church planting

I hope you begin to see the trend that I (Josiah) spend most of my time each day serving at Chili’s.  Here’s another story of how God’s working in our lives in Orlando.

At the end of my shift I had a table sit down and order Chicken Fried Chicken.  I rang in Country Fried Steak b/c I’m human and I make mistakes.  The food comes out and the three ladies look at it and say, “This isn’t what we ordered.”

No harm so far.  We weren’t busy.  Their food came out literally five minutes after they ordered.  I had my manager swing by and talk to them and we got them their correct order in a matter of 5-10 minutes.  They were still working on their salad and black beans so they weren’t without food at any point.

I bring out their correct order and magically there aren’t any mashed potatoes on the plate.  The lady to my right says, “You got it wrong again, there aren’t any mp’s.”  The lady to my left says, “Stupid.”  (Under her breath but loud enough for me to hear)

I’m furious.  I don’t show it.  I smile and say I’ll be right back with that.  They had mp’s in a matter of 40 seconds.

I continue to wait on them, anticipating their needs with refills and boxes and the whole nine yards.  I figure, I’m not going to let a grumpy old lady steal my joy for the day.

I bring the check and they pay with 100$ bill.  NOTE*  If you go out to eat and your bill is less than 50$  do NOT pay with 100$ bill.  We’re not a bank, we don’t have that kind of cash in our server books at 1pm, especially when everyone else is paying with debit cards.  It’s a huge hassle.

Anyway, I finally scrounge up their change and bring it to them with To-Go drinks.

They leave.

I go to the table to collect the tip but………………there is no tip.  There’s no tip.  They ran up a 50$ check and stiffed me.

I’m fuming.

I look out and see the ladies walking to their van.  On this van, neatly placed on the right side is a Jesus Fish.  Just like this car.

You can only imagine what’s running through my head now.  As I begin to sift through my thoughts to pick an appropriate one to attach to these ladies I look down and see this.

That’s right.  They left their take out boxes full of their left over food.  (There was a lot of it.)

I look out the window and see the ladies having a nervous conversation looking back towards the restaurant wondering if they can sneak back in knowing full well what they just did.

Then it hits me.

I grab the box and run out to their car and say, “Hey ladies!  You forgot your take out food!”  They say anxiously, “yes……yes we did, didn’t we?”  I reply, “I like your Jesus fish.”  ”You do?”  ”Yes ma’am, I’m a Pastor.”

Silence.

“Oh really?”  ”Yes ma’am, well you all have a great day!”

I watched those women talk to each other in bewilderment for the next five minutes as I cleaned their table.  They never came back in and tipped me, I didn’t even really care about the tip that much.  What I did care about was the example I got to set for my co-workers.  I spent the next ten minutes telling and retelling my story to my teammates and they laughed hysterically!  They couldn’t believe, first of all, that I would take those ladies their food after they had stiffed me and then they couldn’t believe how foolish those women must have felt after they received the knowledge that they had just stiffed a local Pastor waiting tables to scrape by.

I had a choice.  I could have cussed those women and bad mouthed them to my teammates and just been another disgruntled server, or I could swallow my pride, take those women their take out food and set an example for my friends at Chili’s that even when people treat you unfairly, you can still love them while exposing their wrong doing without hurting them.

I hope those women learned a valuable lesson today.  As Christians, how can we go to a restaurant, run up a 50$ bill and then not be gracious to the person who served us that meal?  You don’t have to tip 30% to show how awesome Christians are when they go out to eat.  Just be patient, kind, gentle, and generous and maybe people will recognize you by your love.

One thing you all should know about servers at restaurants is this……it’s going to sting…..are you ready?

If you’re not a regular (someone who comes in the same time ever week and sits in the same section and orders the same thing)……if you’re not a regular, your server doesn’t care about you.  It’s nothing personal, actually that’s sort of the gist of it.  Guests are merely dollar signs to servers.  Sure they’ll treat you like kings and queens but as soon as that credit card receipt is signed you’re simply taking up precious space until the next party of four dollars sits down.  Is this taught by the companies/restaurants in training?  No.  This is an unspoken norm that I see played out every day.  I’m ashamed to say that I get caught up in it.

One night, a week or so ago I had two people sit in my section.  It was close to closing time, I was tired, I wanted to go home and be with my wife….needless to say, I didn’t care about these people.  I walked up to greet them, put on my fake server smile and asked if I could get them something to drink.  The guy informed me that he was an employee of Chilis.  That changed everything.  Employees get 50% off their bill and usually tip really good so my demeanor shifted a little.  I was refilling drinks, chips and working my tail off for that one table because the little dollars just turned into bigger dollars.

