. He gave up a career in football for a bigger purpose. These are the stories you’ll never see on ESPN. Check out A.T’s story.

Filmmaker Frank Lozano went to Burkina Faso to help capture the story of our ministry through Engage Burkina. This six-minute video could be used in your churches to help provide living water to a country that desperately needs to know the forgiveness, love and hope of Jesus Christ. Check out the video.

If you or your church would like to contribute financially, you may make a donation through the Engage Burkina website.

It’s hard to believe my journey as the Interim Pastor at our West Ridge Cartersville location is coming to an end. As you know, James Griffin was recently appointed to take over the role permanently. He started moving into his office in Cartersville yesterday and will officially start on January 1. James is going to do a super job!

In the mean time, let me share some highlights and news for the next couple of weeks:

• Momentum - We continue to see more and more new faces on Sundays. And, because of that, attendance has been up significantly in recent weeks. Last Sunday, as an example, we were up close to 20% from the same Sunday last year. Don’t worry…we’ve added seating for our Christmas Eve Eve services.
• Christmas Eve Eve - It’s “sold out.” If you didn’t get your tickets for one of these services, please consider joining us on Christmas Eve instead for our 4:30 pm service. There are a handful of free tickets left for that service.
• New Year’s Day - Brian Bloye, our senior pastor, will be teaching live at all three campuses. Brian has a lot to share about what’s planned for West Ridge in 2012.
• January 8 - James will be teaching and talking specifically about his vision for West Ridge in Cartersville. It’ll be his first opportunity to address the congregation as our new lead pastor.

We had a great week at our West Ridge Church location in Cartersville. We hosted “Hope for Christmas” for the first time serving almost 200 families with over 500 kids. Really appreciate all the volunteers who provided the food, gifts and fun.

We already had a couple families join us for services on Sunday who were served on Saturday. And, I’m hearing many stories of people who volunteered and are considering joining one of our ministry teams. People are taking their next steps!

Also, we are continuing to see an uptick in attendance with more and more people either attending for the first time or coming back. I love the energy of our Sunday services–both for adults and our kids! Keep inviting your friends and family to join us.

Here are a few big things to keep in mind for the coming weeks:

1. Our kids are singing this Sunday. If your children are in KidQuest, they’ve been practicing Christmas songs to sing in the services this Sunday. Bring your kids. Bring the grandparents. Bring your cameras. Plan to arrive a bit earlier than normal to get a parking spot and seat and make sure your children are checked in before the services start. (My daughter, Brooke, has already picked out a fancy dress for Sunday. She’s super excited!)
2. Bring your Gift Offering this Sunday. Every year we plan a special Gift Offering at West Ridge to impact people outside our church. This year we’re focusing on three projects: ministry interns, supporting a church plant in Atlanta and building a church building in Burkina Faso. Emily and I will be bringing our Gift Offering on Sunday. I hope you’ll consider supporting these initiatives as well.
3. Get your Christmas Eve Eve tickets today! The two services on Christmas Eve Eve are filling up fast, but the Christmas Eve option isn’t far behind. If you plan to join us, please get your free tickets today so we can make sure we have enough room for everyone who wants to attend. (As these fill up, we’ll consider adding another service option.) You will need tickets for yourselves and any friends and family you invite.

Here’s the recap video from yesterday’s Hope for Christmas event at the Cartersville location of West Ridge Church. We had the opportunity to provide food and toys and fun to nearly 200 families with over 500 kids. (Thanks to super-volunteer @JonathanSutton for pulling together this video in less than 24 hours.)

Our team at West Ridge was hit hard with this news from Troy Page, one of our pastors:

I hope you’ll join me in praying for him and his family.

There’s a lot happening at the Cartersville location of West Ridge Church in the coming weeks. Because of that, I want to provide my church family an update. If you aren’t part of our community, well, you can just ignore this post. :-)

Here’s what’s coming up that you need to have on your radar:

