Amazing really. We pulled off our very first preview service without a hitch. 51 people came! I am overwhelmed with the show of support from RCC Lewiston and Mount Helena Community Church, not to mention our own team. Thank you everyone for making this such a successful event! We couldn’t have done it without you. I bet we had 1000 man hours into this event. I’m sure we’ll become more efficient with our next service. We need to, because we’re exhausted!

We really had a good time, and were able to connect with several new families that seem to be interested in River City Church. That is what this service was all about, connecting with people. Our new facility worked out great. Thank you Brent, Lona, and the rest of the YFC staff for all of your help. We can’t wait to see this facility completed. It’s going to be a great outreach to the community. I’ll be sharing more later about what we learned and I’ll even include some photos of the event. I’m already looking forward to July 26th!

One of the things RCC wants to do is make a visible, practical impact on the city of Missoula. We decided a few months ago that it would be cool to partner with a major grocery store in town and to give away as many groceries as we could for a day. Well, it looks like Rosauers is on board! (thank you Jamie). The manager sounded really excited about partnering with us. The plan is this: RCC is going to give away $5000 in $25 gift cards to be used in Rosauers. We are also going to have the Missoula Food Bank on site that day, so if people want to donate their cards or food to them they can. We are asking Rosauers to match our donation, so hopefully we’ll be giving away $10,000 in food! This is going to be awesome. A lot of people are going to be blessed. I’ll keep you posted.

Our first official gathering is this Saturday at the new City Life Community Center! We are so stoked! I feel like I hardly slept last night as I was thinking of everything that has to come together to make this work. Thankfully, I’ve only got a small part to play. I’ve got an awesome team of people who are taking care of media, music, logistics, greeting, nursery, kid way, BBQ, etc!!! It’s so nice to be able to sit back and know that everything that needs to get done is going to get done. I can’t wait to meet everyone who comes this Saturday. We’re going to have a good time together as I share the vision of River City Church and we eat together down at Boyd Park. Feel free to call me (877-836-8226) if you have any questions about this Saturday. See you there!

It’s official. I’ve received my first hate mail. I think it’s a right of passage of sorts for pastors. Funny thing is, it wasn’t even directed at me. Actually, it wasn’t very funny really. In fact, it was very hurtful and full of lies. My biggest mistake…I read it. I should have known better, since there was no return address. There was also no signature, just an anonymous letter. I happen to know based on the contents of the letter that it wasn’t from anyone I know. Now, it was so ridiculous that I didn’t take it to heart for even one second. I threw it right into the trash. However, I realized that if I were to get 1 or 2 of these a week, they might start to get to me. Particularly if they were directed towards me. There’s nothing healthy about reading garbage like that.

So, I’ve implemented my first official policy regarding communications at RCC: I will no longer read nor open any mail that does not have a return address. It will go directly into my hunting pack to be used at my discretion as fire starter or toilet paper. Emails may be a little harder to weed out, but they will likely be from some email address I do not know and may not have a subject line. I wish I could put these in my hunting pack too, but they’ll just have to go in my trash folder. I’m going to recommend to our team that they adopt the same policy regarding letters and emails from unknown senders.

Here’s the issue: I’m about building a church community based on authentic relationships. I know most of us don’t like conflict, but it’s a necessary evil of healthy relationships. If we’ve got something we need to work out, then by all means let’s work it out. The only way to do that is through dialogue. Face to face is best. Those are the rules for being a part of the community.

So here’s a notice to chronic complainers, naysayers, and downright mean people: If you have something to say, say it to my face. If you don’t have the courage to do that, give me a call (it’s toll free 877-836-8226). If you lack even that small shred of bravery, do everyone a favor and go to www.ventpost.com and vent your frustrations there. At least someone might read it if you post it there.

BTW, if you send me an anonymous letter, could you send it on soft tissue paper?

We made it to Missoula on Wed eve, and we’re starting to feel like we’re getting settled in. It was snowing the first day we came into town, and then raining like cats and dogs. It finally cleared up today and was 75 degrees. I took the boys up Rock Creek today, which is more like a raging river, and Jordan caught his first brown trout. I really needed to get out in the woods and unwind. We saw a bunch of deer, and about 30 bighorn sheep. You gotta love that!  We’ve met most of our immediate neighbors thanks to Andrea. It’s been so cool, 2 of the families have been looking for a church. I guess that’s God’s way of reminding us that He’s got us here for a reason (as if we would forget). We’ve been scoping out the new building and making plans for our first service in 2 weeks. We can’t wait!

We’re planning a Man vs Wild sermon series on Surviving the Jungle of Life starting in September. We’ll be doing a Can You Survive? campaign, and we have a website CanYouSurvive.org that we are going to post this video on. After the video plays, the visitor will be routed directly to rccmissoula.org website for more info on our church. We’ll probably be adding more to it as the summer progresses, but for now this is what I have. Make sure the volume is turned up so you can hear the music.