Later in the meal I stopped by to see if they needed anything.  The girl had gone to the restroom and the guy looks up at me and says, “Hey man, sorry I’ve had such a bad attitude this entire meal.  I got some really bad news today.”  Oh no.  This isn’t good.  My dollars were turning back into people.  People with real problems, real families and real souls.  I had a choice.  I could blow it off and say, “sorry bro, more sweet tea?” or I could truly serve “the least of these.”

I said, “I’m so sorry man, what happened?”  He said that he just found out that he got rejected by the law school he’s been dreaming of going to since he was a little boy.  I replied, “Wow.  That’s awful man.  Well, I know some people with connections to some great schools in Georgia.  I’m a pastor, here’s my card.  Call me and we’ll grab coffee or something and talk about what’s next for you.”  He looks up at me, “You’re a pastor?  Me and my girlfriend have been looking for a church to go to around here.”  From there on I told him about Crosspointe and where we meet.

I’m not sure if that guy will come to church, or even call to talk about what’s next in life for him.  I’m not sure if that was even the reason for the lesson I learned that evening.  I am convinced of one thing though, we all get caught up in whatever it is that we do and devalue people.  Pastors devalue people to numbers.  Serves devalue people to dollars.  Politicians devalue people to votes.  So how do we change that?  How do we see the value in people?

We serve them.  Whether it be with time, money, work or refills of sweet tea, we serve them.

35 For I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me drink, I was a stranger and you welcomed me, 36 I was naked and you clothed me, I was sick and you visited me, I was in prison and you came to me.’ 37 Then the righteous will answer him, saying, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you drink? 38 And when did we see you a stranger and welcome you, or naked and clothe you? 39 And when did we see you sick or in prison and visit you?’40 And the King will answer them, ‘Truly, I say to you, as you did it to one of the least of these my brothers, you did it to me.’

Matthew 25:35-40

Love,

Josiah and Jordan

In Exodus 17:8-13 there’s a story of perseverance in which the armies of Amalek and Israel fought with one another.  Moses instructed Joshua to choose men personally to go and fight with  him.  The deal was that Moses had to lift his hands (in which he held his staff) above his head, raised and the Israelites would win.  If he lowered them, the Israelites would lose.  Short version of the story-Moses raised hands, he grew weary, Aaron and Hur each held one arm up, Joshua cleaned house with his sword and God facilitated the win.

Last week I was working a shift at Chili’s and the night came to a close.  If you’ve never worked at a restaurant, here’s a look into what happens at the end of the night.  It’s insane.  The servers are taking care of their last tables while doing sidework (i.e. cleaning drink stations, salsa cooler, chip machine, trays, trivets, soup station, dessert station) and trying to clean their tables, all so they can roll two buckets of silverware before they can go home to their families or cats.  All the while, the bartender is cleaning the bar, the bussers are taking out the trash, cleaning the bathrooms and bussing tables, and the kitchen is cleaning all the grills, fryers, bowls, utensils and well……it’s chaos.

I walked back to my manager’s office to cash out for the night and we begin talking about Jesus, life, Christianity, and the church.  This is all fairly normal as the relationship I’ve developed with my boss has basically become a really great Q&A concerning the Gospel.  My boss begins to tell me about his life and the things he’s going through with his family and work and basically let’s me know he’s broken.  I assured him that we’re all broken and in need of Christ.  I explained God’s sovereignty and how He’s way ahead of us and is already putting into place things in our lives to draw us closer to him.  I shared 1 Peter 5:5 with him and explained the difficult process of how getting walked on glorifies God.

After talking I asked if I could pray with him.  He said yes.  So amidst the chaos of the restaurant closing, I laid hands on my boss and prayed for him.

God is moving in Orlando to redeem this city.  God is using Crosspointe Church to reorient people to the gospel, and God is using simple servers at Chili’s to pray over their bosses  prayers of healing and grace.  This is all being facilitated by and through your prayers and your giving.  Thank you for trusting God and supporting us.

Love,

The Potters

I’ve heard a story told in pictures communicates far more than words so I’m going to heed that phrase and instead of describing how our first Sunday service went I’m going to let you see how it went.  God blessed us and brought us more than we expected; in people, in ministry opportunities, in community and in grace.  Here’s a peak into our first Sunday.

Brent and me figuring out last minute tech stuff for worship and teaching.

Brent and me testing the mic for recording and Jared & Jocelyn & baby Hudson looking over the seating arrangement.

Shot from the back of the room.

Where the body of Crosspointe Waterford Lakes worships.

Praying over the night.

Community

Jordan already has a big children’s ministry!!!  Six children!!!

The first worship at CPWL.

Out of the 32 people that God brought us that night, 5 were orphans from a foster care home.  They were awesome students and so much fun to talk to and be around!

Jared teaching the gospel.

Children’s ministry in full effect.

