OFFLINE

Hey guys, for those who don't know me, my name is Aaron Loy. My wife and I moved to Lincoln, NE from L.A. in April of 2010. We hit the ground running - meeting with anyone who would listen and sharing the vision God has placed in our hearts. We threw lots of parties and bbq's in those first few months. The goal was to move people to a place where they simply loved being together and genuinely cared about each other. We figured if we could do that well, we could weather just about anything.

in mid July we and 8 or so others had our first Launch Team meeting. Over the next few months, that team grew to 35 or so. In September, we launched a campaign to raise $30,000 in 30 days. During it, we made a video a day for 30 days, sharing the vision, stories, and values of our church. (I believe all of them are still up at www.mosaic30in30.com). On the night of Day 29, the last of $30k came in! It was a defining moment for us. During those 30 days, the videos ended up being shared all over facebook. The website we made for the campaign had 12,000+ hits during the 30 days - our city was buzzing!

In the coming months, we kept preparing, the team continued to grow, and God continued to provide (including an anonymous $30,000 gift! To this day, I don't know where it came from). It was about this time, however, that our sponsoring church backed out. We asked every church we had relationships with and over the next couple months, every single one said "no."

After praying about it, we felt we needed to plant with or without a sponsoring church. We renewed our commitment to tithe to ARC, but would have to launch without their financial support. We cut our budget in half and slashed our marketing by more than that. It forced us to make some tough decisions and get creative.

Two weeks before launch, a church I hadn't previously contacted came alongside us and committed to be our sponsoring church! On March 6, by God's grace, we launched with over 250 in attendance (while spending less than $3k on marketing.) This summer we've been averaging roughly 170 people and will be moving 2 services in September.

However, as you all know, the best part are the stories of life change. That's really how we measure our success. We've been deeply humbled to see atheists coming to church, Muslims connecting in life groups, we even baptized a life-long Buddhist who Jesus got ahold of a turned his world upside down. For me, that's what its all about.

Bottom line: I'm an idiot sinner who loves Jesus, loves the ARC, and who can't believe I get to do this with my life.