lion chasing - big & tall style, PART 2

we finally found someone here at hpc who can wear the batterson lion chaser shirt. (check out PART 1 here.)

man, i wish today was yesterday

this is the team i'm taking to mozambique

pray for me.

lion chasing - big & tall style

mark batterson sent us a few really cool t-shirts with this slammin' lion-chaser logo on them with a very batterson-esque a/f gap feel and look. too bad they were L and XL (just a size or two too small.)


me and a pastor from hpc who chose to remain anonymous modeling our new attire

mark - i'm wearing mine to the buzz conference, dude.

tweezerblog

the doctor is blogging. check him out at jasonlaird.blogspot.com.

yeah baby.

i love this dude.

children's cup video

here's that video i tried posting a few days ago - this should be a little easier for you to see - last time it was just a huge download. this should work better.

a few pics from my "others"

rhett lookin' hip


pyjama wii boxing twins


more pyjama wii boxing twins


justice project #1 (tori's in there - first one on the left)


rhodes sleeping by me in church saturday night


my four sons - jd is in the front - tough to get a pic of him lately - but check out the twins on the couch together (vicki was in australia and tori was at amplified)

check out dino rizzo's post about "others" and you'll get the point.

update from luke walters

my boy luke walters and his son luke are in sri lanka right now - doing what they do - reaching the lost in "the window" as he refers to it (the 1040 window).

check out this email i just got from him.

here's a news article on the airport bombing from radio australia.

please keep the two lukes in your prayers - for their safety and for open doors for the gospel.

hpc experience #1

check out this post from nathan martin after his time here at healing place church earlier this month during the hpc experience:

read the whole post here.

One of the things that came out of this conference was a deeper understanding of our vision with regard to the community. I had a clear understanding of how we were to relate to one another within our four walls, but I wasn't clear on what Christian Challenge was supposed to look like to the larger community. The HPC Experience helped me gain a clear perspective of how we are to relate to our neighbors. And it can be summed up in one word: CARE. Christian Challenge Cares. We want to reach out to our community with an open hand, seeking to serve without expecting anything in return.

Christian Challenge CARE Team Out of this is coming an exciting outreach philosphy. We are forming the "Christian Challenge CARE Team". Whenever we have an opportunity to touch our community with the love of Jesus, we want to do that as part of the Christian Challenge CARE Team. We've ordered yellow t-shirts with that phrase on the back, with the word "CARE" being the largest. We want to demonstrate with our actions that Jesus cares for those around us. He cares for the thirsty, the hungry, the poor, the hurting. We desire to be a tangible demonstration of that very real care that He has towards all people. The Lord said it best through the prophet Ezekiel when He said, "As a shepherd cares for his herd in the day when he is among his scattered sheep, so I will care for My sheep and will deliver them from all the places to which they were scattered..." (Ezek 34:12 NASB)

I'm excited about what the Lord has for Christian Challenge. I look forward to demonstrating the love of care of Jesus. I thank God for Jeff Murphy who went with me. He has really caught the vision and is providing valuable leadership to our efforts. I appreciate my friend Joel Dyke for telling me about the HPC Experience and for being a friend who always believed in me. I thank God for Dino Rizzo for inspiring me to believe that we really can touch our community. Fasten your seatbelts, Christian Challenge! It's about to get exciting!!!

thanks for posting about it nathan! and thanks to all of you who came - it was great to meet each of you and see what God is doing in your comunities.

oh, wow.

lifechurch.tv is even cooler than i thought (and i've had them pretty much at the top of the "cool churches that aren't healing place" list).

ok, so it's not really about their cool factor, it's about their insanely genius, anointed creativity, redeem-the-culture, milk the technology mindset of getting the Word out.

check out this post about their new virtual campus coming online in a couple weeks.

sheesh.

robbed at church

check out this billboard that the creative geniuses at lifechurch.tv came up with.

i love it.

thanks, david turner, for the heads up.

another video u gotta watch - much smaller filesize

this is another video - the latest from ty van rensburg for children's cup.

this one is much smaller, so if you had trouble viewing the video in my last post, don't give up and not try this one out.

click here to watch

you gotta watch this video

i've had this children's cup video for quite a while - ty van resnburg and i made it a while back - just finally got the smarts to post it.