God is so good.  We are so thankful for your support and prayers.  Keep coming back for more weekly updates on what God is doing in Waterford Lakes!!!!

Love, The Potters

This past weekend Jordan and I went to Waterford Lakes to celebrate Kelly Allen’s birthday, Jocelyn Davis’ baby shower and hopefully lease a house in Waterford.

This is Crosspointe’s Lake Nona Campus where we worshipped and heard the Gospel from Pastor Chan Kilgore.

Here’s Sydney the proud big sister of Brody.  They’re Rob and Kellie’s children.

Who would’ve thought I’d reconnect with my dear friend JT Dellis in Orlando!?  God is moving and shaping JT in amazing ways!!!!

Here’s Jo at Disney.  She loves Disney!

Here’s the Allen/Potter/Davis clan at Disney.  We’re excited about sharing the Gospel with these people!

Our Saturday was filled with appointment after appointment on every half hour with realtors and home owners that Jordan skillfully planned down to the minute from 9am-4pm.  After hours of searching and taking photos and reviewing and praying we finally decided upon a house!!!  Here it is!

Above is the neighborhood we’ll be living in.  From what the neighbors tell us it’s filled with young families, UCF graduates and students!

Above is the front of our house.  We are thankful that it will have enough space to host Bible Studies/Small Groups and it fit our housing budget perfectly!

Above is a lake near our house.

These are the roads that weave in and out of Waterford lakes.  There are lots of little playgrounds like this in the area.  The one below happens to be immediately off of our cauldesac.

We are so thankful for God’s providence in bringing us to Waterford Lakes.  It’s been an exteremely difficult six months and not how we would’ve pictured our first six months of marriage but God has proved over and over again that He is faithful and continues to guide us as we seek Him in everything we do!

Our next step is Jordan graduating from Palm Beach Atlantic University on December 19th!  After that we will drive up and begin our lives in Waterford Lakes, spreading the Gospel of Jesus Christ to everyone.

We are currently 30% supported and are praying for God to provide 75% support by Christmas!  The more we are supported the more we are freed up to minister to Waterford Lakes so if you have a moment today, pray about partnering with us in ministry and God’s redemption of Orlando.

We love you all!

Josiah & Jordan

So over the last few weeks God has shown us how faithful He is over and over and over!

Jordan has been busy nannying and going to school full time and is almost finished with her Bachelor’s degree in Christian Leadership and Josiah has been asked to speak all semester at TNL presents The Anchor at Palm Beach Atlantic University as well as lead worship for the FCA chapels on friday mornings.

God has also been using us at Truth Point Church in West Palm Beach which just had it’s first Sunday in Bear Lakes Middle School a couple weeks ago!  It’s been a wonderful win-win situation where God has provided us a place to serve and be ministered to at the same time!  Here’s a photo from the first Sunday!

The biggest thing that God has been challenging us to do is to surrender everything we want to worry about to Him.

Money—->worry—->surrender—–>God provides

House—->worry—–>surrender—–>God sells it in 3 days

A place to live in waterford lakes—–>currently surrendering that to Him

As full time missionaries now the biggest concern is how we will afford to live in this American society without getting full time jobs on top of our full time calling/job.

Thankfully Jesus has been providing for us and showing us that He will choose who He wants to support us with.

The first thing people tell you when you are about to ask friends & family for support is; ‘Make sure you send letters to people who have a lot of money!‘ and while that is tempting we choose to prayerfully consider who we send letters to and trust that God will take care of the $$.  Here’s a perfect example.

This is Taylor.

She is one of my guitar students and has been taking lessons for about six months now and she’s getting quite good at her instrument!  I had the joy of meeting Taylor and her family at the last church I served at and am so thankful for them as they have been so supportive of Jordan and I in our transitional season.

One day Taylor came for her lesson and when she was about to leave, she handed me two envelopes.

Two envelopes? I  thought.  Hmmm….maybe we missed a week of lessons and I forgot about it. Nope.

This is the envelope.

That’s right.  In parenthesis it reads “My God money”

We were so touched by Taylor’s love and support and this was just another HUGE reminder that God’s going to use the ‘least of these’ to give Him glory.

As we continue to take steps in the direction that God’s leading us in we are constantly reminded of His love and grace and provision as we seek His glory in planting in Orlando.

Thank you to all who have supported us and are continuing to support us in this next season!  We love you and are praying for you!

Love,

The Potters

It has been a crazy couple weeks and Jordan and I have been in awe of God’s faithfulness and providence!

We just signed the papers to sell our house in Boynton Beach!!!  We listed it Wednesday night, had an offer made Saturday night and are faxing the signed papers today!

People talk about the economy and housing market as if God is God of everything else but those areas.  God is the God of the universe and as hard as it was to surrender the house (our greatest anxiety) to Him, when we did He took care of it.  Not only did He take care of it, but He decided to do it in 5 days!!!  We will be emailing everyone our new mailing address for Nov/Dec when we find out where we’ll be.

