Beautiful

This is amazingly beautiful. It makes me wonder how close we get to others without actually connecting.


Parallelostory from impactist on Vimeo.

Something New

Hey all, so I have an idea for something new for us. I know that there are several of us here at FBC who take photos, I also know that there are several who take really good photos! 

I've been trying for a while to come up with a way to access and outlet all of the creative photogs that are running around this place, then Carlos started something at his church in Atlanta and I thought, "Maybe we could try it here."

So here's the scoop. Let's call this the official start of the discussion about the Pocatello Photography Project.

Sketchy details...

• Open to anybody
  
• We would have a different project three or four times a year (relationships, power, moments, etc.)
  
• We would take photos that center around the project theme
  
• Photos would then be submitted and chosen for display and other creative uses
  
• We would build community together by meeting at the beginning of each project
  

It's just the start of the idea. 

What do you think?

I've already been approached by one local artist (who goes to church @ FBC) about using his work in our worship services.

The creative opportunities are nearly endless.

This is something we are going to do... but I want your input as we start.

Let me know what you think and if you want to be involved.

Technologicality or something like it...

When it comes to culturally relevant technology there are no shortage of options. Ipod, Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, and many more. The big question is how can the church use them to be more effective? Perry Noble said this,"What we allow to distract us can often be the very thing that eventually destroys us!" The funny thing is that he said on Twitter. Which can be distracting...

I've been mulling over ways that I can use these technologies to spread the Gospel of Jesus. I have some ideas but I don;t know if they will work. I recently had a conversation with some pastors about Twitter and how I use it. They had some good questions but the one that kept coming up was basically "why do I care if Perry Noble likes ice cream?" 

See, their idea of how Twitter is used leads them to a particular place of thought. Now I happen to know that Perry does indeed like ice cream, but that's not the main way he uses Twitter. Through his blog, and his twitter, the people in the church he pastors as well as others around the world get a better picture of who Perry is. That's what we've been trying to do with the staff blogs here. We use them as a way to communicate, encourage, and be known to all of you!

I want to see some of these work but only if they make sense...

More of us blogging and connecting to each others online life

Twitter as a communication tool for teams

TokBox as a way to do small groups, and training

Some others that I don;t have figured out yet...

I want them to be used technologically. They need to make sense for us. 

What say you?

Does any of this make you excited to try it?

I'm serious about this.

Let me know

I'm Broken

I'm broken. I know that you don't hear that kind of thing very often from people. It usually comes at the point of recognition of a major problem. Addiction, financial ruin, etc. But here's the deal My major problem is me. I'll admit it, though it's only recently that I would. I am my biggest problem. 

I find myself doing and saying things that I will tell myself i didn't mean, but, when it comes down to it, if I didn't mean it I wouldn't have said it. See, that's the issue. I doesn't matter what I want because what I do shows who I really am. And I can't change that! Sure, I can alter behavior patterns for a little while, but I've never seen lasting change come from myself. 

Maybe you see this too. It could just be me, but I don't think so. The truth is that I can't change me. I just can't. Maybe some of you have been able to, but I can't. That's why I am so utterly and desperately thankful for Jesus. Because of his sacrifice, I can be changed. 

Things I have struggled with don't tempt me anymore. They don't have a foothold in my life. Not because I wanted to stop doing them, because I did, but because my life has been and is being transformed by Jesus. I'm not perfect. Never will be. However, as I let go of trying to affect change in my own life and let Jesus create change in me I see the way I act, think, feel, speak, all of these get better and better. 

If you already know Jesus, do you see that transformation in your life, or not? Take a good look. 

If you don't follow Jesus yet, come check him out. Easter is a great time to do it. 

Sat. 11th @ 5 & 7 p.m. and Sun. 12th @ 9 & 11 a.m. at First Baptist Church, 408 N. Arthur, Pocatello. 

Transformation is possible. Jesus wants to create it in you. 

Sunday's Gonna Rock!

