¶ Summer Vacation and Two Services
hey , georgetown , I'm everett and I'm jake , and welcome back to the gbc empower podcast . We took a huge break , right , we're back . We're back . We are well rested , jake , how was your summer ?
you know I um , I started going to the tanning salon and they sent me back . They said you're a lost cause . No , none of that's true . Had a good summer , got a chance to take my wife on vacation just me and my wife . And I've had people tell me this for years If you go with just your spouse on vacation , you know it's a vacation .
If you take your kids , just your spouse on vacation you know it's a vacation . If you take your kids , it's a trip . I got to go on vacation and go on a trip this summer and both were wonderful and gave us an opportunity to get away . You know , not everybody gets to do that and we talk about that often as a family .
Those little moments , you know that would be easy to take for granted . Don't take them for granted . If you get a chance to get a break , get some rest , man , what a blessing is that . How was your summer ?
It was absolutely fantastic . It started with a vacation . Then we literally as soon as we got off the boat because we did a cruise with just a bunch of people , just family , friends and all that kind of stuff and we jumped off and the boom , that's VBS , that's when camp , that's when kids camp happened .
We did all the summer in nine days , actually , a little more than that , but not much more than that . It's like we took a vacation , shotgun happened and it was absolutely fantastic .
God was so great in that and then we decided not , we decided her other family got jealous that we went on a cruise and so we went to Disney World and I thought I was going to hate it and I loved it .
So that's pretty awesome . If someone gets jealous enough to go , we're going to take you on vacation . It was awesome . How do we , how do I find a situation like that ? That's pretty cool .
Um , I moved my wife away from her really close knit family and like not really we live 10 minutes away , just just in case you didn't know .
But it was like , and like not really we live 10 minutes away , just in case you didn't know , but it was like it was just one of those seasons where , like we had a super busy summer , they had a super busy spring , and so like we usually meet for like dinners and all that kind of stuff .
And finally the parents were like no , we want to do a vacation and we'd really love to work around your schedule , and like come together in this . And so like we budgeted and we did it and it was great family fun .
The question of the ages . What is the best ? I mean just what's the best thing you ate ?
in disney so okay , I do have a . I will be short . I have a funny story about what we ate in disney . So we're walking around epcot and if you've never been , epcot has like all the countries it has , like scotland , it has china , it has mexico detroit it has .
it has paris , which a lot of people eat at , it has morocco , it literally has all the countries .
And we're walking around and I noticed mal like is like talking a little less , which is weird for her , I know , for for the listeners it might not be weird , but , like for me and her relationship , she does most of the talking , which I know you probably don't believe me , but she like started to be quiet and I'm just looking and I kind of noticed and I
look at her and she's like about to like pass out , like fall asleep , and I said are you hungry ? And she goes , yes , like I'm so starving . And so I said , hey , the next country we hit we don't have a map or anything next country hit , we're gonna go eat . It was america , nice , so we ate barbecue at in florida and it was great and listen , man .
A good meal is a good meal , no matter where it is . Yeah , it was as far as I'm concerned it was .
It was really good food anyways fed your wife very good . Yeah , I did good , and then she was either the rest of the time she's back , yeah , she's back anyways .
So this podcast as you uh at from the title and as you were a part of this Sunday has to do with just us going to two services , which is a huge undertaking , but man , it's just been such a God thing . Jake .
What has been one of the things you've been excited about just going to two services been one of the things you've been excited about just going to two services .
Capacity for visitors . We love when we were gathering together , you know , over in the last year , year and a half , it's so much fun , there's a lot of energy . When you come into a room that feels full . And that's the point . Feels full is full . Sometimes we were really full , I mean legitimately full .
You know we used as many chairs as we felt like we had to offer .
¶ Church Growth and Community Expansion
But what I'm excited about is seeing new family members , seeing people who have an opportunity to come and get to know the saints of GBC , the amazing people , and just the capacity for that .
We have the ability now to grow from where we've been , not just numerically , but to see people grow spiritually by finding a Sunday school class so they can be in community , to be involved in what we do on Wednesday nights , to be involved in the church . So just capacity for growth is what excites me and it's one of the driving forces .
Yeah , I literally couldn't agree more . One of the most beautiful things about the season that we're like we are in is just the spiritual growth I've seen throughout the families , like just yes , the sanctification , the ebbs and flows . It's not like we've just been perfect and all that stuff , but just the spiritual growth and and and .
To walk through struggles together , to walk through praises together , like like literally to do all this together and to come out on the other side and be like and feel like I have been stirred up , like hebrews 10 talks about , like I've been encouraged , I've been stirred up and I've grown and I've seen other people grow and it could be like in my personal
prayer time . It's like , okay , do I want to be content in that or do I want to invite more people into that ? Because , like , honestly , my myself wants to be content in that . I love my church . I've grown up here .
I have the huge blessing of getting to work here and coming here every single Wednesday and Sunday like it's been so great and it's just like , like , like what I've been teaching . Just the conviction I had is like okay , why wouldn't you want more people to experience the saints ?
