2008 - Things I can't wait for......

• Our 11th year of ministry at NStar - each year gets better!!! We baptized 200 in 07 - I am praying for more this year!!
• Planning our first NStar conference "Take-out" where we will talk about how a church connects with their community! It truly is what we do best! Can't wait - I think it could revolutionize a lot of churches and communities!
• Easter 2008.....I love Easter Sunday!
• Feb. 24...this will be my last birthday as a 30 something....scary!!!
• My 14u "Kennesaw Titan" travel baseball team season...I am so excited about this years squad!
• Spring break 08 - going to Destin again with my 3 favorite people in the world
• Impact (June 2-6)....my favorite student camp on earth - this is my 20th year being involved and this summer I will be speaking and Casey will be there as a student! I started going when I was 19 and he will be 14.......oh how time flies!!
• Our baseball season ends with a tourney at Disney in their "Salute to Baseball" July 2-9!
• Allatoona High School opening up!! They are building a great staff & team there and we (NStar) can't wait to be a part!!! Go Bucs!
• New business leaders breakfast that I am working on - can't wait to tell you about it!
  
• Figuring out how to handle everything God is sending our way on Sundays at NStar!!
  
• Praying we get our road out to Cobb Parkway in 08 - this will be HUGE to us!!
• On the GT front - can't wait for the Paul Johnson "Triple-Option" attack on the Flats of Tech!
• Mary-Michal will start middle school in the fall and Casey will start high school.....we are sad as a parents but excited for them! (We love our kids so much!!)
• Anne & I will celebrate 17 years in October!!

I could go on & on but I will stop there!!! I love a lot to look forward to and a ton to be thankful for!! God is amazing and I feel so blessed for all He has sent my way! Thanks to all of you (all of my 3 readers) who make my life better on a daily basis!! Happy New Year!

One of the good guys!!

I found out this week that a good buddy of mine from my playing days at Liberty University, will be the new 3rd base coach for the Pittsburgh Pirates. Tony Beasley is truly one of the good guys and I can not tell you how proud I am right now for him! I remember first meeting Tony and being blown away at not only what a great player he was but he truly was the hardest worker that I had ever met! After his playing days at LU - he played a number of years in the minors with the Pirates. He has also done an awesome job managing in the minors and I am hoping this is his first break to managing a Major League squad! It is so cool to have a guy like Tony who gets what it is all about and that will use his influence to make an "eternal" difference in a lot of young men's lives!!

Way to go Tony!!!

It was so nice!!

Today I got to something "way out of the ordinary"...I rode to NStar with the fam!! I cannot remember the last time that we all rode to church together and it was a blast! Nick & Brad (our middle & high school pastors) spoke today and were awesome! They were right on the money and blessed me a ton!! Our students are so blessed to have these 2 guys - they are incredible communicators!!! Stephanie Ford did a Nicole Nordeman tune and nailed it (as usual) and really set up the message perfectly!!

It feels so good to be a part of a church where people let you be you and just show up & worship and giving you your space!! I love NStar so much and this just adds to the list of WHY!

What goes up must come down

Today was the official "taking" down of Christmas day at the house. Anne had the house so beautiful for Christmas but we were so ready for things to return to normal! We have been taking it all down and are now just chilling hard!!

The break continues and we are being total bums and enjoying every minute of it! We have decided to take advice from the classic movie "What about Bob" and Richard Dreyfuss character "Dr. Leo Marvin" who told Bob "Bill Murray" to "Take a vacation from his problems"....We are officially on vacation without leaving our house and have decided to celebrate by eating "take-out" or eating out every night!

We have loved the Wii "tennis" and I dominated until last night when Casey figured out how to smoke me in that too! Stinks - have to find something that I can win!!

Praying hard for the upcoming weekend services - Brad & Nick will be speaking and I know that they are going to be awesome!!

Christmas 2007....

