KGCI: Real Estate on Air - Know More About Cedar Valley Church ✨

Episode Date: November 27, 2024

Welcome to All Things Flingo podcast with the Flamingo Group and myself, Beth Riley. Join us as we discuss all things to do with our community, real estate, and all things Flamingo. Welcome and tune in for a flocking good time. Hi, Neil. How are you? Excellent. How are you? Good.

Thank you for coming on to our podcast, All Things Flamingo. I've been trying to get you for a couple months here. So I was really excited that you were able and available. today to talk about Bloomington, which is one of my favorite subjects. I love that. We've known each other now. Are we going to give the years? Are we going to just kind of jump over that?

Well, I'm so much younger than you are, Beth, that it's, you know. Yeah, that's six months. We've known each other since my, well, since the kids were little and they're getting ear infections all the time and we were coming into your car. It's fun. Yeah. A long time ago. Yeah, it's a, it's, and now it's been 10 years.

Okay. So it was first you were a chiropractor for how long were you a chiropractor? Yeah, 20 years. So it's a weird, it's a weird path. Like I get that. It's a really weird path when people find that out. Like you're a pastor. And it's just something that I knew in high school.

I knew I knew I was going to be a pastor. And so I went to Christian University and I studied pastoral studies. And I'll never forget it, man. I just thought, yep, I'm with people in class. And I'm like, this is all seems to be working. And right after my junior year, I went and did an internship, big, big church. And at the end of the summer, man, I was burnt out. And I just thought, I don't have it.

Whatever those people have in class, I don't have it. And I panicked. You know, and so I. I changed my major, graduated, and then about another two years, I went back to school. I'd had a crazy good experience with a chiropractor, and I knew a chiropractor who just kept saying, man, you've got to do this, you've got to do this. And so I'm young and single, I went to chiropractic school, opened to practice, had that for 20 years. But it was interesting because the whole time, I just, I always stayed really involved in my church, really involved, really involved,

really involved, and got married. You know, we got married later. And then we felt like we had to find kind of our own church together because I had been so involved in my church. She left her, as came to church with me. And we were never Neil and Kim. It's really an interesting dynamic. It was always, this is Neil and his wife. Oh. Yeah. And she's just like, I'm never going to have an identity. So we started looking, and I get that, right? It was hard for me, but I get that. So we started looking.

We landed here, got really involved. And I started doing a fair amount of teaching, just adult classes, whatever, whatever. And then the pastor talked to me one time, he said, man, have you ever thought there was more to this? And I said, well, I've thought that for a long time, but I don't know how to get there from here. And he's funny. This is just the way he is. He said, well, this is what's going to have to happen. you're going to have to eventually you got to sell your clinic you got to join my staff you're going to have to get bloodied up and you got to figure this out wow

like wow no kids right there's no gray in that result he's such a great guy such a great guy so i i was on the board here at the church and one night after board me he said hey can you stick around for a minute and i said sure and everybody left he said listen i got a guy that's leaving staff i think you know you know need to sell your clinic and join the staff. And I remember going home and telling my wife, and she was like, so we just started praying. We just started praying about it. And it just seemed right. It just seemed right. Did you get your degree yet in theology? So I had not at that point. But then, so then I started taking classes immediately. And to be honest, for that core of class, I only had about three classes left.

Oh, okay. That's how far along in the program I was. So I went back. I abandoned ship and decided to be a chiropractor. 100%. I just bailed, man. I was so, and I've always battled insecurity, right? So I was like, I don't have it.

I don't have it, whatever it is. And yeah, it just seemed right. And so I had an associate that had been working to the clinic that I just loved, this greatest guy and really good at it. And so we started talking about, hey, did you want to buy the clinic? And he was really, really interested. And so I sold to him, which I felt great about it.

Because you want to leave your patience with someone you really trust. Yeah. And then I was on staff here only about a year and a half. And, you know, Beth, I mean, you're here. You go here. We have about 11 pastors on staff. And that pastor, the lead pastor announces that he's going to retire. And I told my wife, I was like,

we're out of a job because they're going to go get new guy. And new guy very likely could go, hey, Neil, you're a nice enough guy, but you're not my guy. And sometimes they'll let quite a bit of staff go. And so we didn't even apply for the job initially. And one thing led to another and one thing led to another. And now seven and a half years later, here we are. Well, I didn't know when I came to Cedar Valley, you were, I think you were my spinning instructor at that time. Yeah, right. Yeah, because I think you were, well, you were doing that on the

weekend. You were still a chiropractor, started doing this community thing. And then my girlfriends and I were going to your class, and that's where Kim and I, we met. No, I knew Kim from your car, from your clinic. Right. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I'd always done a lot of cycling. And then when the whole, remember in that whole spin class, when that thing came out, I don't know, that was probably, yeah, 2000, early 2000s. And I take a few classes like, man, this works for me. I like this. And so started teaching a few classes.

