Report on First Real Bar Service

Last night was incredible!

We had our first “official” service in the bar. About ten minutes before it started it was still pretty empty and most of the people who were there were Forefronters. Then people started pouring in – and most of them were people we had never seen. It was absolutely packed. Every chair was taken, and about 20 people had to stand … and did so throughout the entire service. Crazy!

People were totally into it. They loved the music. You could have heard a pin drop during the sermon. (Actually right towards the beginning of the message two guys were talking at the bar and one said, pretty loudly, to the other, “Bullsh*t!” – which is something I’m not used to hearing while I’m preaching. The cool thing is that several people around him, including the owner, were like, “Sshhhhh,” “Shut up!”)

Afterwards people surrounded me to say, “Thank you for doing this!” and “I’ll be back next week with friends!” One big, tough looking guy had tears in his eyes and said, “Thank you for teaching me about forgiveness.” One lady went to our “Welcome Table” and asked for one of the free bibles we provide, when she received it she turned to her friend and said, “This is the first time I’ve ever touched a bible.” — Awesome!

The other crazy thing that happened was that about 40 minutes before the service two different news camera crews showed up. Joe (our worship leader and campus pastor for this location) and I spent the half hour before the service doing interviews. Then the cameras were moving around all during the service and pulling people out of the service for interviews.

Thank you to everyone who prayed – your prayers were powerful and effective! If you’d like to keep praying for us, this Sunday we have the Grand Opening of our brand new Chesapeake campus……

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