Christmas "Thank You" to Centerpoint Church

This Sunday we would love to give you a gift of appreciation on behalf of Centerpoint and your team leader as a small “thank you” for serving here at CC. Stop by the Starting Point room in the lobby to pick it up.

It is seriously the greatest privilege of my life to serve alongside our team of Bridge Builders at CC!

I am so thankful for our Host Team, Cafe Team, Parking Team, and Ushers who wake up early and “roll out the red carpet” every week to create an exceptional experience for everyone who drives on our campus & walks through our doors. I am thankful for a multi-talented group of team leaders and staff who walk with a confident humility. I am thankful for amazingly talented people who serve

behind the scenes to run audio/visual, to prepare environments, and to creatively plan events because they are so passionate about introducing people to Jesus. I am thankful for the Kid Zone Volunteers and how every week they pray for babies to come to know Jesus [Including my little girl] and “build bridges” for the babies’ parents to hear the Gospel. I am thankful for how the next generation is led in an inspiring and creative way to make the wise choice because of Jesus in Kids Point; for the way middle school and high school students are being inspired to shape culture in Velocity & Fuel by allowing Jesus Christ to define who they are. I am thankful for the Worship Team who, with excellence, leads us to focus on Jesus every week and prepares our hearts to hear the Word. I am grateful for our community groups—little churches of accountability, belonging, and care. And I am grateful for your financial generosity, which allows us to do what we do every week.

We are humbled by the fact that our gathering continues to grow, that dozens of adults & students

have accepted Christ, and that families have been transformed forever. But we believe the best is in front of us!

Because of YOU, we are shaping the view of the church, and, consequently, Jesus for many who vowed never to “try it” again! As we move into 2014,  we are asking God to use us to shape a city, re-define the church, see hundreds changed by the gospel, and make Jesus the hero every time.

For this and so many other reasons, thank you, Centerpoint Church! Merry Christmas!!

Complacency or Faith? Here are some suggested steps from Sunday's message.

This past Sunday in The Highest, Part 8 [You can listen at www.centerpointfl.org/seriesarchive.php] we looked at this important truth: every single day we as Jesus followers are growing in complacency or growing in faith. There is no neutral ground because our “enemy the devil prowls around like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour.” – I Peter 5:8 He knows where we are weak, he knows where we are vulnerable to temptation, he knows what dark days are prone to drive us toward, he knows what happens when we feel the pressure from other people, and he knows how to sell us on compromise at just the right time.

 

So Paul warns us that our faith must grow. It has to grow beyond the feelings of waiting on the next emotional message, right song, or perfect verse for the day. It has to become something we personally know and grow in. If not eventually the wrong emotion will override our devotion no matter how strong we think we were. But as we begin to personally get to know what God says, God’s spirit begins to confirm God’s truth in our lives and our faith grows. Paul says is this way,   

6 So then, just as you received Christ Jesus as Lord, continue to live in him, 7 rooted and built up in him, strengthened in the faith as you were taught, and overflowing with thankfulness – Colossians 2:6-7 

It all starts with taking a step. Here are a couple ways you can begin to make the scripture personal.

1. Make it a priority to attend weekend services and when the Scripture is preached, personally engage by having a Bible [or youversion app on your phone] to look at and highlight. Certain passages will become very personal to you.
2. Download a personal reading plan at www.youversion.com. If you are new to reading the Bible, start with the life of Jesus or the book of John. Just begin with 5 minutes a day.
3. Join a community group at www.centerpointfl.org/grouplink. This helps apply the truth to daily life. Truth without community leads to arrogance.
4. Sign up for free video based Bible studies to do individually, as a couple, or as a family provided through CC. Go to www.centerpointfl.org/rightnow to sign up.
5. Use the tools we provide each weekend to help your children. We have a Parent Cue card that gives you questions so you can interact with your children about what they are learning [K-5^th grad] and God Time Cards your children can use to begin to learn the verses they are studying each month. Each is given away free as you sign out on Sundays.
6. Check out the weekly blogs for our children and student ministries to follow what they are learning: Kids Point: http://kidspointministries.blogspot.com/ Velocity and Fuel Student Ministries: http://velocitystudentministries.blogspot.com/

So are you growing in faith or growing in complacency? Is the scripture becoming personal or are you waiting for the next spiritual high? Join a community group and choose now to take a step for you and your children to be rooted and strengthened in faith.