And it just clicked for me. It just, it worked. It made sense. And that was great. I mean, I love that. I love, you know, I loved a lot of different things. So. And, you know, obviously, we got, we got to know a lot of people better and know more people.

It's been fun. There have been times when I'm at a service. service. And in fact, it was just this last Sunday, a woman came up to me and she goes, do you remember me? And I said, man, you, I remember your face. I can't remember the name. And she says, here's my name. She goes, I used to see you at your clinic. And then I'll have other people that come up to me and they'll say, hey, this is going to sound like a weird question, but did you ever use to teach cycle classes? Like, that happens too. That's really fun. So you've always been in Bloomington because your clinic was in Bloomington. Now this is located on the east side of town.

And it is a, it's not a Catholic church. We're assembly of God. Yeah. Yeah. And you know, Beth, because you live in Bloomington, right? When Kimmy and I first came to the church the first time, we walked in, we both said, you know, I don't know, I don't know what it's going to be like, the service, I don't know any of that, but we both met, man, this fits for us. And you know because

you live in Bloomington. Right. And Bloomington, if you, if you're not from Bloomington, if you don't know, Bloomington, it's very wide east to west. You know, it's a, it's a city of almost $90,000, 90,000 people. It's a suburb, right? But because it's so wide east to west, there's a definite it, east side, west side. Now, it's probably not what it was, let's just say in the 80s. It was very elite, very prestigious to live on the west side. But still today there's this thing, east west. And we both grew up in communities that are like East Bloomington, like the East side of Loomington. Yep, same here. And so we came here and we just loved. We loved the feel of it. We love this kind of neighborhood.

We both grew up in lower class, blue-collar neighborhoods. And that's kind of what this is. It just feels right. We love this place. Yeah, it's definitely a church you show up. You just show up. Show up. You don't do anything.

I said that story one time. I ran into somebody. We were in a store buying some furniture or something. And the gal who was working at the store, she'd been she'd been we would see her in class all the time and she said hey blah blah blah blah didn't you sell your clinic i heard somebody told me you're a pastor in a chair and i said yeah yeah and i was talking i said man and the guy that she's with i said you guys got it you guys got to come sometime and she goes oh she goes i don't know if he'd ever get all dressed up and this is

saturday i've got like a shirt like this i've got a pair of jeans on and she said i said well people there dress up i said no i said i'm a dress like this And she said, well, you're not going to wear jeans. And I said, yeah, I'm going to wear jeans, you know. So we're certainly a little more laid back. It's come as you are for sure. Yeah, it's a really nice environment. And also, it's pretty easy to get in and out.

It has nice, you can sit upstairs if you're a little uncomfortable about being downstairs. So it has a really nice feel to it. If you can just do the high points for me, like what do you, what do you believe in? as a church, just give everybody sort of an understanding of as a God and the direction. So, you know, look, I believe in the things that we'll die for. And Beth, if you and I disagree on some of the other things, you know, and oftentimes say, like, man, we believe that the Bible's inspired word of God, and we believe the Bible's inspired whether we like it or not. So I don't get to pick and choose.

Right. We believe there's one true God. There is one God. Now, we believe he's a triune God, which is the Christian belief. We believe he's father, son, and holy spirit, but it's one God. People say explain that. And I'm like, hey, I always say, you know, you've heard me say this. When I get to heaven, first place I'm going is the information booth. Like, I don't understand exactly how everything works. But we do believe he's one triune God. We believe in what we call the deity of Jesus, meaning Jesus Christ wasn't just a good prophet, as some would say, or he wasn't just the son of God. He wasn't just a good teacher. He actually was and is God. We believe that Jesus is divine. And then we believe in a biblical salvation, which is that the way that we're saved is purely by the grace of God when we place faith in Christ. That's it. You can't earn your way to heaven. You can't be better than someone else.