Today is our last day at River City Church here in Lewiston. I’ve been reflecting on all of the different churches that I’ve been a part of over the last 25 years, and I can see how God has purposely used all of the people in our lives to shape us into who we are today.

His Place Foursquare

This is the church that I grew up in and where I first met Jesus. It was the first church that I stepped foot in that I can vividly remember sensing a strong presence of God right from the get go. Larry Wersen was the senior pastor, and his son Bruce was the youth pastor. Both of these guys had an unbelievable impact on my life. Larry was such a down to earth guy, and an avid outdoorsman, which appealed to me. He was never afraid to tell all of the crazy stories from his past, and he always ended them with how God totally changed him. Bruce was about the funnest guy around, and genuinely cared about all of the kids around him. He would ask me every week, “So Brian, how are you doing?”. I would answer, “Fine”. Then he would say, “Really?” as if somehow he knew I wasn’t fine. In fact, I was starting to experiment with drinking and was slipping into the party life. I couldn’t figure out how he knew, but he did. Bruce is now the senior pastor of that church. Thank you Larry, Bruce, Ken, Kurt, and all of the other wonderful people at His Place! You taught me that church life is supposed to be fun!

Pullman Foursquare

I went through about 10 years where I didn’t serve the Lord, but rather served myself by partying constantly. That ended abruptly in 1994 when God intervened in my life. Andrea and I started attending Pullman Foursquare. Our first Sunday, we were mobbed by well meaning students inviting us to their small group. These people were obsessed by small groups! We held them off for about 3 Sundays, then we were tricked into bringing olives to one of their dinners. We had to show up. We learned the value of small groups at Pullman Foursquare under the leadership of Dan Smith and Steve Reames. I’m so grateful that those crazies kept inviting us to their group, even though we really didn’t want to come. Thank you Dan and Steve for your passion for people and small groups!

Desert Spring Foursquare

We moved to Oregon after college and began attending Desert Spring. Dave and Kelley Eshleman immediately began courting us (by Dave taking me fishing and Kelley hanging out with Andrea). We became part of the leadership team there and ultimately launched a small groups program. It was an exciting time for us and helped to anchor our passion and conviction for small groups. Dave’s unique way of teaching helped to ground me in the Word, and gave me a passion for teaching the Word. It was here that I received my calling to plant churches. I’ll never forget all of the people and experiences that helped us grow at Desert Spring. Thank you Dave and Kelley and all of the other people we love at Desert Spring!

River City Church

You would have thought we’d have found another Foursquare church when we moved to Lewiston, but the week we were visiting looking for a church, Foursquare was having a leadership convention in Oregon and none of the pastors would call us back. Go figure. Instead we found River City Church and Ron King. The minute I met Ron I knew he was our kind of guy, and the minute we stepped foot into RCC, we knew it would be our home for a while. One of the things that we weren’t prepared for was the grace that flowed in this church. It was so thick it was almost overwhelming! I didn’t realize that I had a fair bit of legalism in me, and God was going to use the people of RCC to beat it out of me. I’ve also learned the value of team here at RCC. Nothing is done here without a team, thus we are planting a church using the team approach. I wouldn’t do it any other way. Maybe that’s just me. There are so many people that have influenced our lives here at RCC and through Lifelinks, I couldn’t begin to list them all! Thank you Ron King and Kevin Beeson, and the rest of RCC and Lifelinks! I’m proud to say I’m a DORK (Disciple of Ron King)!!!

Of course this is just a small smattering of the people who have helped us get to where we are today. There have literally been hundreds of people who have mentored us, allowed us to mentor them, and just stood beside us as God has grown the vision for church planting in us. Thank you everyone!

We’re going to be meeting for the first time on Saturday, June 28th at 6pm at the brand new City Life Community Center. Following the service we’re going to do a BBQ at our place for anyone who wants to join us and get to know us a little better. Our goal for this service is this: to communicate the vision of RCC to anyone and everyone who may want to be a part of this new church community in Missoula. It’s going to be a casual atmosphere, both at the service and at the BBQ. We’ll be doing a full service, with music, Kid Way, and Tiny Town. If you’re interested come on down and check us out at 1515 Fairview Ave. The BBQ will be at 2787 Westminster Dr at around 7:30pm. Hope to see you there!

We’re moving to Missoula on June 11th. It’s so ironic, we had decided to wait until the house sold and we had stopped looking for rentals in Missoula. Then, while we were over there this week we drove by a house with a For Rent sign in the yard. We called and it was the perfect situation for us: 6 month lease, in the right school district, nice home, 2 blocks from the Beesons. Better yet, we had favor with the owner and he didn’t even take an application, he just handed us the lease to sign!

So, even though our house hasn’t sold, we’re moving in faith. Our hearts are for Missoula and it’s just too hard sitting here in Lewiston with nothing to do. It’s go time!