"it's about the children" - click here to watch and brace yourself.

i need to put it on you-tube someday.

more on africa from rob ketterling

here's a pic pastor rob ketterling posted on his blog of him and his team at the new healing place church campus in mozambique. they've just returned home from a trip to work there with children's cup. if you haven't checked out his posts from the trip you need to.

and you really oughtta think about going this summer yourself. check out go global to see when and how. it's your turn.

rob ketterling - posting from africa

check out these three posts (and more to come) over at rob ketterling's site - posting during his trip to africa - he just spoke at the first church service ever held at healing place church_mozambique - an unofficial "launch" in preparation for the official launch we'll do in april when i'll be there with the elevate team from hpc.

254 in attendance - plus 25 americans. but get this: about 200 of those were children.

Care Points
Back To Swaziland
Mozambique

and his post about the visit to the children's cup carepoints in swaziland... phew. so true...

amplified baptism pics

got these pics from robert conti - from the baptism in the hpc lake after chad daniel spoke at amplified saturday night. i love that we have a lake for Holy Ghost dunkfests.

a few battersonisms

found these notes i texted to myself during the hpc staff meeting mark batterson spoke at. (i know i'm pathetic - texting notes to myself rather than writing with a pen. but honestly, i loathe writing by hand anymore...)

• don't accumulate possessions. accumulate experiences


• r u living a life that is worth telling a story about?


• i wana live life not like "the best i can do is the best i can do," but like "the best can do is the best that God can do."


• pray ridiclous prayers.


• it's easy to act like Jesus. harder to react like Jesus.


• perfect love will not make u sentimental, it will make u fearless.


• guilt will paralyze u. God is bigger than ur biggest failure.

dude's got some serious truth running around in that head of his. to all of you up there at ebenezer's and ncc - thank God daily for the pastor he's blessed you with. and happy first anniversary.

in a warehouse with 200 rats on a sweaty day

from left to right: derek smith, mark batterson, mark stermer

this week (wednesday and thursday) i got to spend a bunch of time with a couple pastors i really respect.

one was troy shaw - pastoring a slammin' church - the oasis church up in loganville, georgia. troy's got a huge vision and from what i'm hearing, the people in loganville are catching it. troy's working on putting a team on the ground in africa with children's cup for a couple weeks this fall, working toward a bigger project there - it's an understatement that i'm excited about that.

i get to go up to the grand opening weekend for their new worship facility in may. can't wait to see the church - not just the building - but the amazing people that have chosen to do life at oasis.

the other pastor i got to hang with this week is mark batterson from national community church. we figured out that we've known each other about a year and a half (we agreed it feels more like 15 years), and in that year and a half i've really seen a lot i respect in him. what got my attention was the cool factor and the innovation he thrives in. but what i've learned since is that he's more than just cool factor. he's got substance to deliver. the cool, the innovation, the technology - for him they are not an end in and of themselves. they are simply a means to the end. the end is the Gospel.

there's so much truth in what he taught at our wednesday night service at healing place church - much of it from his new "you-have-to-read-this-book" book, in a pit with a lion on a snowy day. he said so much i wanna relate here, but i'll give it to you this way. buy the book. read his blog. and check this one point out - he said this in our staff meeting yesterday:

"sometimes we can let the momentum we gain from yesterday's anointing cause us to relax - but we need today's anointing today."

and this:

"i don't want to be someone who is known for being on the cutting edge of yesterday's movement."

ok, so i paraphrased it - he was dishing out truths faster than i could type.

get the book. read his blog. track this guy if you aren't already. i'm gonna try to find my notes from staff meeting and see if i can clean 'em up enough to make a sensible post from. it's great stuff.

so what's the scoop with the title of this post, you ask? ahhh.... well, on the way to the airport in new orleans, we stopped by donaldsonville to check out the dream center (and the new donaldsonville dream center west facility - the elementary school we were given by the city). mark stermer and derek smith (two of the coolest, hardest-working, God-fearing, Jesus-loving, i'm-glad-they're-on-my-team cajun men of God i know) showed mark batterson around and it was really cool.

