I’m on the road preaching this week, away from my family and Elevation peeps, and I had this thought:

I can’t imagine being the pastor of a church I didn’t like.

I love Elevation Church. I love almost everything about Elevation Church.

I know, I know, we’re still in the honeymoon stage and everything’s still fresh.

And I know we aren’t perfect.

But there are some things about our church that I like that have nothing to do with how new we are.

Like how humble our band and singers are.

Like how hard the production crew works on Saturday nights and Sunday mornings.

Like how people pray for me backstage as I preach during both services.

Like how our staff lets me lead and preach and cast vision.

Like how certain volunteers have owned the ministry of cleaning the bathrooms every Sunday. And these are public high school bathrooms.

Like how the anticipation is so thick every Sunday you can feel it in the atmosphere.

Like how God shows up in power every time we get together.

This is just the beginning of what I love about our church.

Anyway, when I’m away, even on a good preaching trip, I miss my church with the same emotion I miss my family (just not quite as intense!)

By the way, I am eating more food this week in Louisiana than I think I’ve eaten in the last month total.

Like today, I had a seafood baked potato. I know you just said yuck in your mind. So did I at first. But you need to reconsider. It was a baked potato with crawfish and crab meat and shrimp and cheese. Mrs. Velmanita (I think I spelled that right) cooked it for me, and it was just the appetizer. The main course was fried catfish (everything is fried here and I love it) and there were also these things called Budan (I have no idea if I spelled that right) balls. They were weird, but I liked them.

Then I had something with peanut butter and Butterfingers and angel food cake. This was out of control delicious. I was waiting on someone else to ask for seconds so I could get seconds too, but nobody did. Dang it.

That was just lunch.

Dinner was gumbo.

I told the ladies: “I don’t do this Southern politeness crap where you pretend like you like the food even if you don’t. If I didn’t like this food, I would just go on a fast this week.” They laughed. I was serious.

On a spiritual note: I have no idea how many kids have given their lives to Christ this week, but I know there are a lot. God is really moving every night and kids are responding. Rock on!

Elevation, it’s fun to pastor a church that you can’t wait to come home to.

See ya this weekend!