You can't, if I just work harder, that is not a biblical belief. this idea of, well, I'm a good person or, you know, I've done enough good works that sounds good, but it's actually not a biblical belief. So, so those are our core. And if you and I want to disagree, look, we have people, you know this, we have people from all different traditions. And all different ways. My wife grew Catholic, went to Catholic schools. So we're going to disagree on some things, but we're not going to argue and fight over those things. We're going to, we're going to stay to the majors. That's what our focus. really is. Absolutely. So with that, there also comes some core beliefs of the church itself.

And this will run into a lot of what you guys are doing and then also in the community. But let's run down some of these too. Yeah. So first and foremost, man, we're about the worship of God. And this is very interesting to me because we live in a, such a consumer culture. And that comes right into the church. That when people, people say to me things like sometimes they'll say, you know, I didn't get anything out of a service, or I was going to that church and I wasn't getting anything. And I say, well, it's a worship service. Now is worship something you get or is it something you give? Well, worship is something we give. And so if you can get anything, you weren't necessarily supposed to get. Like we come to give.

So that's our big ticket item. We just say that, like first and foremost, man, we're about the worship of God. And then secondly, you know, we say that we teach and train. And so again, we're devoted to the word of God and we study the scriptures. So like at our place, when you come on a Sunday morning, we're going to study the word and not just geek out on really highly intellectual things. But you know this. What we try to do is say, okay, here's what the scripture says. This is what this really means. And I think very importantly, here's how this applies.

life. If you to, it's interesting, if you'd asked me 15, 20 years ago, you know, what's 15 years ago? What's your desire? I would have said, probably teach the word of God. That's what, that's what we want to, we want to teach the word. But if what you want to do is teach the word, then you should go to a Christian university or a seminary and teach. I would say my goal with the sermon is life transformation. I want to see life change. I want to see people's lives change. And so if that's the case, then we have to teach. the Word of God in a manner that like we can we can actually translate this into real life where I can go home and and learn this and be inspired by it yes like this stuff should change lives right

and then we say we love others as God loves us and I think it's easy to say we love others like Beth hey I love you Beth hey I love I love your husband Dan but the qualifier that's put on there that the Apostle Paul gave us and that Jesus gave us is, no, love your neighbors, love others as you love yourself. And that's a whole different thing. And so we really want to do that. We want to love others. We want to sometimes, you know, love your neighbor as yourself, man. Sometimes your hardest neighbor might be a spouse, you know, or a parent or a kid. But if I start to say, no, no, no, what would I want there? And that's what I'm going to want from them. And it's interesting in that Jesus even said, man, this commandment fulfills all the commandments. Like he said, you've heard it said, hey, you shouldn't commit adultery and you shouldn't murder and you shouldn't.

But if you love your neighbor, that'll fulfill all the requirements. Because if you love your neighbor, as you love yourself, you wouldn't have an affair with their spouse. Right. Because you wouldn't want that for yourself. You wouldn't want it for yourself. Right. And you wouldn't want to defile that person because you wouldn't want that for yourself. Right.

He said, if you love your neighbors, you love yourself, you certainly wouldn't murder. You wouldn't, you wouldn't even covet what they want because you'd be so happy. Beth, I'm so happy for you that you got that. I'm not like, oh, I got to have that. I want that, right? And so we say, man, neighbors, we love our neighbors. We love them as we would love ourselves. And then we talk about the neighbors and nations.

We absolutely want to make Jesus known. And not so we can be right. not so we can be better than any other group, but we just think eternity is on the line. We believe that salvation is by the grace of God through faith in Christ. And so therefore, man, if people haven't gotten there, man, they're not bad. We don't not like them. It's none of that.

We're just concerned for them spiritually, eternally, which is the big picture. And look, let's be honest. Let's call a spade a spade, right? the church sometimes has a bad reputation and they've earned it. And we belittle people and mock people and ridicule people because they don't believe what we believe the way we believe it. And it's not about- We believe it. That's kind of the key line there.

And so we just say, no, man, we believe this is about making Jesus known. And then it's not my job to make you believe that, Beth. ultimately that's between you and God, but man, I want to put you in a position where you can at least be aware and know about it and then you can make your own decision. Right. And then the last thing we talk about is, is man, just life together. Like we want to celebrate transformed lives. We want to we want to celebrate like you see people whose marriages have just been brutal and they've been on the rocks and finally, right, like God has created real healing. And we want to celebrate that.

Or we'll celebrate people who have just battled insecurity or whatever, or they battled just finances and handling, or they've battled just alcohol or whatever. And their lives have literally been transformed. Okay, we want to celebrate that. We think that's cool. We want to celebrate it. Yeah, there seems to there's something for everyone. Absolutely. As you go through it.