This year was the latest we have EVER slept on Christmas morning (7:15am)....I was crazy tired after our 2 Sunday services and 4 live services on Monday....I was worn out!! Christmas morning was as fun as ever - we love watching the kids open their stuff (especially) since we have been looking forward to playing some of their new toys!! My parents made the trip up from Fayetteville and spent some time with us and Anne's parents and brother & his family spent the day with us. We were bums and did almost nothing except play Guitar Hero & Wii!! I am brutal at both but we have had a blast playing them!! Today I talked some smack to Casey about NCAA 08 Football and he smoked me 3 games in a row....I better keep my mouth shut from here on!

It has been a long time we have just hung out after Christmas and done absolutely nothing...it is actually nice! We finally felt guilty tonight and got out to eat & hit big Target!! It is bad when all of our exercise from 2 days has come from Wii tennis!!

We found out also today that over $95,000 was given to NStar from 2 separate families.....people like this blow me away! Their generosity with the blessings that God has given them blows me away!

Back to bumming.....and waiting for some good football in a few days!!

What a day!!!!

I can't believe.....Christmas eve is no more and the big day is almost here!! I cannot even begin to describe what an amazing day we had at NStar! Our band and technical team got to the campus to start rehearsing at 11am and we walked out tonight around 7pm........long day for our volunteers!! Our staff team arrived around 1pm and did an amazing job creating a great atmosphere to walk in to! We have a bunch of stinkin all-stars that are the best of the best.....

We had no idea what to expect with our 4 services yesterday closing out our "Little Big Town" series and great crowds. Today exceeded our expectations with close to 3,000 people walking through our doors for our 6 services!! Every year I am amazed and seeing a packed room with candles closing out the service never gets old!! If only we carried that light all year - we could really change the dark world we live in!! I love it!!

Christmas Eve 2007 is over....sort of sad.....but it feels good hitting the sack tonight knowing that a bunch of people today heard the "real" Christmas story!!!

Merry Christmas from the Linch family and the NorthStar family and I cannot wait to see all that is in store in 2008!!!

Christmas Eve!

I cannot believe that today is Christmas Eve! We finished our "Little Big Town" series yesterday and get ready today for 6 total Christmas eve services (2:15, 3:30, 4:45 & 6:00) - the 4:45 & 6:00 will also be live in our True North auditorium! It is going to be a blast, the services are always such a rush for me and I love being there all day!!

Alright...one admission that is a little embarrassing....when I look out and see a big 2:15 crowd I will start worrying that there is no one left to come to the others ones....I will do that until we are done at 7pm tonight!!!

Here are a couple of thoughts from the weekend and looking ahead to this week:

• Yesterday I saw some former NStar families that came back for the day and it was so good to see them! These families were part of my life when I was in student ministry and were there when we first started NStar - these folks were a huge part of our lives!
  
• Last night we had dinner with some old neighbors and it was a blast to sit & laugh (and then wonder on the way home if we ran them all off????) We did have so much fun!
• I will leave out shortly to run by the hospital and see one of our NStar team that is there (Nidia Walkup) and then spend the day at NStar......Casey is going with me today - that will make it so much more fun!! It meant a ton that he wanted to come with "old man rivers" and then I found out he was meeting "some friends....female" at the building and hanging with them(their parents are on staff as well)!!!! Too funny!!
• Thanks to J.R. Lee for his kind post today..
• I am putting the finishing touches on my Christmas eve message for tonight...trying to keep it different than our 4 weeks of "Little Big Town" Christmas series...As any pastor knows - that is harder than it sounds!!
  
• Can't wait to start "NorthStar take-out" series which starts January 13!
• Can't wait for Christmas morning!!!! Always a big day at the Linch house!!!

Movie Reviews

Save the money on "the Chipmunks"....pretty bad!!! National Treasure 2 - AMAZING!!! I loved it - as good if not better than the first one!! Great stuff!

Saw a ton of NStar families out today and met the owner of the Mellow Mushroom on Chastain Road, he & his family are members of NStar and I have never met them.....I love meeting people and getting connected outside Sunday!!

What a week!

