CLA

If you read my Twitter posts to the right of this blog, you could tell last week was pretty crazy for me and some of the other staff and volunteers at LCBC. Thursday and Friday was Willow Creek's Leadership Summit which broadcasts a live satellite feed all over North America. LCBC was one of those sites and I was asked to produce the conference for our site. There is about a year of preparation on Willow's end for the yearly conference, and roughly 6 months of off and on prep work from several people at each site. It was satisfing to see everything go off well but there was a portion of the summit that was even more satisfing.

A few months ago we found out that LCBC was one of three finalists for the Couragous Leadership award, which is a yearly search for church communities that are looking to make a dent in the AIDS epidemic in Africa. Friday, during one of the sessions of the summit we found out that our church was the winner this year! With that comes a $100,000 grant to continue the work which is being done.

Jason has a great post that describes the excitement that filled the room during the presentation.

The thing that caught my attention regarding the whole deal were the judges comments regarding the prize:

“Very powerful ministry in one of the most theologically conservative areas of the country. Launched with the vision of a senior pastor whose heart was given to this emergency and carried by an entire congregation, LCBC has coalesced business and religious leaders in their community, inviting them to join in their AIDS initiative. Their drive to understand the impact of AIDS and inspire others to appropriate means of involvement is inspiring. To the citizens of a Kenya community, they could not come at a better time.”

I am just so thankful to God that I am able to be a part of what he is doing in Lancaster, the Susquehanna Valley and around the world. And like David said this morning, I just want to continue to be a part of the ride and not screw things up!