And there's something every week, which is I like. I also like that because then it keeps me engaged in the name. neighborhood. I'm with everybody at church because, you know, it was tough. COVID was tough. It was tough on our society. It was tough on our neighborhood. It was very difficult to find community. And it was nice to come back into an environment that everybody was talking each other and just doing something as simple as eating donuts. It's so interesting. It was really comforting. Oh, I think it's really interesting. I just think, like, look, I'm actually an introvert and people can't believe that my wife and I were actually both introverts.

But introvert or extrovert, the reality is the way we're designed, right? We're designed for some form of community. Absolutely. Some people like to be community is loud and it's 100 people. And sometimes community could be Kimmy and I and we get together with you and Dan. And right, that's community. It doesn't always have to be loud and long. But we're designed.

I think we saw how people suffered through COVID. anxiety and still people are still suffering the the ramifications of it like anxiety was at an all-time high you know we're made for community absolutely some of the missions that you had you're extending to our neighbors mobilizing feet to the nations i i was not familiar with this till i read it what exactly does that mean well the biggest thing is that we really say is you know we always say that we're as neighbors and nations and so we want to meet real needs when we want to meet felt needs you know so like I just think look if I pray for you I think that's significant I think that's a great thing I'm not minimizing that at all but Beth you have no food and I say oh you know

sister I'm a pray for you I'm a pray for you like right now brother I I don't need prayer. I need a hamburger. Right. So we definitely want to meet felt needs. And so in our community, look, food insecurity is a real thing. It's very real. Yeah.

It's a real thing. And so you know that. We do a program we call Food in the Hood, right? And we feed folks a meal while they're there. And then we send them home with big boxes of food, right? That's a felt need. That's a real need. Not we're meeting real needs.

you know what i liked about that program too is that the neighborhood came in people that might need that food as well as people that don't that were um part of that program you know begging potatoes doing any of that i thought that was unique too because i you teach man to fish right 100% and i thought that that was a good use of teaching man to fish i've done other i i'm very much into the food insecurity and all that kind of thing going on in Bloomington. And so I've gone to different places. I was impressed with the fact that and the people that are helping and that are working, there are issues sometimes.

There might be mental health issues. There might be physical, like physical needs, things like that. One of the things that we don't talk about all these in the United States is if you have the biggest form of bankruptcy is health. So if you have a health issue and you have medical bills, you, that's the leading number one reason why people go bankrupt. So as people are having, and that includes mental health also. Yes. And I was just going to say that, right?

Mental health is a big issue. Especially when you talk about homelessness, you know, look, okay, so again, I just always like to get the obvious and the honest out of the way. Are there people who are homeless because they just haven't given a rip, and they haven't gotten a job. And well, that exists. I'm saying that exists. Do I think that's the majority? No, I don't think that's the majority.

No. You know? And depending on what part of the country you're in, we went to, I have a friend who he ran, I think it's the largest homeless shelter in the U.S. It's Union Rescue Mission. It's right on Skid Row in L.A. And so a couple of times we've taken teams down there.

You sleep up and tents up on the roof, you know. And then you work there and you feed meals and then we go out on the street and work with people. Listen, man, we met homeless people with jobs because in L.A. What can you afford? Right. You know what I mean? So depending on where you live, but a lot of it is like mental illness or physical illness and it's just wiped people out. Right.

I mean, that's real. It's very real. And it's something that I think that this is doing a good job meeting at least that initial gap. I don't know what's going to happen with them and bills and getting help and all that. That's just a whole other level of service. Hopefully there's something. But for now, but for now, what can we do? Right.

And one of the things that you mentioned that I really like about food in the hood is you'll notice that a lot of the people who are working here at food and the hood are also receiving. receiving food. Like they're working. These are people who come to get food and eventually they volunteer. And I think that's that's that's bad man. It does something for them that they're doing something back. They're giving something back. Absolutely. We always have to lead a purpose-filled life. That's it. We have to. And so giving people, giving anybody if they've received those services fantastic, but then they want to go the next level and they want to either help their community, which is what we're doing through their volunteering. And then also I do know that there's people that are organizing the whole. It's pretty complex, actually. And it is getting a lot of food