Bryant

Bryant Golden [Lead Pastor]                                                                                                                                    

CC Easter Recap: 2013

Easter Sunday was an incredible day as we lifted up who Jesus is and proclaimed the reckless grace found only in Him.  I want to personally say, "thank you" to all of you who served so faithfully this weekend. I personally had several guests here Sunday who couldn’t stop talking about the passion, friendliness, and genuineness of every bridge builder they encountered.

I believe Jesus was glorified, families were impacted multi-generationally, people experienced the love of Jesus, the Gospel was heard, and lives were changed forever. Here is a quick snapshot: 

• We had two packed services at 9 and 11 AM. Thanks for inviting.
• We had at least 11 people we know of accept Christ or surrender their lives to him. And, I'm sure, many more decisions we haven’t heard about yet.
• We also received incredible stories of how God is changing lives. A woman by the name of Kathy wrote us Monday to say, “I have been out of church for 10 years…a recent event caused me to promise God I would go back to church and he led me to Centerpoint. This Sunday my sister and her four kids decided to join us. I just wanted to tell you I’ve never looked forward to church as much as I do know and I am renewing my relationship with God and my kids are really learning who Jesus really is…thank you!
• One girl was heard coming out of Kids Point and saying to her parents, “Mommy! Did you know that Easter is about Jesus dying on the cross and coming back to life?! The little girl heard the gospel for the first time on Easter!
• Last Thursday night a group joined together in the auditorium for corporate prayer. They walked every environment & the property of CC to pray for our bridge builders and those who would attend Sunday. I believe that God worked through that night more than you or anyone else can know. Thank you for making it a priority.
• We heard many other stories of people responding the Gospel as they attended Sunday. 

It would not be possible without you. Thank you for sacrificing, showing up on time, and passionately reaching out to serve people. Lives are being radically changed for His glory alone.

For those who surrendered to go public and be baptized—congratulations!

For those who are new to Centerpoint Church—welcome!

For those who volunteered on Easter—thank you!

For those who are part of the Centerpoint Church family—thank you for helping us care for all of the new people God continues to bring to our church! As Easter guests return for a second visit, introduce yourself, invite them to your Community Group, answer their questions, help them see that Jesus is alive and working through us.

This Sunday we begin the series called Give Me Faith. This series is for anyone who has doubts, questions, or concerns that hinder their relationship with Jesus or are keeping them from embracing him as savior at all. This may be the best series this year to invite someone to attend. So if you invited someone on Easter don't hesitate to ask them to join you this Sunday. Send an e-invite at www.centerpointfl.org/invite.php.

Praise Christ that he has invited us into something special at Centerpoint Church. It is a privilege to serve with you and be your Pastor.

For His Fame!

Bryant [Fellow bridge builder and Lead Pastor]

P.S. If you have any stories/testimonies from Sunday, please let us know at info@centerpointfl.org

What are you concerned about?

Recently I was reading through the book of Jonah in the Bible. It may seem odd to reference Jonah around Easter, but Jonah’s story pictures the depth of God’s plan for the world. "For as Jonah was three days and three nights in the whale's belly; so shall the Son of Man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth" (Matthew 12:40).　Jonah’s story was a picture of the coming Messiah and His message of grace to an undeserving world.
But Jonah’s story is also the story of many of us as Christians. Jonah was a good guy. He was committed to the moral guidelines God had established but he wasn’t fully surrendered to God’s purposes in the world.
Jonah reveals in chapter three that he is consumed with the fact that he’s uncomfortable, depressed, and bitter about God’s grace to the "undeserving" and ready to go home to the safe and prosperous confines of the familiar. God calls him out for being obsessed with the wrong things and shockingly unaware of his own desperate need for God’s grace. To paraphrase His words, "Jonah, I am concerned about this generation of people (120,000 Ninevites), what are you concerned about?"As many of us approach Easter weekend, we are in many ways surrendered to living morally. We are "good Christians" but are we concerned about the right things? For instance, are we concerned about this generation of people who are dying and going to Hell? Jonah foreshadowed the death, burial and resurrection of Christ that would cancel the debt of sin, absorb the wrath we deserved, and give us new life. Do we forget already how shockingly undeserving we are? Are we aware of the desperate need of those around us or are we going to just purchase some new clothes and go through the religious routine of attending a church service?
Put your ear down to the burdened, agonized heart of humanity, and listen to its pitiful wail for help. Go stand by the gates of hell, and hear the damned entreat you to go to their father’s house and bid their brothers and sisters and servants and masters not to come there. Then look Christ in the face—whose mercy you have professed to obey—and tell him whether you will join heart and soul and body and circumstances in the march to publish his mercy to the world.　