• Momentum – Last Sunday it was fun to celebrate baptisms, the generosity you displayed with Hope for Christmas (see below) and large crowds at both services. I don’t think I’ve ever been a part of a church where worship attendance went up on Thanksgiving weekend. Thanks for continuing to invite your friends and family. Yesterday we added seats to the auditorium to accommodate the larger crowds. Pray with me that we can add a third service option soon to give us the opportunity to reach new people.
• Campus Pastor Transition — James is continuing to work with the team at the East Paulding location to transition leadership. He officially starts as the Cartersville pastor in January. In the mean time, James is participating in team conversations in Cartersville, and you will see him at several services and events in the coming weeks. We embrace team teaching at all our locations, but you will also begin to notice that James will be teaching more frequently in Cartersville.
• New Series —  We start a new series this Sunday. It’s called Stressmas. You can read about the new series and then be intentional about who you will invite to join us on Sunday. I’m guessing you may know someone who is experiencing stress in their lives who would benefit from this series.
• Hope for Christmas — I’m so proud of you! Last week we collected food for Hope for Christmas. Hundreds of bags came in. You are a generous people. I love that! This week we are focusing on toys for kids or “Secret Santa Shop” gifts for parents. You can get recommendations on the Hope for Christmas website. I’m hoping we end up with a mountain of toys and gifts after this Sunday.
• Kids Singing in Services — We’re starting a new tradition this year. On Sunday, December 18, all our kids from kindergarten through fifth grade will be singing in the Sunday morning services. If you are a parent, you should have received an email message with details. I’m fully expecting December 18 to be one of our largest Sundays ever in Cartersville, so plan to arrive earlier than usual to get a parking spot, a seat and, if you have kids, to get them checked-in. More important, bring your family. Invite grandparents and cousins to watch your kids sing. (And don’t forget your camera to capture pictures and video. It’ll be a Kodak moment.)
• Christmas “Eves” Services — As we do every year, we’ll be celebrating Christmas Eve Eve in Cartersville. This year we’ll also be offering an identical program on Christmas Eve. You’ll help us make sure we have adequate seating for you and your friends if you get your FREE tickets as early as possible. The sooner you do that, the better your chances of getting your preferred service time.

Following my post about using tickets for Christmas Eve services, I had requests for samples of the tickets we use at West Ridge Church.

As much as possible, we encourage people to get their free tickets online. (By the way, if you live in northwest Atlanta metro area, we’d love for you to grab some tickets and join us at one of our locations with your friends.) As you can see, we use Eventbrite to process online tickets.

Below is a picture of the physical tickets we print. This is a sample for one of the service times. Obviously we print different tickets for each of the different service times and locations.

Amber and James Griffin

Yesterday we shared a big announcement at our West Ridge Church location in Cartersville. I’ve been serving since March as the interim pastor. Beginning in January, James Griffin will become the new pastor. James has been serving in our student ministries at West Ridge for about four years. He’s a great leader and teacher. Since my family will continue to attend and serve in Cartersville, I’m looking forward to serving under his leadership.

James and his wife are from the area. They’re also brand new parents. It’ll be fun watching them take this next step in their ministry as a family. This is a win-win for the Griffins and the church in Cartersville. We’re all dreaming and praying for big things for the future of the church.

If you’re a parent of a high schooler at the East Paulding campus, you don’t need to worry. James has built a fantastic team, and he’s obviously around to guide that ministry through this transition. Brad Chandler is providing leadership to our student ministries at that location. We’re also in the process of interviewing to fill the role James will leave. Your students are in good hands.

In the mean time, my role is changing once again. My new responsibility at West Ridge Church will be to oversee the campus pastors for both the current and future campuses. Because of that, I’m looking forward to partnering with James and the other guys as we take our next steps as a church.

Because of what I do, I get to sit in many different services in many different churches. I’m surprised at how very little connection I typically see between the various elements of the services in many churches. It’s as if there was no planning — I’m guessing everyone prepared their portion of the service separately. The message stands alone. The worship stands alone. The announcements stand alone. The videos stand alone. The special music stands alone.

On the other hand, there are churches that understand the value of communicating one message throughout the entire service. Every element is connected. It flows from beginning to end. In fact, if you were to pull out a particular element on its own, you may ask why would a church include that in a service? But, in the context of the entire service, it helps communicate a powerful message. This video is a good illustration of this.

Last week at the East Paulding location of West Ridge Church, the band played “Black Dress” by The Normals. It’s a song about adultery. It’s accompanied by a video that visually captures a man wrestling with sexual temptation. On their own, either one of these elements would be completely inappropriate for a worship service. In combination with everything else including the Bible teaching that follows, though, it provided the foundation for the one message that was communicated in the service. Check out the video:

Among other things, let me highlight…

• Chris Fenner did an amazing job with the video. He’s incredibly talented. We’re grateful to have him on our team.
• The video shares an unfortunate trend we’re seeing: People are putting their marriages at risk by engaging past relationships through Facebook. It’s a real life issue that needs to be addressed.
• Paul Richardson immediately comes out to connect the message of the song and video with the message he’s teaching — it’s the same message.

I love the intentionality of creative arts programming like this. We’re fortunate to have many of these resources in-house at West Ridge to accomplish this. However, there are many resources available so that churches of any size can integrate every element with the one message in a service.

Are you being intentional about communicating one message through your entire service? This article on 10 Ways to Improve Series Planning may help you think about how you can improve your planning to improve this aspect of your services.