weekly prayer focus

I sure love being back in Tulsa this week! Thank you for your prayers last week when I was on the road.

Here's what I'm praying about this week and would love for you to pray with me . . .

• Kind of ironic, but as we're in the middle of the "Discovering God's Will" teaching series on Sundays, I'm wrestling with a big decision myself. It appears that I may need to go into a season of suspending my own paycheck for a little while to keep the church bottom-line healthy. I knew, going into this, that this would be a very real possibility. I took full pay from the beginning hoping and praying that our church's financial momentum would pick up enough by now to support that long-term. To date, it has not. So, my specific prayer is when, where, how, how much to work outside of my responsibilities at the church. Sara and I do need wisdom on this question.
• This one is directly related to the one above. I'm in a heavy season of networking and fund-raising right now. Please pray that God gives his favor as I ask different people and churches to partner with us financially. On top of that, I am still believing that our weekly offerings would average $3K and we would see three significant financial gifts come in this year in the amounts of $10K, $25K and $50K. Those two moves would have our church fully self-sufficient and positioned to take some very serious steps toward planting our first new church in the near future.
• I am continuing to believe that God will heal all my back and neck problems. Thanks for your continued prayers on that.
• I'm going to attempt to write a vision statement for my marriage and my relationship with my kids this week (this will tie in with my message coming up on Sunday too). I need some good focus from God on these statements.
• Finally, our kids and youth ministry leaders are attending the Seed Conference at Church on the Move this week. I will be with them for much of it. I am praying that God will give us some fresh vision for reaching more kids and families and building our leadership structure to do just that.

I am praying that your week is awesome. Feel free to shoot a prayer request my way.

what I'm praying about this week

This is a copy of my weekly email to my prayer partners (email me at jason@freedomvalleytulsa.com if would like to get these weekly emails and will pray with me about them) . . .

Thank you for your commitment to join with me in prayer! It really means a lot to me. Here are the places I'd love to have you pray with me this week:

• I'm away from my family this week - I am serving as a coach at an Assemblies of God "Church Planters Boot Camp" this week at North Church in OKC. This is a five-day training event for people and teams who are moving toward opening new churches in the future. I am really happy to serve here, but I hate being away from my family. Additionally, I'm in a hotel all week by myself. I certainly don't plan to misbehave this week, but I recognize that I'm human and hotel rooms have been the downfall of many good men and women. Please pray that I will be focused on Jesus all week. Also, pray for my wife and boys this week, please.
• Connections - I am believing that I will make some good connections with key people this week when I'm here in OKC. I'm talking about people I can work with to open more churches in the near future. Please pray with me for that to happen.
• Money - Please continue to pray with me that our church finances pick up significantly. I am praying the following for 2011: (1) our weekly income to come up to $3000/week. This will allow us to make our current payroll and add some part-time staff. (2) Large cash gifts of $50,000, $25,000 and $10,000. These will allow us to be completely debt free and then some. That allows us to begin diverting all our missions money (currently 16% of our income) toward starting new churches directly.
• Leaders - We have many wonderful people serving on our various ministry teams. I'm asking God to begin to build up and distinguish a few of those people as high-level leaders who will serve as "architects" of future vision and plans at Freedom Valley

Again, please feel free to ask for any details or clarification you may need to pray more effectively.

will you pray with me this week?

It looks like this could, possibly, be a fairly normal (scheduling) week. That would be the first one since mid-December. Wow.

I appreciate so much your willingness to pray with me! Some areas you can join me in prayer this week:

• My extended family - As you know, we lost my grandmother, Nola Matteson, last week. Please join me praying for my mother, aunt, uncle, grandfather and any extended family members who are struggling with the pain of losing her.
• A decision about scheduling for this summer - I have a schedule conflict between two events. I very much want to be at both and think both are very important in the life of our church. I am needing to decide which to attend. The events are not until June, but I need to decide this week. I'm praying for God's direction and wisdom.
• Continuing health and healing - I've been worse, but I'm still experiencing some pain in my back and neck. I believe I'm on the road to total, pain-free living. Pray with me that will be a reality.
• Church finances and outside fund-raising - The savings our church is operating on is dwindling and both the giving from within our church and the outside financial support (from other churches) needs to increase for us to sustain our budget. Please pray with me that both of these increase. I'm praying and believing for our income to come up to $12K/month.
• Steps toward our first church plant. I believe we will see our first new church open in 2013. That means we will need to begin to lay the foundation for that this year. Please pray with me that God brings the right leaders to our team (if He hasn't already) and great funding plans to go out from our church to open this new church in 2013

Thank you again for your partnership in prayer! I would be happy to elaborate on any of these if that would help you pray. Just ask. I'd love to pray for you too. Just ask.

If you missed yesterday's webcast . . .

Here it is. I hope you'll watch this video and consider partnering with me in prayer. I can really feel the need to have a solid team praying with me. Thanks for watching and thanks for praying!

Freedom Valley is live on the web tomorrow!

Just wanted to remind everyone that we will not be holding service at the Cinemark tomorrow, but we will be streaming live online tomorrow morning at 10am.

It’s very easy to view. Just click on this link. You an go there now ahead of time and create a U-stream chat account (takes 30 seconds) so you can respond live in the chat window tomorrow morning. That chat window will take the place of our connection card tomorrow. You can post prayer requests and respond in other ways to the teaching if you choose to.

You can also keep up with your tithes and giving by donating on the online giving page, which is where our live stream will be showing.

I hope you can join me. I will be teaching about the “Myth of the Perfect Pastor.” I hope and pray that some of you will decide to join me as a prayer partner.

You can respond back to me here if you have any questions. Looking forward to seeing you (online) tomorrow morning.

Pastor Jason

PS – The Super Bowl Party at my place is still on at 5pm. Sara and I just cleared some parking spaces :) Everyone is welcome!