North Side

Teaching an Old Dad New Tricks

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Want to be a better father?  Join me for the course Courageous: Honor Begins at Home.

Derek was a “good enough dad.” He provided for his family. He stayed faithful to his wife, never committed any of the “really bad” sins, and took his children to church. Most people would look at him and think he was a model father.

In his late 60s, something changed. As a retired grandfather, he become exposed to biblical teaching concerning a father’s responsibility to teach the truths of the Bible to his own children. Through the conviction of God’s Word, he began to seek out how exactly God had called him to live. As he watched the movie Courageous, he realized he too didn’t want to be just “a good enough dad.”

But it was too late. His children were out on their own, married with their own children. While all of his children were fine members of society, God was a part of their home and not the central piece. He realized that his children were simply repeating what they had seen.

His children were out of the home, but they were not beyond his influence.

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What’s Better Than 1 North Side Worship Album This Year?

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Exciting stuff in the works with North Side Worship this year.  As a worship ministry, we are really focusing our efforts this year to help disciple our church through worship.  I have shared some of what that means, but I thought I would clue you in a little bit more today.

Today, you can pick up THE MANIFOLD WISDOM OF GOD: SERMON REMIX 2011 on iTunes or you can get a hardcopy at North Side.  That is just the 1st step of projects that we are working on as a worship ministry this year.  Months ago, I gathered the band together and asked them, “What would be better than 1 worship album this year?”  Someone got bug eyes, and replied, “2?”  The answer was correct as I shared what would be album #2 for us.  But then it went to 3.  And then even to 4.

Yep, we are planning on releasing 4 worship albums this year through North Side.

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Sermon Remix: 2011

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I’ve mentioned in the last couple of weeks some pretty exciting stuff coming up for North Side Worship this year.  I’ve talked about how we plan on discipling our church through our worship ministry.  I shared with how I felt the Holy Spirit was leading to a pretty big initiative and our team jumped at all the opportunities.  Let me now share our 1st offering coming your way very, very soon.

In many of our previous recordings, we have included a spoken-word track.  On Overcome, it was a message that was trimmed down from 40 minutes to 4 minutes with some music written for the piece.  The sermon served as a catalyst for the entire album and really summed up a lot of how God was leading our church at that time.  Jeff was originally against the idea because he didn’t want to have a lot of focus upon him.  I was able to talk him into it, and since we have released that album, I have heard more encouraging words concerning the track “Don’t Give Up” over any other track on the entire project.  It is powerful.

And I’ve always wondered: what would it be like if an entire project was dedicated to a sermon remixes?

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North Side Would Fail Church Growth 101 Class

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Saturday morning, leaders from North Side gathered together to continue on this journey God is leading us.  We talked about discipleship.  We celebrated the lives that are being changed, and yet we also focused upon those people who are still struggling to follow Christ.

We laid out a strategy that is a little different for a church our size.  In fact, North Side would fail Church Growth 101 class if we were taking it.  Let me explain:

Church growth these days is all about the large groups.  Get more people in the seats and that means that you are winning.  What we are finding is that it is easy to fill seats, it is hard to disciple people.  And in our current church culture in America, people are church hopping, filling out commitment cards, getting baptized, and then dropping off the face of the earth!  The parable of the Seed and the Sower should scare us enough to realize that we might be giving people false assurance of their salvation that way – they need to be discipled!

Here’s some things I took away from Saturday:

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You Are My Portion – United Youth Worship Recap

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We had an incredible night of United Youth Worship last night.  Still beaming from how these students worshiped Jesus.  Love seeing the shift in the room last night.  Below are some pictures taken by the talented Paige Stumbo.  We will be posting some more pics on Facebook later.

You are more than enough for me, Jesus, more than enough for me.

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Feeding the 5,000

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Happy New Year’s everyone!  We started out 2012 in a fantabulous manner at North Side this morning.  I had the privilege of coming and worshiping with my family and being led by some wonderful people!

