What a Sunday! We started a new series at North Side entitled “Tempted.” Today was all about understanding temptation. From start to finish, it all was geared to us understanding what temptation is, how bad sin is, but how good God is to us helping us fight temptation. Jeff blew up his sermon. It was crazy. What’s even crazier is …
Last night I shared some upcoming events with our worship team (afterwards, they surprised me with a birthday cake – they win). We have some big stuff on the horizon and I wanted to make sure you were in the know. Worship Team Training – Aug. 11 – In two weeks, we are going to have a time of training …
It’s my birthday. So blessed today. A little bit older and so much more blessed. 29 reasons to be thankful today: Jesus Christ doesn’t want to be a part of my life, he IS my life (Col 3:4). I have the most loving and consistent wife a man could ever ask for. Obadiah continues to amaze me with his …
This upcoming Sunday we are starting a new series entitled “Tempted.” This 2-week focus will help believers utilize methods to combat temptation. We often blame our circumstances when we mess up. Sometimes we say “the Devil made me do it.” But each of us are tempted, and each of us always has a way out of escape for every temptation …
How we can focus on sharing the gospel solely with those who have heard numerous times when there are those who have never heard it once? There are unreached people groups in the world who have never even heard the name of Jesus. This week’s prayer is all about helping our church reach the unreached. Is it time for us …
Enjoy the week 3 recap:
On Tuesday, we had planned to work on artwork for the upcoming “Overcome” CD release. Cory and I started going through some design ideas that were going to look pretty good, but nothing was changing our world yet. I was talking with Jamie about how we could use this CD’s release as an impact to our community (more on this …
Sunday, we had a time when people could come down to the front in our services and fill out a card that said, “God, if only You could…” and they were to fill in the prayer request. This morning, our staff started going through the huge stack of prayer requests. When I got the stack from the stage, the one …
Yesterday, we introduced a new song to North Side called “Nothing is Impossible.” My lovely wife sang the lead on it and sang her face off! This song has been our worship song and prayer over the last year in our family, and it was such an honor to share it with our church family yesterday. We still believe that …
What a great day at North Side! Jeff threw a bomb on us again this morning as we went through the “Dear God” series. Jesus defined Christianity by a simple phrase: “make disciples.” How much of that actually takes place in our lives? Jesus’ call was not for an institution to do that, but we, as individual believers, are to …
Week 2 of recording – hope you enjoy the progress:
Worship is all about God. Whenever we serve in a manner to get attention for ourselves, we are attempting to rob God of his glory. People who are called to lead others in worship must be bent on leading humbly before God and his people. In the humility department of leading worship, I believe 3 things are absolutely key: Genuine Faith – …
Our staff and interns have been feverishly working on the new North Side website and we are almost finished! We stepped back and evaluated our website a while back, and realized a few things. It was too busy, it wasn’t easily navigated, and it was missing some key components. So we went back to the drawing board, developed a new …
1 Bible but it has 66 books in it. You have your favorite. Maybe it’s the simplicity of James or the poetry of Psalms. But you also have the books you avoid. Maybe your rule is – if you can’t pronounce it, you are scared to read it. I want to hear from you: favorite book to read and scariest …
This second week in the “Dear God” series we heard Jeff’s 2nd prayer for our church: “Dear God, make us one.” In a church, truth, convictions, and preferences are always present. Unfortunately, we normally focus on our preferences or convictions more than we do the truth. If our church is truly to become one, we must lay aside our preferences …
We started recording for “Overcome” this week! I uploaded all loops and finalized all arrangements with Anthony Gravley. I laid down scratch guitars and vocals on all tracks to serve as a guide. Jamie has started to come in and lay down some sick beats! Here’s a video for you to enjoy to update you of our progress – please …
That’s right – I’m sending you back to school! Maybe you won’t be able to enroll in seminary, but have you ever had a subject in Christianity that you wanted to go deeper in? Have you ever wanted to know more about a certain subject? Have you ever wanted questions clarified about a subject in our faith? If so, I …
Yesterday, we introduced a new song at North Side called “Worship You.” Written for our upcoming album, this song is all about lifestyle worship. Angela McCall sang it for us and will be singing it on the album. I liked the song as a simple tune with my acoustic guitar, but as I worked on finding the right key …
As our church focuses on prayer in the “Dear God” series, our pastor has four prayers for our church that he wants answered. The first prayer is: “Dear God, I want to please you.” Too often, we come to God just to fix our problems. God wants to fix you, not your problem. In Colossians 1:10-12, Paul reveals four …
Today is Amanda’s birthday. Everyday I am more and more amazed at how blessed I am to have such an extraordinary wife in my life! Next to Jesus, she is the greatest gift I could ever ask for in this life. She is a treasure, she is my bride, and she is my closest friend. On her birthday, people celebrate …
One question: what’s keeping most churches from experiencing true unity today? On your mark, get set, go.