You know to experience the church , to experience , really to experience Jesus , and so , like one of the capacities that we have is Sunday schools . Like that's been one of the hard parts I don't think you were here when we moved back to one service was that we had two Sunday school hours and then we moved to one .
One hour is like okay , where are we going to fit all these Sunday schools ?
and now it's like we get back and like I'm excited for new Sunday schools yeah , so you know , in the last year we had added a marriage group that started as re-engage and now re-engage meets on Wednesday nights . That's starting back up on September the 4th , if you want to sign up .
But then we kept a Sunday school class called marriage enrichment yeah that has been a wonderful group of people that continue to meet . And then we started a class called joy in the journey that Donna Hughes teaches and Diane Moss helps lead and we have seen so many women come and get involved in that class , or they've had like three rooms , yes .
And you know , they just they're just busting at the seams and that , honestly , is what really started . The concern that our church had was we want to have room for people to meet in Bible study . It's not all about coming to the worship service . It's so incredible when people join community , biblical community .
Well , now we are starting a brand new class with a coach uh , jd Henderson , um , who's been a member at Georgetown for many years . He was there through the infancy stages , you know , when we were in the original chapel . He has served as a deacon in this church , in fact , the class that Scott Gallion teaches Unbelievably .
JD was the inaugural teacher of that class and eventually handed it off to Scott and Coach Anderson is starting a brand new class today on the 18th , called the Huddle . Brand new class today on the 18th , called the Huddle . He's an ex-coach but an incredible godly man . I love how I said he was an ex-coach but he's a godly man .
There's a lot of coaches that are godly men , don't read into that at all .
I'm just a C student , don't have to talk sometimes . But the whole concept of the Huddle he got from Ephesians 4 . And that's the point family , we're not just focused on the Sunday morning experience in worship .
We want to make sure that there's plenty of room for classrooms , and we are now in a new season where we actually can add new classes as that need fits , and it's kind of a I mean , some of this discussion is a leadership discussion .
You have to create capacity , uh , in order to progress further and , um , I love that we're able to do that while continuing to maintain what makes a church a church and we're we . You may some people I don't , I really don't know how everyone thinks about this but some people may think could we be getting away from what we ?
are .
I actually think we're getting closer to what we are , and Jesus was very clear to his disciples when he saw the masses . He saw the crowds . I mean . The scripture says he had compassion and one of my favorite passages is when he says the harvest is plentiful , but the workers are few .
And you know , when we initially made this decision , we actually pulled this trigger . As a ministry staff . In late April , early May , we started praying hard about this and under the surface of the church , this entire summer , we've actually been doing a lot of planning . We've asked more people to volunteer in the church than we've ever asked .
We have had meetings with people who are jumping on board to help us with Sunday mornings , to help us be able to really greet people and make sure that we don't have people fall through the cracks . We want people , when they pull up to church on Sunday , to know that there are Christians that love them and care about them and value them .
And really nothing's changed in Georgetown we're just going to have worship twice and we're going to have two Sunday school hours , but we are still exactly what we are , if not more .
And what I loved about just about again , just the season that we are , like we are in this past year , is you've seen it throughout all the ministries , you've seen it through the Sunday schools and you've obviously seen it through Sunday is that we're experiencing healthy growth .
It's not like this massive rapid growth like one day we had a hundred people and the next day we had 500 people . No , it hasn't been like that .
It's been like , okay , honestly , from what I've seen personally , it's like , okay , this family got discipled and they're inviting , like their neighbors or the people that they're living life with , they're inviting a church and they've seen them come to church and like they're getting discipled and like then it's like this chain reaction , like you said , it's been , it's
been laborful , and so one of the things like I'm actually excited about is like we move off to these two services .
Yeah , there's not going to be 300 400 people in the room , but like what I know is that , like man , there's there's 200 people in this room , there's a hundred people in room , and like what it's going to look like a year from now if we stay faithful to God , if we stay faithful to discipleship , we stay faithful to our community and like wanting to bring
them the gospel . I mean like , Seriously , forget about the numbers , for numbers sake , think about how many disciples we can actually invite into the body of Christ now that there's actually an opportunity . And I love that we're nervous about it , because it means that it's important to us .
It means that we love our church and we want to keep what we love the same . I'm getting a little excited about it , I guess we love the same . I'm getting like a little like excited about it , I guess . But like um , but it's like man , like let's keep that , because , because we want to keep that and let's invite um .
I keep saying it , let's invite more in , let's bring more disciples . And like this this this summer , I mean , I'm sorry that's not what we're talking about , but like this summer , like like 40 to 50 people are getting discipled on Wednesdays . Like think about that , you said it in a sermon like , okay , next year it's going to be 100 .
Like you know , I mean just mathematically , if we do what Matthew 28 says , 50 turns into 100 , because you go make disciples .
Yeah , like we need to be the church that , yes , holds on to the Christian values that we have , holds clings to the that we have , clings to the cross , but also clings to the commission that God's called us .
Amen , I love the struggle .
