Questions I'm Asking

• Why does replacing an oil pan gasket cost $400? I should have used the money to by a lift and do it myself.

• Instead of thinking, "How do we respond to growth?" I'm asking, "How can we prepare for growth?" What should be be doing that will pave the way to the next stages of Connections?
• What is the next big move for Connections?
  

1. Should we go two services back-to-back on Sunday's? This means negotiating a deal to get in at 7am, running services at 9am and 10:15am, and deciding where to put child care.
2. Do we go simulcast- running a live video/audio feed into another theatre on site, running at the same time? This would be a pretty straight forward step in techonology.
3. Do we go to another site when the theatre fills up? A school, a community centre, an arts centre, another church building?
4. Do we go "mulit-site" and what does that even lookj like?! Do we run it like a branch of Connections? Is that crazy audacious to "branch" a church our size? Is that relevant for our context of ministry? Do we become a church-planting church at that point?

To answer this question I'm going to need a lot of feedback from people. If Connections continues to grow, then I beleive we must respond by creating a larger space and more opportunity for growth at Connections. If we seem to be leveling off, does that mean we need to focus our sights on becoming a "sending" church.

Either way, growth is not an option. We have to keep growing. It's one of our values- growing in size and maturity. This that aren't growing are stagnating, or worse, dying. Ouch, harsh, but it really is that simple.

I also don't think it's too premature to be asking these questions. We should be looking at this stuff now so that we can make prayerfully informed decisions in the future. I also need to ask these questions because I tend not to be a long-range planner.
I like to live in the moment.
But the reality of life is that planning and preparation is required.

Maybe something will come along that is totally unplanned. A God-thing that just falls in our lap. But you can't count on that. You just praise God if it works out that way.

So that's what's on my mind this morning, between trying to get the car fixed, and trying to plan ahead!