Wednesday night, 11:18pm and we're back in our hotel room. Today was a great day of vision and confirmation. We began the day with some planning and strategy time at Starbucks. (You can see the deep thought on our faces).
Next, we traveled to lovely Catoosa to meet Ricky Van Pay for lunch. One of my prayers at the outset of this trip was that "contacts" would become friends. I believe that happened today with Ricky. He told us his story and we told him ours. God has blessed Ricky. He's been doing weekly services for about 8 weeks and his attendance is solidly over 100 weekly and spiked to 350 on Easter Sunday - in a community of 18,000!
After lunch, we went back down to the River walk area and surveyed some strangers about their take on their community. My quick observations are that Tulsans are frustrated with the condition of their roads, like their schools and don't think much about church. Although one person Jake talked to almost ended the interview when he mentioned church! Only 6 interviews, but interesting that we saw trends develop in so few interviews.
After a working dinner at Mazzio's Pizza and a very sinfully delicious brownie fudge sundae at Braum's it was on to Guts Church. It was interesting. It's unusual for us to get the outsider's perspective on church. We sure got it tonight. You can see from the photo that Guts is a real "in your face" kind of church. Notice their billboard in the background that says "tougher than hell". It definitely connects with a certain group. We decided we're not in that group :)
After Guts, some debriefing time at Starbucks and then a trip downtown, followed by some great conversation at the River again. Today it began to dawn on us just what God has in store. Although I don't see the whole picture, what I do see is wonderful and exciting.
Tulsa feels like home and I feel humbled and honored to be part of the plan God has here.
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