at a very good price. The beauty of food in the hood is you don't have to qualify. That's right. You don't have to qualify. You have to fill out paperwork because part of what we get are grants for the food. And so we do have to keep track. And then we do have to weigh the food. But you don't have to come in here and show us at W-2. You don't have to show us that you've been out trying to get a job. to do anything like that you just show up you fill out a little bit of paperwork it's very minimal the first time and then get some food right i love that yeah i also like the um everybody eats together it's a big deal to me um i was i'm from a big bigger family like six kids but i've found that sitting at the table is so important to first of all having eye contact with other people

right direct complete there's lots of opportunities either after church you have danishes silly food you know things like that and then wednesday night you have your community dinner night before all of the different programs and then is it every first and third tuesday is that the food in the hood yeah yeah yeah there's something crazy about food that way and i'm not sure exactly what it is but man it's one thing to talk to somebody, but it's it's a whole other thing when you sit down and have a meal and you know what I mean? Like now you take your time and you talk and there's there's something special about it. And we don't always know I'm going to go down this track a little further because I've noticed this with other situations. People don't always need it at a

table. Correct. And they don't and all your tables are circular. So that again is very important to the fact that you do eat across from somebody or right next to somebody. Absolutely. Yeah. And then what we do is, so a lot of people are working that room that night, they're volunteers, the majority of volunteers. But then we do have some staff and volunteers specifically from the church. And they'll just work the room and meet people and introduce themselves.

And we always offer, hey, can we pray for you? Now some people say, no, I'm good. Okay, right on. that's that's fine. But you'd be surprised at how many people say, you know what? Yeah, could you pray for and they got something going on? And then our team just just just just pray for them, show them love and pray for them and there's no strings attached. And so I really like that. Yeah. In business, it's been interesting. People have lost their jobs and called me, whatever. And I'll say, oh, you know, and they might be, I don't know the religious background.

So what would I know? But I have told. people, I'm really going to pray for you. I hope that this works out for you. And they've been so touched by the fact that I would take a moment to think about them. A thousand percent. A thousand percent. Yeah. You know, there's an old saying we say there's no such thing as an atheist in a foxhole. And people are atheists. That's their business, you know. But I had a good friend for a long time. And he always always, I'm not sure I believe in a God. I'm not la, la, whatever. And he was just going through this terrible, terrible divorce. I mean, it was just, it was brutal, right? I'm sorry. And he was just, it tore him up. And we were on the phone one time. And man, he was

just torn up. And I just said, I wasn't trying to force anything, but I just said, hey, do you mind if I prayed for you? And he said, oh, man, I totally appreciate that. Whoa. And I just think when there's a sincere offer, hey, would you mind if I, I don't know that I've ever had anybody say no. You know, now, if you just walked up to a stranger, but I'm saying if you chat just a little while and you develop any kind of relationship at all, and it's a sincere offer, most commonly people say, yeah, I'd appreciate that. Nice.

Yeah, it's great. It's a great gift. It was funny because I was at the gym. This might have been in the last year. That's been a little more in the year. And the dude that I know the gym just totally tore up his knee. And I just said, man, I'm sorry, young guy athletic. And I said, I'm really sorry.

I'm going to, and I didn't notice to do real well, just, you know, chit chat at the gym and said, I'll pray for you. And he goes, okay. And he just stood there. It caught me off guard actually, you know. And he just stood there. I was like, oh, snap, I better pray. Like we're right in the middle of the gym.

I was like, well, I better pray. Right now. Great, man. It was awesome. Yeah, that actually is. I wouldn't have expected that. No. So that's a terrific outcome from that.

Really great. As people get involved, like you said, we've already discerned it. It's 9.30 on Sunday mornings. There's one service. People are welcome to come in any way they'd like. So now they come in. People are starting to join. I'll just talk a little bit about this.

A lot of times I'm greeted by people right away when I come in the door. Yeah. Really nice. I mean, they're giving me a handout, right? But they're also interesting because they're quite, they are prayer warriors also is what I've noticed. Yeah, yeah. They also let you, there's no judgment. If you want to sit outside the area and just watch the TV, that's okay.

You can drink coffee and do that. That's cool. I noticed that that was something I really liked also as I got to know and get involved. For us, what's been interesting is that you had next steps. We'll kind of go through this. But some of the next steps was the fact that you had this alpha program. Maybe that's on the next slide. Yeah.

Okay, whatever. But we went to the alpha program. And Dan and I have never taken anything like that as a couple before. I mean, we've taken other ones. He wasn't really interested. And that's cool. I mean, I like it because I can't stop talking to people. I'm the other side of the fence.

