“Excellence” is one of the many buzz-words at most church plants and self-proclaimed “modern” churches I’ve been exposed to. But there’s one major issue.

What exactly is excellence?

At OneLife, we’ve wrestled with this from the beginning. And one thing that surfaced very early was something I learned from my buddy Bruce Pearl in nearly every interview I heard him do in his first year at UT: It’s all about the process!

If our product (whatever that may be) is excellent but the process to get there is a big ole mess, count me out. It’s fake excellence. What we want is a culture of excellence, not just products of excellence. A culture of excellence will affect everything we do: the staff throughout the week, volunteer expectations, OneLife Kidz, the worship service, and on and on it goes.

This morning I shared with our staff what it is going to take for OneLife to have excellence as a culture and not just a buzz-word. It’s going to take a “that can’t happen!” culture.

In other words, gone are the days of accepting mediocrity in anything we do. When something begins to slip, we must approach it saying “That can’t happen!” When something or someone falls through the cracks, “That can’t happen!” When we begin to accept low-risks instead of trusting our BIG God, “That can’t happen!” When my relationship with God isn’t where it should be, “That can’t happen!” When someone doesn’t view their volunteer responsibilities as if eternity weighs in the balance, “That can’t happen!” And when those pesky details don’t get the attention they deserve, “THAT can’t happen!”

What I’ve learned is that no matter how great things are now and no matter how good we get at making things look good on the surface, if we let this culture erode over time then we will lose our excellence and therefore our effectiveness. No matter how much we say we want excellence, if we accept mediocrity at ANY level it will eat us alive. And that CAN’T happen!

OneLifers, our God deserves our best. We as a staff are committed to helping you and our church give him nothing short of that. And when we see the early signs of it slipping away, we’re gonna commit to this battle cry:

That can’t happen!

This weekend was a fun one! Lots to be excited about.

• On Saturday, we partnered with Angelic Ministries in downtown to serve the homeless community.
• Somewhere between 50 and 60 OneLifers gave up their Saturday to help those less fortunate than we are.
• It was an eye opening experience.
• Each person there has a story, a family, a dream.
• Our band did a great job leading worship at Angelic and I preached a message about not ever being able to earn God’s approval without Jesus.
• There were close to 200 in attendance! It was amazing to see.
• Not only did we provide the weekly worship service, but OneLifers rolled up their sleeves to sort clothing, household items, organize their food serving area, serve food, and clean up.
• It was awesome to read lots of really cool Twitter and Facebook updates of OneLifers whose lives were literally changed by this one experience.
• Then came Sunday and we wrapped up One Prayer with a message called God is…Indescribable.
• It was SOOO good to be back in the saddle preaching after two weeks of video.
• I think I will one day do an entire series dealing with how God truly is indescribable.
• We should be in awe and amazed when we think of Him. NOT complacent or unimpressed.
• This summer has showed us a few areas we need to tweak. Some of our volunteer areas are about to get some extra attention.
• As our church grows, our way of doing things has to change, too!
• We need as many OneLifers as possible to keep the pedal to the metal and help us get to where God is taking us.
• The best is yet to come! Let’s keep our commitment to the vision of reaching this community and beyond.
• Speaking of reaching our community, I got to have a great lunch with a future planter and his wife. They will be moving to Knoxville next year and launching some time in 2012. I left energized about what God is doing and going to do in our city! Follow his blog here.
• A busy week is ahead. Some prayers would be much appreciated!

We are very blessed to have a staff full of people who believe in the vision of OneLife so much that they are willing to be volunteer staff, verrrrrry part-time staff, or bare-bones-living-on-love full-time staff. In fact, talking with a larger church a couple months ago it was discovered that our entire staff gets paid barely more than one pastor at a church they planted.

Now don’t get me wrong. We don’t always want to stay here!

But for now it’s amazing to see people willing to do whatever it takes to see us reach our dreams and goals of being the church God has called us to be. This week we added two more people in official roles. Once again, they are either doing it for free or next-to-nothing!

Dylan Martin – Student Ministry

Dylan started attending OneLife a few months ago and quickly hit the ground running. He has a heart for students like none I have ever seen and over the past couple of weeks has taken this opportunity to run wild with his passion. Dylan has served at several other churches in the role of student pastor and brings that experience to OneLife.