well, while we were in the warehouse at the east dream center, mark stermer started telling mark batterson about the days following the hurricane, and how rats had invaded the warehouse. literally took over the joint. derek said they got into some vitamins and stuff and apparently bulked themselves up or something because he tried hitting them on the head with a shovel and he said they just looked at him and ran off.

they had to get a three-pronged hoe and stab/gouge/cut the rats. and they were everywhere. he said they were swinging, sweating, like men fighting bees. crazy scene. adrenaline pumping, slashing rats left and right. derek said they counted and piled up 200 dead rats outside and took a picture with 'em. oh, yeah... you know i'm asking for that picture...

that's the kind of man derek is. and mark stermer. sure, the rats weren't lions on a snowy day, but the rats were certainly standing in the way of what God wanted done, and derek and mark chased 'em down in the warehouse on a sweaty day and killed all 200 of them.

maybe we'll start a website called www.chasetherats.com.... hahaha

troy shaw, mark batterson - it was great to see y'all this week. thanks for coming.

good stuff from perry noble (via tony morgan)

check out the notes tony posted from some of the sessions perry noble is teaching to a bunch of church leaders at the unleash conference up in south carolina:

• The myth behind growing churches is this: It's all about style. It's not about style.


• Churches don't grow without Godly leadership.


• How can you get a vision for your church without time with God?


• In the Bible, God never gave the vision to a committee. "The personnel committee, they're of Satan."


• "God didn't ordain deacons to tell the pastor what to do."


• "If you've never been scared, you've never heard from God."


• If you're not the senior pastor, you have to trust that he's hearing from God.


• "As a pastor, I can't please everyone." I'd rather offend the people in the church seats than God who gave us our vision.


• People will leave. And that's OK.


• Most of the people on NewSpring's staff team come from NewSpring Church.


• "God has never called us to do anything that's safe."


• "It insults God when we dream small dreams."


• Ask God for big things.


• "If you can sleep, it's not a vision. If you can do it, it's not a vision."

great stuff - and that's just a portion of the whole - check the whole post out here.

thanks, tony, for posting it for all of us non-attenders.

ready for elevate:mozambique

check out this story on charles and kristen young's blog about this man that last year's elevate team to africa prayed for.

Jesus is moving

amazing. i'm so ready to go to africa with this year's elevate squad.

please remember to pray for us. let us know you'll be praying - just leave a comment here (or email me at: dan dot ohlerking at healingplacechurch.org)

wii sports tournament

wii tourney - it's on, boys

what do you do when mom's away in australia, big sister is at a meeting at church? you twist dad's arm to do a wii sports tournament with you. jd and lincoln and i had a mini tournament at home tonight - i think jd won... certainly wasn't me. lincoln and jd are tough competition for me in the boxing, but they kicked my tail in bowling and baseball and golf.

chad daniel and dr. tweeze

(from left to right: chad daniel and jason laird)

jason laird (our high school student ministries pastor here at healing place church) and chad daniel (global expeditors missionary wildman) at a meeting tonight my daughter tori was at. i have always seen similarities between chad and tweeze, but this pic that tori sent me really highlights more similarities.

i really really love both these dudes - an amazing love and passion for God.

prayer need from swaziland

just got this from ben with children's cup over in swaziland:

We have a doctor team here right now and the head doctor is having some problems with kidney stones. We are rushing him to the hospital now!! Please be in prayer with us.

please take a minute to pray for this situation.

thanks!

UPDATE: ben just sent word to us here via patrick conti that dr. beyda is doing much better. THANK YOU to all who prayed with us for this great man.

elevate '07 - mozambique

team members - click here for the elevate mozambique team blog

i get the honor of leading the team of full-time interns (elevate) from hpc to help launch our new campus in mozambique. i'm soooo excited about not just going back to africa, but to be able to participate in the development of this incredible bunch of young men and women of God. they represent the future - no doubt - but they are also the present. they serve like crazy here at hpc and i'm excited to get to share with them the opportunity to experience missions in africa.

here's the team:

brandon bourgeois
barton pickens
blake prudhomme
kaycee smith
gabi leblanc
katie fontenot
katherine sharkey
angela musso
natalie spera
brooke anderson
colleen thorp
lauren best
(in just a few short days, they'll each have their own blog - a team assignment - and i'll be sure to post links to each of them for you.)

