I Went to the Bar Last Night...

Last night I spent a few hours attending one of the coolest things I've ever been a part of. Before I tell you about it, I have to give some background information.

Chuck and I have been attending Forefront Church (www.forefront.org) for 5 years now. We've been meeting in a high school auditorium all that time and we have no plans to build a building. I worked there for a period of time as an administrative assistant and now Chuck is on staff there as a Campus Pastor. I always loved Forefront before I worked there, but once I began working there and learned how intentional every single thing they do is, I really fell in love with the church.

We use a lot of humor, really rockin' music, funny skits, pop culture, games, and much more in an attempt to get visitors to uncross their arms and let the music and the message sink in. Before I worked on staff I thought we did all that stuff just to be cool. That's not it at all. We do all that stuff because we want to reach lost people. We don't want to be the cool church in town that all the Christians flock to. We want truly lost people on the road to nowhere walking in our doors. And we get a lot of those people.

The original vision of Forefront was to have different locations all over our area. We live in an area of about 7 big cities and there are all kinds of waterways. Traffic is a mess. So, it's not always likely that a person two towns over will come to our church because it's a long drive. Over two years ago our church started moving in the direction of starting another location, or campus. I've sat in on a lot of training for this church model, so I can tell you that there are many churches across the country who have been very successful with multiple campuses. Logistics are a lot of work to figure out, but once the plan is in place you can keep adding campuses fairly easily. It's an awesome way to reach more and more people. And in our area, it's the only way that our church can reach out beyond our circle.

On October 7th our 3rd campus launches, and Chuck is the Campus Pastor of that location. The preaching at that campus will be video of our Senior Pastor. That campus will also meet in a high school. On Tuesday, October 2nd, our 2nd campus launches. The 2nd location came about because we needed a midweek place to film our Senior Pastor preaching so that on Sunday morning the two campuses would hear the exact same message. God's plan for that video venue turned out to be The White Horse Pub in Pembroke Mall. Last night I went to the first of two practice services for The White Horse Pub location. It was awesome. There were a number of us from our church there, but there was also a bar full of people who didn't mean to, but ended up going to church last night. They enjoyed the music and the message. They didn't go running out the door. They stayed. The owner and his waitstaff enjoyed it too. We brought in a lot more business than they are used to getting on a Tuesday night.

Okay, if you are reading this and you are thinking, "Oh my goodness, this is blasphemy!" I'm going to tell you that you have a right to your opinion. I'm also going to ask you a few questions.
Who is the last lost, and I mean truly lost, person that you successfully reached out to and brought to Jesus. How many non-Christians do you hang out with? How many want to hear what you have to say? How well are you fulfilling the great commission in your own community?

I believe Jesus would preach in the bar, too. He repeatedly reached out to the people the Pharisees wanted nothing to do with. You know why? Because those lost people in the bar are precious to Him. He loves them just as much as He loves you and me. He hasn't given up on them and neither should we. Should we expect that these people will clean up their act and come to church on Sunday morning to hear about Jesus? No. As Christians we should be reaching out to them.

So, I'm pretty excited about what our church is doing. You don't have to be. But I wanted to blog about it because it is seriously one of the coolest things I've ever witnessed.