What got me excited about Dylan is his shared passion that he has to lead a ministry that fits what OneLife is already doing. He has no desire to create a “church-within-a-church” kind of student ministry that happens at so many churches. Our student ministry will be small groups based and encourage students to volunteer and serve with other OneLifers.

I don’t think I’ve been this excited since we launched 8 months ago! Contact Dylan at students@onelifeknox.com or call the church office at 865.238.4242.

Ashley Ellis – Assistant to Lead Pastor

Ashley is a life saver! Her job is to protect me from myself. One thing I didn’t anticipate when we launched this church is just how much time I would end up spending on administrative duties and tasks. Things like returning emails, scheduling meetings, tracking expenses, returning phone calls, answering basic questions, etc. that kept me from focusing on studying for Sundays, leading the staff, and doing what only I could do as pastor.

So enter Ashley. She is now managing my calendar, email (which all of you who have waited weeks for a response – if you ever got one – are excited about!), answering basic questions, tracking my credit card receipts (which will also make our bookkeeper very happy…since 3 months of statements are on my desk!) and setting up any meetings that are needed along the way. So basically, if you need me – she is the one to go to! I won’t have a clue otherwise To do just that, email her at pastor@onelifeknox.com or call the church office at 865.238.4242.

I am so thankful for the staff God has brought together at OneLife and their heart to reach the disconnected and unchurched in our community. Why don’t you do me a favor? Visit www.onelifeknox.com/staff and pray for each of these folks. And even though I’m not listed on that same page, I could use a prayer too!

Thanks OneLife. I truly love each of you with all of my heart!

I love starting new series! This one was especially fun for several reasons…

• This is a family series which means we get to be really practical. And what I love about practical series is not that we get a step-by-step, how-to-do-better sermons (those just mess people up!). But we get to really see the heart of God in how he is in control of our lives.
• Being a family series, we wanted to have fun with it. So our awesome creative team branded it “All-American Family Feud.”
• Check out the promo video here for a good laugh: www.onelifeknox.com/series
• And check out the first sermon (at least just the first minute) for the awesome bumper: www.onelifeknox.com/watchonline
• Two services continues to go well. The split was once again dead even this past Sunday. But the second service feels fuller in the auditorium because we have more adults and fewer kiddos.
• Speaking of kiddos, the volunteers back there are wearing it out! 4 kids gave their lives to Jesus this past Sunday!
• Most of our regular band was out but the subs we found did a great job. The first service was honestly a little shaky but the second service was smoking. God was truly worshipped.
• This coming Sunday is Mother’s Day and I am pumped! Since I’ve never been a mother, I’m getting a little extra help to learn what it means to be a godly mother. Come see it for yourself!
• And what if you’re a guy or a female that doesn’t have kids? Come anyway! We all will learn a pretty awesome principle about who God is from this message. Don’t miss it! I promise you will grow.
• Don’t forget to take mom out for lunch, too!

Good intentions aren’t always enough. And my good intentions of keeping the blog updated more often have not been met! So instead of weekly recaps for the last two weeks, here’s a quick recap on the “Healer” series we just wrapped up.

• I think this series caught some people off guard. Because of the name, I think some thought we would talking about physical healing, relational healing, etc.
• However, even though we hit on those subjects from time to time, each week pointed us back to the ultimate healing we all need – healing in our relationship with God.
• Jesus is the only thing that brings this healing!
• We started two services during this series and it was the best thing we’ve done yet.
• The mornings seem so much less stressful. That seems strange because we doubled everything.
• But I think it’s because we all get there 30 minutes later and because all of our volunteers get to attend a “real” service.
• I’ve been amazed at how evenly the two services break down. The attendance is pretty much identical at each.
• The one big difference is the 10:00 crowd is rowdy! Then the 11:30 seems to be the sleepy gang. We’re working on that, though
• Our volunteers have stepped up over the past 4 weeks in incredible ways. All of our children’s areas are fully staffed for both services, set-up and tear-down are both happening in 30 minutes or less (which is MIND BLOWING!), our greeters and parkers create the perfect balance of welcoming without smothering, and most of all they have fun!
• We’ve also started working on some pretty big initiatives for the coming months. Student ministry small groups are about to get fired up, two huge missions opportunities are about to be announced, and adult small groups are in the early stages of being planned for a Fall launch.
• OneLifers, the best is yet to come!!!
• See ya Sunday for the start of a FUN series I am PUMPED about! “All  American Family Feud”
• Be there! Powell HS @ 10 and 11:30 a.m.