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6 Things You Need to Know

March 22, 2013 in Blog, From Aaron Kennedy with 2 Comments

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Open Door, here are a few things that you need to know.

In opening, I would like to say that what we are experiencing right now is something I’ve never seen before. Momentum can be man created, but when God breathes it is sustained! From the opening of the year I felt like God gave me a word that we would double in attendance this year. The weight of what I felt was tangible and a little overwhelming at first. I didn’t know what it meant exactly as there were no real signs it would happen. I now believe it was prophetic as to what was about to happen. What we see now is literally unlike anything I’ve seen before, and I believe that it is just beginning. The determining factor of what happens now will be what it has always been: will we continue to seek God or become satisfied with where we are right now? Our prayer as a staff is that our hunger for God would continue to grow, and that we, as a church, would not back down from desiring more of Christ, more of His Spirit, and more of what He wants for us as a church! I am blessed to be your Pastor and we are just beginning to Love God, Love People and Change the World.

Here are 6 things we want you to know and we ask you to continue to pray for and celebrate with us about:

1. Overflow 2013, our student camp for grades 6-12, is FULL! This is huge, as our students are hungry for Christ. We decided to double the camp this year and before the end of March it is already full! They have a fundraiser coming up in April that you can help with, but more importantly please be praying for the leadership, staff, and students that are going, that God would show up big and lives would be changed! They will be selling BBQ & Chicken meals throughout April. You can find out more by clicking here.

2. Uprise, our young adult ministry for 18-25 year olds in downtown Greenville, is exploding! John Conway and his team are slaying dragons and people are coming to know Christ and experience the power of the Holy Spirit! I realized after it was set to launch that the very location had been something Michael Chandler and I, with several others, had circled many years ago believing Open Door would have a presence there one day in downtown Greenville. It’s happening… and it is just beginning! They have been running 60+ since the start in February and I am about ready to SHOUT with joy over it!!

3. Life Groups are going amazing! More than likely you’re in one and God is showing up in a big way as we read The Circle Maker! Over 450 people are in small groups right now. That’s double the amount of people we’ve ever had in Life Groups! Not only that, but marriages and individuals are seeking God in ways like never before. It is truly a promise of God realized. We are releasing our new catalog for summer Life Groups soon and I encourage you, if possible, to make this commitment to get into a group. IT WILL CHANGE YOUR LIFE!!

4. We are growing!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! We have literally seen a jump in attendance of 400 people since the beginning of the year. We broke the 1000 mark for the first time in our history during this stretch. While numbers aren’t everything they do mean YOU ARE INVITING PEOPLE which is a huge honor that our staff and volunteers don’t take lightly. With that, please be praying as we need help in our children’s areas to help facilitate the growth. If you can volunteer on Sunday to help in this area please click here. Also be praying that people will experience the love of God and be drawn closer to Him in our services, and help us by loving on people around you and making them feel welcome!

5. We had our Next Generation Building Campaign offering a few weeks ago and were blown away by what God did. Over $223,000 was taken in to launch the effort. The faithfulness of our God and the faith the families of Open Door have in God amazes me. We are humbled by what has taken place and we believe, by faith, that we will build this next phase DEBT FREE in Jesus name!

6. EASTER IS COMING, and we are ready! We are calling it Scandal of Grace and we are expecting crazy big crowds, but more importantly we are expecting for many to rededicate their lives to Christ and to receive Jesus for the first time. Our big ask of you is to invite someone you know. Our big ask of God is that He would move and that it wouldn’t be a performance, but that it would be all about Jesus so that He can do a real work in people’s hearts. Our Senior Pastor called for a Daniel Fast leading up to Easter. You can find out more about that by clicking here. We are so expectant of what God will do that day. I’m so excited I might even wear a suit!!!!

We love you and are honored to pastor a church like you Open Door…let’s press into Him and continue to seek Him!

Not to us, O LORD, not to us, but to your name goes all the glory for your unfailing love and faithfulness. – Psalm 115:1

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Aaron Kennedy
Executive Pastor

Valentine’s Day

February 14, 2013 in From Aaron Kennedy, Message Series with 2 Comments

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This past weekend I had the opportunity to bring a message on the subject that “Relationship with God is the basis of my prayer life”. I wanted to share with you some of the many songs that I use in helping me enter the presence of God.

  1. You Revive Me
  2. The More I Seek You
  3. 10000 Reasons
  4. Not For a Moment
  5. Believe

I think it’s fitting that you get this blog on Valentine’s Day. I fell in love with my wife because I spent time with her. I think many times we approach God from the standpoint that we should automatically be in love with Him, instead of embracing the concept that time spent with God causes me to fall in love with Him.