We traveled to Tampa this past weekend to celebrate the 10 year mark of Fresh Start Church.  While we were there we got to cast the vision of Crosspointe Waterford Lakes and learn from people who have been planting for years.  Fresh Start was so gracious to us and we are so thankful for them.  Here’s a shot of Scott Welch at the celebration dinner.

We’ve been receiving postcards these past few weeks from supporters and ministry partners and are so thankful for all of you who supporting us as we heed God’s call for us to share the Gospel of Jesus Christ in Orlando!

In the meantime, Jordan has been finishing up her classes at PBAU and working and Josiah has been leading worship for a church plant in West Palm called Truth Point.  Josiah met the lead pastor, Jeremy, while hanging out with Jared in Boca a few weeks ago.  Jeremy was in need of a worship leader and offered Josiah a chance to begin leading worship again and getting acclimated to leading a small church of about 12.  God once again showed His grace in orchestrating that situation because it’s been a very helpful part in our process of transitioning to Orlando.  Josiah was also asked to lead worship at PBA for the FCA chapels this fall as well as speak at TNL, the thursday night college ministry.

Let me (Josiah) take a moment and just brag about my wife because she is the reason we sold the house!  Jordan continues to keep us very organized and has been looking at houses in waterford lakes non stop trying to find the place that God wants us to live in.  She’s been an amazing help in taking a lot of stressful things (that i’m not good at anyway!) and taking them on her shoulders while being a full time student and working full time.  We’ve only been married four months and it’s been the most amazing four months of my life.  We keep hearing how the first year of marriage is  the hardest, and well….if this is the hard part then we are SO pumped about the future because it’s been awesome being married!  Love and respect people.  Love and respect.  It works.

Prayer-

We are looking for a room to rent from Nov 1-Dec 20 so if you know of anyone in the WPB area that could help us out we’d love it!

The Crosspointe Leadership.  God is still moving and providing the people He wants to use at Waterford and we ask that you all be in prayer about those people and that they would feel and hear God speaking into their hearts,

Support.  We have about 25% of our support raised and hope to be fully supported by Nov. so we can begin to fully focus on planting and hit the ground running when we arrive in January.

Thank you all so much!

Love, The Potters

We know online giving is a new thing in the church realm and we had a lot of questions ourselves about what happens and how to do it.

Here is a step by step instruction guide to giving to the Potters through Crosspointe church online.

FAQ’s

*When do you get the online support? Once payment is received, the accounting office at Crosspointe cuts and mails us a check.

*Is it tax deductible? Yes.  When you login you will see your contribution schedule and a year to date contribution history and total for your records.

Step 1: Go to the Crosspointe Church Website and click on ‘Give’ in the upper right hand corner

Step 2: Click on the ‘click here’ button to give online or simply mail your contribution to the address provided

Step 3: If you are a new user, click on the ‘create account’ button

Step 4: Fill out the information sheet (this is all strictly confidential)

Step 5: This is where you can either give a one time gift or schedule a monthly contribution.  Click ‘Individual Support’ next to ‘Fund’ and then click ‘Josiah Potter’ next to ‘Sub Fund.’ After that you can choose what day you would like to give and then fill out your Billing Info.  Below you will be able to keep track of your schedule and history with a year to date total at the very bottom.

Thank you all so much for your support!  Please continue to keep us in your prayers!

Our immediate requests are

*Sell our home in Boynton Beach Florida

*Find a house to rent in Waterford Lakes that is big enough to have meetings/small groups in

*That God will provide 100% support by November

Blessings,

The Potters

As you may or may not know; I was asked to step down at The Journey Church and have been replaced.  This was not how I envisioned leaving The Journey, but I do have a choice in HOW I leave. I get to choose my response. We all get to choose how we respond to something that comes our way. We get to choose our response and in the end that may be the most important choice of all.

The best part about all of this is that God has been in all of this, directing it, guiding it and putting things in place I cannot even see right now.  The beauty of the situation is that two months ago Jordan and I began praying to consider joining Jared and Jocelyn Davis in planting with Crosspointe Church in Orlando and little did we know God had already provided for that!

What this means…

We need to sell our house.  3/2 in Boynton Beach Florida.

We are going to be 100% financially supported by givers and hope to be supported fully by November 1st. (Think American Missionaries)

We need to find a house in Orlando to rent and move in by January 1st 2010.

Please pray for us as we listen to God’s call for our lives and if you are interested in supporting us please let us know and we will send all the info to you and come visit with you as well!

Grace and peace,

Josiah

This is my little buddy Elisha.  His mommy and daddy Amy and Roger are long time friends.

Elisha loves Jesus and he loves worship!