Anonymous has left a new comment on your post "Suffragen Bishop Katie, Popcorn Cathedral of Rock,...":
The new CORE logo gets my vote. Cute isn't he.
[GJ - Dude, where's my prize?]
The Suffragen Bishop's Twitter:
@loswhit three pastors from Milwaukee and I want take you to dinner (your choice) on Wednesday after Drive. You game?
about 5 hours ago from Tweetie in reply to loswhit
[GJ - Translation: Katie's Tweet to Carlos Whittaker is an invitation to dinner after Drive 09. Apparently three WELS pastors and Katie are going to Drive 09 together. Carlos is on the staff at Northpoint/Buckhead Babtist Church. Ski went to Drive 08 with John Parlow, a member of the Willow Creek Association.]
About Carlos Whittaker
Carlos Whittaker is an artist, pastor, thinker, experience architect, and Web 2.0 junkie.
Carlos was at Sandals Church in Riverside California where he served for 10 years as the Pastor of Worship and Creative Arts. Sandals Church is an authentic community of believers whose goal is to be real with themselves, others, and God. His passion for leading the church into a relational worship experience each and every Sunday was his hearts goal.
In August of 2007 Carlos and his family made the move from Southern California to Atlanta, GA. Carlos became the Director of Service Programming at Buckhead Church which is one of the three North Point Community Church campuses. He oversees all the Sunday adult experience and design. He directly oversees all areas Hosting, Production, Creative, Video, Music, and Programming at Buckhead Church. He also sits on the creative sermon planning team for Andy Stanley.
Carlos and Heather Whittaker make up a blogging power couple in Ragamuffinsoul.com and Whittakerwoman.typepad.com. They have 3 children. In November 2006 Carlos and his wife Heather adopted their son Losiah from Seoul Korea.
:: This whole Ragamuffin thing is simple. I'm just a screwed up man, in need of adoption, trying to be real. I was poured into, mentored, taught, and sometimes beat into authenticity by my family at Sandals Church. They created this beautiful mess of me and I'm forever grateful.
:: Now in the ATL with my hot wife and kids, I get to create relevant & engaging worship experiences every week. I am being shaped by Jeff Henderson and Andy Stanley at Buckhead Church. From creative sermon planning, to off the hook music experiences. This place is stretching me to my limits and I love it.
:: My life goal is to inspire a movement of authenticity among all generations of Christians that morphs the face of the evangelical church into a place of being real with yourself, others, and God.
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My group does not speak English. How can we make arrangements for translations?
Translation equipment is prohibited during any of the sessions, breakouts or round table discussions. This is due to the disruption to other guests and the possible interference that may occur between translation devices and audio equipment used throughout our facility.
Schedule
Monday, May 4
5:00 p.m.-7:30 p.m. Check-In
7:30 p.m.-9:30 p.m. Main Session One
Tuesday, May 5
8:30 a.m.-9:30 a.m. Breakout Session One
9:30 a.m.-10:00 a.m. Break
10:00 a.m.-11:00 a.m. Breakout Session Two
11:00 a.m.-12:30 p.m. Lunch
12:30 p.m.-1:30 p.m. Breakout Session Three
1:30 p.m.-2:00 p.m. Break
2:00 p.m.-3:30 p.m. Main Session Two
6:30 p.m. Drive Thru
Wednesday, May 6
8:30 a.m.-9:30 a.m. Breakout Session Four
9:30 a.m.-10:00 a.m. Break
10:00 a.m.-11:00 a.m. Breakout Session Five
11:00 a.m.-11:30 a.m. Break
11:30 a.m.-1:00 p.m. Main Session Three
Breakouts Inside Admin
Welcome to a behind-the-scenes look at how we've established our administrative culture. Over the past thirteen years, we have brainstormed, strategized, tweaked, and modified our model. In this breakout, we'll share philosophies, strategies, practices, and processes in an effort to help other churches learn from our successes and failures. We'll also talk about the why behind the things we do.
Teaching That Sticks
What if you could significantly improve how much the people in your ministry learn each week? You'd do it, wouldn't you? As teachers, preachers, and leaders, we often try to pack as much as possible into our lessons, messages, and events. We think we are doing a disservice if we don't "download" all the information we have. More often than not, people leave our environments so overloaded with stuff that they forget what should have been the bottom line. In this breakout, we'll unpack bottom-line communication and discuss how we have implemented this "less is more" strategy in our teaching environments.