It is with that thought I leave you, and pray that you would begin to express love to the ones God has given you, and to the One that created you, allowing Him to breath His life into you.

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Aaron Kennedy
Executive Pastor

Sharing Goals

January 8, 2013 in Blog, From Aaron Kennedy, Message Series with 1 Comment

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What’s up Open Door! Hope you had an incredible Christmas season. This time of year is always a great time to review everything God has done for my family: the different struggles that He has brought us through, the fun stuff, the vacations, etc. It’s also the time of year to look into the future and believe God for what will happen in the next chapter of our lives.

I encourage everyone and all our families to take some time over the next few evenings to do just that. Sit down with your spouse if you’re married, even get the kids involved, and pray for this next year. Talk about some goals, that as a family, you want to see happen and are going to submit to God. Dare to put your faith in action and speak it forth.

How good and pleasant it is when God’s people live together in unity!
It is like precious oil poured on the head, running down on the beard,
running down on Aaron’s beard, down on the collar of his robe.
It is as if the dew of Hermon were falling on Mount Zion.
For there the Lord bestows his blessing, even life forevermore.
- Psalm 133:1

Remember there is a commanded blessing where there is unity. Open Door, may there be unity in our homes this year. I believe it is going to be the best year yet!

We are praying for you and be sure to be here this Sunday as we continue our series on vision, speaking about what we, as a church, are believing for this year!

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Aaron Kennedy
Executive Pastor

6 Things You Need to Know

November 7, 2012 in Children's Ministry, Community Outreach, Four18 Students, From Aaron Kennedy, Message Series with 1 Comment

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I just wanted to take a moment and update you on a few things coming up so that you can help us pray as we continue to seek what God has for us as a church! As always we are praying for you and are so blessed to have you as a part of the Open Door family!!

1. I’m so excited for what God is doing in our student ministry! We are literally seeing teenagers come to know Christ weekly in Four18! Our attendance has grown to average around 70 students or more, and we are continuing to see growth. We already updated the room earlier this year and we just ordered more chairs and we are still running out of room! To help, we are getting ready to expand space again by ripping down more walls upstairs which will provide more space for our Students and our After School program that meets during the week which has now grown to around 50 children each day!

2. In addition to our students, our Children’s Ministry has launched our new 4 & 5 year old ministry Kidmo Jr. This has been a huge win; and parents have responded as we continue to see tremendous growth in that age range. Thanks for answering the call, and helping us reach more children than ever!!! We are so blessed by the incredible volunteers that serve throughout the month!

3. Please be praying for our Senior Pastor, Greg Kennedy, as he is in Latvia over the next two weeks speaking into pastors and spiritual leaders in that country. Pray for protection over him in his travels and strength as he will be teaching over 20 times in the next few weeks. God is continuing to grow our influence to the nations and we are so excited to see what God continues to do as we change the world for the kingdom of God!

4. One of the most important times of year is upcoming as our City Outreach Day is right around the corner on November 17. Because of how many we have had answer the call in the last few years we have expanded what we normally do in the Fall, and we need your help!! We still have some openings to fill for this year’s Outreach Day. We are also collecting food all month long. Please consider bringing some needed items with you throughout this month. Click here to get more information about all the different events your family can participate in to reach our community and show love and compassion to them this Holiday season!

5. Our Christmas service is going to be held on December 23rd and we are so excited about what we have planned for this service and the opportunity we will have to reach tons of unchurched people that day. Please be in prayer for that day and we are asking you to ask people to attend! This is a great opportunity to invite someone to church and believe God to impact their lives. We will be releasing invite cards to help you as the date approaches!

6. We are currently in a VERY IMPORTANT series on family and relationships called Worth Fighting For.  Please be praying for me as we continue in the series over the next few weeks and make plans to be here if at all possible. I believe this is an important time in our families in which God wants to grow us closer to each other by growing us closer to Him. If you missed last Sunday’s service, you can check it out by clicking here.

Thank you for all the sacrifices you make for the kingdom of God. Open Door is blessed because of you and your love for the King we all serve…. it is only getting better and may Christ receive all the glory!!

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Aaron Kennedy
Executive Pastor

5 Things You Need to Know

August 22, 2012 in After School, Blog, Child Development Center, Current Events, Four18 Students, From Aaron Kennedy, Message Series with 3 Comments

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Hey guys, I wanted to take a quick second of your time and share with you five things that are important for you to know as part of Open Door. It’s an amazing season and things are happening all over the ministry that are exciting! Continue to believe with us for the continued favor and blessing of God as we pursue all that He has called us to do.

