Yesterday's Service

First of all, I apologize for the tardiness of this post. I said I'd post in the a.m. and it is definitely p.m. Most of this a.m. was spent sleeping because I had a fabulous time with a friend staying up until 3 a.m. playing some Super Mario Brothers 3 last night. We whipped out my old Nintendo and had ourselves a little sleepover. It was mad fun, but I am way too old to stay up that late!!

Okay, Church yesterday. It was awesome!! Most of our Launch Team was there at 7:30 a.m. to set up. I helped prepare communion. I broke the crackers, that was my job. Since I'm obsessive compulsive about most things, it was a good job for me. I had to break those crackers down to just the right size. By 8:45 we had communion ready to go. From there I went to help out in other areas, but most everything was done. We just had some straightening up and putting away of things to do. We were completely ready to go at 9:30. By 9:45 I was feeling like I could throw up and wondering where all the people were. And then they began to trickle in. I was standing near our information table watching the door and seeing people come in. Most had kids with them. Our people pointed them in the right direction for Children's Ministry and the auditorium. There was a good vibe.

Then, I got pulled into the toddler room (13 - 23 months). I agreed to help out there if they needed me. They needed me. Actually, they needed a lot more than me, but they got me. I walked into a room of 12 toddlers and about 8 of them were crying LOUD. It was insane. I grabbed a crying kid and settled her down. Then another and another. Two of them would not chill out. They were both toddlers of Lauch Team members and they both have a tendency to not like being left in Children's Ministry. We ended up having their parents come and get them because they were way too upset. So, we (me and 4 others) settled down with the babies and played. We talked about how God made the water and the dry land and the kids got to play with some water. One of them was insisting on getting in the tub of water. It was so cute!

So, I'm sure you're thinking, "That's nice Juli, but we want to hear about the service." I can only tell you what I heard since I wasn't in there: It went great!! The people were excited to be there. We show a video sermon and people seemed to be into it. They laughed when they should have.

After the service Chuck says people swarmed our info table looking for info to give to their friends. Chuck says it got a little crazy over there as people swarmed looking for stuff to pick up. I left the toddler room after most of the kids had been picked up and I hung out in the lobby looking for people to talk to. There were a few ladies there that I knew. They had attended a small group that Chuck led in Chesapeake 3 years ago. Both had stopped going to Forefront (because of how far away it was) and had also stopped attending Gel Group (small group). It was so good to see them there at church. They were pumped to be there and said they looked forward to coming back.

Chuck did really well. He remembered all his stuff that he had to say. He did jump up on stage before a video that he was supposed to wait for, but our production team just rolled with it and inserted the video later in the service. Some people who know him well told me that they could tell he was a little nervous, but that you wouldn't know if you didn't know him. I'm supposed to be able to view a video of the whole service sometime this week. There's a part of me that was relieved to not be in the auditorium because I would have been so nervous for Chuck that I don't know if I would have enjoyed the service. I sure hope that feeling goes away!

I will try to get Chuck to make an appearance on the blog so that he can tell you about things from his perspective. Oh, and by the way, he was so stinking cute on Sunday. He got some new duds and looked very handsome.