From Crib To College
Are you interested in creating a Family Ministry environment that is intentional about what it teaches children and students at every stage of life? Do you believe that the investments into the life of a child from birth to high school have a cumulative effect on that child's spiritual life? In this breakout, we'll share the significant mile markers for each age group and the critical handoffs from one stage to the next.
The Volunteer Experience
Every Sunday, an amazing group of people wakes up early and heads to church. They lead small groups, direct traffic, run cameras, and lead worship. We know we couldn't survive without them. One of the most frequent questions we get is, "Where do you get enough volunteers and what do you do when you get them?" In this breakout, we'll explain how we find, equip, place, inspire, and lead our volunteers to serve strategically.
Developing A Healthy Staff Culture
Whether you intentionally communicate it or not, your staff members know what is valued in your organization by what is celebrated, what happens relationally, and what is questioned consistently. Join us as we talk about how you can deliberately create a healthy staff culture.
Connecting Adults Into Small Groups
For most churches, connecting people into groups is challenging. And for most church attendees, it is confusing. Providing multiple opportunities for an adult to take the next step is the key to assimilation. In this breakout, we'll talk about our assimilation strategy and how events such as NEXT, Fusion, and GroupLink function as steps to connect adults into small groups.
A Starting Point For New Believers
Where in your church can new Christians and non-Christians go to explore faith and experience community? Starting Point groups are safe places for people to ask their questions about God, as well as to learn about the Bible and Christianity. Come learn about Starting Point, a conversational environment where people can explore faith and experience community.
Developing A Small Group Strategy
There is a road map you can follow when developing your small group ministry. In this breakout, we'll talk about the key principles that form the framework of our small group strategy. And we'll discuss how you can contextualize them to your own adult ministry, regardless of the size.
Developing Group Leaders Who Lead Well
Imagine a network of small groups led by people who truly understand their roles, a development strategy that focuses on the irreducible minimums of leadership, and a leader coaching system that actually works. Possible? Absolutely! Join us as we unveil the practices and principles for building an effective leader development strategy.
Student Impact
Some of our best volunteers are high school students. If you walk around our Sunday morning environments, you'll see students running soundboards, leading worship, facilitating small groups, and caring for babies. Find out how we create specific opportunities for students to be connected, grow spiritually, serve strategically, and make a difference in the lives of others.
Multi-Site Strategy
Developing a multi-site strategy can sound complicated. But it can also be the key to leveraging the abilities of your leaders to reach even more people in your community and beyond. How do you determine if multi-site expansion is right for you? What are your expansion options and which is best for your organization? Which practices are integral to your DNA, and which ones are optional? In this breakout, we'll share what we are continuing to learn about multi-site strategies.
Guest Services
We want everyone who walks through our doors each Sunday to feel like an invited guest. Our volunteers and staff are consistently challenged with the task of removing obstacles that would keep a guest from having a great first experience. Find out what it takes to make a positive first impression as you walk with us from the parking lot to the children's environments to a seat in the worship service.
Worship Service Programming Model
It's the number one question on all of our minds: "Sunday's coming and what are we gonna do?" Our programming team has developed a strategy that makes planning the worship services fun and exciting. We'll walk you through the process from creation to implementation . . . and everywhere in-between.
Memorable Experiences
What do people remember after they leave your environments? For the last thirteen years, we've been creating, evaluating, and recreating ministry environments that keep people coming back. In this breakout, we'll pass on the key principles we use to create memorable experiences.
Putting A Creative Idea To Work
Have you ever had a great idea and wondered how to actually make it happen? The secret to moving from a great concept to a highly effective product lies within the creative process. We'll help you move from the brainstorming phase to the actual implementation of the idea.
The North Point Model
This session is designed to give you a look at the founding principles of North Point Ministries and the philosophies that shape our environments. We'll explain our mission and strategy and encourage you to clarify your mission, fine-tune your strategy, and focus your environments.
Essentials For Leading Student Small Groups
The 5 Essentials are vital ingredients of our student ministry's small group leader training. These simple but rich values describe how our best volunteers positively influence students in our ever-changing culture. In this breakout, we'll share with you the insight we have gained from conversations with our most effective leaders.