1. Our students in Four18 are experiencing an incredible move of God over this summer. We had standing room only this past Sunday night as students were hungry for Christ! Bottom line is God is answering our prayers from earlier this year that God would raise up a generation of students that would seek the face of God!

2. We currently have almost 200 kids enrolled in our Child Development Center and new After School program! That means that on a daily basis we will have the opportunity to pour into families and kids the great and mighty love of Christ!! That is awesome…. I am stoked…. God is amazing!!

3. We have been gathering on Thursday nights for some “Old School” prayer meetings and God has been stirring a passion for His presence in our people… pray that we continue to have a hunger stir in us as a people for God. Please make an effort to get here on Thursday nights from 7-8pm. Remember, as we’ve been saying during the Heart to Heart series, if you want something different than you have, then you have to do something different than you’re doing.

4. Uprise our college ministry is starting back this week. Please be praying for our volunteers and students that God would do something awesome on the campus this year. We are blessed to have tons of students that attend Open Door! Be sure to make them feel welcome and encourage them to attend Uprise on Wednesday nights in Mendenhall from 8-9pm in Room 15!

5. We are starting a new series next month entitled Epic Faith. We strongly believe that God wants to do something powerful in this new series over the month of September. I want you to invite everyone you know from young to old as we believe God to work in our lives and for our faith to grow. We’ll be looking at some very practical steps to walking out our lives with epic faith in God. You don’t want to miss this new series, and invite everyone you can because we are praying that God would continue to change lives each and every Sunday!

I love you guys and I am so grateful to be one of your pastors. Please know that God is for you and not against you and that as we place our faith in Him our potential is unmatched. No matter what you have done, His love for you does not waver!

I leave you with a comment from Pastor Dad this past Sunday that truly encouraged me: “Two days living in your sin is at least one day too long… get up, ask for forgiveness and go on.” You guys are awesome, and remember our best days are ahead of us!

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Aaron Kennedy
Executive Pastor

Update Video Blog

August 16, 2012 in Blog, Community Outreach, Current Events, From Aaron Kennedy, Message Series, Uprise College Students with 0 Comments

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We’ve got a couple of important events coming up this week! Check out the video below for all the details:

Hope to see you tonight for Prayer from 7-8pm.
We will be meeting to help out with the Uprise Move-in Day in the parking lot next to McDonald’s at the intersection of 10th street and Cotanche at 8:40am on Saturday.

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Aaron Kennedy
Executive Pastor

Heart to Heart Prayer Initiative

August 1, 2012 in Blog, From Aaron Kennedy, Message Series with 3 Comments

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Hey guys…writing this blog on the tail end of an incredible Sunday this past week. We saw God do some amazing things in both our services and were amazed by the presence of God that was so tangible as the church worshiped Him. The second service was particularly awesome as I didn’t even get a chance to preach! God’s presence directed us to go a different direction and abandon all plans and I am so glad we did as our altars were full up front at the end of the service and we were able to minister to our congregation! Anytime God wants to do that is ok by us!

So we are really excited to see what God is doing in our church and where He is taking us over the next few weeks as we dive into a new series called Heart to Heart. This is a series speaking about the topic of prayer and the importance it has in our day to day life. You can check out the trailer for the series by clicking here and you can invite someone by clicking here.

As part of this series we want to offer you the opportunity to practice what is taught. To do this we will be opening the church up on the Thursday nights in August for prayer together as a church! Starting August 9th from 7pm – 8pm we will be gathering to pray in the Main Auditorium. We will be praying for healing, families, children, missions, nations throughout the world, and other things that God places on our heart. As a church we want to press into God, because He promises if we seek Him that He will be found! We will not be offering child care during these events but we hope that you will make the sacrifice to come and join us for this hour each week and seek God’s face with other believers!

God is up to something, may we be about His business. See ya Sunday and maybe I’ll actually get to preach this time! LOL!!

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Aaron Kennedy
Executive Pastor

4 Things You Need to Know

April 12, 2012 in Blog, From Aaron Kennedy with 0 Comments

It has been an incredible time here at Open Door over the last few weeks. God has had His hand on all of us throughout the first of this year and below you will find four things you need to know so that we can keep pressing into what God is calling us to. So here they are and throw out some praise to God as the best is yet to come!

1. Easter was amazing! We had record numbers with over 975 people in attendance, over 12 people received Christ in just the adult services (still getting numbers back from prison ministry, Kidmo and Community Shelter Outreach: Feed my Sheep) & above all else Christ received all Glory and the church worshipped like it!