So I have talked to everybody. But in this situation, he loved Alpha, really enjoyed it. And that, of course, was community. We all ate together. And then we had the Alpha class. Can you talk a little bit about what that class is? In a heartbeat. I love Alpha.

And here's the reason why. So I think in the church for a long time, I think one of the, downfalls perhaps is that the church was very threatened by questions. Do you know what I'm saying? It's like, how can we do that? Well, I'll tell you, Mr. I'll tell you why we do that. You just, your grandfather did. And I'm like, well, that's not really an answer. And so I think questions are really important. I don't think you can own, like when we're talking about faith, I don't think you can own anything you've, you've never wrestled with. And you can't wrestle with it if you're not asking questions. You know, like, well, who was Jesus? And what really is prayer? And how would I read a Bible?

And like, I mean, there's so many more, but I just think, so I love the fact. So Alpha is a, is a national program. And we've just happened to run it forever and ever. It's a developed curriculum. We've run it for, I don't know how many years here, longer than I've been here. And the logo for Alpha is actually a question mark. And so every week, We wrestle with a question. And then we have table discussion. And we tell all of our table leaders, hey, this is, this is not you sitting at a table teaching, giving everyone all the answers.

This is about discussion. That's what we really want. And so I love Alpha. Alpha is, we always say this. Alpha is for people who say, hey, you know what? I don't call myself a Christian at all. But I'm curious. I'm certainly very curious. Alpha is for people who say, hey, I'm brand new to faith.

And I've started loads of questions, which, of course, you do. It's for people who've been in the church a long time, but we're never allowed to ask questions or who just have more questions. And so it's all of that. So it's dinner first. We all sit together at your table, you'll sit in your house. Yeah. You have dinner. And then there's a talk, there's a teaching, and then there's table discussion.

It's just very non-threatening. If you don't want to talk, you don't have to talk. If you, you know, so I, I love the alpha format. It's just inviting. It's welcoming. I don't have to say it's safe. Very safe. Yeah, really nice.

The table, what I liked is that the discussion, all that I really bonded with the other people in the group, our first group. and I went on to, I forgot what the next one is. What's the next class? Freedom. Freedom. And I found a freedom with a few people from our group or from our table. So I did really make very good friends there.

They all talk. I also like the teaching part of it because everybody came from a different place. 100%. So just to be able to have something as random as, and I liked the video format. Yeah, there was, I thought it was a very. it was a very warm environment. And it brought people together. First of all, everybody needed to eat anyways, right?

And you come right after work. You basically, you kind of, you might stop home, but then you come over at six o'clock is dinner. Right. So I love that. I mean, I thought that that was a really nice program. Yeah. Some of the other places you, there's this line here talks about find a place to serve. there's a lot of different ministries inside of the church itself.

And it seems like I don't know where to start. Maybe you could just talk a little bit about each of these different areas that understand better. First of I would tell you this, it's the dirty secret of the church, right? It's like we're a slightly larger church. And so sometimes when you come into a larger church, like, how do I get connected? How do I meet people? Well, the best way, the best way is start serving somewhere, especially if you're a guy, right? Because now you're working alongside someone and you kind of see the same people.

You serve with the same people each week. And so we have all kinds of different places. We have kids and youth. Like, that's a great. Some people just are really good with kids. We have things like our first impressions team. Those are greeters and those are ushers. Those are people who work the coffee bar or the Instagram.

info booth. It's those kinds of things. We have a production team that, that, you know, we've, we've been live streaming long before COVID. And so there's a production team that's to put that together every week. There's a prayer team and a support team. And there are people who just love meeting with people and praying with people, right? And so they're there every week for that. And then there's just our facilities team. We have a security team. And, you know, it's all of those things. So there are far more places than that even that you can serve. But those are usually funnel. In those five major categories, it'll funnel you to something. And I tell people all the time, you know, you kind of start somewhere and that may be it. But you don't usually just latch

onto it at first. You might say, well, this kind of wasn't a fit for me, but it made me think of this and I kind of weaseled into that. Or, you know, some of it. Sometimes you might say, man, I didn't, I still like this, but I didn't like doing it with that age group. And I'm going to find my way to a different age group. Oh, that just worked for me, you know. But I, you really get to know people. Then you start to take ownership. And this isn't the church anymore.

This becomes my church, you know. Yeah. I think it's, it's so valuable. Yeah. It's kind of like reading the first line. a purpose-driven life, it's not about you. You know, as soon as you get in and you start doing stuff, the more you give, the more you want to keep giving.