First off, Ben Hjalmer, our student pastor, preached for us on Jesus feeding the 5,000.  He preached his face off!  I love getting to hear Ben speak because of his genuine passion, but he took it to another level today.  It was fantastic.  I still got my bag, and planning on giving what I got and watch Jesus do amazing things with it!

We also were privileged to be led in worship by our student band.  This group leads at the Peak on Wednesdays.  At North Side, we always include our students in leading worship, but I can honestly say, I have never heard a group so polished and known a group more committed.

I told this to the group afterwards that it’s typical to hear people say: “That group did great for a bunch of teenagers.”  Unfortunately, I can’t say that.  They just did great period.  Teenagers, adults, you name it, they were a great group of worship leaders all around.  As tight as could be, as focused as could be, I closed my eyes and thought these guys could be musicians much older and experienced than what they were.  They love Jesus and are committed to His Church.  They were and are fantastic!

Today, we worshiped to:

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“So, How Did the Change REALLY Go?”

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In the recent weeks, I have learned that there have been 3 people very interested in the changes going on at North Side.

  1. North Siders – This group has been interested in how all of it would look when the dust settled and the new day was here.  What would worship be like?  Where would their families go?
  2. Other Greenwood Churches – We also have heard that it’s been quite the conversation among other churches, and even in some churches, people have attempted to lure people to their congregation because their worship style was something they would enjoy better (that’s on both the contemporary and the traditional side).  I guarantee if someone leaves one church because of music and find refuge in another, those are the type of members who leave the 2nd church one day as well.  It’s like young ladies who feel like they have to advertise to get a man.  Whatever it takes to get him will be what takes him one day.  The same is true with churches.
  3. Other Church Leaders – Along the way, I’ve been contacted through this blog, Facebook, or email with questions how we are going about these changes.  It seems there are a lot of churches who desire unity as well.  Many congregations are tired of the church buffet lines, but we served as the “guinea pig” to many of them.  If it works here, maybe it could work there too was the thought process.

So, I posted on Sunday that Sunday was a great day, and it was.  I believed it was going to be a great day, but I didn’t think it could have gone that smooth.  But many people emailed me on Monday morning and said, “OK, you can tell me, how did the change REALLY go?”  As if Sunday everyone would be all smiles, but then Monday morning, our inboxes would be overflowing with hate mail.

So, how did the change REALLY go?

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College Discipleship Groups

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  What a wonderful weekend with the North Side family!  We were blessed to have a bunch of college students worship with us yesterday from Lander, Erskine, Piedmont Tech, Presbyterian College, and much more.  It was a blessing to connect with so many of them at our lunch yesterday and our dodegeball tournament last night. We want to make all

Good Friday Service

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On Good Friday (April 22nd), spend your evening at North Side with a special service spent remembering the cross. Baptism & Lord’s Supper. We will include baptism and an observance of the Lord’s Supper this evening.  If you would like to be baptized on this date, please comment here.  Your RSVP is helpful too as we prepare for the Lord’s

Lift Schedule

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Details are coming together for Lift, and our team is getting more and more excited by the day!  People from Greenwood to Summerville or planning on making the trek for this Saturday worship training session, and we could not be more humbled to partner with others to lead churches in worship.

I wanted to provide you with the schedule so you can make your plans.  It’s a funnel type schedule focusing on music, tech, and host teams that work in worship settings.  We start large, go to medium size, smaller groups, and then back all together.

This workshop is for seasoned worship team members and also for those who are just curious if they have the skills needed to join.  It’s free lessons, so nothing to lose!  Not only will we have a lot of information, we are going to have a lot of fun!

Here is our promise: we are teaching principles, not models.  We don’t want you to copy what we are doing, we are going to teach principles that we have been learning that can be applied into any context.  Please list any questions you might have.  You can register here.

See below for details:

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