Forgive me while I borrow liberally from Seinfeld:

“I don’t know if you’re ready for this. I don’t know if you should be sitting down for this or standing up. On the one hand, sitting is good if you’re going to faint. But standing is good for jumping up and down.”

I’ve counted the numbers three times. Are you ready for this?

I’ve thought for several months now that if we somehow were able to get 500 people to sign up and participate in our Legacy Small Groups Church it would be a wild success. In fact, there’s no way I thought we’d hit 500 in this first go-round. It was the way-out-there, impossible goal. We always, as a planning committee, threw 500 out there as the high ceiling mark of possibility.

We have 386 adults signed up for Small Groups. 386! And that doesn’t count one single baby, not one child, not one teenager. These are all adults. 386 of them! And they know what they’re signing up for. They and their families are committing to meeting in each others’ homes every Sunday night to worship and study and love and serve. 386! And if we add in all the kids (and there’s no way I’ve had time today to do that. Who is going to do that, by the way?) we easily have well over 600. Maybe even closer to 700. Some here at the building today have insisted that a safe and fair estimate would be to calculate one child per adult. They say that’s a pretty good average to work with. If that’s the case, IF that’s accurate, we’re looking at 772 people signed up to participate in Small Groups Church! And that’s after just one day of sign-ups. Now, I don’t ever want to be accused of throwing out a trumped-up number or a “preacher’s count.” So, to stay on the conservative side, it’s more than safe to say that we have way over 600 dedicated to Small Groups.

Praise God!

And I’m not sure yet what all this really means. Not yet. Our church family is indeed ready for weekly Small Groups. We’re starving for deeper, more meaningful relationships with each other. We’re hungry to get deeper into the Word and apply it to our daily lives. We’re excited about new opportunities for evangelism. We’re tired of meeting at the building on Sunday nights. We’re ready to try something new. We see the vision of growing closer to each other and closer to God through Small Groups. We believe in the dream of turning our community upside down for Jesus with Small Groups. We view the mission and the goals of Small Groups Church as Scripture-based and as a return to the Bible. We think the new logos are cool. I don’t know what we can read into these numbers just yet. Except for this: our God is blessing what we’re doing. The response has been more than we could ever ask or imagine. Our Father has overcome every hurdle, he’s obliterated every obstacle, he’s risen above every miscommunication and misunderstanding, he’s triumphed over all the ways I’ve messed everything up to show us that this is the way to go. And I’m more convinced than ever that he’s not leading us or guiding us as much as he’s pushing us in this direction. I’m committed more than ever to turn all of this completely over to him, to sacrifice it all to him and tell him to do with it what he wants.

Give our God all the glory and honor and praise. He is so very, very good.

We still have 15 different groups of every variety and demographic that have not filled up. We still have slots for 68 more adults which translates to probably another 120 people. There’s still room in the inn. And we’d love to have you! Signups will continue through the end of the month.

“Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, for ever and ever! Amen.  ~Ephesians 3:20-21.

Peace,

Allan