100%. And again, it is part of the problem, again, with the American church, because we're such consumers. And we've been bred that way. And it's like, I want this here, but I go over here to get this, and I want this, and I want it this way, and this is when I want it. And to be honest, it's just really tough to leave that behind. just because you walked into a church.

Right. You know, that's tough. Yeah, kind of the Sesame Street approach. You want to be entertained. A thousand percent. Yeah, I get that. I think I get that to a certain, I do, yeah, I get it. I think that that broke for me during COVID.

That broke for me. It was like, nope, I need to belong to something. And I need to have a lifeline. and I want to be able to be somebody dependable for somebody else. And yeah, it really, it really broke the bank for me, beyond family. Yeah, right. So in the steps we talked about Discover Cedar Valley, then you talked about developing your faith. Deploy your gifts.

Could you tell me a little bit about that? Yeah, and that's again all about it. It's really a week where one of the things, we do is we do you know the bible talks very much about spiritual gifts right about different spiritual gives teaching is a spiritual gift um acts of service is actually a spiritual gift like my wife she's just all about acts of service i'm gonna do this for you i'm gonna do this to you right um and so one of the things that we do in that third week is we have like the types of assessments and you've people have done all kinds of assessments for all kinds of things and this is just really trying to help you

find that oh i'm kind of wired for this it's just kind of it's general it's not a an exact match always but we just try to help people start to narrow it down so we want to try to help people find because the reality is man when you find something that you're really wired for and you do it i mean you know i always say this man i only got one gift it's the only thing i do i just teach that's why it was such a natural fit for me when I was teaching spin class. Right. Whatever I've done, I'm a teacher. It's the way I'm wired.

I coached high school and college basketball. Coaching is amplified teaching. That's right. And so when I teach, like, I'm just jacked up. I'm wired. I like, I love to teach. And that's true for most people. When you find that gifting, that niche, this is what you were made for.

It's what you were wired for. When you do what you were wired for, what you were made. for you find great fulfillment in that and folks really really enjoy it so we just try to help folks like let's see if we can narrow that path for you just a little bit and and shorten this up and give you an idea of where to start looking you know yeah find like find your bliss i mean that's that's the expression that's been used for years and it also um helps you focus on all sorts of stuff it It gets off of a lot of, I don't know, unfulfilling things. It's like, so like I don't have really any,

I have very little administrative gifts, that type of stuff, right? And so when there's really detailed things that have to be done and they have to be, or, you know, I'm like, oh man, I hate that. Who would want to do that? Like, who would like, I have an admin and she kills it at that stuff? And she loves doing it. I'm like, who in their right mind would enjoy doing that? There are people, that's how they're wired.

And you can go down the list with all the different things like that. And man, if you're wired for it, you get to do it. You're loving life. You're just enjoying it. Yeah, every day is just a bag of fun. 100%. Yeah. So, of course, declare your devotion.

that always helps is that if you find it, you start getting involved. I think that that comes naturally. Yeah. It's the next step. It is. So for us, that's what we call membership. And churches of all different churches do membership different ways. And hey, why would I become a member?

And our only reason, you know, becoming a member at our church, you're probably right. It doesn't, it doesn't do you. It doesn't do you. There's no benefit. If you're looking for more perks and benefits, because we don't give you a discount on communion, you know, you don't get community, you know, but, but it's really more for you. It's really more for you to go, okay, this is going to be my place. And I'm going to serve here and I'm going to be a part of this.

And again, it's, it's not, not just going to be the church. It's going to be my church. And I'm making this my place, you know. And so, and so you don't, you can do almost anything here without being a member. You know, there's no, there's no, there's no great perk to you except that you say, I've kind of made my declaration. This is my home. This is my place. And so what we do for membership is, is we just finally, because all through all these levels, you know, you've got to know more and more and more of all the church.

Is this a fit for me? And not only is it a fit for me, but where do I fit in and all that? And so the next, the final step is just like declaring, yeah, I'm going to be a member. So the only perk for members, I think, that I can think of off the top of my head is, you know, at the annual kind of, we have our annual meeting where we might have to bring up things that the body here would have to vote on. Vote if you're not a member, right? If you're not going to make a commitment to the place, we're not allowing you to make decisions. But yeah, that's really the only real perk. So that's kind of our final step. Well, I think if we could put the last slide up, which is events.