and as an added bonus, jarred ray from the hpc video team will be coming with us to shoot video and stills, and pastor mark stermer from hpc is going to join us a couple days into the trip along with a couple of great pastors - nathan keller, from sugarland texas and chuck colgrove from humble texas. it's gonna be an awesome trip.

pray
please pray for us. we need support in two huge ways. we need people who will commit to pray for us - starting now and thru the duration of the trip (we get back may 2). that is our first priority. we are totally convinced that this mission needs to be a partnership - those of us going partnering with those who stay here but invest prayer and finances to help make it possible.

if you want to commit to pray, either leave a comment here or shoot me an email at dan.ohlerking at healingplacechurch dot org.

give
obviously, trips like this cost quite a bit to pull together. we're doing all we can to keep the cost down but it's still well over $3000 per person. if you want to give to help send this team, just click here to give through the children's cup online giving system. 100% of your gift will go toward the elevate missions trip - so long as you select the designation "Elevate 2007 - Mozambique."

anything that is accomplished for God on this trip will be the result of those who went and those who sent. (ha - some unintentional poetry there - sorry.)

go global missions workshop

ok, i'm still learning the nuances of using this new phone's camera, so the pic is terrible, but as far as i know, it's the only pic we took at the missions workshop this past weekend.

saturday was a great day for healing place church. it was a great day for a lot of people in a lot of places all over the world. it was great because nearly 200 people joined together for our first-ever go global missions workshop, and by being there, they were showing their intent to go on the mission field sometime during 2007. get that - nearly 200 missionaries being sent out on short-term missions trips in the next six or seven months. how cool is that?

we're sending people on missions trips to places like italy, canada and los angeles, and others to places like cambodia, mozambique, swaziland, peru and mexico. what may be the most exciting part of it all for me, though, is that when we start 2008, there will be a couple hundred more people who have missions even more deeply entrenched in their hearts and lives.

to all of you who came out at 8am on your saturday morning, thanks and congratulations - you're on your way to becoming a missionary.

vicki's off to colour

wow. i did something today that i don't ever wanna do again. i drove my family down to the new orleans airport and dropped my wife and the mother of my five kids off so that she could hop on a plane and go to l.a. then on to sydney. by herself. one of the hardest things i've had to do in a while. i think it was harder, too, because it caught me off guard. i've been encouraging vicki to go - to enjoy the time - to take it all in... but when it got down to the moment of seeing her walk out of view into the airport...

i texted her a few minutes later and told her "i just sat back down in the car, couldn't breathe, couldn't talk, kids asking me a million qpm (questions per minute) and i couldn't muster any words." it wasn't a frog in my throat. it was a fully-grown hippo jammed in there where i couldn't swallow.

but.... we will make it. we'll be better for it. i'm actually looking forward to the time with the kids.

but dang it, it'd sure be nicer to have made it all happen with her around rather than having to deal with her being gone. she alwasy tells me when i go out of town that it's harder for the one being left at home. i agree today. (she did bring that up today, but she said at least today she's wondering if it's true or not.)

pray for her if you get a chance. pray that she connects with everyone God has prepared for her to connect with and that all that God has in store to show her and do through her is done - completely - during this experience.

it's obvious that i'll be needing your prayers, too.

that your drink dad?

today at lunch, rhodes looked at his menu and pointed to the diet coke logo and said, "that your drink, dad?"

tell me coke isn't a master of marketing. 36 months on this planet and my son has already figured out what dad drinks.

then again, maybe it's the sheer volume of diet coke logo stuff that comes thru my house. happy now, dean?

awwww...

the now-three-year-old rhodes and rhett taking turns driving this afternoon (lincoln had their other jeep - the sharing went well for a while anyway).

i love being a dad.

