Rejoicing in Akron!!!

jklapp · Postby **jklapp** » November 18th, 2008, 9:40 am

Praise the Lord and Hallelujah !!

Jesus said... ("Go out into the highways and hedges, and compel them to come in, that my house may be filled.") Luke 14:23

I'm Excited!!! 2008 has been an incredible year for the Akron Sanctuary. The Lord has not only blessed His house Spiritually, Physically, and Financially, but He has also sent workers to help fill His house. And I mean FILL!!

Beginning January 2008 the Sanctuary's average Sunday Morning Attendance started at 120 and by October 2008 that number has increased to an average of 204... PRAISE GOD!!... And if you can believe it, Novembers attendance is looking even better than Octobers!! The first two weeks in November our Sunday Morning Attendance averaged 235 and last Sunday's attendance hit a mind boggling 323. (Yes, you read that right "323") And if that's not shocking enough, we are estimating Christmas attendance to topple 400 this year..

All Praise, All Honor, All Glory goes to our Lord Jesus Christ!!!

("Except the LORD build the house, they labour in vain that build it") Psalms 127:1

Rejoicing in the Lord,
Pastor John

dolfan · Postby **dolfan** » November 18th, 2008, 9:45 am

Well, there y'go. Emphasizing numbers, again.

JUST KIDDING. Good work!

Postby **Pastor Gary** » November 18th, 2008, 9:48 am

jklapp wrote:Praise the Lord and Hallelujah !!

And if that's not shocking enough, we are estimating Christmas attendance to topple 400 this year..

All Praise, All Honor, All Glory goes to our Lord Jesus Christ!!!

First of all, I join you in rejoicing, congratulate you on the growth, and give God the Glory. My only question is, how does one estimate Christmas attendance a month in advance?? :lol:

May Akron doesn't have bad weather days, flu epidemics, people who oversleep, etc. like the rest of us! :lol:

jklapp · Postby **jklapp** » November 18th, 2008, 9:59 am

Pastor Gary wrote: First of all, I join you in rejoicing, congratulate you on the growth, and give God the Glory. My only question is, how does one estimate Christmas attendance a month in advance??

Thank you Pastor Gary... God has been Good!!

Historically, Christmas attendance has always been double the average attendance here in Akron.

Postby **Pastor Gary** » November 18th, 2008, 10:08 am

jklapp wrote:
Pastor Gary wrote: First of all, I join you in rejoicing, congratulate you on the growth, and give God the Glory. My only question is, how does one estimate Christmas attendance a month in advance??

Thank you Pastor Gary... God has been Good!!

Historically, Christmas attendance has always been double the average attendance here in Akron.

Got it... so it might be more accurate to "project" than "estimate?"
In any case, great!

(Oddly, our attendance around Christmas is usually dismal. We serve a lot of young military enlisted people and university students who head to the mainland about the second week of December and return in early January. Our Christmas attendance is closer to HALF of normal. :shock:

)

stevenson · Postby **stevenson** » November 18th, 2008, 6:33 pm

Where are you seating them? I've been in the Sanctuary, remember?

Hope your growth continues though!

jklapp · Postby **jklapp** » November 18th, 2008, 9:12 pm

stevenson wrote:Where are you seating them? I've been in the Sanctuary, remember?

We turned the downstairs into a huge overflow room and use cameras to pipe the service downstairs... But even with that we are still really cramped. Last week we had to use the stairs and foyer for seating, plus a lot of people had to stand during the service... Now the parking situation is really crazy. People have to park 4 blocks away and walk to the Church. (What we really need is a bigger building, but that's another story.) But what was really great though was last week our new Overseer came down and he got to witness it all.

Speaking of our new Overseer, have you had a chance to meet him yet? He preached Sunday and everyone loved him and his preaching!!! 14 people went to the altar and 6 of them got saved... It was an awesome service!!!

dbserv · Postby **dbserv** » November 19th, 2008, 8:27 am

AWESOME!!! AWESOME!!! AWESOME!!!

Praise the Lord, John.

I would encourage you to consider starting multiple services as soon as possible. It is a historical fact that once we hit 80% of our building capacity, some folks will look for reasons to stay home.

By spreading them out over 2 or 3 services (we are currently forced to have 6) you allow folks the elbow room we all expect so we can have our "space".

In the meantime, I'll be praying that your people will go AGAINST the norm and NOT allow satan to lead them down that thought path.

In the New Testament and in other countries of our world, people are MORE than willing to stand, to sit in the stairs, to sit outside in the rain (they can hear because there aren't any windows anyway), etc. to be a part of God's house and worship together.

We've been there and are still there as we wait for the final county approval to build our second new (and much larger) building in 5 years.

Isn't God WONDERFUL???

PRAISE THE LORD!!!!

BTW: I miss seeing your active participation here.

jklapp · Postby **jklapp** » November 19th, 2008, 11:53 am

dbserv wrote: By spreading them out over 2 or 3 services (we are currently forced to have 6) you allow folks the elbow room we all expect so we can have our "space".

Praise His Name for what he is doing in your Church Brother!!! WOW!!! That is AWESOME!!!!

You are definitely the man I need to talk to... I've been debating on whether it's better to add a second service on Sunday or just open the Church up on another day. (Possibly Saturday) And here is why...

Because Sunday got too crowded we decided to move Sunday School to Wednesday Night... Well, something interesting happened... We ended up with two congregations. Most of the Sunday Morning crowd do not attend on Wednesday, and most of the Wednesday crowd do not attend on Sunday. (Which is good because we run between 120-150 on Wednesday night) So what I was thinking is if we opened up a Saturday Night Service it's possible the exact same thing could happen and we could end up with 3 congregations.

But who knows

How do you guys do it? Give me some advise.

dbserv wrote: BTW: I miss seeing your active participation here.

Thank you

I too miss chatting with my Jude2 brothers and sisters.

But I've been SO busy... To be honest, sometimes I don't know whether I'm coming or going... But I love it!!!!

stevenson · Postby **stevenson** » November 19th, 2008, 12:22 pm

Great job Pastor Klapp! I know God will continue to bless.

jklapp · Postby **jklapp** » November 19th, 2008, 5:31 pm

stevenson wrote:Great job Pastor Klapp! I know God will continue to bless.

Thank you Brother, but seriously, I can't take any of the credit... It was the Lord that sent the workers, it was the Lord that sent all the people, and it is the Lord that is keeping them coming back... And as a Pastor, it is an honor and a privilege to watch our Lord in action. He is Amazing!!!

Jude 2