Serve the House | Serve the City | Serve the Globe – Celebration Church in Austin, TX

We were so fortunate to send a team to Honduras this summer.  Hope you enjoy this video of some of the trip!

This week we received an update from Pastor Mel Stauber and family from Swaziland! Here are a few highlights on Celebration Xai Xai!

We have obtained our visas and are headed to Mozambique on Tuesday to start the next leg of our journey! Thank you for praying. God’s hand was all over this process and we’re grateful to be crossing the border in the morning. This is the first of 2 visas that are required. A great blessing is that we are actually registered as a church, which is very fortunate as many other churches have been in Africa much longer and have not been able to attain this status! The Lord has already given us great favor!

We are headed to Maputo for possibly another 2 weeks while we await our passports. Once we obtain our resident visa we’ll be able to purchase a vehicle. We have received word from local Mozambiquans that the people in Xai-Xai are excited about us coming. They have seen how we have cared for the kids for the past several years and are now sending pastors to move forward and they are ready to welcome us with open arms.

Diane and the kids are doing well. They are adjusting well and developing some great friendships over the few weeks that we have been here! The locals are having a great time giving us a hard time about the US in the World Cup! We’re looking forward to many more great reports! If you would like to support us in prayer, here are some ways that you can pray for us:

* 2nd Visa for our 1 Year Residence to go through quickly and with favor
* Reliable and affordable vehicle
* Affordable and secure home in Xai-Xai
* God’s hand on our family and on our church

If you would like more current updates on the Staubers and all of their adventures you can follow their journey both on twitter (Visit www.twitter.com/mstauber or http://twitter.com/DianeStauber) or on facebook at http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=1053216806 or http://www.facebook.com/diane.stauber.

On June 22nd, 2010 Celebration Church joined together with the Livestrong Foundation in their continuing fight against cancer. 60 golf courses across the nation teamed up to put together the world’s largest simultaneous shotgun start golf tournament. This national tournament helped raise money and awareness for the cause against cancer in cities across the nation. Celebration Church served locally at the Teravista Golf Club where just over 60 golfers showed up to support this event. Celebration provided witnesses for the Guinness Book of World Records and set up two water stations on holes 5 and 15 to pass out 300 free bottles of water to thirsty golfers that participated in the event.

This weekly Vision/Information/Prayer (V.I.P.) thought is designed to inspire, inform and focus Celebration Serve Teams around why we do what we do.

Vision:

Colossians 2:19 “(Be)…connected to Christ, the head of the body. For he holds the whole body together with its joints and ligaments, and it grows as God nourishes it.”

Our head rules; it leads our body.  That’s why we call leaders “heads.”  Christ is head of the church and Pastor Joe is the head of this local assembly.  As you serve, be led by the head!  That’s where our eyes and ears are!  Let’s think, “Is this how Christ would listen?” Or, “Is this how Pastor would see it?” Our life and future is in our head!  Trust God to grow you and nourish you as you submit to leadership.

Information:

Growth Track Sunday: June 20 @ 6pm in Georgetown (& every 3rd-Sunday-of-the-month)

• Connect – membership & DNA
• Grow – what we believe & why
• Serve – why we serve the way we do

Summer Mixer Picnics: June 25 @ 7pm, Bring your family and a side-dish!  Georgetown @ San Gabriel Park & Cedar Park @ Brushy Creek Park.

XL Fest: June 24 – 26 in Georgetown, $10 (includes meals)

Awesome Speakers – Battle of the Bands – Concerts – Outreach for high school, middle school, college students & young adults are invited to participate in three days of fun!

Prayer:

Pray that we grow together as a team and as a church united in His and Pastor’s leadership.  Pray that the DNA of our church be pure from head to toe.

Last weekend Celebration Church volunteered at an event in Taylor, Texas sponsored by Texas Mission of Mercy and the Smile Foundation. These two organizations worked together to provide absolutely free dental care to more than 900 Texans in 2 days! Celebration Church has the opportunity to partner with this remarkable effort at a higher level in 2013 at the Cedar Park Center where 2000 people could potentially receive free dental care!

Celebration SERVES Honduras

God is doing amazing things across the globe… this week.  Oftentimes, we hear that, “God is doing amazing ‘things’,” but how often do we really feel personally invested in them?  Sometimes when I hear that, I tend to feel as if it’s this distant nebulous thing, but not this week.  I’m just amazed at all God is doing throughout the globe through Celebration with people just like you and me who are willing to GO.

This week’s snapshot:

Xai-Xai (Mozambique, Africa)// Pastors Mel & Diane Stauber packed up their lives and their family to move to Africa this week—launching Celebration’s first international campus!  With all the years of prayer and preparation, it is incredible to see our vision to expand internationally happen right before our eyes.  Pray for them in their first leg of the journey as they are getting acclimated to the culture and learning how to facilitate the feeding program Celebration runs in Xai-Xai (feeding more than 400 children every single day).

Peru// Pastors Joe & Lori Champion are speaking at Camino de Vida Church in Lima, Peru with one of our missionary partners, Pastor Robert Barriger. Pastor Joe is encouraging hundreds of Peruvian men to lead and move forward into all God has for them.  They both are providing encouragement to many of the pastors and the church as it makes an impact in the impoverished country of Peru.

Honduras// Inspired by a heart to serve, a team from Celebration left for Honduras this week with hopes to make a difference in every way possible, and that’s exactly what they’re doing.  In just a few days, they renovated a house for a mother struggling to provide for her family.  With tears of joy she thanked them for thousands of cinder blocks they lugged through the mud to provide a safe shelter for the children.  Yesterday, they are shared the Gospel and provided food for an entire village (more than 2600 meals)!

It truly is amazing to see all that God is doing with people who have simply gone to the poor and needy with open hearts willing to serve.  Looking to get involved in a trip yourself?  That’s great!  We have so many opportunities for you to Serve the Globe with Celebration.  In fact, the trip to Panama leaves in July.  What are you waiting for?  Download the Missions Packet and join the team!

Guest Blogger: Krista Williams

Sunday, June 6th & Wednesday June 9th

Vision:

1 John 3:18 “Dear children, let us not love with words or tongue but with actions and in truth.”

This verse really could speak for itself! The value of a kind word or a simple smile can be such a blessing at times! We have all had days where we just need to be encouraged. This verse in 1 John encourages us to not just love people with our words, but to show them that we care by our actions! How can you go out of your way today to love someone in truth? To share the love of Jesus could come in many ways; repairing a leak in the roof of a widow, offering a cup of water to a thirsty child, sharing food with a hungry man. Let’s go to the same level that Jesus did in loving people through our actions in truth!

Information:

Promotion Weekend – THIS weekend, Sunday, June 6^th is when school-aged children move into their 2010-2011 classroom.  Parents will check children in to the NEW classrooms.

Kingdom Builders – Our next event is on June 13^th at 4 pm! Pastor Joe will share a word and we will head out to the top of the hill to catch a fresh vision for the future!

Prayer:

Pray for our church and families to express love not only by their words, but also in their actions!