Many people have been asking us about Eli. We are so blessed to have the prayers that have been prayed over him. We did travel to MUSC to run tests and check on a few medical issues. I don’t know why they only do this consultation from 1-4 in the afternoons which is exactly Eli’s nap time. Even after being …
As the United States soccer team was eliminated from the World Cup, America must wait another 4 years to impress the world with our skills. An interesting set of 4 games that they played still had them losing in the first knockout round. Americans don’t like to lose. America’s reputation is often that we think we are the best …
What a great Sunday! One of my favorite things was we got to ordain Luke Tolbert into the ministry. Luke, Patty, and Anna Kate have just finished seminary and accepted the call to service at Malvern Hill Baptist Church in Camden, SC. I LOVE this family so much and wherever they go, the church is better discipled – excited about …
Genesis. The first book in the Bible. What Jews and Christians claim as the authority on creation, origin of mankind, etc. I’d say it’s a pretty important book concerning the history of our world. In September-October, North Side’s life focus will be on two series walking through the Book of Genesis (Origins: Genesis 1-11, Ancestors: Genesis 12-50). While the sermons …
Our worship team has recently been through some changes. A few months ago, I felt the need to step it up a few notches. So I fired everybody. Everybody. I even fired my wife. No matter how long everyone had played or sang, everyone lost their job. I told them I would be willing to rehire them, but the commitment …
This is the time of year when we focus on our country’s freedom and liberty. While it is fitting and appropriate to celebrate our freedom, many people in our society turn the focus on freedom to a self-indulgent focus on “my rights.” Freedom becomes a focus on individual freedom, which unfortunately becomes an emphasis on a person’s freedom to do …
Happy Father’s Day! We had a great day celebrating fathers and the church. Great moments: The Spearmans Testimony – So great to see a father and sons going and serving on mission together Romania Commissioning – Great time commissioning the Romania team for their trip – they leave on Saturday Worship – It was a great time of worship, so …
Tomorrow, I get to celebrate Father’s Day as a father of two special boys. I could not be more proud to be a father. Life doesn’t stop when you become a parent, it just enriches so much. I am blessed beyond belief due to these precious boys! We were so thankful to have Paige Stumbo do a photo shoot of …
North Side’s senior pastor, Jeff Lethco, does a lot of things well. Recently, he added authoring to his credits as he finished his first book, Before You Change a Thing. Book description: Church leaders today are being bombarded by a growing number of voices about how to lead effectively. Unfortunately, some things that need to be said aren’t being said …
I get to talk with church leaders a bunch about how North Side does ministry. I would love to hire a ton of people on our staff to do all the ideas we have, but that’s just not feasible. So we cheat a lot. What I mean is we find good resources that make what we do better. Sometimes we …
Item #3 that could kill North Side: looking the other way. What can bring a congregation down? When we fail to engage in church discipline. Yes, you could hear a pin drop today in services. In his message, Jeff preached on the need for discipline within a local church body. To his admittance, he stated that the concept of church …
This is my 1,000th blog post. As I looked down the line at what this monumental post should be about, it was very simple: I have the most amazing wife in the entire world. Today marks 6 years of marriage for the Agnews. Amanda and I were high school sweethearts, and why I cared for her then, I can’t even …
One of the many reasons I love my life:
Last night, we had the members of the North Side Worship band over to the house. We canceled normal practice to eat, hang, sing, dream, and pray. We have been planning to record again this summer, and this was the official meeting to kick things off. Sitting around a circle in the floor last night, I laid out the plan …
My buddy at the South Carolina Baptist Convention office, Mark Powers, called about a month ago to ask a favor. He is the director or worship and music for the state. Each year, he puts on an event called the Worship Summit (click the link to sign up for the conference) which equips worship teams to go further in their ministry …
Eli has been home for 5 weeks last Saturday, and yet pictures like the one above keeps our family grounded. Whenever I see my son crawl over to a vent and stick his face or his feet over the air and squeal in delight, I remember. I remember how stuffy it was in his cramped room in the orphanage. Eli …
Passionate, honest day about being the church at North Side. 2nd week into our “5 Things That Will Kill This Church” series and we stated the 2nd thing that could kill this church: “Looking Out for #1.” When selfishness infests a church, it is a dangerous place to tread. Today, we worshiped to: Kingdom Come – Travis Agnew Marvelous Light …
Poll: what Bible verse changed your world lately? Share the love! On your mark, get set, go!
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