Hey just thought I would drop a note to everyone. In case you were wondering Sunday is going to rock! Jesus has some awesome plans for us and I don't want you to miss them! Bring a friend and come ready to encounter the Savior!

Round Midnight - Creativity on a Monday Afternoon

Great musicians, and one of my favorite tunes...

Worship Workshop is Here

Last week I told about a workshop we had coming. Well it's here! WE are a go!

Carl Albrecht, Leann Albrecht and Ed Kerr will be with us in southern Idaho for a day and a half of worship and teaching. It is going to be awesome! For all of the info go check out the site and register!

Here are some highlights though....

• $45 per person - You can't beat that!
  
• Friday night and Saturday - Use what you learned that weekend!
  
• Beautiful Burley Idaho - My home town!
  
• The King Fine Arts Center - Wait till you see it!
  

Number one though.....

wait for it....

It's the best...

Our KING, REDEEMER and GOD will be there! Worship is going to happen!

I hope to see you there.

Mad At Church?

Are you mad at church? To be honest I get mad at church. I know that this might seem like a trick question because Bill talked about anger and Chris and Karl talked about bitterness. But it's not.

There are people who are mad at church. Not mad at A church (although I would wager there are those too!) but mad at THE church. Let's face it, we haven't always and continue to do things the wrong way. Even Jesus got pretty mad at the church in His day! 

So this is where we are. As you drive around town for the next few weeks you're going to see billboards that say www.madatchurch.com. You should check it out. Seriously! We are really stretching out here because we feel like the things that Jesus talked about are important! 

We've screwed stuff up and it's time that we own our mistakes and set things right. So if you are a part of the FBC family then get ready because we need to do this. If you're just checking this out then I would encourage you to come on out on a weekend and see what we're talking about.

There will be more updates coming and invitations for you to hand out soon! 

The Abacus is here!

Thanks to everyone who voted in my poll. Based on your recommendation I have now received my abacus and am trying to learn how to use it!

Ok, so I didn't really get the abacus, although I did have a few people ask me if it was a new line of computers that they hadn't heard of yet. For those of you who don't know what it is! What I did end up getting though is the MacBook Pro.

After much research I'm convinced that the Mac and Windows machines are exactly the same when it comes to the hardware. The only real difference is in the OS. There is a new version of Windows coming out this year and it looks pretty neat, but I needed something sooner than that.

So I went ahead and got the Mac. I have to admit it does look very cool. But coolness aside, it is just a tool. In fact all of the cool things that I have are only tools that Jesus has given me to help point to people to Him! I have to remember that otherwise I just get to wrapped up in my stuff. I would bet that there are some of you who need to do that today! You need to recognize that your stuff is only yours because Jesus wants you to use it in a way that brings glory to Him.

I'm not saying don't enjoy it. I love playing my hand-built, custom electric bass. But if I only used it for me then I would be wasting it.

The Mac is cool, but I hope that because I am able to have it someone, or many someones, will get to know Jesus, who, by the way, is way cooler than Mac and Steve Jobs any day!!

Workshop in Idaho!

Hey bloggers,

Just wanted to let you guys know about a little somethin' that's coming up. On May 1-2 (Friday night through Saturday) we are hosting a workshop that you are going to want to be a part of. Carl Albrecht, his wife Leann, and Ed Kerr are going to be with us to clinic and lead worship. We don't have all of the details yet but I can tell you this...

• It will be in Southern Idaho - so you don't really have to go far!
  
• It will be less than $50 - if you sign up early!
  
• It will be awesome!
  

Seriously I've seen each of these guys teach and worship and they are amazingly gifted and humble. Please take advantage of this opportunity to learn and grow!

There will be a few more things on the agenda so check back in for updates!

If you want to receive info about the Clinic let me know, drop me an email, aaron@fbcpoky.com, or call me at the office 208-232-6305.

As I have more info I will post it here so check back often!

It's hard to blog when you don't have a computer!