¶ Embracing Growth and Church Mission
I used to hate the struggle , but now . I love the struggle and the reason you love the struggle is because the struggle is where you grow , the struggle is where you're stretched and families . If you really want to walk with Christ , you need to be willing to walk into the struggle .
You know , I'm , I'm , I'm one of these weird people that I will do all this working out and then I will go six months with never working out and then I'll you know , kind of from one extreme to another .
But uh , you know , right now I'm trying to get back into running and I've officially hit that place where man go give me my two-mile run and I'm happy , like I'll do my two miles and I'll go home .
The problem is if you do your two miles enough times , two miles doesn't feel like what two miles used to feel like , which is why we have to be willing to do three miles . And it's not because you're just trying to be big and bad and all those things it miles . And it's not because you're just trying to be big and bad and all those things .
It's just what the process is . And you know , we have people in our church that have really stepped up and I hope that it'll be visible to people . But whether it is or isn't , I've seen the spiritual work that's happened and you know , one of the things that we're going to do this fall in fact we started today is just fixating on what .
What is the church all about ? You know , one of the things that we're going to do this fall in fact we started today is just fixating on what is the church all about . You know who are we , what are we ? And we will be in 1 Timothy for a while and continue on into 2 Timothy .
But in 1 Timothy 3 , verses 14 through 15 , paul is writing to a young man that he met on his first missionary journey and saw him converted , and then he came back the second time and saw how much Timothy had grown and he said all right , buddy , you're coming with me .
And then Timothy followed Paul on his missionary journeys and eventually Paul said I'm going to leave you in Ephesus and you're going to be the pastor . Wow , and Paul writes to Timothy to do two things One , to encourage Timothy , who has wore out , and he tells him stay , don't leave , keep ministering .
But also he's trying to help the church in Ephesus that they'd been dealing with a lot of problems , a lot of organizational issues , a lot of theology issues , no different than what we have now .
We live in a culture that man , we're trying our best , but we just have a lot of issues that we're facing and one of the biggest issues is our theology and the way that , even in Christian churches , we see that Kind of going back to . You talked about healthy growth . I've sat at tables where we say how are we going to grow this church ?
And .
I've heard people go well , what if we just give away a car ? You know what if we give away a car and we have people show up and well , we get them in the room and we give the car and , man , the kingdom of God will expand . Or you know what if we change up our music ?
Or what if , in the reality is all churches have to give people is Jesus , and guess what ? Friends , that's enough , that's sufficient . And we want people to grow for Christ's sake and for nobody else's sake . But here's what he writes in verses 14 and 15 from chapter 3 .
He says I write these things to you , hoping to come to you soon , but if I should be delayed , I have written so that you will know how people ought to conduct themselves in God's household , which is the church of the living God , the pillar and foundation of the truth .
And that's what we're going to fixate on in the study of first Timothy is how do we do church God's way ? We're not changing anything , friends . If anything , we want to re reorient ourselves to what we're here for in the first place . We want to be a church that do things God's way , and that's happening .
We're praying that that happens at Georgetown , but I could point to you churches in Grayson County .
I can point to you churches in Pottsboro that are operating God's way and , uh , we're so very blessed to have good churches , good pastors in this area and , um , we just want to be faithful church family and , um , I , I ask you to be praying as we are stretched not just um , not just our members , not just our Sunday school teachers , but everyone , every one
of us , are being stretched Um , and and I'm glad I'm thankful for that wretched , and I'm glad I'm thankful for that . Yeah , no , absolutely , I am too and I hope like yeah continue in prayer and I hope you are excited about it and if you're kind of nervous about it , you know it's okay , we're all there , bro .
Yeah , just know that's all okay . I mean I can tell you numerous times where God was continuing to grow me and I was like I don't know if I want to do that . But anyways , we just absolutely love you guys . We hope that this Sunday has been great . We hope that you continue to get discipled , continue to grow and do what the Great Commission has for us .
Let's be a healthy church for our community so that our community can know who Jesus is what is the episode number of today ?
Oh , it is 54 .
54 . 54 . A number that will live in infamy . Second string all district . Second string all district Jake Edwards won number 54 in high school .
¶ High School Memories and Recognition
Listen , you reach an age where you went through all these years . You didn't want to be lame , so you didn't talk about what you did in high school . Listen , you reach an age where you there were . You went through all these years . You didn't want to be lame , so you didn't talk about what you did in high school . You didn't .
You know , you didn't buy a minivan . Um , you didn't wear Crocs with socks to the grocery store . Yeah , that's all these things , but then you do reach an age where you want people to know that . Hey . I was number 54 in high school and I don't know why they haven't retired that number yet .
I mean we never really won any playoff games or did anything of notice . But , man , for those two years I held down that right tackle position . You know what Good job . Thanks , man . Trisha , if you're listening , I bet you're so proud .
And Landry turned off Like he was listening anyways . No , he doesn't listen to podcasts , that's 13 year olds , don't do stuff like that that's fair . Anyways , love you guys , take care and have a great rest of your Sunday . Bye .