Round Table Discussions - As an alternative to attending one of your breakout selections, you can choose to attend a round table discussion on a very specific topic. Groups will be limited in size to maximize discussion time. Topics have been chosen based on your input and roles of those attending. You can discuss anything you want concerning the discussion topic with the staff and other leaders at your table. Our hope is that you will walk away with your specific questions answered and some real, practical implementation strategies. Tickets for the Round Table Discussions will be available at the Ticket Exchange Stations at the conference.
Click here to download this information as a PDF file.
Pricing and Policies Early Bird ($239) through February 15
Regular ($269) from February 16 through April 20.
Pricing includes conference materials, snacks, lunch and dinner on Tuesday, and lunch on Wednesday. Transportation is not included.
Terms and Conditions, Cancellation Policy - Please note that a full refund less $50 per person will be given for cancellations made on or before April 1, 2009. There will be no refund for cancellations made after April 1, 2009, or for no-shows. Registrations may be transferred from person to person within your group or organization at no charge. Transferring or selling your registration to anyone outside of your church or organization will forfeit your entire registration. Registrations are not transferable to future conferences. All cancellations must be made online at www.driveconference.com. Please do not ask the Drive staff to make exceptions to this policy.
Payment - Payments may be made by Visa, MasterCard, or check. For credit card payments, the full amount will be charged to your account at the time you register. For check payments, you will be emailed an invoice for the full amount due when you register. We must receive a check for the full amount due within 10 days or your seat will be released without notification.
If you elect to pay by check and then cancel your seats before your check has been received, you are still obligated to pay the cancellation fees ($50 per person for cancelled seats before April 1 or the full conference fee for cancelled seats on or after April 1).
Waiting List - Once we have reached our maximum conference capacity, a waiting list will be opened. Names will be added to the list in the order they are received, and they will be removed from the list in the same order as space becomes available. Priority will not be given to churches or organizations that already have a group attending or those who have already purchased airline tickets. PLEASE BE SURE THAT YOUR CONFERENCE REGISTRATION IS CONFIRMED BEFORE PURCHASING AIRLINE TICKETS.
Registration Fees - Price includes registration fees, conference materials, and snacks on Tuesday and Wednesday.
Please register early to ensure your spot and to have the best breakout selections for Drive 09.
North Point Community Church
4350 Northpoint Parkway
Alpharetta, GA 30022
Drive 08 Highlights - Ski's Blog.
Registration for DRIVE 2009 is now closed. Registration for DRIVE 2010 will open on Monday, May 4.
Is there a discount for churches that use 252 Basics or First Look?
These two curriculums are produced by an organization called "The reThink Group," which is not a part of North Point Ministries. Therefore, we are unable to provide any discounts for anyone who uses their products.
So it is the end of ‘08.We are choosing to trim in ‘09 as an organization in lieu of the current economic slump.This isn’t rocket science.It needs to happen.One of the ways that my dept and others are choosing to save is by not catering for Christmas parties and having pot lucks in each others.
"I'm Doug Englebrecht, in charge of doctrinal discipline in my district. Oh yes, the COP expressed concern...that they weren't going too!"
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Anonymous has left a new comment on your post "Suffragen Bishop Katie, Popcorn Cathedral of Rock,...":
Ok, Ichabodians,
Let's presume a church's website reflects a bit about the people that worship there. Perhaps as Lutherans we can associate with calling it an outward "confession" of the congregation. "This is what we believe..."
Here are the two church home page websites of the fellow that three WELS pastors and the Bishop of Butter want to take out for dinner, or as it used to be known "break bread with." Mr. Whittaker is "Director of Service Programming" at Buckhead and he is on the creative sermon team for Andy Stanley.
http://www.buckheadchurch.org/
http://www.northpoint.org/
Ok class, you seen those two websites. What is missing? What extremely important 'confession' is missing from those homepages? Is the name of any particular Savior missing entirely? What does that congregation emphasize to world instead?
Based on what they show to the world, assess what appears to be more important to that congregation: music concerts or Christ.
No wonder Ski wanted the big screen and subwoofers.
+Diet O. Worms
***
GJ - Somewhere on the Northpoint Babtist Church websty there is a page opposing infant baptism. The WELS workers going to Drive 09 are saying by their attendance and fees, "We agree. Infants cannot believe and baptism is just an ordinance to be obeyed by man." As Ski observed ecstatically at Drive 08, they worship with the Babtists.