Healing Place Church Missions Update

this year is already shaping up to be a tremendous thrust forward for hpc in our involvement in global missions. we have reshaped our structure of support so that we can be better stewards of the missions resources God has entrusted to us.

that does not at all mean that we are cutting back. quite the opposite – in fact, this year, we plan to invest more resources, put more people on the mission field, provide more support, and have an even deeper connection with the people and the projects on the ground.

we’ll have more information on the hpc go global website very soon that will provide the details of this new thrust to "go global." for now, please pray that God will continue to show us favor, and to bless and guide our efforts to serve His purpose globally to reach out to the poor and hurting and give hope in Jesus everywhere we go.

maybe pepsi isn't so bad after all

i coached my son jd's upward basketball team at this past season (to an undefeated record 10-0... yay). the team was primarily 5th and 6th graders but there was this one kid - peyton palma - who is in 4th grade, but was deservedly "playing up" with the big boys.

he's got a great game, great shot, good speed, huge heart to learn... a great kid....

so anyway, after the season, his parents brought me this folder with a free vacation for my wife and me to go to a hotel from just about anywhere in the usa. something to do with his work at pepsi allowed him to get the deal at a discount, but still... thanks palma family. thanks pepsi.



it made me think the other day at the store... maybe i've been too hard-nosed about diet coke. it may be another life-changing epiphane like i had three years ago when i went mac.

i know this sounds like sacrilege to the likes of geoff surratt and dean turner... my apologies....

we shall see.

hpc live (still a little early)

watch the hpc arena go up live! click here.

thanks for the link fazha.

chapter 2, baby!

[ok, so you can't view it if you're not actually logged into the hpc office network. my bad. i guess i was getting a preview of what will soon be made open to everyone. sike! my apologies... thanks for the heads up, phill.]

seeing red

this past weekend my daughter tori was involveed in setting up for "red" - a concert at the annex with a band called "no shoes" that they really did a great job of creating an environment for. it was a slammin' night of worship in an awesome environment. after i was there (this pic was toward the end) i got a text from tori:

dad, everyone's going to get baptized at the lake - can i go? please please please?

i had visions of the lake bottom swallowing up kids' feet, making for a messy if not dangerous scenario. but how in the world do you say no to that? as a father i ask you...



she came back from the night saying the whole thing was like going to summer camp (which in her language is about as extremely cool as you can get).

thanks, tweeze, and the rest of the student ministry leadership (d.a.) for doing what you do.

happy birthday sooze

susan rodgers standing on the edge of "execution rock" in swaziland

got this picture from my mom out in swaziland after they celebrated my little sister's birthday out there with the rest of the africa children's cup team.

happy birthday sooze.

mobile medical team video

dr. cheri leblanc sent me this link to a video that her son phill made for the healing place church mobile medical team meeting the other day. what a statement it is of the blessing of God that having this team and the mobile unit are.

watch the video here.

thanks phill.

thanks, God.

dsr at pathfinders tonight

david st. romaine leading worship at pathfinders tonight

my boy jd took this pic of david st. romaine leading worship at pathfinders (healing place's jr. high student ministry) tonight. pretty cool to see. last thursday jd and i were watching david win third place in the nashville star singing competition, and jd was remembering david teaching him how to run the lights and audio board for pathfinders, thinking it was cool to see him on tv. then tonight, jd saw david again - still about worship - still about serving Jesus Christ.

cool testimony he's kept thru this whole star thing. way to go dsr!

portable sounds

i wish this tour was coming to our area...

i just downloaded the new toby mac album "portable sounds" from itunes. as usual, he's stinkin' creative, maybe not as heavy in this one with the rock as i've liked in the past, but dang - creativity oozes from this dude.

worth checking out.

check out hpc on mondaymorninginsight.com

great post from todd rhoades over on mmi. check it out here.

sanjaya-esqueleto

esqueletto - partner of ignatio (nacho libre)


sanjaya - american idol contestant

is it just me, or are there some crazy similarities here?

i wonder if sanjaya likes stealing the Lord's cheeps?

how would esqueleto look in that dick tracy hat and a pony tail?

i bet esqueleto could sing better than sanjaya could wrestle.

actually, it's too bad nacho himself couldn't do a guest artist gig on idol this year - i could handle a little "in-car-nah-hah-see-oh-ho-ho-ho-ho-hown" - maybe they'll have a nacho libre soundtrack theme night on idol this season.

dang, that'd be sweet.

brian bailey quote about dinorizzo.com

"I will say that Dino Rizzo, the lead pastor of Healing Place Church in Louisiana, is one of the best. He always takes the focus off of himself and points people to Christ and to Healing Place. At the same time, you really develop a personal connection with Dino, through his openness and honesty about great struggles and amazing triumphs. His writing throughout the Katrina disaster was truly moving and filled with faith and hope."

