FRC Doral Volunteer Appreciation 08

Friday, May 30, 2008

Last year we started a tradition at FRC Doral on Memorial day, it was to say thank you to all of you who serve so faithfully. I was encouraged to see so many of you come out with your families to participate. The competition was tough but ultimately, a new team was crowned for beating out all the other teams. Congratulations to the red team and all of the other teams who participated. But most importantly, we all had a great time together as we gave thanks to God for all that He has done.

Check out some of these pics and enjoy.



By the way, that Paella was incredible!

Thank you all once again for serving as you do and for was giving God your very best week after week! This year we had over 50 adults and about 20 kids, I know God will continue to bring us more people as we remain faithful to reaching this community for Him.

A day in Doral... Wednesday, May 14th, 2008

Thursday, May 15, 2008

On Wednesdays I normally try and stay in the Doral area all day. I try to make all my meetings here locally around the city. It does not always work out that way, but yesterday it did. The slides represent some of things I was able to be involved... pretty cool.

1. I was invited to the unveiling of the Bison Mascot presentation. While there I was able to speak to the Mayor of the City of the Doral, J.C. Bermudez and our very own Doug Rodriguez, principal of the Year about doing a Podcast. They both agreed! This may be the first time we have a non-pastor/church person share on our podcast.

2. Hermes and Alicia Soto are pastors from Cuba. Hermes has been a pastor at the same church for over 30 years... Iglesia Bautista McCall in Santo Suarez, Cuba. He is also the president of the Baptist Seminary in Havana. He shared with me that the enrollment at the seminary went from 70 students five years ago to 490. That's impressive! This was accomplished by setting up regional locations where students can take the first two years under the direction of local pastors. God is doing a great thing in the island of Cuba! Pastor Hermes is one of by distance mentors in the faith. He is an inspiration to me of a man who is totally committed to the calling God has given him.

3. Doug Rodriguez was named Miami-Dade Principal of the year last week. I had the unique privilege to sit on the team who recommended him in front of the special board from Miami-Dade Public Schools. More importantly, Doug has been such a great supporter of the church, even before we began to meet at the school almost two years ago. I am very grateful to Doug for giving FRC the opportunity to meet here. I'm also very proud that I get to observe and learn from his example. Congratulations on a great job! In this picture, Doug received the City of Doral Proclamation presented by the Mayor and the City Council.

4. Last night we had our second Small Group Couples meetings. We had 8 couples who where able to laugh, learn and share what having expectations does to there marriage relationship. God is really working in this group. Several of the couple have only been attending the campus for just a couple of weeks or months. I look forward to see what God does in the next four weeks.

What does doing life together means to the community we serve? Are you comfortable just around a group of Christians? Are you willing to step out in faith and represent God in public places? The longer we are Christians the harder this is to do. How do you overcome this tendency in your life?

What's new at FRC Doral

Tuesday, May 13, 2008

I hope you don't miss the the delicious Popcorn and Snow Cones we are now serving at the campus. Through June we will be serving both as we raise funds to send our student and children ministries to camp this summer.

I hope you take the time and meet some of the awesome students and their leaders who are making this effort.

Tell them pastor Igor sent you!

Mastering the five levels of influence

Last night several leaders from the Doral campus finished a book study on the book Launching A Leadership Revolution. The consensus was this book is perhaps one of the best books on the subject of leadership we had all encountered. We were all challenged, stretched, and confronted about where we are right now as leaders. Not just that, we also had to take a hard look at how we move from where we are to where we need to be or should be.

Our group felt they needed to go beyond what they were doing and come up with ways to implement what they had learned. As a result, we came up with several projects to pursue in the course of the next year. Here's a short list of what we came up:

1. Start a campus in Bogota, Colombia.
2. Partner with a local health care clinic to provide medical care to those who can't afford it.
3. Have a ministry fair at the campus to help people engage in service opportunities.
4. Partner with leaders in the church to mentor each other.

I congratulate all the participants for their commitment to come to the book study every week for the last 10 weeks. You guys have all taught me the value not quitting. Thank you for making these weeks all worth while.

Before I go, here's a quick review of the five levels of influence.

The cycle

1. Being a learner
2. Being a performer
3. Leading
4. Developing leaders
5. Developing leaders who develop leaders

We are all somewhere between 1 and 5. Most people never make it above level 3. Some make it to level 4, only a few make it to level 5. If you desire is to make it to the top level you are going to have to have a passion, work hard, be willing to bring people who are better than you for the ride, and stay the course.

Where are you on this journey? Do you have what it takes to stay the course? Do you have the passion? Are you willing to hire people better than yourself? What is keeping you?

Friday, May 9, 2008