Yesterday Restore Community Church had our first preview service at Park Hill High School. Overall it was a great success. Having our first preview six weeks out from our launch gives us significant time to discover and correct issues.
The morning started off a little challenging with picking up the trailers. Patrick O'Connell and I thought we were giving ourselves enough time by beginning at 5:30am, however the storage place where the trailers are kept is on a hill and the drive had a sheet of ice on it. Unfortunately, our truck was only a two wheel drive. After a couple attempts and a trip to the local 24 hour grocery store to get ice melt, we finally got the first trailer to the school and backed into place at 7am. We retrieved the second trailer will a little less difficulty and had both there by 8am. Only a hour late, so we were a little rushed to get everything together by our 10am service.
It was all hands on deck with our staff and launch team and they did a wonderful job pulling everything together from guest services, to creative arts, to stuco and kids' city. Kudos to team mobilization.
For our preview services we chose to use the Arrested Development series, from the NewThing Big Idea, talking about Spiritual Development and the role of the individual, the church, and the Bible in guiding a Christ Follower from infancy to spiritual adulthood. I think this is going to lay a strong foundation as we begin this journey together.
There was very positive feedback from adults and kids alike. One of the kids who came asked their parents if they could come back the next week. I was so proud of our team. Just the stuff you want to hear.
We had great support from friends and family. Sherry Gossman was here and wrote a great post about her experence (read it here). We had Jason Allen and a group from LifeConnection Church in Independence, and a group from Indian Creek Community Church and a large group including Justin Moxley from the Heartland Project and Cedar Ridge Christian Church. Here were the numbers. We had 96 total with 60 adults, 24 in Kids' City, and 12 in Stuco.
Our staff will do a full recap and review this Wed and make improvement plans for our Feb 3 preview service.
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