–

William BoothThis Easter it’s not about measuring up to a moral code and mindlessly going through the motions of religious tradition; it’s that Jesus already meet the moral code we couldn’t keep and now we, in turn, surrender to his concern for this world for the sake of his glory. For the past seven weeks we have been praying #byname for those who need the radical grace of Jesus. This Easter weekend we have the opportunity to invite many of those people to attend. So continue to pray, be bold to ask, and be open to the conversations to share the name of Jesus. Join us Thursday night at 7 pm in the auditorium as we come together to pray corporately #byname and ask God to open the eyes of men and woman to the Gospel. We are excited about what God is going to do through us this weekend!
The message of Easter is that He’s concerned about this generation of people. What are you concerned about?

Important Details about Easter at Centepoint

Important details about Easter at Centerpoint

   One of the big questions about Christianity is how did it get out of the first century? How did a struggling movement centered around a dead guy ever make it out of Jerusalem? Furthermore, how did a band of insurrectionists and misfits who were cowering to school girls in courtyards (Peter) hours before Jesus’ crucifixion suddenly become ferocious with the message of Jesus? How does that happen?  Two words: The resurrection!  A resurrection confirmed, in part, by two men known as Nicodemus and Joseph of Arimathea. These two men's actions and boldness allowed first century Christians, and eventually us today, to be confident in the resurrection.

   And here we are… The name of Jesus is recognized and known worldwide like no other name. Join us on Easter as Bryant [Lead Pastor] tells the back story to the resurrection and unpacks the incredible good news of Jesus.  View our trailer video at http://www.centerpointfl.org/easter2013

As a lead up, over the past seven weeks we have been praying #byname for people we know to embrace the reckless, undeserved grace of Jesus. Over the next week we want to aggressively focus on:  

• Praying: pray that God would lovingly break into people’s lives with saving and renewing grace. Join us next Thurs., March 28^th in the auditorium as we pray for our city and our church to be a conduit for the power of God. Join our #byname initiative at www.centerpointfl.org/byname.

• Connecting: connect with people in genuine relationship, be bold to share the name of Jesus, and look for opportunities.

•  Inviting: Don’t just inform someone but personally invite them to join you. A personal invitation is one of the most powerful ways to open up future conversations, to help change their perspective of “the church” [which many times is the greatest obstacle], and further invest in relationship. Pick up Easter invite cards this Sunday and send e-invites about our Easter services at www.centerpointfl.org/invite.php

·         For more details, invites, and volunteer sign ups, go to www.centerpointfl.org . Our service times for Easter, March 31^st, our 9 and 11 AM.

  This Easter the majority of people you know will probably attend church somewhere. The question is will it be a place they truly hear the radical grace of the Gospel? Last Sunday a woman who had attended “church” all of her life came up after one of our services to say, “For the first time in my 50+ years I understand the grace of Jesus”. I believe that is what’s at stake for many people in our city and our sphere of influence. Join with us in praying, connecting, and inviting this Easter at Centerpoint.

Join The Conspiracy.

Dear Centerpoint Church Family,

I love this time of year – parties, family, good food, and a focus on generosity in our society that is different than any other time of year. As The Church, we should be at the forefront of that generosity.

During the month of December, I’m inviting everyone connected to Centerpoint Church to participate in our Advent Conspiracy Offering. The idea behind Advent Conspiracy is turning this season upside down to unleash an avalanche of generosity on our community to advance the Gospel and meet needs because of the Gospel. This is the time of year where we put feet to our faith – where we show our community the love of Jesus.