Oh, yeah. There's a whole bevy of stuff here. Before we get into this, though, some of the things that I want to go back is that your vision for that part of town is super important to the outcome of the church. And I think that the stronger you've made your vision known not only to the church, to the community, you do a lot of outreach on just silly things, like making sure the parks and rec knows that Cedar Valley is going to serve hot dogs every Thursday all summer long at the splash pad and the park behind the church. Yeah, yeah. That's a simple thing, but you wanted to make it clear to parks and rec that the neighborhood knows about it. And it's gotten bigger every week that I've been there because everybody, the community knows about it.

Yeah. You know, so the vision, we say around here, our vision, like we have our mission, but then we have our vision. The mission, I don't think we get to pick. The mission is a biblical mandate. It's to go and make disciples. And we just say it this way. We say leading people from where they are to where God wants them to be, you know, wherever that might be for them. But the vision is more contextual.

And we say our vision, we say we dream of being a multi-generational, multi-ethnic church reflecting Jesus to our neighbors of the nations. And I will say this. And I don't want to step on anybody's toes. I think it's become very invoked today to kind of become multi-ethnic. And so when we say we want to be a multi-ethnic church, it's not because it's hip. It's not because it's the invoked thing to do. It's because it's our community. Right. But our community here on the east side of Bloomington is about 30, 30, 30, 30, 30, 30, 30, and 10.

And then 10% is Asian. And so I think, man, if we're going to have impact in this community, we got to look like this community. And so for that reason, we want to be multi-ethnic. We want people of all races to walk in here and go, yeah, this is, I can see me here. you know, we want them to feel at home. And so that's really the vision. So then what we want to do with that is we want to be out in the community and doing things for the community and how can we help this community. And so we have a pastor and staff who's fantastic. He's really worked hard. It's a process, but has made great relationships. He has, we have involvement in the schools.

We have involvement at the city level. And our involvement there is not to say, hey, we want to we want to change policies and we want to give it the way we want the we want the we want the community know that we actually care that we care more than just like hey can we ultimately weasel our way so that we get our way we just want the community know that we love people and that we love them specifically and so yeah we're we try to stay busy in the community and do things that that have impact right it's very creative I think that most recently you did the mega sports camp is that right Awesome. Yeah, mega sports camp was just about last week. So we offer it for free. It's half days. It's every day till noon. We have kindergarten through fifth grade.

And we have people in the neighborhood now. This is only our second year and it doubled. And people in the neighborhood find out and they just walk their kids on over there and bring their kids. And so it's mega sports camp. So we did basketball. We did football. We did soccer. And then we did cheer. And so kids can get 18 every day. And then along that way, yeah. Yeah, we integrate our faith. No question, we integrate our faith because we love people, because we do it from a place that we care. But it's really fun and the community came in for it.

So it was awesome. And then you ended it because I saw it on, I did some of the packing, but then it by Sunday. Oh, you wanted the kids come with their parents, hopefully to church on Sunday. And then all of them got their school supplies. Got their school supplies. So our last day of mega sports camp was a Thursday, because we do it Monday through Thursday.

Right. And that Thursday was lunch at the park then. The park was packed. And then that following Sunday, for anybody who came back, wanted to come back on Sunday, yeah, they got their school supplies. No, there's no real strings beyond that. I mean, we just said, come to our service, join us, come worship with us. And they got their school supplies. So, yeah, we love being able to do that.

Yeah, that was a great. I thought that was a great full connection, especially since it was August. I mean, now, I mean, they do need, kids need school supplies. If you're talking about food, school supplies wouldn't be top of the list, right? And again, man, a lot of the kids in our neighborhood, a lot of kids in our neighborhood need help with that. Well, we can help you. We can help. And again, no strings attached, you know. Yeah, so we just loved being able to do it. It was a privilege. Well, thank you. This has been excellent. I think that this really gives the neighbors and Bloomington an idea of what Cedar Valley is doing and your location in East Bloomington.

which is super important. You can see at the bottom here. We do have Cedar Valley Church. Well, thank you. Yeah. This was very informative. I appreciate it. Oh, yeah, that's right.

I sell real estate. So. P.S. How's about that? Which I totally appreciate, Beth, because you do this. And I'm like, she ain't getting nothing out of this, right? So I think good on you, man. I appreciate it.

I love the community. And I want to always give back. And it'll all work out. So anybody else, Dan and I would love to help them out with that. Awesome. And we look forward to more information and we look forward to showing the videos of everything that's been going on. Yeah. Thank you.

Thanks, Beth.