If you can't figure out why it's been so long since my last post you should read the last post. I've been bouncing around from computer to computer and space to space the last few weeks. Good news though, the office space is almost finished. I get my cube back but new and improved! The insurance is going to cover the replacement cost of my laptop and I was able to get most of the data that I needed off of it!

Here is my conundrum though... I haven't really decided what kind of computer I should get so... if you have any recommends let me know...

Hopefully I can get something quickly and then I can get back to regular work. We have some big things coming and it would sure be nice to have a computer to work on them!

Let me know what you think in the comments or take the poll.

Of Drowned Laptops and Overflow

Greetings from vacation. I may be the only person on staff who blogs on vacation but you will just have to deal with that.

So you should check out what Bill had to say about Thursday, but I wanted to focus more on the overflow. In case you didn't know we did something on Thursday that, as far as I know, has never been done in the 100+ years of FBC. We had simultaneous, multi-site, service!!! It was far from perfect, but it allowed us to increase our seating capacity by another third. We had 235 people in the main worship center and 98 in the family room! We need to give a big shout out to Darwin for getting us hooked up with an awesome screen and scaller! I hope to learn a lot from him. Just you know, that this is not going to be a one time thing, soon we are going to need this every week. It is going to take some investment of both money and time but if we need it because we are out of room it is the right problem! Just a side note, if you were in the overflow I would love for you to let me know what you thought, saw, heard. We need to make it better and the only way we can do it is to hear from You!

To go along with that, I poured almost a pint of water out of my laptop on Friday after the ceiling leaked water on my desk! I'm currently posting from Janaye's laptop in Midway, UT. I tell you, a forced hiatus from all my files and projects has been good but scary! I managed to get it up enough to start a backup of the things that I need but it will never function fully again. Sad music here. The lesson in this... BACKUP YOUR DATA! Do it now. You never know when the roof is comin' down and your computer is going for a swim!

Is this you?

This is NOT me.

Hope.

We've heard alot of talk about hope this last year. We were told to hope for change, hope for the best, hope that tommorow will be better. But lets face it. Sometimes we don't really "hope"

Many times we treat hope just like wish. I wish things would change, I wish things were better. They sound kind of the same.

Here's how dictionary.com defines hope: v. to look forward to with desire and reasonable confidence.

As followers of Jesus we have much to hope for. This is way more than a wish. We should have hope that He:

• will return
• rescue us from our sins
• provide for us
• guide us
• comfort us
• prepare a place in His Kingdom for us
• call us to great things
• restore us to Himself

But what makes me do this job more and more is the knowledge that here in our valley there are literally thousands of people who will go to sleep tonight without that hope! That messes with me. The closer I get to Jesus (and I've got a long way to go) the more I hope to have the chance to shout hope to all of them. That's why we do what we do on Sunday. WE shout hope, the hope that only Jesus can bring. I want to shout it louder and to more people than ever.

So my question to you is this. Does it bother you that there are people in our community without hope? Does it bother you that there are people in your life without hope? It bothers me and I am trying to do what I can to let them know that there is hope! Wanna Play?

Just went live!

Hey,

We got to try something new today. Live Webcasting! So it's not that new but we've never done it before. You can check it out here.

Now, I know that the quality could be better. Here's the facts. We need a better camera! There is one in the budget. BUt we can't spend money we don't have, so we do what we can with what we've got.

Look for more live coming soon!

You Want In?

Whoa. It's been way too long since my last post.(bad blogger, bad blogger) Anyhoo, I took some time off and actually didn't touch my computer for FIVE DAYS STRAIGHT! It was awesome! I would recommend you try it some time. So I was trying to figure out what I should say since it's been so long. It can be tricky sometimes to come up with things to say.