2. We updated the church a week ago on the building project, but if you weren’t here we have gotten the plans back from the architect and are making some final adjustments, getting the numbers together and getting things in order to present to the church and place online. You can expect this in the fall. Please be praying for wisdom over our staff and Executive council as we seek God in every aspect of this process.

3. Our Overflow Camp for our Middle School and High School Students is coming and we are so excited to announce that we have over 40 kids going!!! This is huge for us as a church because it a part of the vision God has been giving us for many years and it is exciting to begin to step into this. Please be lifting up the volunteers, worship team, and speakers as we get ready but most importantly, please be praying for our our teenagers, that they would experience Christ in a way that will leave them changed forever. Click here to check out a blog our Student Director wrote to see the BIG number you guys gave to help these kids go to camp. Also we have a chicken plate fundraiser coming up on May 20. Click here to get all the information and to purchase plates. Please get plates for everybody you know as the food will “DO-LICIOUS” as I like to say, and your donations will go to support our campers!

4. I have been so proud and blessed by the new families and people who have stopped me and told the reason they have started attending Open Door is the love they feel and warmth from our volunteers and people who attend. With that being said our first City Outreach Day of the year is fast approaching and this is our opportunity to take that love outside of our walls and show Winterville and Greenville the love of God by serving our community. Last year we had over 150 people including kids reach out in this way. We want to double that number and we have plenty ways to do it! Click here to find the ways that you, your friends, or your family can best reach out. It’s only a few hours and there are many options. Open Door let’s show some love by doing what we do best!

I love you guys and as always we are praying for you and believing God to do awesome things in your lives. Wether you have been here forever or just one Sunday, we consider you family. If you need anything let us know because we would love to help you anyway possible!

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Aaron Kennedy
Executive Pastor

“The Church”

February 17, 2011 in From Aaron Kennedy with 0 Comments

"The greatest event in history was the coming of Jesus Christ into the world to live and to die for mankind. The next greatest event was the going forth of the Church to embody the life of Christ and to spread the knowledge of His salvation throughout the earth.


It was not an easy task which the Church faced when she came down from the upper room…. Left to herself the Church must have perished as a thousand abortive sects had done before her, and have left nothing for a future generation to remember.

That the Church did not so perish was due entirely to the miraculous element within her. That element was supplied by the Holy Spirit who came at Pentecost to empower her for her task. For the Church was not an organization merely, not a movement, but a walking incarnation of spiritual energy. And she accomplished within a few brief years such prodigies of moral conquest as to leave us wholly without explanation – apart from God."
- Exert from A.W. Tozer
Some have said the Church is failing, or the Church has become irrelevant. They say that we should stop what we are doing. They say that we are cursed, looked down upon and yet, we stand. 

This isn't about Open Door, or any other church that anyone reading this blog attends. This is about being what God created us to be; a reflection of Him. Let us not forget that we hold the answer. It isn't in our gimmicks, the way we do church, or the things that define us. It is simply in His power. We can't do it separated and we definitely can't do it majoring on things that Christ himself didn't major on. 

How do we do it you ask? By simply doing what He created "The Church" to do; LOVE. You are part of something bigger than yourself. We are part of "The Church'. The bride of Christ.   The potential still faces us and her glory is still yet to be totally seen. Yet we press on to what Christ sees in us and what He has promised.
Prayer – May God help us to be all He created us to be. Allowing Christ to define us, instead of men's opinion to shaping us. Amen

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Aaron

Keeping Quiet Time Fresh

January 12, 2011 in From Aaron Kennedy with 2 Comments

 Wanted to share a resource with you guys as you start the New Year. One of the most common statements I hear every January is "I want to read the Bible this year." As a Pastor that makes me happy but many times the best laid thoughts are just that, thoughts, until we put action behind them. So with that being said I wanted share a resource I use to keep me on track and make it interesting.

It's a simple web site called www.youversion.com.

This is a resource developed by Life Church TV which is one of the fastest growing churches in America and they really have a heart to see people connect with God in a way they never have before! You Version is awesome! It has every reading plan from easy to complex that you can imagine. Every version of the Bible is there so you can compare. They even have a way you can chat with people all over the world while you do your devotion on the things God is showing you. Last but not least, is the fact you can take notes, journal and send it to your email so that you have it!

The other cool feature that makes it work really well is that it's not just a web site, it's a mobile application also. You can get it on your iPad, iPhone, Blackberry and other mobile devices so that no matter where you are, you always have the Bible with you.

This is a New Year, and if we want it to be the best we've ever had than let's do some things we never have done and find out what God has to say on the subject of life!

What do you do to keep your quiet time active? Ideas welcome….. this is something we could all use help on!

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Aaron

 

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