Recently completed a trip to beautiful downtown Clovis, CA where my good friend, Tim Brown is the Senior Pastor of FBC Clovis (www.fbclovis.com); a church that has experienced remarkable growth under his leadership these past 8 or so years....averaging 70 in worship when he arrived, they now have close to 700+ attending each weekend.
Growing Healthy Churches (www.growinghealthychurches.org) is a church transformation and church reproduction (planting and new sites) organization led by Dr. Paul Borden. His two recent books, Hit the Bullseye, and Direct Hit have been helping denominational leaders and local church leaders achieve transformation. Paul spoke on Saturday morning and did a great job.
Most of my time at these conferences is with other pastoral leaders; many of whom I'm proud to call friends and colleagues in ministry. Some of the guys I have been able to serve as a mentor; this particular conference was rich with new church plant and turnaround stories...very cool to be with great guys with a BIG heart for God. Also got to spend some good time with Andy and his wife Kelli. Andy leads a very cool, very hot, very happening church called New Vintage Church in Santa Rosa.
But, my special treat this year was spending some more time with Ray Johnston, Senior Pastor of Bayside Church in Roseville, CA (www.baysideonline.com). Ray has become a very good friend and I'm always energized when I'm with him. Ray did a bang-up job on talking about the trajectory of our culture, cutting edge leadership, communicating with excellence, and building Thriving Churches. In fact, I encourage you to visit the Thriving Churches Conference website (www.thrivingchurches.com) to register for their 2007 conference...it is the BEST conference I've ever attended at connecting Head, Heart, and Hands all in one experience.
I've been fortunate to have several opportunities with Ray this year....and been lifted to new levels each time...