The idea here is that as we buy gifts for other people, we want our largest, most extravagant gift to go to Jesus. We’ll use 100% of the donations to the Advent Conspiracy Offering to fund the following projects:

• Adding a full-time pastor to our staff. Our church has grown by nearly 150% over the past year, making it one of the fastest growing small churches in the country (Ed Stetzer, Lifeway Research of churches of 1,000 and under). The exciting thing for us is that many of those people are new to “the church” or are returning after being away for years. This has created a great need to add additional leadership in order to continue to create great environments, develop leaders, and have the structure to reach more people. Adding staff is in line with our vision, which is not just to grow numerically, but to help those who are attending CC to grow spiritually.  
 

• Planting our first CC extension campus near USF. The addition of another full-time staff member will allow us to partner with several groups who are also passionate about reaching college students, the least-churched demographic in the United States. We already have college students who commute and are asking about the possibility of inviting their friends to an extension campus closer to their university. 
 

• Digging wells through Living Water International. We will send money to dig several wells in Uganda where the lack of clean water is directly linked to disease and death. It’s an amazing opportunity to show the love of Jesus globally. 

On December 16, 2012, we will receive the Advent Conspiracy Offering during both of our weekend services. We’re providing special giving envelopes and encouraging everyone to come prepared to give on that day. You can get more information on the offering at www.centerpointfl.org/AC.

If you’re going to be out of town on December 16 or if you’d like to go ahead and donate now, you can do that online at www.centerpointfl.org. It’s safe, secure and simple to use.

In addition, during our Advent Conspiracy campaign we are encouraging every CCer to be generous with food and time. Donate food for Metropolitan Ministries on December 9^th and donate time by serving at one of the incredible compassion organizations we partner with. We also have an Advent Devotional Guide with activities for individuals, families, and community groups during this season. All of the details are at www.centerpointfl.org/AC.

Please pray about participating and conspiring with us. God has given us an extraordinary stewardship of this message of reckless grace. Let’s unleash a wave of generosity for more people to encounter Jesus and for real physical needs to be meet.

Bryant

Lead Pastor and Fellow Bridge Builder

Centerpoint Church

Video Messages & Important Things To Know...

CCers,

Over the course of the last month, our gathering at Centerpoint Church has continued to grow numerically because you have invited! As a result, we have experienced an explosion of life change that has been un-matched in the life of our church as people have trusted Christ, taken steps to heal from addictions, and have given their lives back to Jesus. The power of God working through His movement, the church, to radically change lives with His reckless grace is alive and well. This note from Sunday, which is one of the many stories of life change, reminds us of the fact that every person, every invite, every encounter represents someone who needs the love of Jesus.

The next two weekends are strategic times to ask someone to attend with you.

• This Sunday Bryant (@bryant_golden, lead pastor) concludes our series “The Shocking Statements of Jesus”. He will answer the question posed last week, “What does love require of me?” Our band will also introduce two new songs. It’s going to be an amazing Sunday and a great time to invite a guest to attend for the first time. You can send an e-invite at www.centerpointfl.org/invite.php, share our Facebook page at www.facebook/CenterpointChurchFL, or share our Twitter handle @CenterpointFL. The point is, if you have been waiting for a Sunday to invite, then this is the perfect time.

• Then, next Sunday, Oct. 21st, we begin a brand new series called Upgrade. Many of us have never really thought about what it might look like to upgrade our walk with God - to step into the life Jesus created us for. So for several weeks we are going to talk about what that looks like practically. We say this often, but a new series is a great time to invite someone. Don’t miss it!

Video Messages. Lastly, we have recently created a youtube channel for Centerpoint Church at www.youtube.com/CenterpointFL. We post our weekly announcement videos and now our messages. The first message posted is "The Shocking Statements of Jesus, Part 5 (Grace & Truth)". The quality of video and audio will improve in the coming weeks and it will serve as another tool to view messages and share them with others in our community.

We look forward to seeing you Sunday at 9 or 11 AM.

Bryant (Lead Pastor)