However, after Bills message on Sunday I thought it might be a good idea to let you guys know about some volunteer opportunities that you might want to check out. Seriously, these are all things that make a huge difference in the life of our church and the lives of people who come to our weekend services. So if anything sparks some interest drop me a line! aaron@fbcpoky.com

• Sound Engineer - This is an on the job training kind of thing. If you'd like to check it out we can provide you with what you need. Janaye, who leads this area, is awesome (and not just 'cause she's my wife!)
• Multi-Media - These people take care of what you see on the Big Screen during the services. Seriously, if you can push a button you can do this!
• Video - I know we haven't had video announcements in a little while but if YOU helped out we could do it every week with no problem! Video is more than just announcements though. We've go big plans for this team and need people to write, produce, direct, edit, engineer and a bunch of other stuff.
• Musician - Instrumental or vocal. We would love to have you in our band! If you play or sing or play and sing let us know.
• Web - Oh the web! You may have noticed that from time to time our website is out of date. Does it drive you nuts? Do you want to do something about it?
• Design - If you have any graphic design experience you might not know that you can use it to let people know about Jesus. We need designers to build thing for promotions, invites, and many other projects.
• Communications - There are a lot of things that we want to do with our Communications here and we need you to step up and help make them better. There are some great things coming but they will only work with your help.

All right, I sure hope that you was something that you might want to check out. Here's the deal, I promise that you won't get stuck in something and never be able to get out of it. Give us a test drive. Experience something new. Let me know (aaron@fbcpoky.com) if you want to get in the game!

Now there are many other things that you can do here at FBC, but... these are a lot of fun! (I'm just kidding, other things are fun to)

So whatever you end up doing, do SOMETHING!

JOY!

I want to be like these guys when I grow up!

Crazy Week

Wow. It's been a while since the last post. Sorry about that. I don't know what your week was like but mine was jammed full. It usually happens at least once this time of year but I had something every night for eight days in a row!

However, there was some great stuff going on. On Wednesday I got to sit in on Chris spilling the vision for Student Ministries for the next year. It was awesome! I can definitely see Chris leading our students to do some amazing things for Jesus in our community and around the world. Better hold onto your hat!

Friday night was the Angel Tree party. What a time! We had seven families show up and we got to bless them with a bunch of free stuff, good food, and great conversations. One family was here for almost two hours and another showed up in church on Sunday.

God is doing some amazing things here! So my question is, "Do you want in on it?"

It's not too late to join what God is doing here at FBC... volunteer, get in a connection group, give to the budget, pray for all of us, start something new, invite friends to Christmas Eve... there are tons of things you can do to join in on Gods party!

So what's it gonna be?

Do you want to play?

Are you willing to step out?

Just so you know the financial series coming in January is going to be off the hook!

Do you feel the excitement yet?

Will you trust God to do what He is capable of?

I recommend finding a way to get in on the action while the gettin's good!

Things I know (and don't know)

Wow, December already! Time has flown by so quickly, I don't really know how it goes so fast. So the real question is "Are you sick of Christmas music yet?" I can take a few days of nonstop carols and classics but that's about it. Sometimes I'm really thankful that I only have a AM radio in my truck.

It looks like it is going to be an interesting season this year. The economy is in a weird place and I know that most of the news for the next few weeks is going to be about how retailers haven't met their Christmas season numbers. I also know that we will continue to hear all about President-elect Obama's transition into the White House (even though it doesn't actually happen for two more months).

Another thing I know is that this season has a different feel about it. It feels like people are much more in the "looking for answers" kind of place than usual.

I was really encouraged by the number of you who caught me on Sunday and told me about what God said to you through the message. Even though is was designed to really speak to people who don't know Jesus yet it seems as if He used it to get to those of us who were trying to hide just as hard. I know that I had to go through some *stuff* in order to be able to say some of those things.

Keep pressing into God this Christmas season. I know that He is waiting for you (and me) to let Him work in our lives and produce the most fruit possible!

Exited!

I am really excited about Sunday. I know that many of you will be out of town but a lot of us are going to have relatives here also. What a great chance to invite someone to church. Now before you get all weird about it Sunday is going to be awesome. The gospel is going to be preached like no other, you will definitely learn something and I think that God wants to use this opportunity to speak profoundly into our lives.

It is going to be different but what else is new. Make sure you bring someone with you.