that's a quote from brian bailey during an interview about his new book (co-authored with terry storch) the blogging church. (by the way, if you're at all involved in ministry and you're a blogger, you really need this book in your library.)



thanks to chris melrose for posting the whole interview at http://mrclm.blogspot.com.

mark batterson at healing place

i'm not sure which i like better: the idea of mark batterson's upcoming visit to healing place, or the obnoxious graphic we're using to promote it.

this is one life u you absolutely don't wanna miss.

check out the rest of the march madness promotion here.

learn more about mark batterson's visit to hpc here.

a sneak look at the real "behind-the-scenes"

hpc experience was supposed to be a time of a look behind-the-scenes at healing place church. and it was. for the thirty v.i.p. guests, they got the real-deal experience. lots of one-on-one time with our pastor, our staff, q&a time, and even a couple outreaches hands-on.

but at the pastor's house friday night, while chris caine was speaking to the guests in the living room, the overflow seating in the next room was where the ever-faithful stayed - continuing to take notes and do their best to listen thru the double-sided fireplace.

troopers. that's what they were. lance, kari and the baby... angie.... little miss imadiva ammons... the faithful.

they're so behind-the-scenes that they're actually behind-the-behind-the-scenes.

got my new phone

from what i hear, i'm still doing better than most on durability of the ol' data phone. but, i did get an upgrade last week. pretty cool phone. and what's even cooler (NOT) is how it's totally free from any old data. all phone numbers... G..O..N..E....

don't even start with the questions like "why didn't you have a backup?" and "don't you ever sync?"

anyway - i'm not griping.... i love the new size, the new slide and the smaller touch-screen.

thanks mark and earl for working it with verizon to hook me up.

cool thoughts on "web 2.0" from bobby gruenewald

bobby's a genius. a Jesus-lover and a genius. i love people like him. check out this post on bobby's blog over at swerve.lifechurch.tv.

http://swerve.lifechurch.tv/2007/02/08/web-20/

thanks to don gulley for the heads up about this post.

go global

if you're interested in going on a missions trip this year, there are a couple things you really oughtta know about.

first of all, if you're a part of healing place church, you need to be at the 2007 missions workshop this saturday, march 10 at 8 a.m. anyone who is even considering being a part of a missions trip needs to go to this.

the other thing i wanna let you know about (and this one is for everyone) is called "go global" - a new deal that john siebeling and a great team in memphis from the life church have been working hard to formulate. it's a partnership of several churches like healing place church, celebration church, church of the highlands, and the life church designed to help create a track for people to go from simply feeling a tug toward missions to actually serving full-time on the mission field.

i'll let the go global website explain it better for you, but you need to know that there are some amazing missions opportunities that are open to you with go global. three of the trips they've set up for this first summer are going to children's cup locations (one of those is to the new healing place church campus in africa where children's cup's newest carepoint is coupled together with the new church.

three opportunities to go to africa this year - just check out their website and fill out the application to get the ball rolling. plus, there are several other places they are sending teams this summer - all great opportunities for anyone considering getting involved on the mission field this year.

so.... don't forget....

1. if you're in baton rouge, come to the missions workshop at hpc this saturday
2. if you want to see what opportunities there are for you to go to the mission field this summer, check out go global.

gimme a holler if you have any questions at all about either.


after lunch sunday (left to right) me, kissy and matt blanchard, patrick conti, heather goff

todd rhoades - the mmi dude

me with todd rhoades outside ralph and kacoo's (boutin's was already closed for lunch - dangit.)

had lunch (actually it was late enough in the day he referred to it as "lupper") yesterday with todd rhoades. todd is in baton rouge (across the table from me now, actually) for our healing place experience.

back when i started blogging, todd's monday morning insight was one of the blogs that it seemed like everyone linked to (and they still do). he was one of the first bloggers i felt was truly dedicated to and understood the value of blogging in the church.

todd is still doing mmi, but he's also taken a spot on the team with leadership network. you really oughtta stay tuned to what he's doing there. church innovation is his passion - and leadership network is giving him the green light to help churches communicate and learn from each other and grow in innovation through interacting with each other.

i had a great time with him - it was an honor to hang with you, todd. you're doing some amazing stuff for the Kingdom.