This week has been a whirlwind!!! We have had something every night and it has been an absolutely crazy week!! Here are some highlights from the week:

• We had a great Management Team meeting on Monday. These are leaders from NorthStar that serve alongside me helping with critical decisions and also accountability as we lead NStar into the future!! Their business wisdom is incredible but their genuine walks with the Lord is even greater!!
• Tuesday I got to enjoy the evening with our Worship Team at the Alliance Theatre on Tuesday night watching "A Christmas Carol"....we had a blast at dinner and the play was great!! We got in some great laughs!!
• I got to have a great lunch on Wednesday with our hospitality team leaders....this team sets the tone each week at NStar in creating an atmosphere that makes it easy for someone to attend for the first time!
  
• Wednesday evening was also our time for our staff/family Christmas party at our True North building....I looked around the room and we have so many amazing people serving with us - they are the best!!
• Thursday, I took the day off and got to attend my daughter's Christmas party at her school. I am a little sad that it will be our last Christmas party......the kids are getting old and so are we!!
• Today we are going to check Casey & Mary-Michal out of school early and go see the "Chipmunks" movie and also "National Treasure 2"....a movie double dip - should be a blast!!!!

• 
  

Rearview Mirror

• Incredible week 3 of Little Big Town.....takeaway of morning "Christmas is about the impossible becoming possible"
• Worship was incredible....as usual!!
• On Saturday, I got to see "Shop with a Warrior" and "Shop with a Mustang" at North Cobb and Kennesaw Mountain High Schools. These 2 schools had over 800 students out to shop with over 4oo under-privileged students from our area. The 2 schools raised well over $60,000 to do the shopping!! Can you believe that....unreal!! NStar got to give $5,000 to each school and help with feeding with NCHS....Marlon, Brad, Lee Ann, Jimmy & Nick did an amazing job with this!!! I was so proud to watch this happen - AMAZING!
• NorthStar this year gave over $30,000 to "Shop with" a Hero, Mustang & Warrior programs along with our people adopting 70+ families for Christmas! Those families represent 600+ people.......this is most giving church I have ever met!!!
• We had our family Christmas party (for the Linch side) on Saturday and it was so fun to see everybody!!
• Just had end of the year Management Team meeting for NorthStar - what an amazing group of leaders that God has assembled here.....I am blown away that I get to serve alongside these awesome men!
• Met a family yesterday that was at NStar for the first time and they are moving in from Maine. They have been listening to the podcast since early fall "Coin series' and have already decided to join us before ever attending their first service!!! Too awesome!
• So proud of our outdoor greeters and parking lot teams yesterday...it was SO cold but they had a smile on their faces and were so incredible!!
• Drove on campus last night for our Student "Fuse" event (my son loved it) and saw all of the cars and it was so cool to know that upstairs in True North Freedom Church was meeting getting ready to launch in January! Glad we could play a part!
• Another week of experiencing God's blessings!
  

Legends

I just got done watching a NFL Films special on: Tom Brady, Brett Favre and Peyton Manning. They titled these 3 QB's as legends and talked through each of their careers. None of these 3 have missed a start since becoming the starting quarterbacks.....unreal!! They are all very different quarterbacks but there a couple of things that they have in common....

• They each took advantage of their shot when they got it!
• They love what they do and it is contagious to their teammates
• They work their tails off and seek to get better each time they take the field

Bet this would work in churches too.......

Marathon

Yesterday I had the chance to meet with some good friends in ministry...(Todd & J.R.) from Freedom Church and Matt Willmington from West Ridge. One of these churches is getting ready to get started and the other is 10 years in and doing great! I made a comment in both of those meeting that we said for years around NorthStar, "It's a marathon not a sprint".....

It is so easy in ministry to do everything in a sprint and not pace our ministries for the long term. I guess one reason is that most Pastors are not around but a few years at a church so you have to hurry to get everything in but I think one's that are in for the marathon really get it done! I think when you are pacing it out you get to enjoy the journey a little more and enjoy the people you are running with a little more!

I love looking at guys like Bill Hybels, Rick Warren, Andy Stanley, Jerry Falwell, Johnny Hunt.......guys who stuck it out and got to see a lot of the fruits of their ministries and see their visions and dreams take shape. These men have sure made a mark and their marathan has influenced and touched so many! I pray that my marathon has half of the impact that their marathon's have had!

