Origins Church Plant Update

New Heights

It's been a great summer here at Origins Faith Community.  In spite of vacations, kids being out of school, and hot summer days, we have continued to grow.  In one 3 week stretch we had over 30 first time visitors (that was in July).  The best part of this is that we repeatedly hear how people feel instantly at home and are eager to make Origins their church home.

Then last Sunday, still August mind you, we had our highest ever "non-holiday" attendance with 185.  We feel like we are poised to break 200 on a regular basis this fall.  All of this is 100% due to God calling people to connect with His heart as we simply don't have the funds for mass mailings or other advertisement.  Word of mouth can be pretty powerful in a small town.

We are fresh off of a great week of Kidz Camp in the park with around 80 kids from the community in attendance and then 250ish kids and adults attending our last movie night in the park.  In fact, if you would like to see some highlights from this event,   click here.

Thanks for you prayers and all the other ways you are supporting what God is doing out here in Oregon/Idaho.  He really is up to something amazing and I'm glad we get to be a part of it.

Beautiful Story

"Lori" showed up about a month ago because "Mark" (our most heavily tattooed Origins member) invited her to church while standing in line at Rite Aid.   She is a 17 year old, single, brand new mom, who comes from a rotten home (and is in fact, legally emancipated from her parents).  She is truly on her own.  But, in just this short time she has connected with the people of Origins and they have accepted her fully.  She is helping with Kidz Camp this week and doing great.  

Her first week at Origins she asked for prayer for a job and childcare.   Then God got busy and...She is now in her 2^nd week of her full time job with provided childcare!  In addition, she has a very supportive boss and they have agreed to work around her schedule as she attends Junior College this fall.  

All praise to God who answers prayer and rescues those who seek Him!

Grateful to be a part of what He is doing here in Oregon/Idaho...

James

Why I love church planting

After the gathering at Origins last Sunday morning, I heard that a question was asked.  This was the question that was asked by a first time visitor (and if you are the one who asked, this is not a slam on you...it's a great question...and a reminder of what we need to do better as we lead), "What does Hosanna mean?"

We had used the song, Hosanna, by Paul Baloche and it repeats the word Hosanna over and over.  These folks simply didn't know what we were singing about.

I love it that they had the courage to ask.  I love it that people who don't know are attending Origins.  I love that we are reaching the people we asked God to send our way.

That is why I love church planting.

Peace.

James

Here is the song if you are unfamiliar...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TY4BWbvxEXQ

Serve Day Highlights

Click Here to see a video of some of the highlights from Serve Day 09 out here in Oregon.

Baptism Pics

Here are some pictures from our recent baptism:

This is how we do baptism (picture taken during worship team rehearsal).  If Jesus can be born in a manger then we are OK to be baptized in a cattle tank.

Down with the old...up with the new!

Rejoice!

We dunk 'em good.

Post Memorial Day Snow!

Check this out...our neighbors Cottonwood tree decided to let loose today.  Thisall happened today.  I mowed this morning.

Serve Day 09

We are busy and excited for Community Serve Day 09.  It all happens this saturday and we are hoping for a great turnout, but more than that we are hoping for a large number of people to catch a vision for what a difference they can make in their community.  Here is the link for the recent article in the local paper.  We will update with the post-event article soon.

http://www.argusobserver.com/articles/2009/05/10/news/us/doc4a06481d7260f762398344.txt

Peace.

James

Brenna's update

Hello friends,

We have a great way for you to stay up to date with Brenna's progress and send her notes of encouragement as well.

You can visit Brenna's CaringBridge site at http://www.caringbridge.org/visit/brennavogt.

If your e-mail program does not allow you to click on the above link, just copy and paste the address into your web browser's address (or URL) location.

Please visit our CaringBridge site anytime. You can use the site to check in on Brenna, read the journal entries and send us messages by signing our guestbook. When you register with CaringBridge and sign our guestbook, you will automatically receive e-mail notifications each time our journal is updated. Or, you can subscribe to receive these notifications even before you sign the guestbook. (Of course, you can unsubscribe from these e-mail updates at any time.) 

Thank you for the continued prayers.

The Vogt Family

Dear Friends,

I’m writing to let you know of some recent news in our family and asking for your prayers.  In a 24 hour span between Monday and Tuesday, it was confirmed to us that our little Brenna has Leukemia.  It has all happened very suddenly and is a complete shock to us.  She has been diagnosed with Acute Lymphoblastic Leukemia (ALL).  The good news is that this is the most common and most treatable form of Leukemia with a near 90% complete cure rate.  Brenna also has several other favorable factors that give us much hope for her and her healthy future.

Tammy and I are doing as well as can be expected.  God is giving us strength and peace (but we can always use more).  We have been pointed to an incredible hospital with a great staff.  They are already in love with Little B.  She will probably be in the hospital for the rest of the week as they have to watch carefully for kidney failure after the first round of chemo (which starts fully today).  I will also be meeting with a financial planner today to learn how this will all play out for our family.  So there is still much to pray about.

Our Origins family is surrounding us completely and helping us in this difficult life transition.  Funny how we thought we would plant this church to “be here” for them and now they are here for us.  I guess that is all a part of God’s beautiful picture called His church.

We will get a blog up soon so you can follow Brenna’s progress.  Thank you all for your prayers.

James and Tammy

From 2 to 3

A lot has happened over the last 2 weeks at Origins.  Here are some of the highlights.

We celebrated our 1st birthday in a big way.  We had a concert on Saturday night of some of the music that our band has played over the past year.  We hung out, laughed, and relaxed as the band played.  It was a great night with 150 in attendance.

Then on Sunday morning, we celebrated our first 52 Sundays.  We recognized leaders, thanked volunteers and our hosts at Four River Cultural Center, and had some good cake.  The Origins people did an incredible job and invited lots of friends to celebrate with us and we had 210.  From 25 to 210 in one year...God is up to something amazing here!

This week we made a big decision.  It's time to go from 2 to 3.  You see, the room we use is actually a big room that can be divided into 3 smaller rooms.  Up until this week, we have been using 2 sections, but it just isn't big enough any more, so we opened 'er up.  Today, Super Bowl Sunday, we had 150 in attendance with another large group of visitors.  The new bigger room felt great!  Now we get to see how long until we need to have multiple gathering times on Sunday morning...

Thanks for all your prayers and support.  If you can ever make your way out here, we would love to see you (and we would love for you to see what God is doing here...it's simply contagious!).

Peace.  

James