I am sorry Mr. Blank

I am so sad for Arthur Blank...a man who bought a brutal franchise and poured his heart & soul into the Atlanta Falcons and he has been slapped at every turn. First, a coach goes on the radio last year and talks about a college job while his team is still playing, his star quarterback goes to prison and now his current Coach jumps ship while the team still has 3 games left! Brutal!!

Mr. Blank, I am a nobody but I have been a life-long Falcon fan and you have done more for this city than anyone can really measure! You don't deserve this - I am so sorry!! Hang in there - find someone who will love this city like you and I bet some championships will be in your future!!

I hope you like the Hogs Coach Petrino - I hope you leave your Falcon gear for our next Coach who really wants to be here!

Praying

My heart is so saddened for what happened in Colorado yesterday with the shootings. Every Pastor thinks at some point of something like this happening, however the reality makes me sick! Though we have officers on campus and in all of our services, you just never know!

So proud

There are times in life that I think it is okay to feel proud....not prideful, because what I want to talk about really has nothing to do with me but rather with others who I get to surround myself with......Here are a couple of things that I am so proud of:

I am so proud of:

• Being at a church that it is FUN to go to and the people who come GET what church is about!!
• Watching our children's ministry team each week make NStar happen (Marsha, Tricia, Terri, Lyndi & Tim) create environments that my even my kids look forward to Sunday mornings!! They are the best!
• Nick & Brad for being "heroes" in the lives of our middle & high school students - they are making our student ministry THE PLACE TO BE!
  
• Ruby, Roach, Randy and Bruce creating multiple areas for people to get connected with other people and begin to grow in the journeys with Christ in smaller environments! Whether it is couples groups, womens groups, mens groups or "growthstarts" gatherings - excellence is always there and people are given the opportunity to grow!
• Greg & Julie for using their experiences in life to help others "survive" their tragedies! These two are making an impact on tons of singles!!
• Bryan, Lee Ann & Jimmy touching college & high school students lives on a day to day basis!
  
• C.A., Nadine & Chris B. for taking ideas in our creative team meetings and putting feet to them and making them look so incredible!! I am blown away by the creative abilities of these three!! If it looks good and you see it or watch it - it was one of them!!
• Daniel, Bonnie, Stephanie, Drew, Greg, Amanda & Winfrey for never letting a Sunday be anything less than a homerun when it comes to what happens in one of our venues! I am amazed at what this team executes week in & week out! There is never a bad week or a slip up - they constantly hit it out of the park and more than that - they live it every day!!
• Jamie & Niki for keeping us between the lines financially and letting me sleep good at night knowing that there are 2 brilliant minds staying on top of our finances! You guys rock!
• Ludell, Paul, Sharon, Emory & Chris G.for sometimes being behind the scenes but always making the details of happen day to day and doing it with such kindness and grace!
• Marlon for being the "go to" guy for NW Cobb County and keeping us "on point" that it is about the "community" and who is not coming!! Marlon truly never stops thinking of ways for us to serve and stay focused!
• Robert, Steve & Carl for keeping our campus "cleaner" than my house and never letting anything be done "less than the best".....I do not know how these guys do all they do!!
• Wally & Nidia leading the charge taking the "love of Jesus Christ" to others in the world!! They love missions and it is contagious!
• Robert Ledbetter for being the Pastor to the people who never get to attend NStar. He & his sweet wife Linda constantly love on people in Assisted Livings, Nursing homes & hospitals......their ability to love is felt wherever they go!~
  
• Kelley for the untold hours of work she puts in to the bookstore and giving people a place to get resources on weekends!!
  
• Our hundreds of NStar volunteers, small group leaders and technical staff that put untold hours into creating a place that OTHERS can "exchange" ordinary living for extraordinary life through the transforming power of Jesus Christ"!!!
• Finally - a wife (Anne) and two kids (Casey & Mary-Michal)who let me be me and who I get to enjoy this journey of life with!!! They are amazing and I truly look forward to coming home every night!!
  

I am so PROUD!!!

Packed out!

Today at NStar we had the 2-5 year olds close out service singing......dude, it was slammed out both hours and our True North was stretched to capacity!! The kids were so cute and great...though this out of the ordinary for us - I am always so glad we do it and I love seeing the parents trying to get a good shot of their kids on stage. It is the only weekend of the year that the front row seats go first!! The morning turned out great on Week 2 of our "Little Big Town" series. Key point today: God still is looking for the insignificant to do something significant through!!

Tonight we have "Couples Night Out" and it is a sold-out event! Can't wait to meet tons of the new people that are attending NStar that I do not know!! I will let you know how it turns out!! Fun night to eat, meet & laugh!!

A New Day

It's a new day on the Flats of Georgia Tech with the hire of Paul Johnson from Navy!! He has been my number one choice from the start He is a proven winner and I think we will have some football days ahead!! I cannot wait for next fall to see what the Jackets look like with their new offensive schemes.....Way to go Jackets!

Blogs

I love that we live in a world where we can learn from the best leaders without ever leaving our home or office! Thanks to all of the great leaders that are bloggers and share their "lives" for free! Everyday I open up my bloglines account and read through 30-40 leaders who are sharing their experience with me!! Many of my favorite blogs are listed on my links!! Thanks everyone for making me stronger & better!!

Last night

For a few years now I have been asked to speak by a local funeral home "Winkenhoffer Funeral Home" at a memorial service they do for families that have lost loved one's this past year. I usually love speaking and look forward to it - but this event is one I love to do but it is so hard. When I stood up last night in front of a few hundred, there were so many sad eyes in the room. There were people in that room that never dreamed in a million years that they would be sitting there without this special person in their life!

What felt so good was to encourage these families to know....The Lord is near and that He will see them through! They may not feel it or think it but it is a fact that God will is right with them and He will see them through!

Though the night was hard - I left there knowing that is what I love to do the most....walk into to people's lives and encourage them to keep going! Easy sometimes....no.....fulfilling....always!

Learning Leadership

Tomorrow our team at NStar will continue our "Learning Leadership" series with Brian Bloye, the Pastor of West Ridge Church in Dallas, GA. I am so excited to have Brian back with our team - Brian is a great leader and has done an outstanding job leading West Ridge into being truly one of the greatest churches in America!

I remember 11 years ago and meeting Brian and him telling me that they were called to Paulding County to plant a church.....honestly, I thought he was crazy!! Dude, was I wrong......Brian & his team have done an amazing job capturing the heart of a community that I really thought was years away from being able to embrace a church like West Ridge!! Just goes to prove - when God lays something on your heart and you know you have been CALLED to a community - do not let anyone or anything deter you!!

It has been great over these past 11 years sort of growing up with Brian in this and watching all God has done at NStar & West Ridge!! Can't wait for tomorrow!!!

BCS

Playoffs......anyone for playoffs??? My sweet precious wife Anne is a ferocious WVU fan and last night was a DARK night for the WVU nation. Our greatest fear was the Dawgs slipping in through the cracks into the National Championship game.....thankfully they are headed to the Sugar vs. Hawaii - should be a fun game to watch!

Wouldn't a playoff be a blast for College football - the best 8-12 teams would have shot to get to the Top 2 spots......that would so rock! For some reason, I do not think the Humanitarian Bowl would be on the playoff list - maybe next year Jackets!!!

Parades & Bullhorns

Today we got up and went to downtown Atlanta for the Scottish Rite Christmas Parade! Mary-Michal's cheerleading squad was chosen to dress like little "Santa Helpers" (elves) and to walk with Santa.....they were adorable!! The crowds downtown were huge with the SEC Championship in town and tons of people there to watch. We are not typically big parade people but we had a blast, especially watching the little kids be mesmerized with everything coming by!!

As Casey & I waited on Mary-Michal's group to come through - we met some great LSU fans who flew in for the game! There was only one "blight" on the day......the bullhorn guy!

Right at the end of the parade route there was a guy on the street corner telling everyone that they were going to Hell and burning there especially since they were there to see Santa....He went on & on and absolutely NOBODY listened other than to just to shake their heads. Honestly, it ticked me off! To all who heard the bullhorn man.....I am sorry!! God is sure not who the "bullhorn" made him out to be!